#‘WBY’s character arcs are complete!’

[yangscowlick]

I still think my biggest bummer with V9 is that — by the logic of the Ever After — episode 4 established that WBY didn’t need to be there. And the speeches they give to their shadow-selves are ones they could have given three volumes ago.

[bestworstcase]

& as heart-wrenching as it is, i think ruby being able to say the words “i don’t want to be me anymore” is also like. it’s been true for a long time, and it’s awful, but before she can fix it she had to let herself see it, and to see it she had to say it. (and i have some nascent thoughts bubbling about neo being the one who ‘saves’ her from the cat—not in the sense that neo intends to rescue her, but thematically it does matter that the character who rips the cat off of ruby’s chest is the character that the cat then eats; there’s a narrative foundation here for ruby to return the favor by saving neo from the cat. or helping neo save herself from the cat, more likely.)

(<- the villain eaten by the story and the hero eaten by the story.)

and—while the allegory is not subtle at all—that it’s coming right after an episode that overtly rejected the notion of ascension being equivalent to death and portrayed wby as heroic in their immediate unconditional support for the paper pleasers’ desire to ascend… the relative locations of these two narrative beats isn’t accidental. the tree does not kill, it resurrects. the suicide allegory hinges on the deliberate narrative uncertainty about what ruby thinks ascension is: why does she drink the tea? what is she asking for? jaune imagines death, neo annihilation, but the paper pleasers say “we are delicate. our world is very fragile. we wish to become more resilient so that we can build something that will survive.” (<- ruby promised to serve atlas and keep people safe. her predicament is the same as theirs.)

is the distinction meaningful? <- a question i somewhat expect the next episode to interrogate. i mean the answer is yes, obviously, wanting to die is very different from wanting to change, but the thematic arc up to this point has been constructed by conflation of the two through the characters’ shifting perceptions; is the tree change or is it death, is it good or bad, does it kill or revitalize. irrespective of what ruby herself thinks, she chose to ascend and the tree answered her, so the threads will obviously get teased apart as we follow what that means for her. (and for little. true ascension vs whatever the ever after can offer ruby is something i’m really interested to see.)

practically speaking, ruby can’t lose her memories—or, not forever/not completely. (i do think a scenario where like, the tree takes her memories and then reveals them to her, a very literal change in perspective, is a significant possibility. what if you could leave ruby rose behind? what if you could see her through a stranger’s eyes? what might you think of her then? the thing about shedding an old coat is you can always put it on again. and if the coat is falling apart, of course, you do need to take it off before you can stitch it back together. how literal a metaphor are we looking at here.)

likewise i doubt very much that she’s going to drastically transform. (wardrobe change, reforged weapon, brushing off her bumps and bruises, yes; radically altered physical nature, no.) largely because her physical form is fine as she is—at no point has ruby been troubled by the limitations of her body—and the transformation she needs is spiritual in nature. if it ain’t broke… and what’s broken is her spirit, her emotional well-being.

which leaves, like, okay. you don’t want to be yourself anymore. what do you want to be instead? nothing isn’t an option. the tree cannot provide nothing. (that’s what the jabberwalker is for.) there needs to be something. you can’t think of anything? not one singular thing you want to keep? not even the tiniest spark of light in all this darkness? alright. turn around and look again. tilt the mirror, look again. what do you want? what do you really want, deep down where you’ve never let anyone else see? look at that. now look again. look for what’s true in this unreal place. if you can’t see what’s in front of you, look again. what do you want to be?

[astraskylark]

Even though the op shows WBY while Ruby stands till, this ep showed that girls are clearly not alright yet.

We saw Weiss regressing back to being irritable(twas amazing but for the sake of analysis we take it seriously)

Yang was back to making jokes, completely moving past how she froze when jinxy dropped the "know how it feels to be loved"

Blake being paranoid about the implications of being a protagonist, worried about following the script laid out in front of them

And Ruby.... Well we can all see she's not doing okay

And from the conversation between Ruby and Weiss...

Ruby doesn't even try to reassure Weiss that it wasn't their fault cause she wholeheartedly believes it was their fault. Weiss has it finally sink in that she has lost a second home now, after Beacon.

Her line " Maybe they saved them, despite us". two are convinced that none of this would have happened if it weren't for them.

When Weiss tries to approach the topic of Penny, Ruby just turns away cause she can't even begin to talk about it yet, can't make herself vulnerable yet. Sure, she delivered the equivalent of a eulogy to the soldiers but she isn't even close to accepting it yet right?

It kinda feels like the volume is setting us up for a lot of character arcs here. Weiss maybe realising that home was never a place, it was always in the people around her, Yang finally realising that she is very much loved and confronting her self sacrificial tendencies, Blake coming into her own, not having to follow a path laid but to find the courage to walk a new one. And Ruby. Knowing the world is bitter and will hurt you, and it's okay to feel it all.

Bruh I'm rambling I have so many thoughts I need to lie down also I can't for wait for Weiss' reaction when she turns little in the next ep, she might just burst a blood vessel

[phoenix-fell]

RWBY emotions and the stages of grief

Okay, hear me out and I’m sorry this is a long one but I’m just a bit intrigued by the emotions of our girls and how they’re being shown. (And a little tired of RWDE folk ripping it to shreds for the comedic outputs). I do feel like the girls mildly symbolise 4/5 of the stages of grief - which I’ll weave in throughout.

We have an obvious loss of innocence/purity and hope from Ruby - which I think is going to be especially interesting in the next couple of episodes, because while Blake has taken the reigns a little here and there, we know that WBY get shrunk and it’s going to force Ruby back into carrying her team (literally).

I quite liked in the last episode just how detached Ruby is from everything; from not noticing the Bees flirting, to not really engaging with the fact Yang is looking for her arm at the auction, to after the auction when she’s just completely oblivious to everyone’s conversation and focused on the sword. I think CRWBY have done a great job of framing her as isolated and detached, or ‘Depression’ - seeing as she speed-ran the first 3 grief stages.

Weiss, though, I feel might be just as interesting. She was framed alongside Ruby when the Bees were having a pun-off. She’s been thrust forward as the comic relief as she struggles to understand the world around her. I know Ruby is heading for a breakdown, but I don’t think Weiss is far behind. 

Since the beginning, she’s been ‘Defiance’, a carefully put-together character who likes to be in control of the situation. But now, it’s not just that she’s somewhere unfamiliar; their entire plan fell apart, she watched her friend die in front of her, she has no home, no school, no idea whether she saved anyone and no idea how to get out of the world she’s been dropped into. When the cracks start to show, she’s often framed without her face, because she’s still keeping so much inside, trying to regain control whilst trying to process the fact she has nothing to go back to in Remnant. She’s had blatant evidence to suggest she’s in a fairy tale, but remains in ‘Denial’. Because, if she is, she can’t control that, right? She’s just walking through someone else’s story.

I feel like Yang has been extra ‘brawler’ the last couple of episodes which I feel is because her go-to is to exude strength in these types of situations, it’s her coping mechanism. The first time we see her she bursts into the scene throwing rocks at the Jabberwalker, her first interaction is an outburst because she failed to keep her sister safe and at the auction it’s clear she’s pissed at the Racoon, possibly because losing her arm is so inherently tied to her ability to fight and keep people safe. She seems to reflect ‘Anger’. 

While Blake might just be coming out of a cocoon of character development - if she’s pushing forward a Bumbleby arc then I have to believe that feral Blake at the end of last season was when something snapped, but she’s having an easier time remaining composed because ultimately, the worst DID happen - and then she found Yang again, she has a second chance, away, removed from the chaos and war of the world they’ve fallen from and now has a second to breathe and let herself feel. Blake finds comfort in being in a story she knows, because she’s learned the moral of it, and wants to avoid the pit-falls that Alyx did - essentially, ‘Bargain’ her way through to a happier outcome.

I feel like either Ruby’s, Jaune’s, or Neo’s arcs (or maybe even all three, or everyone’s) will inevitably lead to Acceptance. Whether that’s accepting the loss of their loved one, accepting the love of others, accepting your own feelings, that you can’t always be the hero/save everyone or accepting you won’t always be in control.

[lipeg]

Jaune is a terrible character

I like him but he had a terrible development.

Now that RT has closed and the question remains who will want to take the risk, stay with Rwby and still have to pay Warner.

Warner is in bad legs, full of debts to pay.

It was revealed by a profile that Rwby is not making a profit unfortunately he didn't give data which would be very important but said that volume 9 had no money to be made and that it was a loan... Well the studio closed.

I believe it has already happened that good studios have closed but... are usually closed because of greed or "Woker"

Japan studios Play Station

About Jaune, he has a lot of problems.

His past is non-existent, we will not have any information about his parents or your other sisters.

He forged documents to get into Beacon, but there's a big problem with this story called Glynda, she would have noticed something wrong with it.

The worst part is that we don't know how big the Arc family was. Why are the only known family members Saphron, who has nothing to show, and Jaune.

V4 and V5 showed almost everyone's family.

It showed Ren's family who died and Nora's mother who died.

There was also "Pyrrha's mother"

But we didn't have a picture of his family.

That drawing showing him and his sisters doesn't count.

He is taking too long to evolve and I still don't see reason for him to go to Mistral and Atlas.

Why did he lose trust in Ozpin, Lion betrayed his kingdom and sold the hunters' location. Of the 4 Headmaster, Ozpin is carefree and paranoid, Lion is a coward, James he went crazy but still wanted to save the world, Teodoro... I don't know much about.

If it weren't for him, Weiss would have died, but I still don't see a reason for him to go, he's terrible in battle. It's still bad but he's not terrible.

I find it incredible that his parents never came after him.

IT'S YOUR SON WHO IS MISSING! They probably knew where he was.

V9 already been "confirmed" that has not been paid. They took out a loan to make the V9 and apparently they didn't pay it.

I wish, I had the data, but I don't. It was the same thing Sony did with the sales figures for Marvel Spider-Man Miles Morales, they only came because of a leak.

Proving that Peter Parker sells more than Miles.

Rusted Knight... The idea is cool, I read a little of the book and at the end and the idea is cool.

A warrior trapped in his own armor, obsessed with the desire to be a knight.

As I said, the idea is good but... Excursion is bad.

None of my experiences were surpassed, in fact they were all frustrated. As much as I liked the idea of an older Jaune, I wish he was more serious, even angrier. He looks like an idiot and a crying baby.

I want the Rusted Knight and Jaune were two separate figures.

Rusted Knight appeared because Jaune's armor was cursed and he couldn't take it off and he had no control over his body and his conscience got stuck in his own head.

In the final battle, he would free himself with the help of Team WBY and show his berserker side.

It would be a big change to the character.

But unfortunately it didn't happen.

About revenge against Cinder.

The only ones who came close to killing her were Jaune and Winter.

Those damn silver eyes don't help, and Cinder has a damn Grimm arm that makes her suffer a lot.

I just hope whoever buys RWBY develops more other characters.

Sun, Velvet, Glynda, Tai Yang, fuck even Cardin. They have the potential to be good characters.

Avatar Last Airbender. The episode The Storm develops Aang and Zuko at the same time but from a completely different point of view. Aang tells his past to Karata and Iroh reveals Zuko's past to his soldiers who understands Zuko's point of view.

And famous episode Zuko alone.

No, because the work is called RWBY, the world revolves around them.

Just take the Baki work, in many Baki sagas secondary characters get a lot of prominence. Sumo Saga Oliva has been humiliatingly defeated and is back for revenge.

Jack Hanma has his own saga in Baki Rahen. Where the protagonist of the work is called Baki Hanma.

It is ridiculous to say that just because a work or series has the name of the protagonist, it must focus only on the protagonist.

I'll wait for what happened with RWBY and I had the V10, I am going to pretend madness and pretend that the V10 never happened like the remake of Avatar the legend of Aang.

[itsclydebitches]

I think the only way to make sense of the new episode is that the conflict about the paper pleasers is how all the characters would react about Penny's death if they knew what Jaune did. WBY comforting Jaune that they and Penny would've wanted this (they're less than human after all). Ruby lashing out at everyone else despite both things (the villager's deaths and Penny's) being her fault. Jaune blaming Ruby but he was the one who forced the villagers to suicide and assisted Penny's.

You know, I've been so distracted by all the other Big Events of this Volume - the bees are confirmed, a whole village happily dies, Ruby is having a meltdown - that I kinda forgot about the whole Penny issue? It only hit me again in the middle of Jaune's grief when he was talking (paraphrased) about how he was the only one who could 'do it.' As you say, there are ways of trying to make sense of this episode "if they knew what Jaune did".... but they presumably don't? I say "presumably" because RWBY drives me up the wall with how often very important information is conveyed to characters off screen, leaving us in the dark about how much was explained and in what way - especially in a show where people keeping secrets/manipulating information is a recurring theme. We've now had two major time skips where Penny's death presumably could have come up: when WBY were catching up after Ruby's faint, and while the girls were filling Jaune in after he rescues them from the first Jabberwalker attack. I don't think Ruby, Yang, and Blake know the full story about Penny yet because HOW could Ruby possibly have a go at Jaune without bringing that up... but I can't be sure.

Which puts the whole episode in an even weirder light for me. Again, is the moral of this that Jaune needs to learn to let people die when they ask that of him? Regardless of the writer's thematic perspective, the characters should have wildly different opinions on that and it's weird that they were allowed to remain ignorant when that all came to a head. It's weirder still that one of our characters isn't ignorant (Weiss) and yet that's had no bearing on her actions this episode.

Weiss, the one person who knows Jaune killed Penny to keep the Maiden powers safe, watching him desperately try to protect innocent, non-human people that are clearly a stand-in for her after decades of isolation from his world: 'He's gone off the deep end, huh?'

I can forgive Ruby, Yang, and Blake ignoring Jaune's cryptic comment/not following up with a, 'Wait, what did you do?' because at that point the fight was starting in earnest and everyone was too wrapped up in themselves. But that just implies that this will have to come out before the end of the Volume which is in... three episodes? The meat of this Volume really only started when Jaune arrived (because of course it did), which means we essentially only have half of an already short season to cover a LOT of stuff: learn the secrets of Alyx and Lewis, figure out the Jabberwalker, defeat it, defeat Neo, fix Jaune (presumably), reconcile the team, semi-conclude Ruby's grief arc, finish things with the Cat, with Little, discover something to help with Salem so this isn't complete filler, get to the tree, establish if they can use the tree, get home. Even if we take into account RWBY's tendency to speed-run through an insane amount of plot in a single scene (here's the introduction of the Staff, how it works, its limitations, and your brilliant loophole all in one go), that's too much to juggle, on top of this, "So... when are they going to learn the truth about Penny and grapple with that?" question. Remember how after Volume 8 the fandom (quite rightly) was going, "Wow! It's going to be a lot for Ruby to deal with Penny's death and the knowledge that Jaune caused it" but seven episodes in she still only has half the information and is only just reaching her breaking point in regards to that. Learning it was Jaune should be another huge setback in a story that hasn't even had her grapple with the first one yet. It honestly makes me wonder if RT is planning to stretch Ever After into a two Volume affair...

[onewomancitadel]

I may have made this post before somewhere in the bowels of my storied #cindemption tag but the great thing about the Omelas yardstick is that not just in respect to Rhodes but actually on a metatextual level if you're 'not' supposed to feel sympathy for Cinder during Midnight, then the story failed the Omelas test. And I can walk away from Omelas

If this is completely nonsense to you, please go read The Ones Who Walk Away from Omelas by Ursula K. Le Guin; it's very short and elegant, and seems pretty specifically invoked in respect to Cinder and Volume 8 more generally (maybe even Penny and Winter, honestly). It's available on a websearch quite easily - a link to a .pdf is one of the first results.

(Sorry, I'm never going to shut up about this specific thing in Cinder's character arc and R/WBY more generally because it's the ultimate intersection of all my interests).

[ironwoodprotectionsquad]

Rwby ost was always funny af because most of the time songs do a better job at developing characters than the show itself.

And of course add the weird gap between the songs that play and the scene they are inserted into.

Like "Be strong and hit stuff" plays during Ironwood vs Everyone for... some reason. "Chatterbox" (a song about Neo and Curuous Cat internally fighting) plays during Jabberwalkers vs WBY for... some reason. And let's not forget "Red like roses 2" playing during RWBY and JNPR vs Nevermore.

Like... at this point I'm not surprised "Guide my way" has nothing to do with vol9 plot nor Rubys arc in the said vol🤷‍♀️

The RW/BY soundtrack certainly makes....choices. Some songs are good across all 9 soundtracks and others are....their. Overall though I tend to not like it when the songs have lyrics during the battles as for me they can distract from the battle itself with wanting to try and listen to the lyrics because as you said, so often the songs do more of the heavy lifting for characterizing the characters and actually giving us insight into their thoughts and feelings.

But on the other hand so often the songs and their placement makes no sense to what is happening thematically. Unfortunately Guide My Way falls into this trap which is unfortunately because we've been so long due for a song that really focuses on Ruby and Guide My Way...falls kind of flat. (TW suicide and attempted suicide discussions below)

I remember when we first heard the notes from Red like Roses I got goosebumps I was so excited and I loved it and it had my hyped for the whole song...but I've realized I don't like anything but that little instrumental section before the lyrics "Red like roses fills my dreams" that is the best part of the song....and its just Red like Roses. But more importantly the lyrics....don't make sense.

I'm begging, can you Guide my way out Of this place?

This song is what plays when Ruby is supposed to be "finding herself" and regaining her confidence in herself. It doesn't make sense for the lyrics to be begging for guidance. If the volume ended with Ruby still in an emotionally shaky place sure the lyrics could work.

Ruby does chose herself realizing her loved ones would miss her and love her because she is her despite her flaws. However she still feels guilty and lost and clearly needs time to heal. The lyrics then have a duel meaning of seeking both guidance in the physical sense and the emotional sense. However that's not what the show went with so the lyrics go against everything the show is claiming is supposed to be Ruby's arc.

Will I ever be (complete)? When will I become all of me?

Again confusing because this is supposed to be Ruby's finding herself and choosing herself moment....why is she asking if she will ever be complete? As I've said it makes no sense for Ruby to in this moment be having these thoughts, the big thing is she should be feel confident in herself and her abilities again and the show has no indication that Ruby is feeling anything but self assured and confident so the song implying otherwise is odd to me.

Your memory ever-lasting at war with my foolish pride What is left?

The foolish pride part is....admittedly kind of frustrating. All last volume the girls all insisted that they where doing the right thing and never really questioned the morality of their actions. The other make sure to tell Ruby when she doubts their actions that that is just thinking like the super duper evil Ironwood and we can't have that. The show has repeatedly slapped us in the face with the fact that Ruby is totes super perfect and is elevating her to this honestly creepy god like status.

This line teases a story line so many people have wanted to see of Ruby actually acknowledging her faults and failures and growing and improving as a person. Unfortunately this does not happen. The mains continue to act as if they can do no wrong and refuse to sit down and reflect on their actions.

I know it's you and I, when I look inside I'll be who you were and I'll be even more

Again, this is supposed to be about Ruby "choosing herself" why is this song that should be about the moment she did in fact choose herself declaring that Ruby will be who her mother was and given that one of the major things that broke her was this expectation that she would solve everything and was perfect and always happy all the time, having her declare she'll be even more feels....tone deaf is the best word I can think for it.

Cr/wby pretended to write this story about a girl carrying the weight of the world and crumbling under the pressure of it all. But then this song is having her declare after breaking that she would be "even more". Pretending that a person who broke under the pressure would turn around and enforce the pedestal they where put on is absolutely insane to me. Just the callousness of it all especially with how Ruby's break was handled.

Cr/wby had Ruby try to end her life. They had her drink tea that she thought would kill her with Neo telling her the world would be better off without her. Neo broke her by reminding her of her faults and failures and made her think the world would be better off without her. Instead of recognizing this pedestal she was being put on was hurting her, they instead reinforced said pedestal and made sure she know how worthy she was of the pedestal putting her realistically in the exact same situation as she was in before.

I am the reflection of who prevails I'm what inspired the fairytale

As stated above, this is just once again putting Ruby further up on a pedestal and giving her this honestly creepy god like status in how she's being revered and inspiring fairytales. It doesn't make any sense to me and it's frustrating how careless CR/WBY has been with this entire arc.

(I can guide me, I can guide my way out) Guide my way out Of this place

"I can guide me" feels almost like an afterthought that was thrown in at the end to me at least. Why is this line a background line if its supposed to be the moment Ruby fully realizes she is enough? Why not have I can guide my way out be the final line of the song? If the song is supposed to be Ruby's entire emotional journey throughout the volume it doesn't convey well at all given how this feels like such an afterthought. If its supposed to be all about how Ruby has found herself it also falls extremely flat.

Sorry to go on a massive tangent their but I had thoughts lolz.

[doomalade]

There's a lot I can forgive RWBY for. I was ready to forgive them for their mishandling of nuts n dolts, especially once they brought penny back. I can forgive them for bumbleby's weirdness, as it was actually pretty well done for the most part. But what I cannot forgive. Is them taking Joan of Arc, one of my personal heroes and an absolute badass, and turning her into a whiny bitch boy whose story has nothing to do with her. He is responsible for the most deaths, all of them women being fridged for the occasional flavor addition to his nothingburger of a story. Literally why are we even supposed to root for him? The most we know about his past is that he's a liar. (got into beacon via false papers) Literally even salem is easier to root for than jaune because at least she has some sort of tragic motivation of losing a lover that people can actually relate to! I've tried to get into rwby several times and every time, the black hole that is jaune singlehandedly dragging the story down is what either mostly or completely ruins it. (I've got problems with Oscar too, but that's a story for a different rant) I'm starting to think people are right about RWBY being a Shonen because it has a fucking misogyny problem, and that problem's name is Jaune Arc.

Omg thank you!

This is exactly my feelings on why Jaune is so disgusting as a character.

RT took Joan of Arc, a historical figure, a symbol of feminism, who led a Holy War and is an important person in French history and overall is a current symbol of bravery and leadership.

Jaune is a clueless loser who lied to get into Beacon and only got somewhat good at fighting because Pyrrha had to baby him.

And then Pyrrha dies for Jaune’s character.

And then Weiss gets impaled for Jaune’s character.

And then Penny is killed by Jaune for Jaune’s character.

And then Jaune takes up even more screen time (the Jaundice arc took over half of the total time of V1 btw)

And then RT had the fucking balls to make Jaune accuse Ruby of being selfish and instead of being pissed at Jaune, WBY hug him because his paper people that he enslaved became rocks???

Joan is a symbol of feminism

And Jaune is a symbol of misogyny

I mean look at the people associated with his character

Miles “I like watching women kiss” Luna and the lunatic Jaune Stans that have attacked me for 3 weeks for pointing out that Ilia is a lesbian.

Jaune Arc needs to die

He should have died before the show even started

What a horrible and ugly and disgusting character

[beetletricks]

Ruby’s Ever After Plotline Possibly relies on Volume 9(Ever After) and 10(Ever After in Vacuo)

A.K.A why we aren’t getting to the Vacuo Capital until Volume 11

Something I misunderstood is that Ruby has yet to realize that her taking the burden on her own is an issue despite being halfway through Volume 9

so we only on the first stage of her arc and it doesn’t seem like it will be solved even by the end of this volume 

I think the reason this volume is beloved is not because its the completion of her arc but rather invokes a ton of emotion 

For example, maybe its more to invoke that Ruby’s team saves her this volume and she in turns saves them

Takeru saved Kairi who was able to then save the day in Digimon 02

Jaiden despite being the Surpreme King in Season 3 ended up saving the day at the end of the season

But something connecting both of these is that both Jaiden’s and Hikari didn’t get that 

“Personal Moment” where they truly learned the lesson

Hikari was still closed off 

And Jaiden, despite defeating Yubel and saving all his friends still suffered from what happened 

It is for this reason I hope Little stays for Volume 10 since I believe she’s really important to Ruby’s arc regarding her personal emotions. 

I assume some of these characters would appear again for a cameo but I assumed it would be the final volume 

Though with the way things are going they’ll likely do a Digimon Adventure Season 1 Second half or Centuarworld Season 2 where the other worlders come to the human realm..

With rather than doing missions like in Atlas, the gang has to round up the fairy tales perhaps simply as a change of pace decided 

In essence, Volume 9 focuses on the theme of 

Acknowledgment 

-this connects to the Caterpillar is stating who Ruby is 

“  Ruby acknowledgeing that WBY indeeds wanted to help her and that they are people she should trust and rely on for help instead of succumbing to a defeatist “this is my life now” attitude.

At the same time, however, it’s still not a perfect solution

So Volume 10′s theme will be more about 

THE ABILITY TO CHANGE

especially with other similar things going on

-Vacuo and Atlesians trying to work together in the refugee settlement 

-Nora and Ren dealing with the consequences of Jaune and how it affects him 

-Emerald being afraid of going to Vacuo capital since she probably doesn’t know what to say to Mercury 

ETC.  

But most of all having Ruby founding new motivation for her fight similar to how Ozpin found motivation in the first maidens 

THE REASON I DONT THINK WILL SEE THE VACUO CAPITAL UNTIL VOLUME 10′s ending is BECAUSE VOLUME 10 Still NEEDS RUBY AS THE MAIN FOCUS RATHER THAN VELVET OR THE SUMMER MAIDEN....especially to deal with the Ever After aftermath that Neo probably caused

[mean-and-rwde]

Volume 9 thoughts

[Spoilers, possibly]

[Rambling ahead]

I don't want to throw out all hope that V9 won't be absolute ""filler"", but it clashes too hard with the high emotions of the V8 finale.

If V8 was trying to be V3 (it failed), then I guess one could say V9 is like V4.

Except V4, while personally being one of my lesser-favorite volumes, does a nice bridge between the absolute chaos of the V3 finale to the V5 chaos. It's slower, a lot more dialogue heavy, and yet manages to remain somewhat true to canon without breaking it too much.

V9, however, looks to be a V1 - V2 ish theme but definitely not nearly as light hearted. I mean, they look to be in fucking wonderland (I heard it's called the Ever After, which is not much better, in my opinion). We've got talking mice among possibly other wild scenarios.

Meanwhile in Remnant (? I don't think Ever After is part of Remnant, I don't know tho):

- Atlas has become Atlantis (to quote my brother, who I guess heard it from a review somewhere?)

- Everyone who didn't fall into The Void / died when Atlas fell is now in Vacuo, the last standing kingdom.

- Vacuo is already very much struggling with what the citizens have. Now what's left of an entire kingdom has been dumped in as well.

- Salem has 2 / 4 relics needed to end the world and is on her way to Vacuo, where the last relic is being held.

- Cinder is still here. Like a damn cockroach

Side rant: I'm sorry, I just don't care for her anymore. I miss V1 - V3 Cinder, who was a legitimate threat and actually scary. Now she's an villain who is funniest when she fails. When I see her now, the sense of dread is more like "ugh this bitch again" instead of before where I was like "oh shit she's back what is she gonna do now?".

Adding her backstory in V7 (or was it V8? I literally can't remember) did nothing for me. It was way too on the nose, there was nothing subtle about it. And the song playing was basically beating the audience over the head with what was happening. It's too late to give her backstory, now it's completely unnecessary. It means nothing. And she has resorted to relying on the maiden powers in fights, makimg her fights boring and monotonous.

Also in Remnant:

- A shit ton of people fell into the void

- Penny is dead. Again. But permanently.

Meanwhile:

Our mains are in some weird wonderland like world where I'm guessing Neo somehow already has what looks like some sort of gang (in the intro, she's seen drinking tea with a bunch of shadowy people behind her).

There's also the mystery girl, who may have something to do with Ruby.

The intro hints that Ruby has become far more depressed and not nearly as hopeful as she once was. In the beginning, we see her as she transitions between her outfits over the volumes, while her emblem slowly fades.

While her team is running through various scenes, Ruby is dragging her feet, noticeably falling behind everyone else.

I hope this actually goes somewhere and makes Ruby + WBY + Jaune realize that they (especially Ruby) haven't made the best decisions as of late.

I haven't seen Episode 1, but I've heard some bits and pieces of it and I'm generally not thrilled. I know it's only the first episode, but I'm really not down for this whole wonderland shenanigans thing when the real world of Remnant is in danger of literally ending.

I don't know, it really feels like how when the White Fang arc was abruptly cut short and dropped (rip most of Blake's character). Things have gotten too heavy and too much, so the writers cut to something else entirely.

In this case, something comedic (or at least trying to be)

A / N 1: Apparently there's a con-man raccoon called Jinxy who is very... Stereotyped and racist. I have not seen this character, but from what I've heard... I don't think I want to know.

[kitkatopinions]

I made this post during the scene in the Lego Movie where Emmet like, jumps from President Business's office in the sky and gets to see Real People and then comes back to the world Even Better then before... And I just want to talk more about the ways RWBY V9 failed in their own plot by comparing what happened with Emmet (over the course of the movie) to what happened to Ruby (over the course of V9.)

On paper when boiled down to the bare essentials, it's actually similar.

(Trigger warning for discussions of suicide below the keep reading)

Our hero finds themselves in a bizarre setting they know nothing about with a bunch of people relying on them to do everything right. Our hero struggles to do what's expected of them and feels bad about themselves and wants to change things about themself. Our hero then in a tense moment does something they believe will result in their death. They encounter what's essentially a god (to them) and get some perspective before going back now more sure of themselves.

But imagine if in the Lego Movie, WyldStyle and Vetruvius and Captain Beardy and Batman were all Emmet's best friends in the world who are supposed to love him and yet they acted even more distant and exasperated by Emmet than they did in the movie. And imagine that instead of them helping Emmet where they could and trying to act like a team, they spent the whole time complaining every time they had to put in an ounce of effort and told Emmet he was acting like President Business when he expressed the tiniest bit of doubt, and then Vetruvius screamed in his face that he was responsible for Bad Cop coming after them and didn't get to feel bad. And then imagine that Bad Cop had been bullying Emmet into jumping from the office tower by making master builders tell him he was worthless and should die, and that when he did the reaction of all his 'friends' was a resounding 'oh no, anyway' as they rushed to happily hug Vetruvius, and then they all decided it was actually a really good thing that Emmet had died and they needed to support his choice. Imagine if Emmet came back and everyone was just like 'there's Emmet the perfect leader who never doubted himself,' and meanwhile none of the others had to learn any sort of lesson, and then Bad Cop was like 'whelp, time for me to jump off the building' and Emmet was like 'good for him' and then they just skipped off into the sunset.

Like, there's a very big difference between a hero sacrificing their life when they didn't really want to for the greater good of the world if their back is to a wall, and a hero just committing suicide because they honestly feel like they just hate themselves that much while their enemy is actively trying to make them do it. There's a very big difference between characters freaking out and upset that their friend is dead and characters being like ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ "They did what was best for them and we support it!" There's a very big difference between a show making what happened to the hero clearly treated like something negative and a show out and out presenting it as a good thing to happen to a different character (yes even if that character is a villain.)

That's not even touching on the fact that somehow the Lego Movie had a more nuanced take on Emmet's struggles. Like, Emmet did need to go through some growth and change and learn that he can think outside the box and will be happier if he lets himself explore possibilities and believes in himself (which is how he comes to embrace his role as a leader and to fight against President Business and become a real master builder) and at the same time, Wyld Style and the others needed to learn to value the things Emmet brought to the table even if they weren't what they thought of as 'special,' and to not judge and look down on others for not being the same as them. Compare that to WBY being like "we completed our arcs already" and then after Ruby comes back they're all like "that's our perfect leader who never doubted herself."

It's terrible actually that a very simple movie for children managed to have a much better and more nuanced and honestly safer emotional climax of the story than RWBY did. RWBY was literally out here glorifying suicide and giving us paper thin 'growth arcs' and hard to like main characters at the same time, when they would've had a better story if they'd taken their cues from the LEGO MOVIE of all things. I care about the characters in RWBY way more than I care about the characters in the Lego Movie, but I have to admit that the Lego Movie is just better, and that's what really sucks. For a character as good as Ruby Rose, I'd expect the writers to put in a little more thought than a movie about a lego construction worker did.

How come the Lego Movie is better than RWBY V9

[dragynkeep]

love the assumption that rwde just didn't get r*byn just like we didn't get the white fang arc because we're all racist misogynists. it doesn't reek of poc and afab erasure at all.

also loving the irony of a r//wby fan acting like rwde can't understand something as thematically simple as robin hood. never mind that several different rwde blogs broke down why r*byn doesn't work, specifically in relation to her allusion. like no you bowl of soggy cheerios, we understand what RT thinks they were doing, but they failed spectacularly. the issue isn't that she's against ironwood (are you fucking kidding me? that was the reason i was excited for her and v//7) or that she's robbing atlas in and of itself (if only we saw her do it more often. not only would it make her feel less useless to the plot, it would give opportunities for bits of worldbuilding and also heists are very cool and sexy), the issue is that she's a privileged, borderline racist asshole who's put on a pedestal in-universe and out. and they butchered her allusion. seriously. how do you fuck up robin hood, anyway? oh wait, i know! make them a fucking politician who patronizes minorities, throws tantrums when they don't get their way, and is incapable of making decent decisions. anyway i'd still take sienna over r*byn even if RT fucked up her character and made her an eviler adam without the incel. a violent extremist asshole is infinitely sexier than a preachy white savior.

yeah like i’m sorry if in order to “get” robyn, you have to ignore how she as a character not only massively fails in representing her allusion both in design & characterization but how she just. fails at being an interesting character in general.

she steals from atlas to give to nobody. she whines & complains about what ironwood does & demands to be in the know without offering a hand out herself, which while “understandable” in the derived context of mantle, also just makes her massively hypocritical. none of her backup team are likeable, we have them on screen bullying the civillians they’re meant to be protecting, something we barely see them do btw. & her chair throwing moment reads less as a leader who’s reached the end of her rope because her people are being ignored by the council as a whole  —  not just ironwood, who the story will conveniently forget has the least amount of power in regards to the treatment of mantle —  & reads more as a petulant grown woman throwing a temper tantrum.

not to mention how her perpetual temper tantrums end up causing more harm than good: they do nothing to endear the council, nothing to help with jacques, actively make the situation on the cargo plane with clover, tyrian & qrow worse. i’m not seeing robyn as a leader at the end of her rope, i’m seeing a toddler.

& this hasn’t even touched the weird ass way she handles her saviour approach to mantle, which ignores the explicit troubles & enslavement of the faunus  —  alongside some weird appropriation / misdirection of “bare your teeth” that had us thinking she & her huntresses, at least some of them would be faunus  —  only to then have her explicitly other faunus when she humansplains to marrow.

there are many issues with robyn & yes, while some dudebros will hate her just because she’s an outspoken wahmen  —  ironically ignoring those dudebros are the exact audience rooster teeth themselves cultivated for over a decade  —  most rwde posters do not in fact dislike her for this apparent facet of her character. willful ignorance to this just completely devalues their point.

[sapphic-sustrai]

Every time someone says “E/merald’s redemption arc feels rushed, it was bad, it felt lazy, etc...” it takes years off my life.

Newsflash to all of you donkeys in the FNDM, her redemption arc just started. V8 was the start of E/merald’s redemption arc, it’s not even close to being finished. You can criticize how it’s been handled so far, but stop judging it as if it’s a completed character arc.

And another thing, R/WBY & co. haven’t fully accepted E/merald as part of the group, they’re not “best buddies” and I don’t think they even fully trust her yet. Currently, they’re working together with E/merald against a common enemy. The group is willing to only place a little bit of trust in her right now.

I really don’t know how else to explain this because it should be something that’s pretty easy to grasp. But I’m clearly expecting too damn much.

[onewomancitadel]

If I'm totally honest with you all, I would've been more okay with Jaune getting the long way around happy reunion with Pyrrha than anything to do with Weiss, and I genuinely don't know how they'd make his character arc coherent if it's not that or him with Cinder. Given that they had the opportunity to do that in V9 with a magical world with no established rules until they established them that volume (and Achilles is met in the underworld by Odysseus...), I'm just like, what?

Because it's like, needlessly depressing having him by himself, and the answer to Ozlem is probably immortal, enduring love. So if they didn't write Jaune as this pained, struggling character since V4 never giving up and always loving, what are they doing with him. Because I don't know what Jaune/Weiss even means. It doesn't mean anything. Salem needed to find a replacement goldfish. I don't know. It's not hard-earnt, it's nothing.

Like sure, on a character level I want him to be rewarded and his character arc to ultimately mean something to the greater story, but he's not the main character - yet in the context of Weiss, Weiss is abnegated to his arc and that doesn't feel fair. Jaune/Cinder is immortal, unyielding, eternal forgiveness and love which answers Ozlem. I want him to have a 100%, no settling, eternal reunion type of romantic love, and it's very hard to think about this in the context of his character (unrealised romance as a repeating and enduring theme) and not ask if it's meant for something bigger.

The reason I'd be more okay with Pyrrha resurrection (ironically) is because I think, ironically, the series is moving in the direction of completely affirming Salem wanting Ozma back, and the idea of eternally intertwined souls, immortal love, all of that business. Death is the affirmation of life but not its sole cessation point. In this case I would genuinely expect Jaune to die and then get a reunion in the afterlife, which just typing out gives me the heebies and the jeebies, if they didn't resurrect Pyrrha. But they didn't characterise him that way or foreshadow it in any fashion, and they've already done the mean twist of his ageing in V9, and then redeemed him.

I'm trying to view this less through a Jaune/Cinder lense, and for the sake of this post, from the perspective of Jaune's character. That he could supplement Cinder's arc and justify his presence in the narrative makes a lot of fucking sense to me, whether I want the romance to happen or not. It's tonally true to R/WBY - but it explains why what has been done with him, has been done with him. And when I said that a reprised Jaune/Pyrrha dynamic makes more sense to me, I mean because it answers Ozlem positively (and ultimately) the way a Jaune romance really needs to. I certainly don't like the idea, and I don't like Pyrrha being framed as a reward to him as much as I don't like that with Weiss, but it'd be slightly more coherent. At least for Pyrrha it would feel like a reward to her, too, but she'd be out of the story for a long time by that point.

This is my pitch to Jaune fans as to why Jaune/Cinder makes sense, even if you don't ship it. Wink.

[h4lcyonism]

wby completing their individual character arcs and feeling sure of their own personal identities means that while ruby’s still coping with hers, the rest of the volume can put emphasis on blake and yang’s growth as a romance and allow them to complete the arc that they as a unit still haven’t fully finished yet, which’ll culminate in them finally verbalizing their feelings for each other

Also I would just like to say I’m obsessed with “if I’m missing something it’s because I haven’t found it yet” 👀