#and the other people I want to play with probably only have v4 as well

[corvid-jay]

why's it so hard to set up a custom minecraft server...

[weirdestcornelius]

Ohhh boy. I'm going to put this under a cut because it's going to get a bit long, but thanks for asking!

I would keep it due to being a suicide attempt, yes, but instead of it just disappearing I would change the entire way Uni is shown to deal with it.

You can't just say a character suffers from something and then never show them actually suffering from a disability. It's a very shallow way of including representation and it's especially shallow with Uni because pup tearing her eyes out is meant to be a strong plot point but. It's not. I seriously FORGET Uni has sight issues because of how erased it is in comic, which is not good when you're trying to write a visually impaired character and have it be a big part of them. So I'd rewrite Uni to have more struggles in the comic.

First of all, her goggles should not erase their sight issues with magic. If you just magically fix her disability with magic there was no point in Uni having a disability in the first place! It comes off as super shallow and overall ableist to go that route. Instead, I'd have pup wear goggles because she's self conscious about her eyes, because they are literally like a SH scar for her! Uni is still depressed in comic and most people who are depressed aren't going to be open about their scars, coming from someone who has suffered with that. To show the reason she wears her goggles is because of them being self conscious, only show her NOT wearing them around people she trusts, like Caroline or maybe Barry over time. Show them being uncomfortable to take the goggles off in other settings as well!

Second, actually show Uni struggling to do certain tasks because of their impairment. The goggles are worn in V4 because they apparently help her make puppets, but just show one of her friends helping her make them! Or better yet, you can show Uni making them by pupself, but just make sure to show her struggling to do certain things, like stitch things in a neat way. Uni isn't completely blind obviously, so she would be able to do some things herself with practice (and making puppets is something she's apparently been doing for a long time) but that doesn't mean they'll be able to do everything perfectly. As for daily things, show her having to be really close to her screen to be able to actually play the video games she enjoys. Show them struggling to find things that are right in front of them because of how bad pups vision can be sometimes. Show her having to get other people to read things to them! In v1 Uni had to ask Barry to read a map because they can't do it themselves, show that again!

As for her wearing them to hide their missing eyes from their kids in Cometcare, sure, that works. But as said above don't make them fix her disability! She can be said to always wear them because 1: still self conscious about her eyes in some ways and 2: doesn't want her children to see pups empty eyesockets because it alludes to the hospital, which the kids aren't supposed to know about. They can even be shown being given more accommodations because shes out of the hospital! Uni has a pet cog in Cometcare (I can't remember her name) but make that a seeing eye cog for her! Kittycorn has already said that ferry's that help with disabilities are a thing, so that means that Uni could have her cog help guide her when she's out alone. Not to mention all the different ways you can spin how Uni got the seeing eye cog in the first place; since Kittycorn says that Uni's parents are concerned for her condition and care about her well being, THEY could have been the ones to gift the cog to them after they got out of the hospital, as a way to clarify that Uni would be safe. I don't know about others, but if I had a kid that randomly came out of some murder hospital and be severely visually disabled out of the blue, I'd probably be worried about how they're going to live life in a town considering Uni hasn't been out of the hospital in like, six years. It's going to take some getting used to if she wants to even walk around the town she lives in.

And since Cometcare seems to be so focused on cutesy ship stuff, make one of Uni's spouses shown to be helping her sew! Show them reading important things to her, show them describing intricate pictures to her! It's not that hard to give a bit of better representation with these kinds of things.

Oh yeah other Sparklecrit blogs have talked about this but I wanted to add to it as someone that is actually pretty badly visually impaired.

I don't like the way Uni's sight is fixed with magic goggles. Don't get me wrong, I love Uni. She is literally one of the most relatable characters I have found in any kind of media as someone who's genuinely traumatized and has taken on coping mechanisms similar to theirs. But I do not like the way her visual disability is treated.

As stated above I am visually impaired. I'm not going into details but it has put me under the risk of becoming blind quite a few times and strongly impacts the way I see the world. Obviously I'm not completely blind but it really does impact me, especially with the way other people see me sometimes due to it and the forms of ableism I've had to deal with. It's honestly why I related to Uni at first; both me and her have the same issue with our vision being really messed up. But it's not just my personal opinion that matters here. As other blogs have said the "magic can fix disabilities" trope is inherently very ableist and gross and just- honestly an excuse to get rid of a characters disability entirely.

While I do understand that Uni doesn't want her children to see what happened to her eyes, just wearing a pair of normal goggles would fix this issue without literally completely correcting her disability as if pup didn't have it in the first place. And before someone says anything, no. Seeing in a single color does not at all equate to her vision being so blurry that she can hardly make out facial expressions. This isn't just a Cometcare issue either, Uni has started wearing goggles in Sparklecare as well to correct her visual impairment and it comes off as really weird. Obviously pup would have a hard time making the puppets with how blurry their vision is but they could always get help from another character. Or literally just show how a characters physical disability affects them ykyk.

While this most likely wasn't what Kc was going for I can easily see why it looks like that, especially with the Jay's scooter and Polly's cane drama. I feel that if Kc wants to write physical disabilities into buns comic, she should definitely get some physically disabled people on the team. Again, this is not hate towards Kc- I just really wish that physical disabilities were represented in a better way in the comic because although squeak probably didn't mean for it to come off as this trope, it definitely did to me and a lot of others.

[sa311]

Tamagotchi Connection and Plus series, comparison

The Tamagotchi Connection series is comprised of the Tamagotchi released in the west during the aughts, starting with the V1 and ending with the Friends.

The Tamagotchi Plus series is comprised of the Tamagotchi released in Japan during that same period of time. The Connection releases up to the V5.5 were based on these Japanese releases. But only the V1, V5 and V5.5 had mostly the same gameplay as their Japanese counterparts. The others were quite different so I would like to talk about these differences. because if i see the keitai getting called “japanese V3” or the entama getting called “japanese V4” one more time i WILL start biting people

So let’s start with the Japanese releases.

The Plus was the first release, introducing the IR communication. It was pretty basic in terms of functionality, but it had some charm that is missing from the future releases, like the idle animations and each adult tier having their own food.

If you had a Plus in Japan in 2004, you would have access to something we never got in the west: the Deka Tamagotchi.

All it did at this point was play a little animation with your own Tamagotchi, but this wasn’t the case for the next release, the Keitai series.

The Keitai series introduced the concept of money (Gotchi Points) in Tamagotchi. And with it, naturally, several items to buy. But the Keitai does not have a built-in shop, it just has a vendor that comes by at certain times and brings one item to sell. This is because, just like the matchmaker is a last resort in case you can’t connect with another device, the vendor is meant to be a way of getting items the days you didn’t have access to your nearest Deka Tama Shop or a phone with the Keitai app.

Similarly, there are just 3 built-in games and winning them only gets you 100 points. This is because you are meant to also be able to go to the Deka Tamagotchi Game Center, which had 5 games more. The phone app is not well documented, but it probably had more things to do other than shop.

The Entama and Uratama also relied on the Deka releases like this, but instead of the phone app it had e-tamago, the Japanese equivalent of TamaTown. This website had a very complete shop, with the gimmick of having some of the items be “sold out” some days.

Also, the Japanese releases tend to be cleaner in a way. There were guides explaining how to get each character and it’s easy to get the character you want every single time. All characters had a personality and an official artwork.

The Keitai series had very few characters in comparison to the V3, but their sprites were clean and the had more C-click reactions. The items you could use changed from character to character, and some items would unlock new connection games.

The Entama and Uratama have similar characters to their Connection counterparts, but in these you can always know who you are going to get from the moment you get a baby. The special families are obtained using an item you get from a Deka, and apparently also from a TV game.

The Plus series had a lot of features, but most were only accessible in Japan and / or are lost media now. But you can still get most if not all of the items via passwords and code generators.

Let’s talk about the Connections now.

The Plus had an interesting transition to the V1. First it was translated into English in an... interesting way with the European Tamagotchi Connexion, which was still mostly the same as the Plus. Then the USA Tamagotchi Connection was released, featuring the translation and the pause function that would persist on all the future releases of the series. This one altered many sprites to tone down the Japanese cultural elements present in the original Plus.

They couldn’t afford to do all the Deka stuff over here so they had to change how to get items in the V2. They made a built-in shop and added more games that could pay more if won. Since it could not connect to a phone, they did not give the V2 an antenna like the one the Keitai has. But then they did use the antenna with the V3, which now could connect to TamaTown.

And that’s it. That’s all the Keitai and the V3 have in common. The antenna. And one (1) game and some characters but the gameplay is completely different. The V2 and V3 just added stuff to the V1. More characters, more items and all adults can use all items.

But we didn’t get a guide and the characters you get are a bit randomized anyway. The Keitai series, had few carefully made characters with their own personalities and artwork. The Connections had a lot more characters but they were presented like this.

This is an official chart by Bandai.

I am not joking. They only used artwork and descriptions for the characters that got one in Japan.

Also, some of the sprites made for the Connections are a bit rougher than the ones found in the Plus series.

The V4 was closer to the Entama since they took the main teens and adults and the whole skill system and career features. But you have no way of predicting what kind of adult you’ll get until you have a teen. Each toddler is more likely to become some specific teens, but there’s still randomness to it, unlike with the Entama. And the special families were replaced by a neglect family that you get if you don’t train them enough or neglect them too much. The V4 also had actual minigames for the jobs. It also retained the features found in the V3, like having an actual in-game shop instead of forcing you to use TamaTown or wait for some vendor.

So basically TLDR

The Plus series had less built-in content. Everything in them is very carefully thought and cleaner looking, but without access to many of the features lost to time some might find them lacking in content.

The Connections have way more characters and in-built games, but they are all based on the V1 and look a bit messier. Also the characters you get are a bit random so you never know who you will get.

I love them both but they are very different.

[nexyra]

RWBY Analysis - Ozpin & Ruby, on the concept of leadership

In her song "Burned out", Dodie sings of her fans, how they look up to her and how uneasy that realization made her. For everyone is at the end of the day just as human as their neighbour; and having the hopes and expectations of others put upon you when you're just as lost as them can be a frightening thing. And this... made me think of Ruby & Ozpin.

On the subject of leadership, Ozpin tells Ruby the following : “Being a team leader isn't just a title you carry into battle, but a badge you wear constantly. If you are not always performing at your absolute best, then what reason do you give others to follow you?”

While I love this quote, I also have to analyze the drawbacks of this mentality and how they align with both Ozpin and Ruby. At the time, Ruby is a newly appointed leader and unsure of this reality. Ozpin's counsel give her the confidence needed to step up as a leader and take her duties more seriously, which in return appeases Weiss' and make their team all the more balanced. It is, in that context, good advice. A good leader should strive to lead by example and work hard to be worthy of the respect others give them, both in and outside of battle.

However there is one aspect that I find much more complex and that is... what does it mean to "always perform at your absolute best" and to have others follow you ? Note the use of follow, people letting you lead alone as opposed to "standing by your side" or a similar expression. It showcases in my opinion one of the biggest problem of Ozpin's leadership, but one that I feel has been inadvertently repeated by Ruby's.

- - - - - - - -

To cultivate hope and lies

When it comes to Ozpin's lies, I am of the firm belief that he had good intentions. Soo if you think he's the scorn of this earth, this might be a good time to tap out :D Now, this said I have a lot to say on the subject but I'll keep this short to stay on track (& make another unrelated post to develop my thoughts.)

In my opinion, at the core of his lies stand different beliefs. And on the subject of leadership, I think one stands out in particular and aligns with the advice he gave Ruby : the need to perform at your best to give others a reason to follow you.

Ozpin is the reincarnation of a centuries-old wizard and the headmaster of a school : what is one aspect almost every character agrees on upon meeting him ? "Oh, he's wise. He's knowledgeable. He has the answers. He has his shit together. He can tell us what to do."

Inherently, Ozpin's existence inspires respect and reassure. Just like to a child, a parent is all-knowing and unbreakable, Ozpin's status automatically give others the assumption that he knows what he's doing. And this, in my opinion, is one of the core problems of his leadership.

May it be with his inner circle, with RWBY, with ANYONE really; as soon as Ozpin reveals himself there are unspoken expectations that will chain him. He has the knowledge, he was here when it all began, he's the one calling the shots so he HAS to know exactly what to do. In that situation, breaking down and revealing to everyone how lost Ozpin is, how out of his depth... is unconceivable. And this is where Ozpin's conception of leadership becomes a problem as well. If you always perform "at your best" then you keep your doubts to yourself, you hide your sorrows and you put on a brave face. There are expectations in place that Ozpin wants (needs even) to meet. And thus the hopes of others and Ozpin's desire to fulfill them feed one another, as a perfect recipe for disaster. Because the more time Ozpin spends acting as if everything is under control, the more the expectations pile up... And coming clean about his humanity, the fact that he's just as powerless as the rest of them, becomes impossible.

And in that sense, breaking down the pedestal Ozpin had been put on was probably one of the best thing to do for his own mental health (though the method lacked a bit of compassion in my opinion xD)

The other part that somehow causes problem is how RELIANT on him his inner circle is. Despite their apparent friendship, Ozpin is the clear leader and as soon as he's out of comission, everything falls apart. Ironwood is the only one to call out Oz but in the end still wishes for the wizard to tell him what to do in period of stress. Qrow plays spy and takes order but doesn't seem really interested in stading at Ozpin's side as an equal. Glynda is stern but still defers to him etc...

All of them FOLLOW Ozpin but are just a few steps off from standing at his side. And this is something I see reflected in Ruby.

✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦

Following optimism up until it fails you

In Vol6, as secrets and lies are brought to the light, the loss of Hope that Ozpin feared so deeply happens. Is it worth it ? What are we even going to do with an immortal foe ? Maybe we should just go home. In that situation, Ruby is the simple soul who manages to keep her optimism, stand tall and say "No. We are taking the lamp to Atlas." And from then on her position as a leader and a bacon of light is reaffirmed. As Jaune put it in V4 "You gave us the courage to follow you."

Now is that, in itself, a problem ? Of course not. In fact I loved seeing Ruby come into herself and take the lead in Vol6. The problem in truth comes after, from the ramifications. From Vol6 onward, Ozpin has essentially been rid of his leader position and Ruby inherited it. And on a surface level sure, they are pretty different. Ruby is certainly closer to her partners : they're a family and they care about each other.

However, she is still clearly put at the lead. The others relied on Ruby's optimism and resilience to get to Atlas, and continue to do so. Setting foot in Ironwood's office, Blake tells Ruby "We'll follow your lead". They trust her, and whatever Ruby does... goes. They lie to Ironwood and Yang expresses some hesitations but eventually rally to Ruby's decision. And I emphasize this again : it is Ruby's decision. They did not pre-emptively discuss this as a group and then let Ruby be the spoke-person. Yang herself in Vol8 criticizes not their actions but Ruby's choices. Ruby calls the shots, Ruby is responsible for what happens, Ruby is their beacon of hope... Ruby is the new Ozpin.

Ruby has to be optimistic, and make the decisions and take risks because she's the leader. When Ruby leaves the room to break down, conversation & strategy stalls : the others don't take the lead. When things go south, it's Ruby's choices that led them here. Ever since Ruby has left Beacon, the only person who consistently encouraged Ruby to express the BAD, to share the negative has been Oscar. Even her silver eyes ask her to focus on only the happy memories to go off without a hitch ! The others comfort, they smile, they trust, they love even. But they don't want depressed Ruby finally grieving, they don't want honest "I don't know what to do" : they try to bring back confident and optimistic "we're gonna try" Ruby Rose. They want their earnest and happy but ultimately perfect leader that gives them reason to follow. In the end, even if they deeply care for her and have no shortage of warm coated reassurances for the teen, they still chain her down with their expectations. Ruby is NOT built for this. And I don't even say that in the "why is a kid calling the shots" sense, but "why is a kid put in a position where she's RESPONSIBLE for calling the shots ?"

Ruby is the youngest of the group apart from Oscar. The others should not rely on her this much to function. Blake telling Ruby that she looks up to her and that they'll follow her lead is admittedly sweet, but still builds up the pressure weighing her down. Blake calling out for Ruby's help when the teen has just been crashed to the ground by the Hound isn't even sweet anymore. They're all supposed to be equals. Blake is just as capable as Ruby. Calling out to your mind-controlled friend to bring them back from the edge is good. Calling out to your 17-old sister who's been beaten up because you need her to fight isn't.

They need to recognize that Ruby should not hold up the place alone. Because yes, they love her. But at the end of the day, Ruby is still the one bearing the weight of their decisions... Alone, even surrounded.

✦ ✦ BURNED OUT - DODIE ✦ ✦

He was certain; So was I There was comfort in her sighs

Dreams and ideas should not be the same thing You waited, smiling for this?

Oh, she'd want it, if she knew She could take it, I thought too Be careful, be cautious but you just wished harder You waited, smiling for this?

"But they love you!" Over and over, "they love you!" Thousands and thousands of eyes just like mine Aching to find who they are

"Oh, they love you!" Oh, you can feel how they love you ! Coated and warm but that's all they can do Words only get through if they're sharp

Oh, how fitting For one so fake Make me a fairy Whatever it takes

And just like a tale my dream was a scam You waited, smiling for this?

I am burnt out I smell of smoke It seeps through her cracks and so I start to choke Sentences sit in her mouth that are templated You waited, smiling for this?

Oh, maybe I'll talk about it... (maybe I'll talk about it) I can just talk about it... (I can just talk about it) I'll never talk about it... (I'll never talk about it) No, I cannot talk about it...

Don't build hope on something broken I am not cartoon. Cry for help, I am not joking I might just leave soon

[sirianhewigxiii]

Folks, I wasn’t really going to write a full-blown analysis about this entire scene - but it somehow turned into one when I started putting down a minor comment I was planning on making about xD 

But I couldn’t help it, especially since I was hoping for something like this and the show delivered something even better...

First there’s Ironwood. He’s down and defeated, both physically and most likely mentally as well. Winter dragged him into the room in handcuffs, the modified version of his weapon on her back and maybe after she had thrown him into the cell she actually even helped him lie down once she had uncuffed him - who knows, either way she had locked him up now. She ended up having to lock him up and place a barrier between them.

So back to the beginning of the scene when we first get back to the cell room after the time stop, Winter is turned towards Ironwood’s cell and she was looking at her scroll and Jaune’s broadcast.

Still what was she doing before that? Was she probably just looking at Ironwood, thinking about how things ended up the way they did? 

I don’t think there’s any regret in her whatsoever, but maybe just a little sadness about what he has become, because at least at some point in her life he probably was the father she always wanted for herself - one that was nurturing her and listened to what she had to say.

So, we first see her turned towards Ironwood and a few seconds in the camera swings to the side and we see Jacques to Winter’s left. And so far Winter hasn’t even acknowledged him in the slightest, she was looking at her scroll, most likely Ironwood before that and she wasn’t even looking at him when she brought Ironwood in. 

Mind you, Jacques is an asshole who got what’s coming to him, but remember, he has no idea about anything that is happening right now and just for a split-second imagine what it must have been like for him to see Winter coming into the room where the cells are...And not only did she just come into the room - she was dragging in the very man he had once accused of ‘stealing her from him’ at the same time.

And it looks like, in a maybe desperate attempt to get to know about what was going on or maybe just to clutch at any last straw he thought he might have, he must have gotten up and walked to the edge of his cell. Still with how WInter was ignoring him he probably hadn’t dared saying a word up until Jaune’s announcement.

And only then Winter barely looked at him to reply and she even turned around to leave halfway - the strongest reason for that most likely being the fact that she was completely unwilling to talk to him and even what reply she had given him felt constrained as if she was forcing herself to do it. 

Still at this point it looks as if she was at least somewhat trying to at least relay what was necessary to him. But here’s where this entire first shot and the positioning come to play.

Not only is there only some large distance between them, but the perspective this is shown from has the corner-projector of the cell’s wall between them and the pillar looks like a thick black line that separates Winter and Jacques. And Jacques is at the edge of the shot and occupying the lesser space of the two.

If we go full symbolic: that thick line that devides them will most likely never disappear and always be there. Jacques has messed up too badly for that to happened. He had ruined Winter’s entire youth and put her through too much shit. Winter was disinherited when she joined the military, if we do some math here it must have been when she was 21. 

She entered Atlas Academy at the age of 17, had four years of training there and enlisted once she was done. 

We can figure that she must have been already in the military for at least a year or two, since Weiss had been the heiress in her stead for enough time for word to spread around by then. (Blake already knew Weiss in V1), so make her maybe 23 in V3 and since two years have past since the Fall of Beacon she is right now 25 years-old.

So she’s now 25 and for the first 21 years of her life she has suffered through his terror, we have seen some of his behavior through Weiss’ experience, but I can imagine that while Jacques still had a tight grip on Winter, she was the one taking the brunt of his outbursts and punishments on Weiss’ and Whitley’s behalf to protect them for a much longer time by then. Part of Weiss’ and Whitley’s conversation when we first met Whitley in V4 also suggests that the two younger siblings were mostly together most of the time until Weiss first became the second heiress and later on left for Beacon. 

Coming back to Winter that means that for the majority of her life Jacques was keeping her completely isolated, probably even from her siblings - Winter’s room was close enough for Willow to figure out how the Hound was closing in on Whitley in Jacques’ office, when Weiss had to walk quite a distance from her room to the office in V4 and we’ve seen Whitley had been dropping by Weiss’ room often enough in V4 to maybe suggest that his room isn’t too far from Weiss’. 

Winter left Schnee Manor for the military completely on her own, never having had a team at the Academy that we know of, never having had any friends she spoke of or rather having been denied all of those thing from, guess who Jacques who was most likely keeping tabs on everything she did at Atlas Academy. 

The first and only friend she had probably made only after freeing herself must have most likely been Penny. Penny who of her own had a special peculiar situation that set her apart from others.

And Weiss who had most likely noticed how Jacques was trying to keep in control of Winter even at the Academy, therefore left for Beacon, while officially coming up with some other excuse he wasn’t smart enough to see through.

And while a 17-year-old Weiss, who had been the heiress since she was probably 15 only, had the chance to more freely meet people, make friends and properly heal. Winter didn’t. 

Or rather she might have healed to some extend and moved forward with her life, but she has huge scars that will always remain and never disappear and so she will never forgive Jacques for what she has been through because of him.

Still when Jacques tries to reach out in desperation and gets zapped by the barrier, Winter slowly stops and actually gives him an answer to his question, even though she still doesn’t even look at him.

 So why did she still talk to him? Why did she go out of her way to tell him that they were going to come back for him (and Ironwood) once they were done saving everybody else? Because of Weiss. 

It’s only for a second but we clearly get to see Winter’s pain when Jacques thanks her and whatever he was trying to say afterwards to weasel himself into her good graces gets immediately shut down, when Winter turns around, directly looks at him for the first time and shuts him down with the truth. 

She only looks at him because the one thing she wants him to actually understand is that she wasn’t the one saving him. She makes sure that he clearly knows that she had nothing to do with it and that it was Weiss’ decision to save his sorry ass. If it was up to her, Winter would just simply leave him to rot here and it was only at her younger sister’s request that she didn’t.

And after that Jacques knows it too. You can visibly see him simply shutting down right after and the moment he realizes it.

For the first time he might have actually become aware of how much irreparabel damage he had done to his first child (or all of his children in general).

This wasn’t what he kept thinking of as Winter just running away and being unruly or Winter having been taken away from him by Ironwood. Jacques finally realized that Winter actually truly left because of him. Because he was fucking up.

And he realized that his life means nothing to her.

Actually absolutely nothing.

[astermacguffin]

The semantic logic of AMVs

I finally finished the post I promised to @katebushstandean , so here's my contribution to the blossoming field of spn amv studies.

In this post I made about fanworks and intertextuality, I argued that AMVs can be referred to as a "discourse between discourses." What I meant by that (and I elaborated on this in the post) can be summarized in this argument structure:

(1) AMVs are typically a dialogue/discourse between a song and a show/film.

(2) A song is already a discourse of its own (i.e. it's the dialogue between music and lyrics).

(2) A show/film is already a discourse of its own (i.e. it's the dialogue between the visual and auditory elements of the show/film).

(C) Therefore, AMVs are typically a discourse between discourses.

I want to push this argument even further and argue for a more generalized theory of meaning that should (ideally) be applicable to any piece of media.

LAYING THE FOUNDATION

Let's start by analyzing at least just one medium at a time. Take music, for example. Without lyrics, how does music convey meaning at all? Now, I won't go too much into either music theory or the psychology/sociology of music (since I don't think I'll be able to give these subjects any justice anyway), but I want us to look at music more structurally/linguistically. (I am certainly not a linguist, but I am a training logician and I think it would be interesting to extract the logical/semantic relations that occur in music if we treat it as a "text".)

If we want to break down music into its smallest possible units of meaning (the same way we break down language into morphemes in morphology), then we would probably end up with notes, beats, and chords as our basic units (among other stuff, like timbre). Obviously, we cannot subject music to the same reductionist approach we do with either natural or formal languages (e.g. breaking down language into morphemes/propositions/subject-predicate relations/functions).

This is due to the fact that music doesn't really agree that much with the principle of compositionality—that "the meaning of the whole is a function of the meanings of its parts and their mode of syntactic combination." (If you disagree with Montague semantics, you might even argue that the same is true for natural languages and that only formal languages are truly compositional, but I digress). Generally, there is "more than the sum of its parts" when it comes to music; the meanings of a chord don't solely depend on the meanings of the individual notes that make up the chord.

Anyway, back to music and meaning-making.

Yip Harburg has this interesting quote on songwriting, which Adam Neely references here at this mark (15:29–16:10), a quote he originally got from Ben Levin. The quote says: "Music makes you feel feelings, lyrics make you think thoughts, songs make you feel thoughts." I think this quote best encompasses what I mean when I argue that songs are "discourses" of their own.

But even without the lyrics, music on its own is already "discursive." A single note played once doesn't really "mean" much, in the sense that we can't really gather as much meaning out of it alone. The note's relationships with other musical elements is what opens up the realms of meanings that we can attribute to it. (This concept is explored much better in here.)

The same thing is true with natural languages. Morphemes and words have meanings on their own, sure, but they don't really say that much on their own until you place them in a specific order with other morphemes/words. A single sentence is already a discourse between the units of meaning that compose the sentence.

I have been using the term "discourse" a lot, but what do I mean when I use the term? Without spending too much time explaining my own theory of discourse, let's define a discourse as a "series of discursive units." A discursive unit consists of two parts: a prompt and a response. What's important to know about responses in a discourse is that you won't really be able to fully grasp what they mean without knowing what the prompts are (i.e. what they are responding to).

When I describe song and lyrics as "discourses", what I think I really mean is that they are "discourse-like" (hence the description, "discursive"). The words of a sentence treat each other as their own prompts/responses; they're not as meaningful alone, but when taken together, meaning emerges. The same goes with music.

Taking this to a more macro scale, we can treat each episode of a show as their own discourses, and each episode "responds" to the others in some way. The harmonies, tensions, and contradictions that emerge from the "conversations" between these episodes are what we often respond to when we make fanworks (fanart, fanfics, meta, and the likes).

Generally, there are two kinds of "conversations" that happens within and among pieces of media:

The intra-discursive (the conversations that happen within a single text, like how a show's episodes converse with each other), and;

The inter-discursive (also called the intertextual, or the conversations that happen between different texts).

Now that we have established these terms and concepts, we're FINALLY talking about AMVs.

THE DEAL WITH AMVS

I've already touched upon this in my intertextuality post, but it's worth repeating. What I believe AMVs do is reveal the intra-discursive using the inter-discursive. What this means is that by making the subject text converse with other texts (e.g. by making clips from Supernatural "dialogue" with a song of your choice), you are somehow extracting the implicit discourses present in the original text.

When we talk about fanworks (and transformative works in general), we often talk about it in terms of recontextualization, as well as adding something new that wasn't there in the original text (e.g. fix-its). But a neglected aspect of fanworks that I believe AMVs bring to light is the revelatory power of fanworks, like the way it makes the people (may it be the audience or the original creators) confront the implications and implicit meanings already present in the text.

(Learn more about the semantic logic of AMVs below the cut)

Another interesting thing that AMVs do is that it often makes the subject text subservient to the song. More often than not, it's the show that has to adjust to the song; it's the show that has to be sliced and diced in order to fit the song. This is simultaneously a form of violence and a form of liberation—violent in the sense that goes against authorial intent (with "author" here used loosely to refer to the forces that brought the piece to life, may it be a single person or an entire production team) and liberating in the sense that the latent or supressed narratives are brought to light.

Even before the AMV is done, this discursive process is already made explicit by the act of editing. In most editing softwares, you get to see the timeline of your material and an explicit divide between the audio and the visual elements. The audio stream is already a discourse of its own, and the same goes with the video stream.

When you vertically slice these juxtaposed streams and cut out a portion of it, you now have what I call a "semantic moment" locked in time. We can imagine the audio being divided into these little semantic moments (e.g. the chords, a key change, a shift in dynamics or tempo, etc.) and something similar can be said with the video (e.g. vital scenes in the show). Now, a semantic moment doesn't have to be special or eventful; in fact, most of them aren't. In fact, all of experience is nothing but a series of semantic moments (i.e. moments of extractable meaning).

Now, imagine an AMV playing in front of you right now. Let's represent the audio as a series of semantic moments from A1 to An and do something similar to the video, from V1 to Vn. If we represent the flow of time from left to right, then we can talk abstractly about experiencing an AMV like this:

A1-A2-A3-A4-A5...-An

V1-V2-V3-V4-V5...-An

Every moment of our experience of the AMV can be divided into a series like this. AMVs are art objects that unfold over time: they are temporal, and therefore we cannot immediately access all parts of the semantic "discourse" of the text all at once—we have to wait for them to happen.

Let's say I want to analyze Semantic Moment number 6 because something interesting happens there: the chord suddenly shifts into a minor key while at the same time, the video shows a character turning their back to the camera. Now, there are three possible ways to handle this (none of which are mutually exclusive; we usually perform these modes of analysis simultaneously):

Vertical analysis - analyzing the discourse between A6 and V6. What meanings are brought up when we take these two elements in conjunction? What associations do we have with minor keys, with people turning around, and how these associations influence the other?

Horizontal analysis - analyzing the discourse between A6 and its earlier counterparts, A1-A5, or between V6 and V1-V5. Earlier, we have discussed that a single chord or a single word on its own doesn't mean that much; it's their relationships with other elements that bring out their "meaning space." What "narratives" or "metaphorical gestures" are brought upon when you consider these semantic moments as discourses/texts as a whole?

Diagonal analysis - analyzing the discourse between A6 and V1-V5, or between V6 and A1-A5. Here, you make the semantic moment converse with the "history" of its counterpart. What are the events that happened in the earlier parts? For example, knowing that the earlier parts of the song were in major key before the turn-around scene might influence our reading of it. Similarly, knowing that the earlier scenes depict a happy relationship might influence how we read the minor shift.

Again, we often do these analytic slices as quick as possible (and often simultaneously); it's not something that we often do consciously (unless the subject text is actually that dense and difficult). It's instinctual to us to bring up these comparisons and engage with the explicit and implicit discourses of meaning happening with any kind of text we interact with.

Now, here's where it gets more complicated. Unless the AMV in question is just a scene lifted from the show and overlaid with a song, it would usually involve a bunch of cutting and joining between different scenes/episodes. What this means is that you're taking an already temporal object and reassembling it into a new order in time. This means that we might've initially thought of as V1-V2-V3-V4-V5...Vn might actually be V3-V1-V6-V19-V8...Vn or some other permutation.

Again, this process is simultaneously violent and liberating—violent because you are destroying its intended order, and liberating because you are negating the tyranny of linearity and contiguity. What I mean by this is that people tend to focus on the discourse of the semantic moments depending on how close they are in space and time. For example, we might focus on how V1 is in dialogue with V2 and how V2 is in dialogue with V3, but the farther the semantic moments are, the less likely we are to notice their discourse.

What AMV editors do is rebel against the tyranny of this habit and bring into light the connections that might have gone unnoticed without the intervention. We often talk about how certain fanworks are more analytical than transformative (e.g. fanfics that function more as character studies and meta analyses of the source text), and there certainly is a spectrum of this among different genres of fanworks. I believe that AMVs, no matter how transformative they are, cannot help but invoke a certain analyticity in their production and reception.

And that concludes my AMV essay. I'll probably add more to this when I gather more thoughts (like how these three posts are related in some way).

Lemme know if y'all wanna hear more about my theory of discourse or something else related. Support your content creators and reblog!

[ayoalex]

Why is Team RWBY since the beginning present as a dangerous team?

Ok, before I begin this post I have to warn that:

1- I'm not an expert, this is based on my basic knowledge as someone that used to do martial arts as a kid, play a lot of video games and watch a bunch of anime/cartoon or read manga

2- This is going to be a long post, sorry 😞

3- You are always welcome to discuss in the replies or to correct in whatever I could get wrong, again I'm not an expert so don't be shy to call me out. Btw, English is not my first language so it's possible I could have some grammar mistakes.

4- Do not want to see any type of hate for any character 🤨

5- And last, decided to post this here because I prefer RWBY Tumblr community than Reddit one 💀

Let's begin!

When they present RWBY at the beginning of the project we got a glimpse of what they can do individually in the short films know as Red, White, Black and Yellow as well as some aspects of their character, backstory, etc.

As RWBY continued their journey we could see they seem as a force to be reckoned with when together but seem to be lacking in some aspects when they were alone.

The ones that didn't do better alone was mostly Ruby and Weiss while Blake and Yang seems to be able to hold their own alone (tho Blake seems to be in her flop era in the last volumes 💀).

So, let's talk about them as individual first.

Ruby: we all know her, leader of the team and the youngest of them all.

Ruby do pretty well alone when she's fighting Grimms, specially those that aren't that hard to go against. She's basically a prodigy and for that she got into Beacon earlier (and the fact she has silver eyes 😬).

She's the few people in Remnant that use a scythe as a weapon and she's pretty damn good with it; as told by a lot of character using that weapon is hard af so probs for her to be able to be so fucking smooth and amazing with Crescent Rose.

As told by Ruby herself in V1 while talking with Jaune, she did her weapon and here comes her first problem.

Not practical. Crescent Rose is a bad ass weapon and I absolutely love it but it's heavy and takes a lot to use it. It's a rifle as well so Ruby basically has to be a sniper to be able to go well with it.

It's a weapon that doesn't goes well with a team as can get in the way unless the user becomes a support for the team instead of being at front.

This is basically a metaphor of how Ruby is kinda a lone wolf at the beginning and awkward af with people.

But! She later gives some upgrades to Crescent Rose that helps her change the direction of scythe which give her adaptability! Which is completely important!

Now, if I take Crescent Rose away of Ruby what happens?

She's dead bro

Ruby is useless in close range combat, specifically physically one. We can see that in a lot of moments through the volumes.

She usually use her semblance as an advantage, which with her weapon works perfectly but without it is... Meh. It only helps her to speed up.

In Volume 5 Ozpin calls her out for that and then trains her, we then see Ruby being able to actually block and evade attacks without the use of her semblance... Until Ozpin took control of Oscar 💀

She knows basic stuffs, mostly with her defense but she lacks attack.

We don't actively see an improvement of this part in the future as she's seen to struggle keeping up with Harriet. Tho I'm going to give Ruby the fact that Harriet was being emotional and "aaahhh go crazy go stupid" In there.

Tho, Ruby lacks in this she make up by being a quick thinker and strategic.

She's the one that comes up with the plans and she's fast on her feet as well, she knows how to use her teammates perfectly to the point on coming up with duo attacks for them. She use her creativity to be able to defeat enemies as we can see at the end of V6 against the crazy old lady.

In general Ruby lacks close range fighting skills as well hand to hand combat + she can be really reckless and not actually think stuffs through it at first which can lead to disaster (she's getting better tho!)

Weiss: so... Oh boy, the ice queen comes next.

Her first actual win in a solo combat was Marrow if I remember correctly.

So here's the thing, as a solo fighter Weiss is the weakest link because she relies heavily in her semblance, get her someone that can break her aura fast and that's it, she loses.

But her semblance is really REALLY good.

Like she could stand in one place, do her thing and that's it but there's a thing... Weiss is too logical and sometimes narrow minded, her winning against Marrow was amazing and made me proud because she used EVERYTHING in that damn room to her favor. She was creative!

For her type of semblance that's important!

At the beginning she was too STIFF with her semblance but it got to the point where she has learned to be fast on her feet. Use her semblance in a better, creative way AND be a support in the team.

But now, without her semblance Weiss is a good fighter, being a mix of ballet with fencing/swordplay. Really pretty to see and then take off the damn weapon and she's pretty useless.

See a pattern here? Team Whiterose are completely useless without their weapons and semblance, mmmm

Overall Weiss is a freaking monster thanks to her semblance. She has gotten better to it, to control it and stuff, became more creative and less stiff as well as quick thinker but she needs to get better in hand to hand combat... Please, I'm begging.

Blake: ah yeah, our favorite emo cat girl.

So, Blake is crazy. That's it, that's everything I'm going to say about her.

Ok no, but seriously her fighting style is chef kiss

Blake use of her semblance is amazing, like this girl knows what she's doing when fighting.

Her weapons are great as well, like they are sword, a gun, then that freaking ribbon where she goes all Spiderman with everyone. Amazing!

Tho, she comes with an advantage that no other in her team has.

As explained by different characters in the series, Faunus has physical advantage over humans, not only some of them can see in the dark, but they seem to get some characteristics of the animal they are based off.

A good example is how agile Velvet is thanks to the fact she's a rabbit faunus or the way Sun jumps because of being a monkey faunus.

Blake being a cat faunus gives her ton of advantage, she's stealthy, agile, fast, listen better than the average human, etc

Combine that with her semblance, weapon and fighting style and you have an amazing fighter.

But Blake is reckless and that have cost her in the past. Not only that but while she seems to know only basic stuff in hand to hand combat, relies a lot in her semblance and lately she use her ribbon way too much.

That gives an opportunity to the enemy to take her out easily as we saw in her fight against Vine.

I'm going to say that Blake is generally a good fighter and probably one of the best in Team RWBY in general words but lately she seems to focus a lot in her ribbon which makes her an easy target, idk if this on purpose because Blake have always dislike her semblance or it just they don't know how to make Blake fighting style anymore but it kinda annoys me how she has been reduced to a damsel in distress in some fighting scenes.

Overall Blake is a top notch fighter and her weakness are small details that she slowly overcoming.

Yang: ah yeah, here comes my girl (stupid Tumblr mobile isn't letting me putting her name in yellow 😡)

As you guys know I'm a hoe for this girl so I will try to be objective here.

Yang is the strongest member of the team, not only physically but mentally as well.

So, by far she has my favorite fighting style of all the damn characters, I just love watching Yang fight. I think is because I did martial arts as a kid and then some kick boxing in college so idk.

Listen, this girl is so damn practical, her weapons are absolutely genius.

She's probably the few (maybe only one?) Character that actually took an existing fighting style and did her weapon around it + uses her semblance around it which is practical and smart af

Which comes to one of my favorite things of Yang, how tactical she is. Like Yang is what Ruby could be if it wasn't because of the damn weapon.

Like you guys don't get, Ruby weakness is Yang strength.

Yang since the very beginning showed us how of an amazing fighter she is. You thought Ruby is a prodigy? That Weiss is a monster? Blake is out of this world? Well Yang is fucking God.

I know I KNOW, I said I was going to be objective but it just MISS YANG XIAO LONG IS WHAT CINDER WISH SHE COULD BE, I SWEAR TO GOD, THIS GIRL IS BETTER THAN SOME OF THE ADULTS IN THE SHOW.

Ok ok ok

Yang is emotional tho, which cost her a lot (like A LOT, she lost her arm), in the past she was angry 24/7 (still is but baby got it under control 🥰). People are going to say "well not in v1, 2 and 3!".

I'm sorry but that girl has angry issues and the only moment she gets to be angry is when fighting so yeah, she would angry fight everyone and you know what? She still was an amazing fighter while doing so cuz she would kick everyone ass, being tactical about it, find her opponent weakness and absolutely looking hot while doing so.

Anyway, Yang doesn't have like a huge weakness like Ruby or Weiss, literally are small details. She's pretty much versatile as Ember Celica give her the option of shooting at her opponent. Since the beginning she was pretty much one of the best fighters of all the kids, probably coming second after Phyrra.

Her semblance use is pretty good as well, she seems to have a better grasp of it than some of the other kids and know how to manipulate it without overusing it.

Which btw is what made me have like a huge problem with V4 with the whole Taiyang stuff cuz Yang already knew how to fight like he was telling her, so idk I feel that was an insult to Yang as a character because the reason she lost her arm was because of stress, tired, being in battlefield and hello her partner is in danger.

RWBY

Now that I finished with them individually we can see that RWBY has 2 support fighters, 1 versatile and the other one a basically upfront fighter. Which comes in handy a lot of fights.

But it isn't this what makes them a formidable team but it's their chemistry.

Since the very beginning we see they do the most important thing in any type of relationship, communication.

As Weiss has her problem with Ruby at the beginning she end up talking with an adult about it and then getting call out for her poor behavior, that makes her change her approach to Ruby but before all that she did communicate Ruby what her problem was with her which made Ruby to talk with Ozpin and change her approach to study and her team as well.

We see that Yang and Blake goes well since the beginning as well, and they communicate a lot better than Ruby and Weiss at the beginning. To the point that we can see it in their teamwork.

When it comes to Weiss racism the rest of the team communicate her to stop it and then you have Blake and Weiss discussion about it where we got a glimpse of Weiss life in Atlas as well the revelation of Blake being a faunus and an ex member of the White Fang. This makes Blake run away which later Weiss criticized while telling her that they should talk first and communicate better.

The priority of RWBY as a team is communication. Ruby communicate her plans to the rest of the teams, Weiss her feelings, Blake her knowledge and Yang... Ok maybe Yang needs to work in this department.

This makes their teamwork really strong and their bond just continues getting deeper.

Add to this the fact they learn to use each other in a better way, as having both Weiss and Ruby as support helps a ton, Blake to distract their opponents and Yang to finish them off.

A good example of this is probably the train part in V6, where Yang fights all of the Grimms closely, Blake tends to fight them at some distance while helping out and Ruby with Weiss combination of support make the job hard for the Grimms.

This is exactly why JOYR had such a problem with a new Grimm, Yang needs someone to catch her back while she finds a way to destroy the Grimm which is usually provided by her teammates meanwhile RWB didn't had the boost of strength that Yang gives them in battle to be able to finish off the Hound.

Even in duos RWBY are a hard opponent to go against, probably the duo that would have a hard time is Freezerburn as we see in V3 and still I think if you put them fight together currently they would be a duo you wouldn't want to cross lol

They shouldn't have a problem with trios either but usually Yang is the strength of the group and basically the tank so is understandable that RWB had a hard time adapting without her there.

There's a part in the book Before the Dawn where Coco talks about RWBY and how they are a really strong team and even say that while JNPR aren't bad, they were basically carrying on with Phyrra since Jaune wasn't the fighter he is today. (Plus other problems that Renora have as fighters but this is something for other day).

RWBY in general has a great communication between the members, a great leadership, strong bonds and amazing fighters. They know how to adapt to each other styles and some members even complement each other (Yang and Blake).

Other thing that should be talk about its how basically Ruby and Weiss are too similar and too different at the same time to the point that they should clash a lot (which they used to do) but thanks to the fact they communicate their teamwork is amazing and in their own way they make it work.

It really helps that Ruby with Weiss can have the luxury to go upfront against an enemy while having Weiss to back her up which is something she can't do with Yang or Blake.

That's mostly because their teamwork is a metaphor of their own relationship as well as Yang and Blake teamwork is a metaphor of their own relationship.

Usually Weiss is the main support of her team since she's a large range fighter thanks to her semblance which is basically what she gives to her teammates outside of the battle.

RWBY basically fight is how they are with each other outside of the battle as we can see in multiple instances.

Yang being the tank and strength in their fighting style is exactly what Yang is to RWB, she's basically the heart and soul of the team and without her a lot of their attacks doesn't have the strength necessary for it to work as well as we can in V8 how long it took to RWB to know what to do while Yang already knew what she had to do with JOYR. She's the action.

While Ruby is the leader and sometimes call the shoot, she guide the girls through battle and help both with support and action. She usually starts the fight as a sniper until she sees an opening to fight up close which is a thing she actually do with her team. She takes a step back before talking with any of them and helps them navigate through situation in their lifes like promising Weiss to being on her side at Atlas to sometimes intervening between Weiss and her family.

Blake in the other hand is more of a wild card, she's usually Yang personal support as their styles complement each other but in most situations she does it on her own, unlike Ruby, Blake usually is more of an upfront fighter and only being support when Yang needs her which is a thing outside of battle. She usually does her own way, and while she support both Weiss and Ruby is with Yang where we see a more intimate support.

This is what makes RWBY dangerous, their bond and chemistry is something they worked hard to have as they started with difficulties, is a thing the 4 of them appreciate and love, it really helps they know how to communicate and do so to be able to have a healthy relationship between each other.

Right now we are finally seeing a lack of communication between RWBY, specially between Yang and Ruby.

As we all know RWBY is a direct parallel of STRQ which means this miscommunication between Yang and Ruby is important for their future as a team. Is implied that they still have each other back but it's necessary for Yang to open up to Ruby about what's going since this could create a breach if not treated.

Conclusion: stan RWBY and stan LOONA 😌

[carriagelamp]

Since it’s Pride Month, I decided this year I wanted to raid the library for a bunch of different queer books to read. Mostly graphic novels in this case, because I’ve had a hard time settling into much reading lately... thought hopefully now that it’s summer and I finally have my second shot I’ll be able to relax a bit more and dig into some heavier novels again. For now, enjoy some light, queer reads that I indulged in this June.

A Wolf Called Wander

A beautiful novel I had been hearing lots about. This story follows the young wolf Swift, who grows up knowing that he and his pack are the mountains, and the mountains are them. It’s in those mountains that he grows and learns and loves… until disaster strikes and he finds himself viciously torn apart from his family and forced out of the mountains that have always meant home to him. Forced to survive on his own. Swift then begins a gruelling journey that makes him face injury, starvation, and the everpresent danger of humans as he seeks a new place he can call home, and new people with whom he can form a pack.

This is all based on the true story of a tagged wolf known as OR-7, following the unbelievable route he took through Oregon and northern California! It was a very neat read, and I’d definitely recommend it if you enjoy stories told from an animal’s perspective because this book is a master class in it.

Bloom

I decided for June to try to read a handful of different queer books, and this was one of the first graphic novels I picked up. It is a super sweet story and the art is lovely. It’s about Ari, a boy who has just graduated high school and is now desperate to move away from his small town and his family’s struggling bakery, to join his band in the city where they hope to make it big. An agreement is finally reached: Ari’s father will let him leave, if he can find someone who can replace him in the bakery, which is how Ari meets Hector, someone who sees artistry and peace in baking. For anyone that’s read Check, Please, it gives off those types of vibes!

Boule et Bill: Bill est Maboul

Another book of Dupuis comics, because I can’t get enough of them! This one I just stumbled across and ended up reading on a whim but it was very cute. Geared younger than the others I’ve read, but still quite funny. It’s the charming hijinks of a young boy, his dog, and the family they live with. Each page or so is a different stand alone joke, a bit like Calvin and Hobbes except expanded beyond a single strip.

Chicken Run: Chicken Pies for the Soul

This was a ridiculous urge I got and had to follow. I recently rewatched Chicken Run (which is, of course, one of the best movies ever made) and felt the need to see if it had ever been novelized. Well, I found something better than a novelization! This is a chapter book with “advice” and stories written by the various characters, post-movie. It really does a good job with grasping the different characters’ voices and making something simple and funny out of it. It was very cute (and available on The Internet Archive if anyone else feels like reading something ridiculous!)

Doodleville

I picked this up on a whim and honestly, I shouldn’t have bothered. It was not very impressive. Very mediocre, awkward feeling artwork, and a story that only slightly manages to redeem it. The concept was kind of neat, and I did like how the ending came about, the rest was rather… plodding. I did not like the main character at all, her friends felt very Intentionally Quirky Aren’t We Cute :3 in a way that just tries too hard, and… yeah. Meh. It technically gets the “queer graphic novel flag” but it’s so in-passing that it feels rather excessive to give it that.

If you are interested, it’s about a world were doodles actually exist as living creatures that can be drawn into existence (the rather unsettling implications of which is never fully explored). This is all well and good, until the main character draws a monster and takes it with her to her art club... where it begins ravanging not only her doodles, but those of her friends. Together they need to work together to figure out how to stop this menace.

FRNCK v4

Phenomenal. I adore the FRNCK series, and book four wrapped up the first “cycle”, revealing several of the big secrets dogging the series so far, and changing how things are going to be able to run in the future.

If you haven’t seen me talk about it before, FRNCK is a graphic novel (a franco-belgian bande dessinée) about a young orphan, Franck, who’s chafing under the constant parade of uninterested foster parents that visit the orphanage he lives in. Determined to learn about his mysterious abandonment instead, he flees the orphanage… but finds himself tumbling through time, landing among a family of cave-people who rather reluctantly take him in and ensure this modern boy doesn’t die in the strange, dangerous new surroundings he finds himself in. You can get these ones in English as e-books, so if you want a really kickass graphic novel series to read please try these.

Haikyu!!

I’ve heard so much about Haikyu!! that I finally gave in and picked up the first book from the library. And I gotta say, it’s well worth the hype! This series really does capture the best parts of a good sports manga -- which is to say the team is filled with interesting, enjoyable character who all need to learn to pull together, boost each other’s strengths, and cover for each other’s weaknesses. Love me some found family tropes and this series oozes it in the best possible way. And then you also get some very cool action scenes as it makes high school volleyball seem like the most intense thing on earth. I can’t wait to continue it

Queer Eye

I haven’t been keeping up with Queer Eye but I was watching it ravenously when it first came out, and this seemed like a very cathartic book to read… and it really was. It had the same gentle, loving encouragement as the show. It doesn’t expect you to change your entire life, but to learn to embrace who you are, and take small steps to enhance those things. There a segment written (presumably) by each member of the Fab Five, explaining the mentality behind what they do on the show and how you can grow in those areas too. It’s very zen.

Spinning

I got this graphic novel out at the same time as Bloom, but it was the one that interested me less of the two... though that’s just because I have less interest in “real world” slice of life as a genre and this one is meant to be autobiographical. If you’re into that, you’ll probably love this because it really is stunning. Very pretty, and the format and pacing is all really well done. It’s a coming of age story for Tillie as she grows up dealing with a crosscountry move, complicated friendships, a burgeoning attraction to girls, and attending competitive figure skating classes.

This Place: 150 Years Retold

A stunning and heart-wrenching graphic novel told by a collection of different First Nation’s authors/artists, recounting oral histories about the 150 years since the colonialist formation of the country known as “Canada”. In other words, this is a post-apocalypse story, but one that really happened and that entire peoples are still fighting to survive. It’s very eye opening and beautifully told. Very strongly recommend the read, especially if you’re at all interested in history.

Torchwood: Serenity

Whoops, not technically a book. I had thought these were technically audiobooks at first, but rather they’re audio dramas that were played on the radio. Still, I decided to include one because I’ve been listening to them like a person possessed and they’re too fun not to at least mention. Let me indulge in my obsessions.

If you don’t know Torchwood, it’s a BBC series that spins-off from Doctor Who, focusing on the enigmatic and flirtatious Captain Jack Harkness, who is running the covert organization known as Torchwood, which is tasked to protect humanity from and prepare them for alien contact. It’s goofy and campy but also more adult and heavy than Doctor Who tends to get, so it is (in my opinion) a really fascinating series. Though it also has content warnings coming out the wazoo so maybe make sure it’s for you before delving in.

Serenity specifically is possibly one of the best Torchwood stories I’ve ever experienced. The Torchwood team concludes that there’s an undercover alien hiding in the idyllic gated community Serenity Plaza, and so that means it’s up to Jack and Ianto to go undercover as a happily married couple and flush out the alien without being discovered first. Even if it means being sickly sweet together, pretending to care about the local neighbourhood barbecues, and actually caring a bit too much about the Best Front Lawn competition. What is truly magical about this one, is that it manages to make it a Fake Dating AU despite the fact that Jack and Ianto are actually dating in canon. But they’re both used to dating as a pair of alien hunters with insanely dysfunctional lives, and who now need to figure out how to deal with domesticity. It is marvellous.

Wilderlore: The Accidental Apprentice

A middle grade novel that felt a bit like a cross between Harry Potter and Pokemon. It’s about orphan Barclay Thorne who wants nothing more than to be accepted in the rule-bound village of Dullshire, and live up to his apprenticeship as a mushroom farmer. He certainly wants nothing to do with the fearsome Beasts who live beyond the village, deep in the Woods or the sinister Lorekeepers that bond with them. It was, after all, a Beast that had killed his parents all those years ago. But when he finds himself at the very edge of the forest, hunting for an elusive mushroom, he is suddenly unable to avoid any of that. Not when a wild girl and her bonded dragon appear to summon a horrible Beast and end up getting Barclay bonded to it instead. Now, if Barclay ever wants to be welcomed back into his home, he has no choice but to venture into the Woods and find a way to sever the bond imprisoning him to the massive, monstrous wolf now imprinted on his body as a living tattoo.

I honestly can’t decide how I felt about this one. I feel like it’d be a really fun read for maybe a grade 5 to 7 student? I was a bit more meh about it. It was fine, but it was very hard not to draw unfavourable parallels to Harry Potter. But for a kid who’s never read Harry Potter? Or even an adult that has but is looking for something different to scratch that itch, this might be a good book to try. I’ll probably try reading the second book when it comes out.

[onewomancitadel]

I mean it’s like I got that ask the other day about R/WBY turning around and doing something mean with the story despite its thematic predictability, I'm not even sure if the storytellers are even aware... there are enough people to upset and subvert no Knightfall/Cindemption with. Like if anything it’s the path that you go if you want to be creative and individual knowing it might upset people.

Like, broadly speaking most people don’t think of Cinder as being that important or relevant (this is even true in-universe: the other baddies don’t really like her or care about her; Ruby doesn’t hold personal enmity towards her, the only person who does is Jaune, now Winter, which I think is some foiling/Maiden sisterly conflict; Cinder was important to Emerald because Emerald needed affection but could never get it from her, it was transactional, Emerald is free now). 

It’s even true of Jaune, Jaune is either the macho self-insert character or the dismissed comic relief. He does have funny moments and he is silly and cute but he’s also serious at times and has a serious moral quagmire to navigate. He’s had a serious shock to his identity.

So both of them are characters, if you want to do something seriously cool and unique, to... well... you know what this blog is about and what I never shut up about.

Most people only pay attention to the allusions, they don’t pay attention to the R/WBY fairytales for their narrative importance, or most of all Salem/Ozma. The allusions don’t really give structure to the direction of the story, in R/WBY now they’re basically obeying the fairytales of that world in the way they’re being retold. It’s very simplistic to my mind, especially for how it plays into the themes of the importance of stories, but yeah.

The Indecisive King is a really curious fairytale to include, because it’s about the last Relic and by extension the last Maiden, and there’s the implication that the crown is sort of a curse as well as a blessing - much like the Maidens being tied to the Vaults and the Relics are a curse. It’s already significant on that front alone because it gives us some thematic sense of what will happen later in the story... the fact that it has all of the potential Knightfall connections is the icing on top. 

I also think that this is pretty early architecture to set up for the ship (speaking specifically about V4/5) because it’s a slowburn like the other R/WBY ships. I think Knightfall is probably late in the game if it happens. It starts with Salem/Ozma, it ends with them (and is a rebirth/new beginning).

So yeah... Knightfall is a very different and unique and exciting ship, I’m not sure they’re trying to do any breadcrumbs for shippers lol, or even aware they might be ‘subverting’ something if they don’t do it. If they don’t do it, it’s just a regular story - Jaune ends up alone or with a character like Weiss, same old same old, Cinder probably dies alone. We’ve heard that one before many times over.

[toooldforfandom-liveblogs]

RWBY V08E01 - Divide

V8 is here!

Sadly, the hype I had for V7 is nowhere to be found this volume. V7 left me cautious. The way it used social injustice as little more than window dressing while doing nothing to address it was enough to leave a bad taste in my mouth, and has ended up being the only season I didn’t immediately rewatch or seek reactions to it. Hell, I still haven’t listened to the soundtrack.

But, weird issues aside, it’s still RWBY and I’m still excited to watch it so here we are! Let’s do this!

Note: I’ve managed to remain mostly unspoiled with the sole exception of hearing this volume is supposed to take place over two days, so yay?

Of all the things I expected this season to start with, Cinder's backstory wasn't one of them. That girl is Cinder, right? Cinderella and all that.

Yyup, Cinder. Wow, seven seasons before giving her a slightly more tangible backstory, maybe to humanize her a bit? Bold strategy, considering everything she's done, let's see how it plays out.

Neo has to be questioning her choices really hard. I know she's on the revenge path but it's one thing to work with Cinder and another to fly directly into a flying Grimm whale.

It's interesting that they chose to have a similar intro as in Volume 4, with someone who doesn't quite know what they got into. Back then it was Emerald and Mercury watching the pools of Grimm, now it's Neo walking into a giant whale.

Neo knows what Cinder is capable of. She's seen her maiden powers first hand. Hell, she knows how charming her personality is. And now she's seeing her kneel before someone. Can't be confidence inspiring.

Tsk, tsk, Neo, I expected she'd know by now her place in Cinder's ranking.

oh god no, please not another failed hug

What's the opposite of a glow up? Because Hazel went through that.

I'm intrigued. The glimpse of Cinder's past where she was completely powerless and now this dressing down. Is she lying through her teeth right now or does she genuinely believe that since Salem presumably rescued her from her previous life?

Interesting choice to not only hide her eyes behind her hair but to also present her Grimm side to the camera while she's saying this, hiding her expression even further.

Salem seems more evil than usual, but maybe she's just on the top of the world after having acquired a relic and having her army on Atlas' doorstep.

I can't quite tell what I'm looking at here. Maybe another angle of Atlas? It looks really weird from the side.

First faunus with animal hands? I guess Ghira had retractable claws.

They are looking quite calm considering there's a giant whale in their sky. Unless they can't see it. They are in a hole surrounded by stone after all. But still, it'd be interesting characterization to have them so used to being screwed over by life that they saw the giant whale and went "Huh. I guess it's Tuesday."

Weiss would definitely know about that.

I'm curious about the coordination that's been happening behind the scenes. How does she know that's a friendly ship?

I guess at least some time has passed, since Yang, Blake and Penny aren't with them.

Very inconspicuous to destroy a droid.

Not a lot of time though, since Ren is still brooding alone. Very intrigued by the picture in the background.

Nothing says that the time for silly shenanigans is gone better than this.

I guess enough people saw Pietro and Maria running around to make them fugitives. On the bright side, it still says "detain," not "kill"

Ironwood literally shot a child, that's pretty important information to keep secret. Even if he is the child who got shot. How long before this bites someone in the ass?

I wonder if the couple in the background are the founders of the happy huntresses. The one with the eyepatch looks a lot like Robyn, enough to maybe be her mom?

Also makes it a lot easier to threaten with overwhelming force to get something from Ironwood but I guess he already gave them up.

Uuh, I like this.

I thought that after V5 the team wouldn't separate again. And if the season is really going to cover just a couple of days, it almost doesn't count. So, it keeps the all the character development from V4 and V5 (that the team is their home) but gives them enough time to breath on their own.

It's also interesting that they seeded this during the last season. RWBY has shown some long term planning but this makes all the in-fighting and arguments from the last season make sense.

If they do split up, I think Blake would go with Ruby. She's always been on the pragmatic side of things. And it adds more drama to split her from Yang, last season was all about how well they work together (and flirting). Hopefully this'd mean that she'd talk with Ruby more than once this season.

It looks like Ren is joining team Yang, which would leave Nora with Ruby if only because they seem to need to do their own thing right now. I'm not sure how it'd fit with Nora's interest in Mantle though.

Everyone else I'm not sure about.

Weiss could go either way. Maybe she feels guilty about Mantle or maybe she feels like she could help infiltrate the military compound. Although that could lead her to meet Winter which I doubt she wants right now. Maybe she's too recognizable to help Ruby.

I think Penny is going to go team Yang. Protector of Mantle after all. And it'd make Ruby's arc more interesting to have less of her usual friends next to her.

I feel Oscar would make more sense in the infiltration side of things and warning the world seems like something Ozpin would try to do.

Jaune I have no idea. Maybe whatever team doesn't get Weiss?

yup

Okay, easy guesses out of the way.

Oh, honey.

Yesss, personal feelings.

Damn, she looks incredibly badass.

Huh.

I guess Weiss is going with Ruby then.

This is tense! I actually had a moment of dread the second everyone noticed it was Penny's scroll.

And Penny just had her remaining faith in Ironwood completely destroyed.

I can already see this season is going to break my heart again.

Harriet is literally pouting. Probably pretty humiliating to have been beaten by some academy dropouts.

Welp, only a human leg left.

Feels pretty on the nose to have him literally lose part of his human body to show how he's been losing his humanity.

Well, that took a turn.

I'm glad they are taking a possible redemption (other than death) completely off the table for Ironwood. I know shooting Oscar was bad but no one knows about that. There's no way to hide this.

Those are not the expressions of people thinking "huh, maybe I'm doing the wrong thing here"

Hm. I guess Oscar is getting kidnapped. By a Grimm?

Is this the first time a RWBY season premiere doesn't have a fight? I think it is, even V5 had Yang punching someone. Not that I'm complaining, I do like talky episodes.

My first thought after the first scene with Salem and company was that there were at least a couple of players not entirely happy with their situation. Cinder is somewhat of a mystery but Neo is way over her head and obviously not happy about being an "asset." Emerald got rebuffed again even after spending two seasons crying for Cinder.

There's a parallel between Salem and Cinder, and Cinder and Emerald I assume is intentional. If Salem rescued Cinder from her Cinderella situation, the similarities would be even more visible, with Cinder giving Emerald a life outside of simple survival. However, while Salem is firm about Cinder's position as a pawn, she does value her. She knows how to play that particular game of emotional give and take. Cinder doesn't. She has never shown Emerald any appreciation. How much further can she push Emerald before she accepts Cinder doesn't care about her?

I'd say Emerald is prime material for turning sides but I wonder... we haven't had a death on the enemies side yet. Even Watts survived. Emerald could be the first. Maybe to show how far gone Cinder is, or as revenge from Neo. And the death of someone who's at least doubting they are in the right place would hit harder that someone who is drinking Salem's kool-aid.

Anyway. I feel this first episode set-up a comparison between all three sides. Salem's forces hate each other, the "good guys" split but they still like and respect each other.

Somehow Salem's downfall (or slowing down?) this volume is going to be tied to the RWBY and JNPR teams working together and trusting each other despite their differences. Which, well, duh, but still.

Ironwood's are a bit more vague, they seem to be solidifying behind him but I'm not sure where it's going yet. Maybe Marrow could defect? Although that still seems like the too-obvious choice. In any case, freeing Qrow and Robyn would be good first step by whoever ends up switching sides.

I'm curious about a lot of things (What's going to be Penny's arc this volume?) but I think that's all for now. Until next time!

[orhelponefaintingrobin]

The Irredeemable Witch

Back in my first RWBY theory/analysis a few months ago, I mentioned that one of my theories as to how the fight against Salem will end is that she’ll end up being, in some way, redeemed. I want to expand on that here, because I’ve been thinking about it again recently.

(Some minor V8 spoilers here, so I’m putting it under a cut again)

One thing that RWBY, in my opinion, has been playing a lot with, especially since Volume 4, is the idea of who is good and who is not. In the first few volumes, the heroes and villains were pretty cut and dry. The closest to ambiguity we got was, like, Ironwood always seemed like a bit of a macho military man, but even then it’s only in hindsight that you can see the seeds of what he’s ended up becoming. Emerald and Mercury, despite RWBY and JNPR thinking they were friends, were introduced literally murdering a guy, Cinder and Torchwick and Adam were always obviously evil. Everyone else was pretty obviously on the side of good; even though you had your arseholes like Cardin, they were still broadly working on the same side as our heroes, when push came to shove. The White Fang were pretty inarguably terrible, just a bunch of terrorists. But, since V4, those lines have blurred an awful lot.

The White Fang are a great example; the show started becoming increasingly sympathetic to at least some of them; in the first few volumes, we got Adam and the guy with the chainsaw, in V4/5, we got Ilia. Even further than that, it turns out Adam’s group was a bit of a splinter group, going too far even by the rest of the organisation’s standards. Certainly when you see how Ghira spoke about Sierra, while he obviously disagrees with her, he doesn’t seem to think she’s a monster, and she certainly didn’t approve of Adam’s actions. And now, presumably back under Ghira’s leadership, the Fang, or at least its replacement, is likely going to be more of a force for good, likely coming to help in Atlas.

Past that, we’ve had more good guys turning bad; Lionheart working with Salem, and Ironwood’s, well… everything. Winter and the Ace-Ops are blurring that line; they say they think they’re doing good, but very clearly they don’t believe that deep down despite following their orders anyway. And we’re seeing people initially antagonistic proving not to be as much. The Happy Huntresses are shown in opposition to RWBY et al, but they’re now on the same side. Emerald and Hazel are turning on Salem. And even the more obvious villains, some of them are getting some depth; it’s definitely getting harder to see Cinder as pure evil knowing what’s brought her to this point.

This show is blurring these lines all the time, and I think the message is clear; people aren’t good or evil, people are people, and they make choices, and those choices can do a lot of good, or a huge amount of harm, but people are able to evolve and move past those choices. Again, Emerald is introduced as part of an actual murder. You can debate whether or not she physically was the one who killed him, but she was there, and she didn’t exactly seem shaken by it; they’d clearly done that before, and they seemed fine with that. But now she’s realising there are other options, and in making that decision, seems to have been quickly accepted as an ally by JNR and Oscar. She’s more than those past actions.

And thinking about that, I quickly came back to Salem. See, I rewatched Volumes 1-7 before V8 started last year, and getting to Salem’s backstory in V6, I noticed something specific about that episode that got me thinking. Ozma’s question to Jinn was “how do I destroy Salem?”. Not even ‘how do I stop’, but ‘destroy’. I had some thoughts about that at the time, but it wasn’t until this episode that those pieces started to fall into place again, in a more solid way.

When I started thinking about this today, I realised that the real turning point for Salem was Ozma taking the children and leaving, and, more importantly, it’s significance from his point of view; he gave up on her. Ozma was obviously right that Salem was going too far, that what she was doing was wrong, but he decided that she couldn’t change, that she was beyond saving. And he seems to have retained that belief through all his lives since.

And it got me thinking, made me realise that, despite seeing all these character arcs, all these stories showing that people are not inherently good or evil, that people are able to make different decisions and change, is that it’s very easy to exclude Salem from that. It’s very easy to see Salem as uniquely evil, uniquely irredeemable, but… Is she? 

I mean, I don’t think the Brothers thought so; their punishment to her wasn’t just ‘you don’t get to die’, it was ‘you live until you learn the importance of life and death’. That isn’t just a punishment, it’s a test (they seem to like those…). And it’s not like we don’t see any light slip through; she was certainly not great when her and Ozma were pretending to be gods, she was doing bad things, but she certainly seemed to have genuine affection for Ozma and their children. If she’d embraced that, instead of fixating on control, her and Ozma probably could have been genuinely happy. The truth is, I don’t think Salem has ever been pure evil, any more than anyone else in this show is.

But no one’s considered that. Even Ozma, the person who should know her better than anyone on Remnant, could only see an end by destroying her, and if he can’t do that, then just delaying the inevitable as long as possible. But, if we can accept that RWBY is showing us that the line between good and evil is in a person’s decisions, if people like Emerald, Hazel, even, potentially down the line, Cinder, can make decisions and choose to change, why can’t Salem?

This is, right now, my primary theory as to how the fight against Salem will end. Someone, presumably Ruby and probably with some input from Oscar/Ozma too, will manage to get Salem to realise what the Brothers wanted to teach her; the importance of life and death, and, more broadly, to realise that she was wrong. Ozma, all those years ago, before even he started to lose faith, was right, humanity was capable of creating something great, and its continued existence is worthwhile. 

And, like, Salem’s motivation for wanting to destroy everything does really seem to be that she just wants to die, so if the only way she can die is by learning that lesson, then presumably she’s got to learn that lesson at some point.

As for what happens after that? I mean, that COULD just be how the show ends, in however many volumes it takes to get to that point. I’ve also seen it suggested that the show could end with some rebellion against the Brothers, in which case I think Salem joining the good guys for that fight would make a lot of sense; they’d need some firepower in that fight, and Salem’s got a lot of it; maybe fighting alongside Oscar, and the maidens, the reincarnations of their whole family.

I obviously don’t have all the details worked out, but the core of what I’m saying is this; I don’t think Salem is at all irredeemable, and especially in a show about breaking cycles and the newer generation making better decisions than the old, Ruby and her friends showing Salem a path back to the light, rather than seeking to destroy her like those that came before, seems like exactly the sort of ending that would make sense for this story.

[misstrashchan]

Since @im-the-king-of-the-ocean did a post about what TMA fear entities the RWBY characters are aligned/avatars of, I’ve been itching to do one myself because as a result of overlapping hyper fixations I think about this A LOT

The basic concept is that avatars in TMA become what they fear most or embrace a fear they have developed the most complex relationship with that plays into their motivations and drive as a character. What negative impulses they have to constantly fight themselves on, the shape of the monster that lives in their heart.

To quote the RWBY song Fear, “But our greatest fear will be realised, if we fall and lose ourselves to fear, we’ll become what we’ve feared all our lives” yeah that’s a very loose definition of what becoming an avatar is.

Since MAG s5 has proven that you can be an avatar of more than one fear, (Like Martin serving both the Eye and the Lonely) some of the RWBY characters might have more than one, but I’ll try to limit it to two to avoid getting complicated, but at the end of the day it’s all fear soup, we might categorise them according to Robert Smirke’s 14, but they all bleed into one another, like Gerard’s colour analogy in 111:

GERARD

I always think it helps to imagine them like colours. The edges bleed together, and you can talk about little differences: “oh, that’s indigo, that’s more lilac”, but they’re both purple. I mean, I guess there are technically infinite colours, but you group them together into a few big ones. A lot of it’s kind of arbitrary. I mean, why are navy blue and sky blue both called blue, when pink’s an entirely different colour from red? Y’know? I don’t know, that’s just how it works.

And like colours, some of these powers, they feed into or balance each other. Some really clash, and you just can’t put them together. I mean, you could see them all as just one thing, I guess, but it would be pretty much meaningless, y’know, like… like trying to describe a… shirt by talking about the concept of colour.

O-Of course, with these things it’s not a simple spectrum, y’know, it’s more like –

ARCHIVIST

An infinite amorphous blob of terror bleeding out in every direction at once.

GERARD

Now you’re getting it.

ARCHIVIST

Like colours, but if colours hated me. Got it. 

Ruby Rose: The End. The fear of death itself, uncaring and unstoppable. Man this was hard to think about but I have a lot of Big Feelings about this one. Initially I really, really wanted to give Ruby the Eye simply because “can laser beam monsters with their eyeballs once they become powerful enough” and there is a fascinating overlap in how the Beholding powers and Silver Eyes function in the same way, (especially in how Cinder being exposed to the Silver Eyes fills her with an overpowering fear and reopens old wounds from trauma that have never properly healed; which is VERY similar in the psychological affect Jon’s has on his victims when he Beholds them) they’re both direct enemies/opposites to the Dark that expose their enemies/victims true nature and destroying them in the process at times. Only one feeds on fear and the trauma of others while the other feeds off of hope and love (Gerard says there’s no such thing as an avatar of hope and love, clearly he’s never heard of Ruby). 

But nope! The fear and nature of the Beholding just doesn’t really match with Ruby at all. She isn’t driven by a need of knowledge, nor does she fear being watched, followed or having her secrets exposed. The End though? Death itself? Ruby outright states that’s her biggest fear in volume 5 to Oscar “It doesn’t matter if you’re standing in Salem’s way or not. She’ll kill anyone. And that, scares me most of all” to me Ruby’s fear of death itself is projected onto Salem here, I think. It’s uncaring, unstoppable, it doesn’t discriminate, and it could come for the people she cares about at any time. What matters though is the context she says this is in explaining her motives to Oscar. Her whole life has been shaped by her inability to process death, her relationship with grief, all starting with the tragic and abrupt death of her mother Summer as a child. She’s also surrounded by a lot of death motif too, the hooded cape, mostly wearing black, the giant grim reaper scythe. She’s the End. 

Of course, her being an Avatar of the End means having to imagine the worst version of Ruby, one that is fully consumed by that fear. Avatars of the End are not malicious or destructive in nature but instead are… very apathetic. They don’t need to seek out victims to feed off of, nor do they have a ritual, because the End comes for all. And that fits with what Ruby would be like if that fear fully consumed her. It’s more or less established in vol6 during the apathy arc when she tries so hard to fight against their influence and how horrified she is when everyone around her falls prey to it. Giving up, not caring, accepting the inevitable demise of everyone and yourself? Ruby was terrified of that. And when looking at the vol8 opening where we see Ruby being dragged down by what looks like the arms of the apathy? She fights the hardest against it because it’s what she’s most afraid of, but because of her inability to process her grief properly is ultimately what will make her the most vulnerable to it when she’s pushed to her limit. All Salem needs to do to break Ruby is to remind her of Summer’s death. Not even what actually happened to her or how she died, just the death itself. Hell, the first time we see Ruby in the Red trailer, she’s at her mother’s grave, the first verse in Red like Roses that’s about Ruby “Red like Roses fills my dreams and brings me to the place you rest” in which we come to understand that the “Red like roses” lyrics in both part one and two of the song is referring to Summer’s abrupt death which Ruby apparently dreams about, which brings to mind Oliver Banks, our most prominent Avatar of the End, whose first statement to The Magnus Institute in 011 (underneath the fake alias of “Antonio Blake”) is concerning how he started dreaming about the deaths of others, which he didn’t begin to take seriously- until it was his father that he saw in his dream. Upon which Oliver realised how terrifying death really was and that fear began to consume him. 

Okay I’ve probably gone off long enough about this but yeah. Ruby is the End. I mean, she also just got a song in the v7 soundtrack called Until the End 

Weiss Schnee: The Lonely. The fear of isolation, of being completely cut off and alone or disconnected from the rest of society. I don’t really have to go too deeply into this one. It’s pretty cut and dry. “The loneliest of all”? And the Schnees basically are the Lukas family. Actually thinking about it the Lukas’ are actually somewhat better? They were the only ones in the whole of TMA that understood to raise a child to be an heir/avatar of their fear they needed room to reject it or actively choose it, even if that had an 80% success rate. Both are still awful though. (Damn, I can’t believe Jaques is an actively worse parent than an eldritch fear avatar)

When Weiss comes back to Atlas in v4 she’s more aware of her loneliness than ever, feels more aware of how she and atlas high society as a whole is disconnected from the rest of the world and its struggles. Whitley commenting on her being in her room for months implies she’s purposefully been isolating herself during this time as well, in order to avoid her family members “A pleasure to see you out of your room for a change” (sidenote; the fact that whenever Whitley shows up it always catches Weiss off guard, like she didn’t even notice his presence until he wanted her too. That’s. That’s a BIG Lonely thing. Given Peter’s siblings eventually ran away and he was the only heir I can imagine Peter being what Whitley would end up like if no one intervenes)

I’d say they might also be an possibility of the Stranger due to her struggling to find her own identity and inability to recognise oneself, but that can be an aspect of the Lonely too, as we see when Martin is in a house that is a domain of the Lonely in s5, and is unable to recognise himself in the mirror or recall who he is.

What I do have to say about this is it’s pretty interesting considering at this point in the show Weiss’ relationship with loneliness is actually somewhat healthy and something she can use to relate to and help others. She understands other people’s loneliness, that Blake in v5 needed space and in time she’d come back, and Weiss would be ready to be there for her when she did. And she also understands Yang’s loneliness in the same volume and that she needed someone there to support her.

“But you’re right. I don’t know loneliness like you do. I have my own version. And I bet  Blake has her own version too.” 

Speaking of Blake…

 Blake Belladonna: The Stranger, I Do Not Know You. The fear that you cannot trust the perception of yourself or of others. The creeping sense that something isn’t right. I considered the Spiral, but the Stranger and the Spiral overlap more than any other two entities so I’m just gonna go with the Stranger. Especially with her semblance being a metaphor for disassociation, a coping mechanism for the abuse and gaslighting from her relationship with Adam being kind of the biggest thing here, since the Stranger and Spiral deal with that a lot. She literally creates false copies of herself, shadow clones which she uses to feint, distract and evade. As well as statues/mannequins when dust is involved, which the Stranger is known for manifesting. Her fighting style centres around misdirection, stealth and fooling people’s senses. She also used to be part of the White Fang, known within Sienna and Adam’s faction to wear the masks of monsters, appearing anonymous. And she literally disguises her identity as a Faunus in order to escape the White Fang and enroll at Beacon. Blake at first was hesitant to trust and rely on the others in the earlier volumes, to let her guard down, and when she finally did, the worst happened and her fears were proven right. In s2 Jonathan becomes more paranoid due to being marked and in close daily proximity to the Stranger (as Not-Sasha), much like how Blake in v2 becomes far more paranoid and less trusting of her team. She also does seek knowledge or answers even at the cost of her wellbeing, which is an Eye thing, but Blake’s desire for knowledge and answers isn’t really consistent or important enough with her character and motives beyond vol2 for me personally to consider her an Avatar of it, but I do think she is Eye aligned. 

Yang Xiao Long- The Eye. The Ceaseless Watcher, It Knows You, as well as The Hunt. For the Eye, the first time we see Yang is her trying to find information on her mother, and we see Raven in bird form at the beginning too, as she has followed Yang her whole life, never actually interacting or doing anything for her, just… watching her. We learn in vol2 that her search for answers surrounding her mother has been a part of her entire life, almost overwhelmingly so to the point where in her childhood she and Ruby nearly lost their lives to the Grimm when she decided to journey to a shack in the woods she thought would lead to clues in finding her mother. She is adamant because of that experience to never let her need for the truth and answers control her, but it is a need that is always there. When she finally meets Raven, she’s encouraged to “start questioning everything she knows” which, she does. Questioning and knowledge is a big part of Yang’s character, even now. She’s the one who questions Ozpin the most, as well as Raven herself, and in the recent volumes is the one who challenges and questions Ruby’s leadership the most. There’s also a moment in vol7 of her drawing parallels between herself and Robyn and relating to her when she says “I won’t stop until I find out the truth” Her being the one to take the relic of knowledge is hugely significant in this too, especially given the context that she acquires it right after confronting her mother, getting the answers she’s searched for her whole life, holding an artefact possessing infinite knowledge, and she sinks to her knees and cries because there is no sense of closure, that anything is better because of her knowing who and what her mother is, and that her choosing this path might have cost her ever having a relationship with Raven (which is more Raven’s fault of course, and Yang knows that, but that’s not how she’s feeling at that exact moment). 

For the Hunt, this one’s a bit simpler. The thrill seeker aspect to Yang’s character and motives in becoming a huntress and enjoying the chase and fighting in of itself. There’s another element in that as most Avatars of the Hunt start out as monster hunters who then develop the need to hunt and kill monsters, and gradually what qualifies as “monster” starts to blur more and more as they become consumed by the need and thrill of the chase and hunt itself. I bring this up because in vol3 Blake draws parallels between Yang and Adam after she is disqualified for attacking and injuring Mercury, worries with how familiar this all feels and that Yang might turn out the same as him (and just for the record Adam is a full blown Avatar of the Hunt, and the Slaughter too most like) 

 “I had someone very dear to me change. It wasn’t in an instant, it was gradual. Little choices that began to pile up. He told me not to worry. At first they were accidents, then it was self-defence. Before long, even I began to think he was right. This is all just… very familiar.” What Blake describes is… kind of similar to Basira’s relationship with Daisy with how Daisy, an Avatar of the Hunt, would justify to Basira and explain away how the violence and murders she committed as being for the greater good. 

Also just one more, because I have to

 Pyrrha Nikos: WebwebWEBWEB. Hoo boi Pyrrha is the Webbiest of Web Avatars as they come. Her whole character’s themes surrounding destiny, control and agency, feeling like her whole life had been decided for her, the fact she’d been blessed with incredible talents and opportunities meant she was supposed to be a huntress, the fact her talent as a world champion meant she was placed on a pedestal without her realising, becoming separate from the people who placed her there in the first place, that Ozpin and his inner circle tell her she has been chosen as the next Fall Maiden, but the method in which she must become so might result in the loss of her identity, that though they ultimately leave the choice to her do pressure and manipulate her into it. The idea of destiny being a predetermined fate you can’t escape is Pyrrha’s greatest fear, and rejects that idea in that she will not let her life be manipulated but will be the one to take control it instead, which is manifested in her having a semblance that she uses to subtly control and manipulate her surroundings. As Cinder puts it, “People assume she’s fated for victory when really she’s really taken fate into her own hands”.  

[nights-lament]

RWBY Volume 8, Chapter 1 Thoughts and Opinions

HELLO, INTERWEBS!!! At long last, we are back with more RWBY, and with it, more RWBY Thoughts and Opinions! After the absolute roller coaster that was Volume 7's cliffhanger finale, I can not imagine the insanity that awaits us this Volume. So, without further ado, here are my various thoughts and opinions on Chapter 1 of RWBY Volume 8, "Divide"

SPOILERS BELOW:

Hmm, starting off with a mysterious woman scrubbing floors, and...wait, is that...no...

I really like the way they juxtapose Cinder scrubbing with her scratching the chair. Very symbolic.

Yick, something about organic architecture just gives me the willies. I mean, is the whale aware that they double as a building complex? Can they feel the diabolical ongoings of it's rib cage? Creepy stuff.

Oof, outright taking credit for grabbing the relic, Cinder? Yeah, no way that's going to bite you in the ass.

Oh my. Mercury, Emerald, AND Hazel have new looks this season. I'm sure I'll warm up to them eventually, but right now Emerald's and Hazel's aren't really doing this. For Hazel, the outfit is all right, but the hair is a bit boring compared to his originals. Mercury's is ok, but is it just me, or is he basically wearing Yang's V4-6 outfit? I mean, it works, but still.

"Without you, I am nothing." That...didn't sound like the first time she's said that. It almost sounds like something Salem's drilled into her head for years. Cinder may be irredeemable in my opinion, but I do love a good tragic backstory.

You know, I guess would make sense for the crater to be the slums area. Can't imagine living directly under a floating landmass would be considered prime real estate.

Ooh, this old man has badger paws. I don't think we've seen that kind of Faunus trait yet.

D'aaww, Nora gave Oscar a soft hug rather than her usual glomp. So cute ^-^

I'm interested in how Oscar not telling them about Oz is going to play out.

Ok, their is a lot going on in this bar-base worth talking about, but for some reason I am fascinated by the picture of (i'm assuming) the founders in the background. What interesting designs they have. I feel like they have a story, and I would like to hear it.

Penny's dejected demeanor is giving me all of the feels Q_Q

Not sure how I feel about the rift forming between RWBYJNRO, though I guess we'll have to see where it goes. At least we have people like Jaune playing mediator.

I will say, though, I look forward to seeing Ren and Nora apart. As much as I love them as a couple, I'd very much like to see them operate as individuals.

God, Ironwood trying to manipulate Penny like that.

And there it is. Ironwood has truly revealed his true feelings, and his motivation for his attempt to launch Atlas. He isn't making a tactical retreat in order to form a new plan altogether. He's abandoning the fight altogether, leaving Remnant to die so that he and Atlas can live. It's funny, he wanted to avoid becoming Lionheart, but he was a coward too.

"Everything that follows will be on your hands". That motherf-

You know, we don't see a lot of corpses on this show, do we? Penny got better, Amber's screentime ended as she died, Roman got eaten, Pyrrha got an express viking funeral, etc, and a lot of others were only corpses for seconds before we never saw them again. They did a good job selling how proper dead Clover is here.

Ok, I don't know squat about Hospital layouts. Is it normal to have the morgue right outside of an emergency room? I mean, I guess it saves some travel time should things go wrong, but still, seems like a great anxiety generator for the patient, especially with both rooms having windows. "That's where I'll be going next."

I like the new metal arm. The fact that you can see all of the internal stuff makes it feel like it was quickly put together for the sake of urgency, while still looking cool.

Man, that rendition of "Hero" in the background. Chilling.

Is Winter getting a new look already? I must say. I like the look of the braces, and the ponytail is a vast improvement over the bun.

JESUS H CHRIST IRONWOOD!!! I THOUGHT HE WAS GOING OUT THERE TO ARREST THEM!!! THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN A PRETTY BIG FASCIST MOVE, RIGHT!? HE JUST SHOT CHAD JAMES IN THE FACE!!!

What really interests me is everyone's reactions. Elm and Marrow are incredibly shocked, Harriet and Winter share their little look of doubt, and then there's Vine who just...doesn't react at all. Either that or it's all in his eyes, which we can't really see from here. Either way, not a huge reaction from him. Methinks the Ace-Ops and Winter might be starting to doubt the horse they bet on.

I find it interesting that Salem doesn't know how the Relic works, but then I suppose it makes sense, seeing as Oz probably placed them into the vaults almost immediately after finding them, so this is probably the first time she's even seen one in person..

Ok, OP time, and buckle up, guys, gals, and nonbinary pals, because this one is going to be a doozy.

-First off, the song sounds pretty good, but it seems like it's going to go through the same cycle as the rest where it doesn't do too much for me at first, but has me headbanging like a metalhead by the end of the volume

- Mantle glitching out between peaceful and wartorn is a wonderful effect. Definitely fills you with a sense of dread.

-The individual shots of Team RWBY are absolutely gorgeous. Conceptually, it's the standard "where we started and where we're at", but the composition is worthy of a chef's kiss. I think I've found my new wallpaper.

-The Ace-Ops appearing on Clover's pin is nice, but what I find interesting is Harriet and Qrow appearing back to back, especially with Harriet looking so angry. Is Harriet going to double down on her loyalty to Ironwood and go after Qrow?

- It seems Robyn is going to be Qrow's main source of support this season, though the bars seem to suggest they might be in custody for a while.

-Oscar seems to be in Salem's stronghold, which doesn't bode well for our farmboy, also, WHY DOES SALEM HAVE DEMON WINGS!? Emerald's Volume 5 illusion wasn't this scary looking!

-I feel like their's symbolism showing Team RWBY's weapons paired together like that, but I feel like it's too early to say what of. Looks pretty, though

-Ren and Nora standing so far apart. It hurts my soul! Interesting how, while Ren looks away, Nora actually turns towards him.

-I didn't notice Winter's change of expression/outfit before passing by Weiss. She went from looking confident and slightly condescending to full with doubt.

-Not a lot to say about the quick shots of Whitley and Willow other then the fact that they both look worried. The image of the Schnee Snowflake shattering, however, is VERY interesting.

-I'm always a sucker for some good ol' chess symbolism. I find it interesting that while Salem's pieces dissolve into creatures of Grimm, Ironwood's simply dissolve, leaving him alone. Perhaps shooting a fellow councilman in the face right in front of his inner circle doesn't play out as well for him as well as he thought it would.

- Speaking of the classics, also gotta love me some reflection artwork. Watts seems to be working behind Pietro's back while Pietro (presumably) works to get Amity running, while secretly worrying about Penny, whose reflection cracks, possibly symbolizing her resolve. I worry for her.

- The snowflake turning into a flower petal in Ren's hand, while a similar petal passes Nora by. I don't know what this means, but I'm intrigued.

- It seems Ruby and Yang won't be completely be at odds, judging by the look they give each other before going into the action shot.

- Hmm, while Cinder pulls a Za Warudo on the fight scene, you can see a dejected Emerald and a pissed off Neo, still moving, among the heroes. Interesting...

-Almost as interesting as Cinder grasping her Grimm arm before being engulfed in flames. Perhaps Salem pulled a Wormtail's Silver Hand with that arm.

-Is this the first time we've seen the Staff of Creation in it's entirety? I remember wanting to include it and the Lamp in my RWBY Vol 7 spritesheet, but couldn't find any images of it's bottom half. I like the little jewel on the bottom.

-Wow, CRWBY went full Kingdom Hearts with the heroes falling through the ice, and I absolutely LOVE IT! This op has some of the most gorgeous visuals the series has ever seen.

-HAPPY EVER AFTER HAPPY? NEVER AGAIN Daaaaaaamn, that's awesome. It kind of reminds me of a line from Red Like Roses Part II, "This bedtime story ends with Misery Ever After". It's incredibly haunting.

-Almost as haunting as the sketchy art style that flashes in between the words, particularly the part that shows Penny's eyes going red before the rest of her does. Did we predict Watts hacking Penny a volume too early?

-The final shot of Crescent Rose alone stuck in the snow. Damn. The theme of this op seems to be "foreboding as all hell"

Damn. Damn! DAMN! This was, without question, the best OP RWBY has ever had. By, like, a lot. The visuals were some of the best the show has ever had to offer, the foreboding is through the roof, and the symbolism is incredibly clever. I don't envy them when it comes time to make Volume 9's, because this will be a very tough act to beat. I am so happy to have RWBY back, and I am both excited and terrified to see what this show is going to do next.

[shadows-twilight]

RWBY Volume 8, Chapter 1 Thoughts and Opinions

HELLO, INTERWEBS!!! At long last, we are back with more RWBY, and with it, more RWBY Thoughts and Opinions! After the absolute roller coaster that was Volume 7's cliffhanger finale, I can not imagine the insanity that awaits us this Volume. So, without further ado, here are my various thoughts and opinions on Chapter 1 of RWBY Volume 8, "Divide"

SPOILERS BELOW:

Hmm, starting off with a mysterious woman scrubbing floors, and...wait, is that...no...

I really like the way they juxtapose Cinder scrubbing with her scratching the chair. Very symbolic.

Yick, something about organic architecture just gives me the willies. I mean, is the whale aware that they double as a building complex? Can they feel the diabolical ongoings of it's rib cage? Creepy stuff.

Oof, outright taking credit for grabbing the relic, Cinder? Yeah, no way that's going to bite you in the ass.

Oh my. Mercury, Emerald, AND Hazel have new looks this season. I'm sure I'll warm up to them eventually, but right now Emerald's and Hazel's aren't really doing this. For Hazel, the outfit is all right, but the hair is a bit boring compared to his originals. Mercury's is ok, but is it just me, or is he basically wearing Yang's V4-6 outfit? I mean, it works, but still.

"Without you, I am nothing." That...didn't sound like the first time she's said that. It almost sounds like something Salem's drilled into her head for years. Cinder may be irredeemable in my opinion, but I do love a good tragic backstory.

You know, I guess would make sense for the crater to be the slums area. Can't imagine living directly under a floating landmass would be considered prime real estate.

Ooh, this old man has badger paws. I don't think we've seen that kind of Faunus trait yet.

D'aaww, Nora gave Oscar a soft hug rather than her usual glomp. So cute ^-^

I'm interested in how Oscar not telling them about Oz is going to play out.

Ok, their is a lot going on in this bar-base worth talking about, but for some reason I am fascinated by the picture of (i'm assuming) the founders in the background. What interesting designs they have. I feel like they have a story, and I would like to hear it.

Penny's dejected demeanor is giving me all of the feels Q_Q

Not sure how I feel about the rift forming between RWBYJNRO, though I guess we'll have to see where it goes. At least we have people like Jaune playing mediator.

I will say, though, I look forward to seeing Ren and Nora apart. As much as I love them as a couple, I'd very much like to see them operate as individuals.

God, Ironwood trying to manipulate Penny like that.

And there it is. Ironwood has truly revealed his true feelings, and his motivation for his attempt to launch Atlas. He isn't making a tactical retreat in order to form a new plan altogether. He's abandoning the fight altogether, leaving Remnant to die so that he and Atlas can live. It's funny, he wanted to avoid becoming Lionheart, but he was a coward too.

"Everything that follows will be on your hands". That motherf-

You know, we don't see a lot of corpses on this show, do we? Penny got better, Amber's screentime ended as she died, Roman got eaten, Pyrrha got an express viking funeral, etc, and a lot of others were only corpses for seconds before we never saw them again. They did a good job selling how proper dead Clover is here.

Ok, I don't know squat about Hospital layouts. Is it normal to have the morgue right outside of an emergency room? I mean, I guess it saves some travel time should things go wrong, but still, seems like a great anxiety generator for the patient, especially with both rooms having windows. "That's where I'll be going next."

I like the new metal arm. The fact that you can see all of the internal stuff makes it feel like it was quickly put together for the sake of urgency, while still looking cool.

Man, that rendition of "Hero" in the background. Chilling.

Is Winter getting a new look already? I must say. I like the look of the braces, and the ponytail is a vast improvement over the bun.

JESUS H CHRIST IRONWOOD!!! I THOUGHT HE WAS GOING OUT THERE TO ARREST THEM!!! THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN A PRETTY BIG FASCIST MOVE, RIGHT!? HE JUST SHOT CHAD JAMES IN THE FACE!!!

What really interests me is everyone's reactions. Elm and Marrow are incredibly shocked, Harriet and Winter share their little look of doubt, and then there's Vine who just...doesn't react at all. Either that or it's all in his eyes, which we can't really see from here. Either way, not a huge reaction from him. Methinks the Ace-Ops and Winter might be starting to doubt the horse they bet on.

I find it interesting that Salem doesn't know how the Relic works, but then I suppose it makes sense, seeing as Oz probably placed them into the vaults almost immediately after finding them, so this is probably the first time she's even seen one in person..

Ok, OP time, and buckle up, guys, gals, and nonbinary pals, because this one is going to be a doozy.

-First off, the song sounds pretty good, but it seems like it's going to go through the same cycle as the rest where it doesn't do too much for me at first, but has me headbanging like a metalhead by the end of the volume

- Mantle glitching out between peaceful and wartorn is a wonderful effect. Definitely fills you with a sense of dread.

-The individual shots of Team RWBY are absolutely gorgeous. Conceptually, it's the standard "where we started and where we're at", but the composition is worthy of a chef's kiss. I think I've found my new wallpaper.

-The Ace-Ops appearing on Clover's pin is nice, but what I find interesting is Harriet and Qrow appearing back to back, especially with Harriet looking so angry. Is Harriet going to double down on her loyalty to Ironwood and go after Qrow?

- It seems Robyn is going to be Qrow's main source of support this season, though the bars seem to suggest they might be in custody for a while.

-Oscar seems to be in Salem's stronghold, which doesn't bode well for our farmboy, also, WHY DOES SALEM HAVE DEMON WINGS!? Emerald's Volume 5 illusion wasn't this scary looking!

-I feel like their's symbolism showing Team RWBY's weapons paired together like that, but I feel like it's too early to say what of. Looks pretty, though

-Ren and Nora standing so far apart. It hurts my soul! Interesting how, while Ren looks away, Nora actually turns towards him.

-I didn't notice Winter's change of expression/outfit before passing by Weiss. She went from looking confident and slightly condescending to full with doubt.

-Not a lot to say about the quick shots of Whitley and Willow other then the fact that they both look worried. The image of the Schnee Snowflake shattering, however, is VERY interesting.

-I'm always a sucker for some good ol' chess symbolism. I find it interesting that while Salem's pieces dissolve into creatures of Grimm, Ironwood's simply dissolve, leaving him alone. Perhaps shooting a fellow councilman in the face right in front of his inner circle doesn't play out as well for him as well as he thought it would.

- Speaking of the classics, also gotta love me some reflection artwork. Watts seems to be working behind Pietro's back while Pietro (presumably) works to get Amity running, while secretly worrying about Penny, whose reflection cracks, possibly symbolizing her resolve. I worry for her.

- The snowflake turning into a flower petal in Ren's hand, while a similar petal passes Nora by. I don't know what this means, but I'm intrigued.

- It seems Ruby and Yang won't be completely be at odds, judging by the look they give each other before going into the action shot.

- Hmm, while Cinder pulls a Za Warudo on the fight scene, you can see a dejected Emerald and a pissed off Neo, still moving, among the heroes. Interesting...

-Almost as interesting as Cinder grasping her Grimm arm before being engulfed in flames. Perhaps Salem pulled a Wormtail's Silver Hand with that arm.

-Is this the first time we've seen the Staff of Creation in it's entirety? I remember wanting to include it and the Lamp in my RWBY Vol 7 spritesheet, but couldn't find any images of it's bottom half. I like the little jewel on the bottom.

-Wow, CRWBY went full Kingdom Hearts with the heroes falling through the ice, and I absolutely LOVE IT! This op has some of the most gorgeous visuals the series has ever seen.

-HAPPY EVER AFTER HAPPY? NEVER AGAIN Daaaaaaamn, that's awesome. It kind of reminds me of a line from Red Like Roses Part II, "This bedtime story ends with Misery Ever After". It's incredibly haunting.

-Almost as haunting as the sketchy art style that flashes in between the words, particularly the part that shows Penny's eyes going red before the rest of her does. Did we predict Watts hacking Penny a volume too early?

-The final shot of Crescent Rose alone stuck in the snow. Damn. The theme of this op seems to be "foreboding as all hell"

Damn. Damn! DAMN! This was, without question, the best OP RWBY has ever had. By, like, a lot. The visuals were some of the best the show has ever had to offer, the foreboding is through the roof, and the symbolism is incredibly clever. I don't envy them when it comes time to make Volume 9's, because this will be a very tough act to beat. I am so happy to have RWBY back, and I am both excited and terrified to see what this show is going to do next.

[littlemisssquiggles]

Hello! Long time no see! I read your Cinder the Red Queen theory, and it's really cool! Cinder is one of my favorite characters (even if I don't watch RWBY anymore) and it would be really awesome to see Cinder play a really big role, besides "revenge on Ruby". Although, I am personally more of a Cinder Redemption Arc fan. So, hypothetically, if Cinder were to get one such redemption arc, how do you think it would play out?

Hiya Yellow! Yeah it has been a while. Sorry I took so long to get back to you. Slowly working through my backlog of posts inside my inbox. Anyways, how have you been fam? And in the literal immortal words of one Oscar Pine, wait…WHAT! When did you stop watching RWBY? ! D8

What happened? If you don’t mind me asking, how come you’re not watching anymore? Is it because you just fell out of love with the series as a whole after being disappointed with its current direction or did all the discourse surrounding the show (and by extension RT as well) drive you to stop?

Sad to hear you’re no longer in the FNDM man. But on a different note, allow me to say thank you! Knowing that you’re a Cinder fan, I’m happy to hear that you liked my Red Queen headcanon for her. Much appreciated.

And yes, I do remember you being an advocate for Cinder’s redemption as well. In response to writing a Cinder redemption arc, I’m gonna be frank. 

Given the way the canon has portrayed Cinder’s character, both in previous seasons and currently, redemption is still the last thing I can envision for your favourite Fall Maiden m’dude. I’ve never seen Cinder getting redeemed as a possibility since to me, the show hasn’t shown enough evidence of her being empathetic to anyone else other than herself to make me believe there’s a chance for her to change for the greater good.

The only way I can picture Cinder going is either she is given the Adam Taurus treatment---unceremoniously killed off despite the series keeping her relevant to the story for so long or…Cinder survives long enough to rise up and see herself becoming the all-powerful entity she desires to be---ultimately walking out of Salem’s shadow to overthrow her and replace her as the Red Queen and succeeding within a short time what Salem has failed to do for centuries---thrusting Remnant into utter anarchy in the form of a second Great  War sparked by one of the kingdoms (possibly Mistral) declaring war against the remaining three kingdoms hoping to conquer them all after learning that the great Atlas Kingdom has fallen along with the former Mantle.

One kingdom to rule them all and this was all done through Cinder puppeteering her pawns in the Mistral Council through her newly awakened abilities after finally succumbing to the Geist Grimm and becoming something more than human--- a Grimm with a soul and a conscience. A Grimm-human hybrid or Grimmoire as I’d like to say.

Instead of being redeemed, I more favour the idea Cinder becoming a bigger threat to Remnant than Salem who I peg would be defeated, purified of her darkness (courtesy of Ruby’s silver eyes) and stripped of any magic that she had, courtesy of Cinder betraying her.

Cinder’s whole “…Without you, I am nothing” statement from the trailer is just giving me huge red flags for her to eventually realize that she can probably do better than Salem without her holding her back. The student does eventually become the master, right? So why not expect Cinder to replace Salem as the main big antagonist of RWBY with her reign being the true threat of Remnant in a time of war?

I really, really like the idea of the main conflict of RWBY not being the war with Salem but the rise of Cinder Fall and the second Great War of Remnant. I think such a plotline would be cool especially looking back on the fact that Oz had told General Ironwood that he prayed that his students---the children whose futures and development were entrusted to him---would never have to face the pains and strife of war like his predecessor: King Phadrig of Vale, once did long ago.

It would actually be very compelling to watch our heroes attempting to survive a dire time when the world was divided with two of its founding kingdoms in shambles while one tried to conquer them all (Mistral) and another daring to defend them all (Vacuo). The first Great War lasted ten years. Imagine if…it were the same for the second with time fast-forwarding to another period ten years later when all of our young heroes were now grown adults. No longer naïve children enamoured by the huntsmen lifestyle but seasoned warriors doing what they could to help the people in a dark world where war raged, humanity pleaded for their salivation and the Grimm feasted.

That could’ve been nice. But…I’m getting ahead of myself here. I’m not sure if anything like that will actually happen in the show. Still it’s good to share the idea around.

Going back to Cinder, like I said---right now I can’t see a redemption arc for Cinder.

As I said, the core reason why I’ve never been for Cinder being a redeemable character is due to the fact that up until this point, the series has done very little to establish her having any positive qualities. Cinder has sadly been selfish through and through making it very clear multiple occasions that she’s only out for herself. For me to have pictured Cinder to be a redeemable character, the series would’ve need to introduce a sort of “buffer character”---for lack of a better term. Basically when I say a buffer character, I mean in terms of a character who could’ve acted as a sort of foil to Cinder---seeing through her power-hungry nature and faults and thus revealing to the audience a much more relatable, sympathetic and emotionally vulnerable side to her through her relationship with said buffer.

The best example of this type of dynamic for me in an animated media is the relationship between Prince Zuko and his Uncle Iroh from Avatar the Last Airbender. In that series, Iroh was Zuko’s buffer character---the one person who saw through Zuko’s acts of aggression and appealed to the side of him that was just a insecure young man lacking any real support in his life and wanting nothing more than to do his best to appease an abusive father just so that he can feel a sense of belonging in the world.

It was through his bond with his uncle that I, as a viewer, was able to believe in Zuko’s redemption arc since it was only with Iroh did we see a more open side to Zuko---the side that reminded us that outside of his status as Prince of the Fire Nation leading the charge to capture the Avatar---outside of that, Zuko was only a boy in need of guidance. Guidance that Iroh attempted to provide him on multiple occasions.

Going back to Cinder, this is what I would have needed to make her redeemable. Give her a character who is the only one to see her more vulnerable side. Using what we know about the series, I’d say Emerald Sustrai could’ve easily been Cinder’s buffer. In the show, RWBY already established Cinder as a sort of motherly/sister figure based on Emerald’s perception of her.

Through Emerald, the show could’ve used her close ties with Cinder to show a side to her that we often don’t see. A side that actually cares for Emerald or at least better fools Emerald (and by extension us as the audience) into thinking that she cares. Ironically enough, the show could’ve had Cinder mirror Salem in this regard.

The reason why I’m more of an advocate for Salem’s redemption over Cinder is because UNLIKE Cinder, the show has given me moments of Salem being genuinely kind and caring to others. We saw this with the way she loved Ozma and would’ve done anything to get him back before her self-interest and hatred toward the Brother Gods consumed her.

We saw this in the Lost Fable and to some degree, even though she is another pawn to her, I’d like to think that the way Salem treats Cinder is akin to a mother. My issue with Salem isn’t that she is incapable of caring about others, it’s that no matter what, she will never put them before herself. It will always be her first and others second. At least that’s what I interpreted and it for this reason while her curse will remain.

However at least the show has shown examples of Salem showing compassion towards other. This is something I have yet to see from Cinder Fall. To me, Cinder is lacking that side of her.

Salem is selfish but as strange as this for me to say, I don’t think she’s entirely heartless. It’s kind of complicated when it comes to Salem but this just adds onto why I find her character fascinating. This is what makes the difference for me between her and Cinder and separates the two.

Salem is selfish but is capable of empathy and a surprising amount of mercy in unexpected moments (like in the way she treats Cinder for example. Salem could’ve easily offed Cinder for her failures like how she ended Lionheart but instead she left her be. And judging from the V8 trailer, even as Cinder came grovelling back to her, Salem still seemed to mostly react to Cinder’s return with an air of a strict parent who isn’t angry at their child but more disappointed. And oddly enough she did the same thing with Tyrian back in V4)

Cinder, on the other hand, shares in Salem’s self-centred nature but lacks any kind of compassion. Cinder is heartless.

Sorry Yellow, picturing a redemption arc for Cinder Fall is tough for me, even hypothetically speaking. I mean, if the show had done something with Cinder akin to Zuko---having her gain the power and status she’s always wanted only to have it result in her losing the only good relationship she had in Emerald thus leading to her falling from grace again after realizing her mistakes---then I could see it.

Or…perhaps the show could’ve pulled an Azula type of redemption for Cinder. Have her gain the power she desired at the cost of her own humanity and she loses herself in the process, becoming a monster and realizing her mistakes too late. And in the end, despite everything she’s been through and in spite of all that she put her through, the only person to appear before Cinder in her time of death after falling from her mistakes is Emerald.

I like the irony of Emerald cradling a dying Cinder Fall, choosing even then not to hate her and remain with her until her last dying breathe as her way of finally paying her back for saving her from her former life of poverty; giving her a new sense purpose in life outside of being a street rat.

That could’ve worked, at least me. But again, this is only if the show had further developed Emerald and Cinder’s bond. I genuinely wished the show had explored more of Cinder’s ties to Emerald. This is why I wanted Emerald to be Cinder’s accomplice for Atlas instead of Neopolitan. We could’ve watched Emerald’s character grow further through her separating herself from Salem’s legion and devoting herself entirely to Cinder. We could’ve watched Cinder even entice Emerald with the prospect of her ruling beside Cinder in the new world she would’ve aided her to build for Salem.

At the end of the day, as Emerald implied back in V5, she doesn’t care that much for Salem. The only person of interest to Emerald Sustrai is Cinder so this makes me curious to see what their reunion would be like for V8. I highly doubt Salem just ups and left Emerald, Mercury and Hazel back in the Dark Domain. Unless they were sent off to Vacuo to retrieve the Sword of Destruction, they’re bound to be there with Salem inside of Grimm Monstro so I’m looking forward to seeing the look on Emerald’s face when she realizes to her dismay that in her absence, she had been replaced with Neo.

It would be interesting watching how Emerald deals with this development in addition to seeing where her story goes from here now that her beloved Cinder Fall is back with her but not really with HER, y’know what I’m saying? Perhaps this could lead to Emerald going out of her way to get back onto Cinder’s good side mirroring Cinder attempting to return to Salem’s.

“…Without you, I am NOTHING!” “…I don’t care about Salem but I owe Cinder for EVERYTHING!”

It’ll be a game of watching apprentices regain the faith of their masters as Emerald is Cinder’s apprentice while Cinder is Salem’s. This should be a fun development to observe for next season

…Sorry if I haven’t exactly answered your question Yellow. Truth be told, I don’t have much ideas for how Cinder could be redeemed. However I do stand by my points about Emerald being used to show a different side to Cinder. It’s a shame this wasn’t done much in the canon. But who knows? Maybe something might be done to change that for V8.

~LittleMissSquiggles (2020)

[marithlizard]

Thoughts on RBWY v7c8, “Cordially Invited”

Last week felt like being at the top point of the roller coaster.  Now we’re just starting that sick-feeling slide down, knowing the acceleration’s about to kick in. 

- Oscar with the strategic observations! (I've seen a theory that he and Oz have already quietly merged to some extent,  based on this scene and his conversation with James last episode.  Maybe.  But they also had months together 24/7, on the farm and then in Haven; there's been a lot of time for "and here's another thing I wish I'd known when I was your age". Plus it's implied that Oscar has always been well-read and thoughtful. )

- They can't possibly have any doubt that the election was hacked, after the massacre, can they? Apparently they can.  

- James, you are so lucky you have RWBYJNR to do obviously sensible things like 'have Weiss investigate the mansion' and 'give Robyn some evidence that you are not a sinister megalomaniac', because apparently you would never think of them.

- Huh, the outside of Schnee Manor does not look at all like I thought it would.  That's not remotely residential architecture.  Probably the intended effect is "Versailles", but what I see is "major governmental office building".  

- Hovercars!  Also, no dressing up, I see.  Jacques doesn't deserve it anyway.

- I like the way James' expression lightens just a bit when Winter snarks back at him.   We're being given the understated impression all through v7 that the two of them have an excellent working relationship.  She's the Glynda to his Oz. ( @fairy-anon-godmother has pointed out that Lionheart had no support staff at all, in contrast.   How's that for an angstfic idea:  the day Lionheart's second in command realized the truth and made herself walk away from him.)

- The bitterness of Whitley could freeze mercury (no pun intended, but come to think of it the two of them have some similar outlooks).   Called it about Klein.  Hmmm....the manor must have a huge staff, but the heir is on door duty?  I don't think so. He's on “handle your sisters and the General” duty and was watching from the window for their arrival.  And he's actually pretty polished with the refined snark himself.

- Incidentally (sorry my brain is tangenting more than usual),  have we ever seen Weiss be anything warmer than borderline rude to Whitley, under any circumstances?  And he and Winter are completely ignoring each other here.

- Oh, yeah,  Qrow's falling.   At this point I have to hope Fair Game works out for his sake,  even if it's not the ship I favor.   *worried*

- C'mon girls, a moment of support for your uncle who just turned down a drink would be nice.

- Weiss has no counter at all for Whitley's spite here.  She wasn't any good at trading barbs with him in v4, either.   But she was certainly fluent in Bitch when she arrived at Beacon.   She's outgrown that and gotten so used to being among genuine, warm people that she can't and won't play the game with her family anymore.  It showed in her earlier conversations with Winter, too.

- Portrait of Whitley and parents to the right of Jacques, clearly taken after Weiss left for Beacon. And a very crudely thrown gauntlet in the dining arrangements. Subtle this family is not.  

- Ugh, Robyn must've hated coming here with every fiber of her being.  That she did so anyway says a lot about her political moxie.

- Does the council have only three people on it, or are these the only two Jacques could rope into this little power play?

-Oh, Penny.  Ironwood thinks of you as a person...as much as he thinks of any soldier under his command as a person.   But he's not defending you against the people who think your'e a soulless murderbot. He hasn't stood up for you as a person at all, has he, because he doesn't see it as relevant to the current crisis.  This is so cruel.

- (Yet another tangent:  I would love to see a crossover of Penny getting to spend time with Murderbot from the Martha Wells books.   Murderbot would have a lot of opinions on the entire Atlas situation.)

- Nora bouncing like a homicidal chipmunk.  Can I get them, boss? can I can I?

- The faunus waitstaff:  Hm, they're taking entire platters of food out of our hands and clearly planning to do something disruptive. We will inevitably be blamed.  It'll be worth it.

- Young padawan,  you are still new to the dark ways of the Schnee, to slink off in defeat so easily.

-Ugh. Things I really, really, really hate:  when Jacques Schnee is right.  The "whole "protection against war" line of rhetoric makes absolutely no sense if you don't know about Salem;  right in the first ever episode of RWBY, Glynda tells us the world is glowing with peace and prosperity since the end of the Great War.   And the more James talks about possible unknown hostile forces, the more he sounds like a power-crazed frootloop.

- Declaring everything classified even from your supposed peers in the council doesn't help.

- Ironwood's face as Winter explodes:  oh crap.

- Robyn's face at the same moment:  oh interesting.  Thanks to Blake and Yang she knows what the Amity project is, though not why it's being kept secret.  She knows Blake believes James has good intentions. And the sincerity wafting off Winter Schnee is palpable.  

- Jacques' face at the same moment:  oh checkmate. 

- Winter: It'd be better if I could act more like a soulless robot.   Penny: There are so many things wrong with that,  I can't even.  Execute "conversation_nope.pny".

- "Your party".  "You...left."  Willow is so out of it she's not even tracking major events?  That's kind of scary. And not new, from Weiss' reaction.

- Willow: "I am doing something about it.  Inverting this bottle."

- All the Schnees have excellent tailoring. I love the aesthetic.  

- In case you ever needed to what, Willow?  How long has she had those cameras up, and what contingencies is she planning for?  I hope she's better at protecting her personal staff than Weiss was with Klein.

- "A man came by".  She recognized Watts, but doesn't want to name him directly to Weiss. And then gives her the phone knowing it'll all come out.  Probability of Watts-Jacques family relationship increasing.

- She's not expecting to survive whatever is coming down.

- We were cued to expect the heating grid hack last episode, but that made it no less chilling to watch.  (yeah, yeah, but no other adjective fits so well.)  AUGH.  

- Almost forgot!  I don’t think it was prudent to bring Oscar to this,  even though I was whining for more screen time for him earlier.  Since Haven they have to assume  the enemy has been briefed about him.   Kidnapping Oz as a personally giftwrapped present for Salem would make Tyrian ecstatic.