And finally, after all the grim and angst we've seen, it's hard to believe this is how Jason used to be portrayed. Dunno what to make of that.
Intentional sabotage on the part of the writer (Jim Starlin admitted that he hated the very idea of kid sidekicks, so he purposefully tried to make Jason as unlikeable as possible in order to have an excuse to kill him off. He also admitted that he would have done the same to Dick if Dick had still been Robin at the time) + The Dark Knight Returns (which make GRIM AND GRITTY popular) + DC's white-and-black mentality (basically, if you aren't 100% pure like a napkin, you must be an evil psycopath. Apparently Max Lord was turned into a genocidal monster because "[he] had a mean streak").