#but mostly again for more RWBY content

[maskyartist]

Watched the RWBY x Justice League crossover with my wife and ngl it wasn’t bad! At least for the RWBY fans. I can see this being not the best for JL fans

But the RWBY content we got from the characters was honestly really nice to see! It felt like a sorta breath of fresh air after V8 and V9 destroyed me psychologically and physically

Basically it’s a good movie if u wanna see somethin stupid. U really gotta just let things happen as they happen, and accept whatever’s goin on as fact. A lot of nodding along n just rollin with the insanity.

I will say the best part for me? The fight scenes oh they were ALL bangers, loved each and every one of em.

[currantlee]

A few comments on a recent post about RWBY I made got me thinking about something. Basically, I think that Rooster Teeth – and possibly by extension its parent companies – have artificially inflated RWBY as a media project and franchise rather than letting it grow organically. Therefore, it became a bubble that was bound to burst at some point. RWBY might never have been a profitable IP, which might be very relevant for its future.

This is not a problem that arose after Monty Oum‘s passing, I feel like this was already coming before that. Shane Newville‘s open letter (which absolutely comes from an emotional, mentally unwell state of mind, but has had many of its contents confirmed over the years, even beyond being one of the first descriptions of the toxic work environment at Rooster Teeth) makes a few points that support this impression. Whether you agree with the letter or not, you cannot deny that the first two volumes of RWBY, while they also had merch accompanying them and stuff, were not produced following industry standards – starting with the 3D software used, Poser Pro (Monty Oum‘s preferred tool for animation). This led to some really creative animation work that, while not always high-quality by industry-standards, was certainly pushing boundaries. It was creative and it worked for what RWBY was: a passion project created by someone who saw animation as his strongest suit – as his preferred medium to tell a story. I‘ve seen a lot of people claim that Monty Oum wasn‘t a writer, and while that‘s true, I feel like the implication of that statement is always that he couldn‘t tell stories on his own. I don‘t think that‘s true. I think Monty Oum was a great storyteller when it came to expressing certain things through animated action scenes. It‘s just that he wanted to tell a story that included more than just that and a few lines of dialogue – which is where Miles Luna and Kerry Shawcross come in, two at the time very inexperienced writers (who possibly had a fallout with Monty Oum over creative differences later), as well as some talented folks – people like Shane Newville. They were chosen to work on this because Monty Oum acknowledged their potential and liked to work with them, and I feel like that created an environment where they were really allowed to flourish. Volumes 1 and 2 are certainly not flawless, but I feel like I can tell the people making it had fun.

To Rooster Teeth however? I think RWBY (and by extension, Monty Oum as a creator) might have been little more than assets to them. RWBY was first created around a time when RT first tried to be more like, well, an actual company. At least from 2014 onward, but possibly even earlier than that, this included an effort to conform to industry standards more, mostly in order to be able to hire more people – very visibly so in RWBY in the form of the switch to Maya (my opinion about that is, the way they did it didn’t do RWBY any favors at all). I think they saw RWBY and Monty Oum as an opportunity to appear… More important, bigger, than they ever really were.

So what did they do? Again, I kind of have the feeling that they “upscaled” RWBY to a size where it appears like this big thing, but it became far too much to handle. Essentially, they created a mock giant, or a metaphorical quasi-star: something that can appear big from afar, but is actually very small / unstable (and if we go with the quasi-star metaphor, disturbs all of its surroundings). This is what I mean when I say that RWBY was a bubble bound to burst, because no star lives forever – and quasi-stars can only exist under very specific, very unstable conditions (I linked a Kurzgesagt-video in case you’re interested what exactly a quasi-star / black hole star is / was, cosmology is so fascinating IMO). Once these conditions exist no longer, they both fall apart and collapse into the black hole that is their core at the same time.

My main argument for this is that RWBY was essentially a huge money sink for RT (Source: Barbara Dunkelman’s unprofessionalism). They pumped so much money into this… Perhaps even more than they ever made from it. While this isn’t 100% confirmed, it is very much possible (and IMO not exactly unlikely) that RWBY was never profitable — which it might have been if RT hadn’t been so hellbent on creating the illusion of a multi-million-dollar franchise.

This is purely speculative, but this might also be why Volume 10 was never greenlit. We know that Volume 9 was to a significant part funded by Crunchyroll and in fact would not have been possible without them (probably because RT was already out of money at this point). They might have bought into this mock giant, then realized they had pretty much been scammed once Volume 9 aired. This might have led to Crunchyroll’s unwillingness to fund another season for something they knew now was effectively a money sink. Since RT at this point lacked the funds to produce Volume 10 alone and therefore was dependent on investors like Crunchyroll and Warner Brothers… Volume 10 was never greenlit, no matter how hard they attempted to get their fans’ hopes up and start a hashtag campaign on social media (as far as I remember, that was started by Rooster Teeth, not the fans. I don’t have my Twitter account anymore though, so I can’t check). Again though, this is speculation.

The worst part? This refusal of RT to just… Downscale RWBY again, this determination that it had to be this huge franchise… Was all put on the backs of the creatives working on it. We know at this point, from multiple sources, that RWBY and other RT productions have had an incredible amount of crunchtime, working overtime, employee abuse, … going on behind the scenes, which seems to only have gotten worse after Monty Oum’s passing. At the end of the day, all RT does and has ever done is blame others for their incompetence. Like, no shit, I’ve seen fans claim that it’s the FNDM’s job to “keep the show alive” (particularly in the light of #GreenlightVolume10), which… No, that’s not the fans’ job. It’s the job of the company who has been entrusted with this beloved IP, and said company has proven to be utterly incompetent on multiple occasions, which is unfortunate, but a sad reality for all those who love RWBY. And while Rooster Teeth has never directly said such a thing, they have certainly implied it and taken advantage of the existing sentiment within their fanbase, as well as their parasocial relationship with it (again, see #GreenlightVolume10 for reference).

To clarify, I’m not saying none of this would have happened if RT didn’t insist on making RWBY this big franchise (and biting off far more than they could chew in the process) – again, RT was far too notoriously incompetent at everything a company should manage – but I do think it might have played a role. It also isn’t an excuse for all the employee abuse. Again, what they should have done is downsizing the project, not inflating it further and further.

If I’m not somehow completely in the wrong (because IMO this just makes way too much sense to not be at least partially true – but let’s face it, a lot of this is just me connecting dots, and there is always a chance I’m connecting them wrong, even though I don‘t think so), then it kinda blows my mind that there are still people who believe in this scam. Though I will say, emotional attachment can do that to anyone. If anything, I’m honestly sorry that those folks lose something that means so much to them, and that false promises were made to them.

At the end of the day, the story of RWBY (the “franchise”) is twofold. It’s a story about an incredibly talented creator who passed away far too early, who was given the incredible opportunity to make his dream come true. It’s a story of people he trusted taking up his torch, and maybe getting lost in the dark along the way. It’s an inspiring story regardless, and I hope to see it continued at a downsized scale so it can grow organically, preferably in the hands of an indie animation studio like Dillon Goo (🤞)

But it is also a cautionary tale to both creatives and companies who employ them, a tale about false promises, abuse of both employees and fans, as well as how to not run a project. Don’t blow your thing out of proportion too early, don’t create a mock giant / metaphorical quasi-star. Let your ideas and projects grow and flourish organically and sincerely.

[midnightechoes]

Okay, so I wanna talk about Jaune a little bit (RWBY volume 9 spoilers warning)

My friend @shera-dnd​ (and others on the internet) have pointed out that in the opening of volume 9, when we see Alyx, we see that there is a second set of footprints already there.

And after today’s episode (v9e5), it seems likely that those prints are Jaune’s, and that he was The Rusted Knight that Alyx writes about.

Also judging from this last episode, Jaune’s been there a while. I had a feeling that this would be the case, and I think a lot of us expected it to an extent. My suspicions that Jaune arrived first was reinforced when we saw Neopolitan arrive so much later than Ruby, despite falling at the same time.

Jaune being the Rusted Knight certainly isn’t surprising, we’ve all been speculating that since we saw the first trailer last July, but I’m not sure many of us were thinking that he was the ORIGINAL Rusted Knight. I figured he would have arrived a few weeks or maybe months before everyone else. But this man’s obviously been here for a few decades at least!

Although, it could have been even longer. We don’t know how time really works in the Ever After, and we have no idea how it affects humans. Do we age at the same rate there? Slower? Faster? 

Back in volume 8, when Ozpin talks about the “Girl Who Fell Through the World” fairy tale, he calls it an old fairy tale. Pure speculation, but if Ozpin is calling it an old fairy tale, then I wouldn’t be shocked it it was a century old at least. If time in the Ever After flows at near the same rate as on Remnant, Jaune’s been there for over a 100 years.

But again, we don’t know how time really works in the Ever After, especially in relation to how it passes on Remnant.

Either way, Jaune’s been in the Ever After for years. His character model certainly has similarities to that of older characters like Qrow, Willow, and Raven, meaning he’s probably well into his 40s at least.

Our poor boy has spent more of his life in the Ever After than on Remnant!

I feel so bad for him. Most of the options feel very bittersweet. Does he go back to Remnant finally, and have to face his teenage best friends as an old man? Does he get de-aged when he returns? And if he does, does he retain his memories? I’m not sure which way is worse. To have gone through that much, only to have it erased feels... hollow. And if he keeps them, he’ll now be a 19 year old with over 40 years of life experience. That’s gotta mess you up.

But what if he stays? What if the Ever After and being the Rusted Knight feels like his calling to him? Could he trust that those feelings were true? Maybe he had come to feel that way as a way to deal with his predicament.

Life in the Ever After feels very... narrow. Which probably works for the denizens of the place, they were made to be content with fulfilling their roles. But Jaune’s human, and we tend to have more robust wants and needs.

Again, he probably pushed a lot of those down or forgot them in order to deal with his situation, but there’s something tremendously sad about him remaining there, content with his narrow existence.

I feel for our poor boy. He’s struggled all his life and had to overcome so much, only for him to be stuck in this position, with mostly only complicated, not great options to choose from.

If you had told me after volume one that someday I would be in near tears at the prospect of Jaune’s fate, I would not have believed you, but here we are. There’s a very real chance that this is Jaune’s last volume, and that his fate may be very bittersweet, and the very thought breaks my heart.

[penny-the-pissed-poltergeist]

Volume 2 episode 11 rewatch thoughts, I'd say RWDE/Critical content ahead but this episode is good enough it might not need a warning

.Ruby's unarmed fighting would be not nearly as bad if she kicked instead of punched, considering how fast she can go she could probably kick with the strength of a horse.

.I really like Roman's hookshot cane, I think it's the first time he's used it so they might have only thought of it by volume 2

.Who on team OWBY is making those explosions? I'd assume Yang or maybe Weiss?

."We're gonna stop that train" The Gang doesn't stop that train

."I think their on the-BONK"

."We've got baddies" So most women on this show... okay that one was very reddit I'm sorry

.The RWBY fandom wiki legit says that Oobleck call a train caboose a caboose is a RVB reference

.Before anyone says that the Dust Torchwick stole went into the bombs, I doubt that because we only see fire/combustion in the explosions and Roman stole WAY more kinds of dust then that, they would be exploding into all the colors of the rainbow.

.Yang winking right before she fucking kills a guy

.You can say a LOT about this show (What do think this blog is for?) but I can give the show credit for how constantly good the villains plans are most of the time, mostly because the bad guys just.. win sometimes

.The dog shot Oobleck does is the sickest thing ever, Zwei best dog

.Oobleck being a full hunter and taking down a mech that team RWBY had to team up to beat is a really good way to show how much room they have to grow

.Neo blocked a hit from her once and Yang already wants revenge

.Love how smug Neo is, she's so cocky and she can back it up, not getting hit ONCE by Yang

.The Lieutenant I'm calling Banesaw my guy, your just warring out your chainsaw's blades by doing that. Always liked the name Banesaw for him, it gives me pro wrestler vibes.

.Banesaw calling her "A Schnee" makes it sound like he's elated to finally kill a dr.seuss creature

.Roman I know you don't give a shit about the law but Blake's still a minor please stop

.Blake both using Dust better then Weiss has so far and pulling of an energy slash we've only seen seasoned Hunters do, Queen slay

.Common Weiss L, forgot she used Time dilation and again here so take what I said about it on the V/2 episode 4 post and throw it out the window

.They play that one piece of stock dramatic music (Or something that sounds a lot like it) when Weiss gets bodied and I think of anything else but the annoying orange when I hear it

.What is hush made out of, I get Neo's putting her Aura over it but still

.It took me until know to realize that you can still she Raven's normal eyes under her mask, in this shot at least

.Neo seeing Raven and just immediately noping out is really funny. imagine beating up some teenager and then the Queen of all bandits shows up, I'd crap myself too

.That dome Weiss made had an above zero chance of caving in on them and just fucking them over more

.This is one hell of a cliff-hanger and the next episode... doesn't really live up to it, I'll get to why tomorrow.

[oddlyhale]

Hey hale, how are you doing?

With what happened to RT how are you feeling?

What will you do now?

Hey! I'm doing good. Experiencing a two-week break from work and it's been great to sleep in more, haha.

I'm not feeling anything strongly with the recent news, to be honest. This was a long time coming, and so it became a matter of when. Still, hearing the news was surreal because I didn't think anything could bring RT down. They seemed to get away with anything, but not this time.

If RWBY gets passed along to someone else, maybe I'll talk about it as I always did with the original RWBY. If Dillain Goo and his team do get their hands on the IP, then I wish them the best of luck and I will keep an eye on whatever content they can make from it. I'm sure they'll bring back the spirit of RWBY that was lost a long time ago.

But I'm not as invested in RWBY as I used to be. In a different post, I said I felt like I had aired out as much of my grievances about Ironwood's death as much as I could, and now it feels good to move on. I started this blog because of what happened to Ironwood to begin with, so now it feels pretty ironic to watch a tyrant of a corporation fall.

Definitely not moving on from Ironwood or Penny, though. Or Adam, or any of the other characters who were poorly handled. I think those characters say a lot about MKEK's writing. Ironwood wasn't a tyrant and I still stand by it. Poorly handled by writers who have internalized ableism? Yep. Handled by writers who don't know how to create morally grey characters and situations? Yep again.

I'm still hanging out here on Tumblr, but on my other blog where it's mostly Skyrim and shitpost-y content, and that's been pretty fun for me to do. I'll keep this RWDE blog up because I feel like it won't be the last time I'll talk about RWBY. A show like that makes waves but in all the wrong ways.

[cosmokyrin]

Hi there! Hope you're doing awesome! Quick question,I know we're only 2 episodes into Volume 9,but what's your take on the whole Penny situation? I was crushed when she first died in Volume 3,then excited to see her again in 7,then crushed again to see her die just 1 volume later,as I'm sure everyone was. I'm hopeful about 9 though,it's looking good,but one of my friends has been turned off by all the gut punches with Penny & everything else,& I'm watching the series through with another friend & I don't want them to get turned off the same way. I'm hoping for something but not sure what at this point.

ayoooo i just remembered this ask now that i have some time kjdflsd kek

Anyway regarding Penny!! The best girl ever /lh

I totally understand if one of your friends got turned off with what had happened to her character so far--- because two years ago I was in the exact same position lol. In fact I came to watch the first ep of V9 without any expectations nor as much interest as I did with V8. I was mostly curious as to what direction they'd be pushing the story into.

And hooo boy was I surprised! And I mean, the kind of "Oh shit I'm caught off-guard by all that Nuts and Dolts moments because it's so in-the-face what thE HELL". Exactly like V8 lmao. I know I'm now speaking about the ship but jfdfdskfj I also do mean Penny content. I caught up with RWBY V6 and V7 during the 2020 / V7 hiatus, and when the Penny content was suddenly given the spotlight, that gut-punched me too.

And yeah that's exactly what I'm seeing with V9. Two years of grieving not really having much canon material to speculate about Penny's direction as a character and the premiere of V9 gave me new hopes actually! From a better perspective, I'm a little more positive that the theories / suspicions that had been floating around the Nuts and Dolts / Penny fandom (since V8) are in the right direction. I'll be bold now when I say it, now that I have moved past the pains of V8 lol: Nuts and Dolts is a living ship, and I have 95% confidence when I say it's actually a canon pair now. The first two episodes especially emphasized this, and I trust CRWBY knows what they're doing with the implications of it. And because they're less likely to bury gays, aside from an entire thesis (no kidding lol) from the Nuts and Dolts nation on why Penny would come back, looking at what the show might be bringing (hopepunk, wlw, LGBTQIA+ reps) gives me a positive view of Penny's general direction as a character.

One of my friends / mutuals said it aptly when they mentioned that RWBY doesn't benefit much from being watched while airing, because as a fan of the show who painstakingly waits between hiatuses it might sometimes feel underwhelming when you've been expecting something big for so long. I've been here since 2013, but it gets better when you rewatch volumes at once especially before a new season premiere! If one gets the hints given by CRWBY right, there is a pay-off there (I had my moment here with Pietro in V8). So I guess technically that means it's better off changing one's mindset that whatever they do with characters / the story usually has a reason forward, but then it would take a while to really get there.

[prancingintheshadows]

I've just finished FFVII Rebirth and RWBY's back with new content, so obviously those two things are the only thing on my mind right now. So of course with my brainrot I have to imagine and conceptualize what the RWBY characters would play like in FF7 rebirth. Especially since Monty was a fan of Final Fantasy.

For people playing Rebirth, there's not going to be any story spoilers, but this will go into gameplay and talk about certain abilities in the game as comparison.

This is mostly just 'how would these characters be designed in this gameplay?', so I'm not really making any big changes to Rebirth's systems to account for RWBY's in-universe mechanics. While Dust is similar to materia, there's some notable differences but I'm ignoring those differences for the sake of this. So these characters will all use Dust/Materia the way the game does, using mp or something rather than having dust be like ammo. And speaking of MP, same case. Aura is both HP and MP in RWBY, but for the sake of this, everyone's having separate bars for those.

My plan is to generally talk about the overall gameplay identity of each character, along with specific details like if they have attacks after dodging worth mentioning or holding square produces a unique attack or such. I will not be talking about synergy, at least, not in this post. Maybe in a future one if I have the attention span.

For the first of these posts I'm tackling everyone's favorite blonde brawler

Yang

Basic Idea

I'm starting with Yang because... she was the easiest. But not too easy. It's not like we can slap on Tifa's moveset and stats and call it a day. Tifa's combo focused gameplan is fun and fitting for a martial artist, but it lacks the defining features of Yang's semblance. Yang's the toughest member of her team by a long shot and her semblance builds up as she takes damage, so it's instead easier to take inspiration from Red XIII's Vengeance Mode. However, not everything of Red's is usable. Red features a lot of supportive moves that apply buffs or healing and that's not really in line with Yang's straightforward, frontline fighting style, so I'd ideally take a mix of Red's ability to turn defense into resources as well as Tifa's explosive damage potential.

In keeping in line with this mix of tank and damage dealer, ideally Yang would have comparatively high health and defenses, though I can see magic defense being noticeably lower, along with good attack and low 'magic' or whatever the dust equivalent would be. Controversially though, I'd put her speed rather low. Yang's not slow, but everything's relative, especially in video games and video game balance. Comparing to everyone else on Team RWBY, Yang's slow. I'm not too sure on luck, but I'm leaning more towards low. Yang strikes me as doing a lot of damage raw rather than relying on situational damage like crits.

Yang, like Tifa, uses martial arts, so she has a short attack range that doesn't have much spread. As such, when coming out of a dodge, Yang will do a spinning kick. I get she's a punch girl, but she's not exclusively using punches. Holding square has her do a close range shot gun blast that can push enemies back. I'd also say Yang's dodge is only average. Again, relative speeds. She's got Ruby and Blake on her team, Yang has to be average at dodging at best by comparison.

Burn Mode

We gotta talk about Yang's unique mechanic. As stated earlier, I think elements from both Red XIII and Tifa work, so I'm trying to mesh them together. At the fundamental level, it works like Vengeance where blocking builds up a meter. However, this meter has several levels, much like Tifa's Chi or Cait Sith's moogle stuff. Obviously, building more levels increases the potency of the Burn Mode, which is functionally a super mode. I'm thinking maybe 3 levels? Like Red, Yang's attacks get a massive boost and increased range and the button used to transform is replaced with a new attack.

Unlike Red, this attack will drain the form's meter, similar to Tifa using up levels of Chi and falling to the lower level. Also, these levels drop quicker than Tifa's Chi or Red's Vengeance. This is just a byproduct of what I'm trying to achieve with Yang. While being a tank/dps hybrid can be a rather simple character, I want to give Yang's fighting game plan depth and complexity. Have her be able to fight smarter like in the show. It's why I want a healthy mix from both characters. Tifa's chi is cool, but you ultimately just spend all of it on a staggered enemy and there's no other uses for it as the buffs it gives you passively aren't enough to be worth considering, so Yang's Burn Mode needs to have passive benefits closer to Red's Vengeance than Tifa's Unbridled Strength. But it also needs to run out in a decent time frame to make spending Burn levels acceptable. I want that conflict of deciding whether or not using a level of burn for a potent attack is worth it. And similarly to Red, I want a lot of interplay between Yang's super mode and her abilities.

Abilities

I'm not going to make enough abilities to match the Rebirth characters. They have 10 abilities, which is an insane amount to be doing for 4 characters for a 'for fun' theory craft. There are certain requisite things Yang needs for abilities. For one, a rather standard damaging ability. You know, your Bravers, Divekicks, and Sidewinders. Likely some sort of punch. Easy enough.

Second thing, Yang's very block heavy, so like Cloud and Red, she gets an ability that puts her in a guard stance that builds up meter faster and is functionally a better guard. I call it Block Party, and no, I will not be using puns this entire section.

Most of Yang's abilities I want to play with Burn in some way to create that possibility for smart play while staying true to her fighting abilities. Dragon Throw is probably the ability that I've best made to fit this mold. In base, Yang grabs an enemy and chucks them at another enemy. In Burn, Yang instead grabs the enemy, and in true FF fashion, leaps into the air and comes crashing down on a different enemy. This gives Yang a repositioning tool without detracting from the brawler fantasy. I think this is also not out of the question as there's a few abilities in Rebirth that bring enemies closer, so I don't see any problem with just straight up manhandling them like this.

Meteor Impact is Yang's basic AoE attack where she slams the ground. It interacts with Burn the same way Dragon Throw does. While out of Burn, it's decent, but in Burn, it's range and power increases. It would be a simple and effective tool for people who like using Burn in a straightforward manner.

Bombshell is an ability that uses Burn meter the other way. You don't have to be in Burn mode to improve the move, the move will simply eat meter from Burn by default. Yang attaches sticky bombs to the enemy that go off the next time they're hit with an ability. The amount of stickies attached can be increased by holding down the command and spending meter. It's a move that has some thought that can be put in it. It doesn't deal immediate damage, so you have to either be willing to wait or have resources left over to set them off. You could attach bombs to an enemy and then Dragon Throw them to make them a living bomb. You can set them up when the enemies stagger is nearly complete so you can rebuild your ATB and resources and go for a truly devastating combo. You can go full throttle on the bombs or hold back so you can still enter Burn.

The next ability is one I really wanted to make once I had the concept of Yang down as a fighter with a lot of variability. Golden Glow takes inspiration from Unfettered Fury being a side grade to Unbridled Strength. It's an alterative to Burn. While Burn quickly burns out and has potent offenses, Golden Glow is a mode that lasts longer but instead focuses on Yang's defenses. While Yang mostly uses her semblance to attack, she's also used it a few times to take hits. An ability like this has lots of synergy with Yang's abilities that want her to be in her super form, but doesn't play as well with moves like Bombshell that prefer having meter being quick to build and spend rather than something long lasting.

Limits

Limits aren't hard to do, but I should still talk about them anyways. A solid chunk of Rebirth's cast has a basic Level 1 Limit, a Level 2 that increases stagger a lot, and a Level 3 which just does tons more damage. That's not to say all of them are like that. Red notably gets healing from his LB1 and a longer lasting mode from his LB2.

LB1 I'd make a basic damaging limit. It'd be just one big strong punch, like the one used against Junior in the Yellow Trailer, to mirror how quick a lot of the other LB1s are.

LB2 would put Yang in Burn with 1 extra level. If used while you have level 3, this would put you in the otherwise unreachable level 4. Because of course there's 4, this a RWBY character, I can't not slap the number 4 on things. I'd probably use a scene from the JL movie part 2 actually. The one where Yang activates her semblance, jumps up, and starts peppering the battlefield with gunfire. I just think it's good to have a little bit of variety between all the melee combat.

LB3, due to being a whole process to get up to, would be huge stagger increase and huge damage. It's meant to help end the fight, regardless of how the enemy is currently looking. I actually think I'd like her to do something new for this attack honestly. LB1 already uses something from the early RWBY days and LB2 uses more recent stuff, so there's a good spread of representation.

[lemon-rwbyaus]

Note: Hi all, I’m Mod Orange.

I have another RWBY blog that’s relatively popular, but is also SFW. Or like…only NSFW in the dirty jokes/mentioning sex sense.

I’ve been out of the fandom for a bit so I’ve neglected both this blog and my main RWBY blog.

But recently I’ve gotten bored and am getting back into the fandom a bit, dusting off my old blog…but I kept seeing really nice and hot nsfw RWBY content that I don’t want to reblog on my main RWBY page, but I still wanted to show some kind of support for.

And so…this blog is already here…and pretty much already serves that purpose…and already has at least some followers so it wouldn’t entirely be starting from scratch…and also nobody’s touched it since 2021 so it’s not like anyone else is using it.

So I’m gonna just…casually dump the spiciest/most fun RWBY content I like on here. Sometimes with captions and tags, mostly not. Will be closer to spamming this blog with RWBY porn than making fanfiction tbh.

If any of the other Mods want to join in or stop me they can, but tbh they’ve more or less gone dark on this blog too and it’s not like I’m changing the purpose of it, so I’m going to do the “Ask forgiveness” method of action rather than “Ask permission”.

If anyone is really angry at this turn of events and convinces me it’s a bad idea, I’ll just create a new blog and give you guys a link so people know to find me.

TLDR: To maybe make it clearer, I’m just going to…treat this more like a personal spam RWBY porn blog than a professional one.

So just be warned, you should probably should turn off notifications for this blog, lol. And unless specified otherwise, Mod Orange is going to be the one reblogging random shit.

I’ll probably fall back out of the fandom in like two weeks, and this place will be dark again, but until then, enjoy the smut!

-Mod Orange

[onewomancitadel]

I’ve had a thought about the Weiss-Jaune stuff happening in this volume that I’d like to run past you. It’s been in the back of my mind since E5 and after this most recent episode it clicked that it feels akin to the development of the Blake-Sun relationship in V2-5, if in a more compressed timeframe. In that there’s this overt (in this case, contra B/S, unreciprocated) physical interest lending a patina of romantic potential to their interactions simultaneous with recurring moments of disconnect undermining that potential. Particularly the hurt when Jaune overhears Weiss insinuating he’s crazy is sticking in my head now as quite similar, narratively, to Blake’s startled upset when Sun misreads her intentions at the top of V4. And then in E9 Weiss figured out the right things to say to him to crystallize his epiphany but any romantic coding that might be read into the moment is (I felt, at least) deliberately refuted through the piling on into a whole-group hug, which again (this is what made it click) feels reminiscent of the inverse correlation between Sun’s emotional understanding of Blake and the intensity of his romantic interest in her.

Which strikes me as interesting because obviously the B/S detour on the way to Blake’s true love interest facilitates development Blake needed before she could be a good partner to Yang—Sun’s friendship confronts and incites the unraveling of Blake’s instinct to retreat and burn bridges for the sake of protecting her loved ones. So it occurred to me that something similar might be behind what they’re doing with Weiss and Jaune in this volume, with her fleeting/superficial romantic interest and romantic incompatibility precipitating a closer friendship that helps him reach an emotional turn toward his true love interest. I’m not invested in the story’s romantic pairings per se (I really enjoy them—I do love how RWBY handles its romantic arcs—but the romance isn’t what’s gluing me to the story), hence my interest in Jaune/Cinder largely comes down to noting that the narrative set up for it is, uhm, conspicuous, and trusting I’ll enjoy seeing how it unfolds. But I was irately nodding along with some of your posts on the Weiss topic earlier in the volume because the out of nowhere of it all really Bugged Me, so I’m interested to hear how this line of thinking tracks from a less casual-enjoyer J/C perspective? Hence rambling in your inbox, apologies for the lengthy ask.

Okay, if you guys really actually love me, please use paragraph breaks. I try to mindfully use paragraph breaks and space out text as best I can to make for an easier reading experience myself. It might also help that if you're sending an essay like this you supply a title with it and maybe even a tl;dr so I don't accidentally skim-read it and delete it assuming it's about something else. Someone bringing an essay about Jaune/Weiss into my inbox really is cause for alarm. You don't know the stuff I've historically just deleted.

Just so everyone knows, Tumblr used to have a word limit of around - I want to say like 250 words, so a paragraph - and a lot of us are still getting adjusted to the freeform wordcount. It's a really different experience because I'm not just answering brief thoughts/questions, I'm now like, interacting with whole essays, and to be entirely frank I'm not overly fond of it. You have to appreciate the length of my response to brief questions (e.g. this very ask here today). I don't think Tumblr is conducive to a debate format like this lol.

That being said: yeah I had separate thoughts about Blake/Sun and its equivalency to Jaune/Weiss, and I was talking to my IRL friend about that yesterday; in the past I've speculated that the Blake relationship patterns also reflect Jaune's, including a point of contention over a redhead kill. I didn't make any posts about the development of Blake/Sun as it pertains to V9!Jaune/Weiss, mostly because I actually hated that storyline then and found its development really boring (on my rewatches I'm really bad and usually just skip past Blake's storyline when Ilia's not around) and I didn't feel confident expressing my feelings on the matter. So that being said, that you've outlined what seem to be eerie parallels, I think you've arguably done a better job than I possibly could on the topic.

So consider yourself the very rare exception in this circumstance where I'm not annoyed and actually quite grateful. Even further I'm grateful someone else noticed the parallel to Blake/Sun, so I'm not the only one seeing it. I agree with everything you've said here (although I would quibble that the romances are thematically and narratively fundamental to the show, and I am personally here for the show insofar as I think its most interesting ideas are actually realised through the romances and the character redemptions. I'm a 'shipper' in a very serious sense that might run contrary to casual fandom, but a shipper all the same).

I'm glad you found my earlier posts about Jaune/Weiss relieving, because I feel pretty alone on the matter since it's obviously a ship some people want to happen, and it's the 'obvious choice' insofar as lazy storytelling. Nice guy waits patiently and gets hot and she finally notices him, yay. I'm gonna puke. Nevermind the replacement goldfish business.

I'm very curious that you're not largely a shipper and you're mostly approaching the matter textually; first of all, way to blow up my ego, because you know the frightful thing with Jaune/Cinder is of course the accusation I'm biased and seeing things because I want them to smooch, but further to that, if you don't mind me asking, what convinced you? I think what you've outlined here with the romances suggests we have similar background of analysis, especially that tension between the shiny thing in the left hand (anime romantic trope) and the textual meat in the right hand being disguised. This type of magician's foreshadowing trick is interesting, even if at times I feel it's a little mean when they do it (it's not a RWBY exclusive thing, just maybe some elements of how it's done). To be totally frank, I do think the shipbaiting is partly to stir furore, but the out-of-nowhereness did make it a little strange (and tonally off with his reintroduction, but that's me).

Seriously, go back and rewatch Volumes 4-8 and compare the Jaune/Weiss interactions to the romances developing at that time. Every reunion, there's no major Jaune/Weiss reunion (V5/V8) when all the others get one, there's barely any dialogue, even when he's healing her in an ostensibly major fucking dramatic scenario their dialogue barely scratches the surface of just buddies being friends. If I were a shipper I'd be disappointed because fan of the romance or no, there is genuine intensity to the other canonical romances, even completely pre-canon ones (e.g. Oscar/Ruby confrontation in V5 and their whole everything). So the out-of-nowhereness in V9 is either bad writing, or it's paralleling Blake/Sun and is saying things about who Jaune once thought he should've been. I'm not going to repeat all of my Jaune posts, but seriously, the only way I can intuitively parse this is that he puts all of those notions about who he should've been to bed, including the idle childish fantasy of the perfect princess (who doesn't even want to be a princess, so who is the one in this story who desperately wants to be a Maiden). I think it's especially damning that Weiss has only noticed him 'now' from a textual perspective, even if shippers consider it 'finally earnt' now he's hot or whatever. Shiny thing in the left hand, meat in the right hand.

If the show had committed to Blake/Sun, hey, I'd give it to the Jaune/Weiss shippers no problem. But it didn't and it was never intended to. So what fucking gives? Because I really don't think it was only purely shipbaiting with those two; I think there was something more weighted there done with the teasing and who the characters are/who they want to be, even if there was some of that. So is the story smart or not? Are they setting up Jaune to do things related to Cinder after this for a reason? (If we do get a parallel of V4/V5 fully, Jaune does want to hunt Cinder down back then, and um... I'm just saying, Blake returns to Yang after her time with Sun...)

So if you've got (bold for kill, central conflict to the given canon endgame pairing): Blake/Adam = Jaune/Pyrrha, Blake/Ilia = Jaune/Weiss (Beacon era), Blake/Sun = Jaune/Weiss (V9), Blake/Yang = Jaune/who??????? WHO, PRAY TELL??????

[hollow-prey]

*obligatory intro/pinned post*

Hey there, welcome! Call me Ellie! I'm an ace gremlin in my 20s, pronouns are she/they, and I self ship for comfort, fun, and as an indulgent creative outlet for myself. I'm mostly here to yell into the void and do my own thing, but folks are welcome to follow if they want! Most of my interests (and F/Os) usually stay within the realm of video games, books, and random internet junk.

I follow from my main blog, @hollow-reign!

❗️Minors, please do not follow or interact!❗️

more details and specifics listed under the cut!

Interests!

Some main interests that I am always happy to talk about are:

Bleach

Jak and Daxter

Hades (SuperGiant)

The Arcana

honestly just...video games in general (mobile included!). tell me about what games u like

RWBY

YouTube egos (specifically JSE)

books!! I'm a big book nerd and I love to read new stuff, so if you have F/Os from any kind of book series/novel/graphic novel/comic series etc. PLEASE tell me all about them

...and much more! If you want to know if I'm into a certain series or piece of media, regardless of format, feel free to send me a message and ask!

F/Os!

My main F/Os (with ship names) are as follows:

Grimmjow (Bleach): Ship name is Hollow Prey

Antisepticeye (JSE egos): Ship name is Corrupted Data

Errol (Jak II and 3): Ship name is Krimzon Reign

Razer (Jak X): Ship name is Smoke & Mirrors

Phoenix (Jak & Daxter: The Lost Frontier): Ship name is Mythic Dawn

Julian (The Arcana): Ship name is Fortune Favored

I also have some small crushes/secondaries that I might mention here and there, but for the most part I post and reblog stuff that relates to my main ships.

Sharing?

I'm generally not comfortable with sharing my main F/Os.

If we happen to share any F/Os, please know you have excellent taste! I respect and support your self ships with them wholeheartedly! But for the sake of my own comfort and mental health, I am respectfully Avoiding and Not Looking at others' ships with my F/Os. If you feel similarly, I promise no hard feelings if you block me (and/or if you would like me to block you as well) 👍

That being said, if we happen to share F/Os and you'd still like to chat, I'd be happy to see how things go and possibly work out a tag system as needed!

And of course, if anyone has other F/Os from any of the sources I mentioned before, I would love to hear about them! 

disclaimers/nsfw content?:

This blog is a personal self-ship space run by an adult and may contain posts and content that are unsuitable for minors.

❗️If you are a minor, I ask that you please do not follow this blog! Otherwise I will block you!❗️

While I don't often post suggestive or nsfw stuff, sometimes I do! Even though I'm ace, it's always a possibility. Plus, as an adult in my mid-20s, I simply don't feel comfortable allowing minors into my personal self ship space where I may post or reblog stuff that could be mature or otherwise inappropriate.

So again, if you are a minor, please do not follow this blog, or you will be blocked!

✨ For everyone who is over 18, welcome! ✨

Like I said, nsfw posts are rare, but not completely out of the question. Whenever they do come up, I will be tagging any such posts (both reblogs and original content) with "Cyr's spice" so that people can blacklist tags as needed.

If you've made it this far, thank you for reading! Your F/Os love you so much and I hope you have a wonderful day! 💕

[twilightguardian]

Lilith Fairen, Canonseeker, Dishonest Discourse and Fixing RWBY

Preamble

I'm going to preface this by saying I'm not directly part of the RWBY community. You could say I'm a genuine 'hater', or whatever, and that's fine. I'd be considered a legitimate one; though I'll disagree with you about what constitutes hate, as I'll discuss below. Had it been my choice, I'd have only ever interacted with RWBY after a friend showed me the first two volumes and I, an animation student and aspiring novelist, disliked it. I moved on with my life. But circumstances led me to seeking out critical content that soon led me into the Tundra Discord server where I eventually met my boyfriend. I don't interact with RWBY spaces because I don't (didn't?) consider myself a fan, but I do have a morbid fascination with it and all the issues I have with it and how frequent issues crop up. The only time I've ever interacted with broader RWBY fandom directly was when discussing Fixing RWBY on reddit (and that one time where I commented when someone compared RWBY to Digimon Adventure 02. But Digimon is my fandom so I commented as part of my space).

I have had many discussions, mostly negative, but also positive about the show itself and while I never cared to watch further in, I eventually watched V3, and V6-8. V4-5 were skipped due to a migraine one week and group watch party exhaustion the next, respectively, but reviews and criticism videos allowed me to know what goes on in them.

Note that I enjoy critical content as a creative myself, and dabbling in critical content is important for someone learning how to write and create. It's just as important to know why something does not work from a critical perspective to understand why other elements do work while also keeping in mind there is a level of subjectivity. Someone is always going to disagree with you. I lurk the r/RWBYcritics for critical discourse, and occasionally r/RWBY, though the actual discourse there is fewer and far between by comparison, and unless I come across someone mentioning Digimon or FRWBY, I don't comment because I feel it's not my place.

So as you can see, I've been on the outside looking in at aspects of this community and considering where my interests are focused, (Fixing RWBY being an interest) found myself overlooking a clusterfuck of nonsense.

The concept of "Hatedom/HTDM"

I'm old guard. Old fandoms and old engagement from a time when the internet was a wild west and niche anime communities were tiny. The days of geocities and fan shrines and webrings. Never in my life have I come across a fandom that shunned a big chunk of itself, gatekeeping being part of the community and saying that aspect of the fandom wasn't valid. Perhaps I was lucky in that regard, but considering I dabbled in quite a few communities, I doubt it. Digimon Adventure has been around since 1999 and there were a lot of hot-button topics that split the fandom back then. More than 20 years later, you tread these old, rusted buttons and under your feet a sinkhole will open with a warm, bubbling lava plume of strong opinions will greet you as you wake the sleeping beast. But not once was there any sniff of a concept that someone wasn't a 'true' fan because of their opinions and outlooks on the show, and that is just a single example of many.

So to see the RWBY community simmering in barely contained venom over the "critics" is certainly an unwelcome sight to behold, and one that has alarming implications. There has been elements of gatekeeping in all fandoms, sure, but this feels on a new level. To think that it would get so bad that it was even considered to ban an entire related reddit group for having critical opinions is frankly shameful, and yes, I was around for that. Anyone who thought that was correct should feel embarrassed.

This idea that having a negative opinion equals a hateful person is patently absurd. It has been stated time and again that having a negative opinion on something doesn't mean you hate it. There are many different types of people in the world, with different mindsets and different ways of engaging with the things that they enjoy or engage with. Some people do art or fanfiction. Others dissect or criticize. It can be a combination of these things and whether or not the criticism is positive or negative does not negate the passion behind the words. Labelling someone who criticizes the show, even if that is all that they do, a 'hater' or part of the HTDM, comes across as punishment for engaging in fandom in a way you don't approve.

The internet as a whole, and fandom space, doesn't just belong to you and people who think like you. It belongs to everyone who has passion enough to engage with the media they've consumed and there are plenty of options available for those who don't wish to engage with certain methods of fandom discourse and immersion. To dictate who can and cannot participate in the fandom and who is worthy of hate and derision for being an "other" or "outsider" is frankly disgusting. If you think that someone cannot engage in "your" space because you don't like what they have to say, get over yourself and for once in your life, look past your own petulant selfishness. Seriously, we got taught to share space in preschool.

Criticism As Art, Engagement, Growth and Study

Criticism is an invaluable tool in creative spaces, both positive and negative, and there seems to be a growing idea of what constitutes valid criticism or not as simply whether or not it is positive and the thought of that is quite disturbing. You'd think that I wouldn't have to talk about this, but there are quite a number of people who don't fully understand there is more to criticism than being nice and gentle - which can do more harm than good, by the way.

There can be an art to criticism, and there is no one way to criticize something as being the ultimate 'correct' way. Just like there are different art styles, brush stroke techniques, chord progressions, building methods, etc, there are different styles of critique. It's up to the personality of the individual what form that critique manifests and there is no right or wrong way to critique like there is no right or wrong way to paint a painting. But there is something to be said about whether or not the messages you're trying to get across are being understood properly; whether the critiques are in good faith and can be understood to correspond accurately to the work in question, and with that in mind, we can gauge whether or not the criticism is good.

Critique and criticism, whether good or bad, can open up someone to a piece of media they may never have seen or heard before. It is then that they can decide for themselves, as individuals with their own minds and relative free will, whether or not they want to further participate in the consumption of the media being criticized. To get defensive over the idea that negative criticism exists because it influences the sheeple, dimwitted and easily swayed as they may be, is insulting to the intelligence of others, Eren. Individual people can look at a criticism of a work and decide for themselves whether or not the work is something that does not interest them, or is something to look into for themselves and decide whether or not they personally like or dislike it.

On the more creative side, criticism, even - and I'd say especially - negative criticism, is an essential tool to help the growth of the artist. It helps you grow and learn the many mistakes and errors one can have in a piece of media and teach someone to grow past and learn to avoid those pitfalls.

When it comes to criticizing a piece of media like RWBY, some individuals within the RWBY community view the criticism not only as an attack on the quality of the work, but harassment of the writers themselves. This is patently absurd for the simple fact that these men (and woman) are professional writers and criticism goes part and parcel with the job. To show yourself as a professional in the industry you'd want to put your best foot forward, show that you have the skills to write, and be humble enough to take criticism when given and seriously reevaluate your work, no matter how difficult it might be. The concept of 'kill your darlings' applies to beloved concepts and scenes in a story that, while loved, might hinder the story you want to tell. When you are putting something out there, even as a job, the goal should first and foremost be to entertain the audience, and to do that, strive to create the best version of your work that you can. Passion for what you do is such a hard thing to describe, but most can see it when it's there and can point to when it's not.

I don't doubt there are a couple of individuals that do legitimately harass the writers and others directly. We've seen that with other franchises, and individuals like that can be in more than one fandom. But I specify individuals because there is a trend to lump everyone that some people (like Lilith Fairen and Canonseeker) dislike and disagree with as one and the same, as though the 'critics' are a hive mind, and that everyone is connected to every other critic and knows what they do or say.

But dissent allows an honest writer or artist to grow from where they are, a community who strive to help others to make everything better so that the media we consume is better and the artist will be more satisfied and fulfilled. That is the goal. That is what critics strive for, because they can have as much passion for that work as the artist, if not directly for that work itself, then for the desire to see a fellow creative flourish.

Canonseeker's Logical Fallacies

Eren is someone that I consider to be fairly innocent in intent. At least I don't consider him to be outright malicious, unlike Lilith, but the results of his actions in trying to rectify what he considers to be a toxic situation is in fact toxic in and of itself. Eren is someone who views the situation of the critics as being outright harmful, as though fans voicing their dissent is bullying. Fans have no power and very little means to influence the media they're passionate about.

Therefore, when someone criticizes a work, the main audience for their criticisms are other fans, people whom they can engage with and share in their frustrations and worries. There is always a chance that the writer or some creative can see their complaints, but it is a low chance, and often little in the ways of rectifying the situation other than in the future. When Eren criticizes the 'critics' he attacks their character rather than the ideas they present. When called out on it, he never acknowledges his own faults, instead doing a what-aboutism to deflect from himself.

Just because other people are assholes doesn't mean you aren't also a problem. And considering the fact that we can see you being a problem right now, and you haven't named individual people for us to also slap on the wrist, we focus on you as a problem community member. Critics attack ideas and competency, not the writers as individual people (for the most part. If the situation calls for it, then how the writers are seen in the public eye becomes fair game for scrutiny).

He puts Miles Luna and Kerry Shawcross on pedestals, saying that they created RWBY. They did not. Monty is the sole creator and he picked them to fill in the blanks between his fight scenes. Personally I don't envy that situation based on what I've heard and I feel sympathy for that. But being 'hand picked' by Monty doesn't mean anything other than the fact that he was personal friends with these men. That doesn't speak to their skills as writers, as the romantic, lofty wording would suggest, and it doesn't mean anything beyond they happened to be available to do the job. Monty wanted to work with friends, that's all. Rooster Teeth runs on nepotism. Fact of the matter is, RWBY is now owned by a corporation, not an individual person any longer and when owned by a corporation, can be used and abused for whatever the corporations needs. If fans think that corporation shouldn't have the product any longer, then that's their opinion that they are allowed to hold. When they criticize RWBY for being the mess they think it is, they're criticizing Rooster Teeth as a company, its practices, and its willingness to allow or even encourage incompetence within the production through various means, some more terrible than others.

Eren's understanding of Death of the Author is tenuous at best and nonexistent at worst. Barring people's misunderstanding of the concept in question aside... The concept that once a work of media exists out in the public, it is out of the control of the owner how their work gets interpreted is something that Eren struggles with. An author or creator can do their best to convey their ideas to their audience as best as possible, but that doesn't guarantee that someone will see it in that exact way. Whether a member of the audience understands what the author is trying to convey is up to the individual person, and their understanding or lack of understanding is valid to their own experiences. Of course there are dishonest ways of interpreting a piece of work, such as misdiagnosing a theme of a work (especially when the theme is stated) and then saying its bad for poorly handling that theme. The themes should be looked at on their own and judged how well they're done.

Anything else that I could say about the man has already been talked about in a different document by SYTOkun, barely anything of which I am interested in talking about, as I'm currently more interested in the misunderstandings and mistakes that lead to someone who wants positivity in a fandom to become a poster child for anti-positivity.

Lilith Fairen's Dishonest Motives

Lilith is such a curious person, and I've tried to understand her mentality and see where she's coming from and where the misunderstanding starts. The main issue seems to be that she came into the fandom with dishonest motives from the start and has admitted to it. Her motivation for coming into the RWBY community was strictly to bully people whom she had ideological issues with, or people she deemed 'critics'. She was mocking people while having never watched the show herself, something that many people pointed out. She's claimed to have since watched RWBY and still finds no issue with it. I have no reason to disbelieve her and thus will not accuse her of still having never watched the show. But considering her starting point, either likes it more for ideological reasons or likes it to spite the haters. While her enjoyment of RWBY may be genuine, due to this history, it's very difficult for me to see her desire for this show as anything but sociologically political.

Lilith herself is a very caustic individual with a large chip on her shoulder. She has a preference for female-led stories, and ones that don't require the girls/women to have motivations surrounding men. While I think there's nothing wrong with that conceptually, it becomes a problem when viewing certain stories one has little preference for as problematic for not fitting into what she personally prefers. For the most part, women and girls are more motivated by social aspects of life, whether it be friendships or romance, and that's not inherently a bad thing, but Lilith has some issue with it due to said aforementioned chip labelled 'misogyny'.

She throws accusations of misogyny around like it's candy going out of style. Rarely does she back up her accusations with any factual evidence, randomly accusing this, that or the other of being misogynistic as though one should just accept or already knows it as fact when in reality is quite odd. Guns, for example, are considered masculine representations in her eyes, and not gender neutral items that can be used by either gender, and thus unsuitable weapons for magical girls, like in Madoka Magica, to use.

I've never seen Madoka. But I don't think I have to in order to see how silly this concept is. Girls can like guns and that doesn't make them less girly. I've never heard of guns as being a gendered item.

While I also don't necessarily disagree there's issues in anime and female representation, tropes and cliches can be overdone and become outright tired and boring, I believe Lilith takes it a step too far when she starts going after other people for their acceptance or ambivalence toward the things she's personally not a fan of. In attacking something like Madoka or other so-called 'deconstruction' anime, she infantilizes female characters by saying they shouldn't be subject to the same challenges and difficulties male characters often are, because they're women. She also claims anime shows girls as hysterical and overly emotional. As though teenagers - which most anime feature - is a foreign concept to her. Also stuff often gets turned up for drama. It's called fiction and literally all media around the world does this.

She's also a negative, salty, bitter person in general despite her preferences for happy, saccharine and light-hearted stories. It makes me wonder if she seeks out these fluffy tales because she has such a dark mentality that she desperately wants to get away from, but has the delusion that what she likes isn't respected for what it is, or liked. As though Sailor Moon or Pretty Cure aren't incredibly large, successful franchises in Japan. As though Sailor Moon isn't still beloved in the west. People in different countries can have different tastes and expectations outside of the niches of anime lovers who already understand and cherish these properties. That doesn't make them disrespected. Madoka was enjoyed by (some) people who had no concept of magical girls outside of cursory knowledge of watching Sailor Moon as kids and praised it as being the best despite likely never having watched before or since any magical girl anime. And these people are the ones she hates, but conflates all Madoka fans as these individuals.

Because of her perceived notion that magical girls are disrespected and dismissed due to misogyny, her attitude toward her original stories can also be quite cynical at times. Maybe if she took a step out of her self-loathing and victim mentality she would realize that a prospective reader seeing something like this on her blog might be a turn-off.

It's not like there are other factors that contribute to your story's relative obscurity like poor marketing on your part or the fact that superhero novels (which magical girls count as) in general are not very popular. Yes, even ones that feature male leads. You find more success with more visual mediums like comic books, movies and television. Girl. From one author to another... There's more to putting your work out there than simply writing and publishing it.

I'll get to Glints Saga another day, but from a cursory glance (at an old version, mind you) I can already tell that if you had gone to a writing meetup and got the story critiqued and they found little issue with it... you should find a better critique group because they were seriously doing you a disservice.

Gotta wonder if Faye said Monara's name often enough she'd eventually remember it. There's also a lot more wrong here, dialogue-wise and prose-wise. But that's more for a comparison between the old and new version if this section had been cleaned up.

But her bad attitude doesn't end there. She also has spite for anyone else that seems to have more success than her that she knows is 'touchable'. Instead of looking at a piece of inspirational messages by a writer trying to encourage others to keep going, she dismisses the critique because they're popular and it's so easy for them. Because it's not like an artist or writer could be popular because they've worked hard for it and were able to market themselves effectively in order to gain an audience and conduct themselves in a manner that wouldn't turn prospective fans away. No, it's just that they only got lucky. That somehow makes their altruistic encouragement meaningless.

Also notice how she never actually engages in arguments when people call her out on anything. Because she either knows she's full of crap or she wants to appear like a tough beotch on the internet and hide the fact that she has no counter argument and treats childishly typing out her laughter like some cartoon buttmonkey is a rebuttal instead of some obvious attempt at trying to hide her discomfort.

You know, completely missing the point of the original post that said if you create for the main purpose of getting recognition and acknowledgment, then you'll soon hate your writing and become miserable when your expectations aren't met. So the advice was to create regardless of whether or not you get any attention because you love to write, not because you feel owed anything for writing. But if she did that then she'd actually feel good about herself and her work and not bitterly lash out at everything and everyone. It's enough to make one wonder if part of the reason why she goes after critics is because she's jealous many of them do get attention and engagement and the main thing she manages to attract is people calling her out for her shitty behaviour.

By the way, both Lilith and Eren think that people going to their public blogs, where they post things that other people can see is somehow stalking. On a website where the whole point is that your posts will likely travel, especially if you talk about a franchise (even if you don't tag). Or that people responding to them at all is somehow stalking. They want to be able to say any kind of vile garbage about other fans they don't like and not have to face any repercussions for it.

One final thing because I know it's going to bug me...

"Critics" do not compare autistic people to robots. We compare ourselves to robots because when they aren't written to just be humans straight up are neurodivergent. They do not think like neurotypical people and in some ways even like humans do. That is the definition of neurodivergence - thinking and processing in a way that is outside the norm. Allistic people accept this and also headcanon many robots the same way in order to be inclusive. Lilith, if you aren't going to properly understand why people say things in relation to mental health and neurodivergence just stay out of it entirely.

Toxicity of FNDM, RWDE and Anti-RWDE

Here's where I'm going to get a little controversial, because members of all sides have done shitty things. Anti-RWDE is obvious, as they're just a salt tag dedicated to complaining about people who have negative opinions because how dare. But even the side I "agree" with more, I think have said some ridiculous and toxic things. Never mind anons here.

Accusations of "fascist", "white supremacist", "racist", "terf", "transphobic", "homophobic", "sexist", "ableist", basically anything under the sun that is a pejorative you can think of it was probably spewed out of the fingers of some member of RWDE or FNDM/Anti like a child throwing insults on the playground.

You have passions and societal issues that you want to address, and that's perfectly fine and understandable. But to accuse someone of being any flavour of 'ist' or 'phobe' over disagreements on whether a character in a cartoon does this action or interacts with that character in such and such a way muddies the waters, dilutes the impact the word has and even makes it easier for people to casually dismiss accusations and even real life and serious instances of these things due to how low the bar has been set for being labelled as such. You aren't engaging honestly anymore, you're trying to shut someone down by calling them names. Attacking someone or a work for miniscule things they do or say that you interpret as being bad without considering that there might in fact be a different reason why they said that thing is dishonest and harmful.

Hey Lilith, you wanna, maybe, define what an alt-righter is to you? Or are you just going to call out anyone who is right-of-far-left an "alt-righter" so that you can feel good and justified for shitting on someone else for literally no reason other than you had a temper tantrum at the concept that someone is unsatisfied with a cartoon? It's not like you have any evidence that Celtic is an alt-righter or anything you just made that shit up.

I've seen both sides do this, and I'm not calling out specific individuals because I've seen many act this way.

There are even certain people within the fandom who say it's your fault that you're upset with the show because you dared to have expectations that the show didn't meet. As though this is somehow a gotcha, that it's somehow wrong of you to have desires to see something you think is being presented in the show, only for it to fall flat with something you don't think is good in its place. You're a bad person for having an opinion that isn't positive about the cartoon. The show has either somehow done the impossible and achieved perfection or there is no amount of problems with the writing or anything else that can justify you expressing your opinion about it. It's best for you to shut your mouth because it personally inconveniences them.

It's gotten to the point where it's almost impossible to have certain discussions without devolving into a slobbering screaming match, because even the characters aren't saved from the pejoratives and some even attach characters and liking certain characters to certain mentalities and mindsets. If you dare like the wrong character you will be seen as x toxic thing. If you want to discuss a certain character you'll be dismissed as y type of toxic person. You also better watch how you dress your characters in redesigns or else you're z type of bad people because somewhere out there someone may or may not make a connection to a real life group you may or may not have taken a couple of design elements from and that is evil because there are 100728 different negative ways you can portray a marginalized group to the point that it would probably be better to forget those groups exist at all and only keep your fantasy series based on the standard big cultures and that's somehow more progressive despite also being a problem. Always watch your step. Always be ready to be seen as a monster, or fight a monster. Absolute lunacy.

On top of that, it makes you no better than the people you criticize. How hypocritical to call someone out for shitty behaviour, complaining about toxicity in the fandom and turn around and do shitty behaviour yourself.

Don't think I didn't notice when Judgmental Critter calls out Lilith for calling her misogynist for criticizing RWBY, saying that she just hates women, then turns around and casually accuses people who criticize High Guardian Spice (or some things about RWBY) for the exact same thing with no basis. I love Critter's sass, opinions, views and her work in general, become one of my favourite youtubers even. I can't wait for when my boyfriend shows me Madoka so I can watch her magical girl series and other videos. But I don't fail to notice when she blanket statements groups of people because she doesn't/won't understand their arguments.

Honestly there are many examples like this but I wanted to highlight an example from each "side" to emphasize my point and to show that I'm not just pointing to any particular side as being the problematic one. I think the worst example of toxicity has to be in the tags of this one post I found on tumblr ranting about hbomberguy's video. It's actually disturbing.

I was so flabbergasted by the idea that someone could actually say this, not because they disliked what was said, but because a video that didn't praise RWBY existed at all.

Backtracking a little, I wanted to talk about how quick people are to make connections and accuse others in the fandom of being something terrible.

We are pattern-seeking creatures and our pattern recognition is exceptional. But it also produces false positives in the pareidolia effect, the phenomenon where you see things that aren't actually there. The most benign and silly of the pareidolia effect is 'faces in places' and likewise, you can see patterns of behaviour, thought processes and ideologies in conversations out of context to the wider behaviour of the person. This is why I'd studied up on Lilith and Eren before writing this to make sure that there was a noticeable, repeated pattern of behaviour before writing all of this up. Lilith, Eren, and their ilk also suffer from this when it comes to criticism of rewrites that they have particular issues with, and I'll talk more about this in the next section.

There's an example of a man whom I'd had an argument with in a server I moderate for. I hadn't meant to get into an argument with him, more genuinely wanting to get his thoughts on a rewrite-heavy AU-turned-original-story idea of my own, as someone who liked RWBY. I thought I could have a fun, creative conversation, getting insight into how I did handling the characters in an AU setting and what I could do to expand on my interpretations. I find the idea of setting characters in different scenarios while still maintaining their personalities a fun exercise. Instead I was met with defensive vitriol.

I wanted the focus to be friendship between the girls rather than a mishmash of family and romance, which he hated. When asked why, it was because I said I didn't like feeling as though I was being lied to with the premise of the story, which was meant to be about four girls who became friends, and I felt it personally didn't satisfy me in that department. Then we got off on a long argument about lying to your audience, which eventually revealed a sort of sad element to the guy that I was talking to: that basically he felt that he had no right to be upset over anything that happened to him. If he was lied to, he shouldn't be upset at it. Not that he didn't want to be upset, but that he felt he couldn't, and eventually admitted to a deeper underlying issue with self confidence and worth he struggled with that seemed to manifest in being upset when anyone voiced dissenting and negative opinions.

While I think looking on the bright side is all well and good, there's a limit my dude, and trying to explain to him why I felt being lied to was a negative thing that I had the right to be unhappy about was such a foreign concept to him due to not feeling like he should ever be upset when people treat him poorly. Then he accused me of disliking him for liking a show I disliked. The whole exchange left me spiraling

But that interaction was telling, and while I can't apply that to all the members of FNDM who feel threatened by criticism and dissent, eyes can be opened about possibilities into the reasons why they find critical engagement so offensive. On some level, at least for some, it might feel like they get personally attacked because the show they love is picked apart, and in turn, picking them apart. RWBY is fundamental to who they are as people, and if you attack it in any way, you are threatening them, their worth and self-esteem.

What is 'Hate'?

Hate is a strong word, and one that, like all the above pejoratives, is used far too liberally. It's a strong negative emotion of loathing and disgust, and if kept too long can cause negative effects on one's mind and body. It takes some amount of derangement, I feel, to legitimately hate something passionately for a long period of time. Hate is usually such a strong emotion that it is temporary and fades quickly.

There were a lot of people who hated Twilight when it first came out. Those people quickly faded away after their rage subsided and the main people who stuck around on the Twilight 'hate train' were people who disliked it, but thought it was fun to mock rather than outright hate. It was silly, after all! Who wouldn't love making fun of something ridiculous and harmful and boring and dumb. Many critics of Twilight even pointed out aspects of what they liked in the book series, namely the side characters of the latter books. The vampires and werewolves helping the Cullens and the inter-species political struggles were more fascinating and interesting than the teen melodrama forced love triangle going on between Bella, Edward and Jacob. There were many more still who enjoyed Twilight knowing full well how trash it was, acknowledging it for its camp and bad writing but enjoying it for being bad.

Twilight is still criticized to this day, broken down and dissected to see what makes it tick, and why it ended up being as bad as it was. But it's not for hate for the most part, though there is dislike. But mostly if you're going to deep dive, pick apart or rewrite beyond an anger-filled review, that takes a certain level of passion for what you're doing. You see the good inside it and want it to be better. If you're going off youtuber's opinions you do have to be mindful that some of them play up their emotions for entertainment. Youtubers are entertainers, after all, and while those feelings might be genuine, there will be elements of hamming it up. Even positive youtubers do this and there's nothing wrong with that.

It's the same with RWBY and a lot of RWBY criticism. Most people who genuinely hate the show have moved on to bigger and better things. Those who stuck around either do so because they genuinely love it, or hope that it will get better, or at the very least need to see it to the end because it's been a part of their lives for so long.

Hate, ultimately, is a negative experience that can't birth anything creative. Hate does nothing but tear, break down and destroy. It's tearing down someone else directly to fill a void, or to make yourself feel better.

Hate, ultimately, is what many in the Anti-RWDE does to the part of the FNDM they don't like.

Fixing RWBY

Now comes the lengthy part of my post! Fixing RWBY or FRWBY is a project started by Raymond McNeil, as most people likely know, and started as a passion project due to his love for RWBY and his dissatisfaction with elements of how RWBY has been handled. If anyone says that he hates the show, you know that it's in bad faith and they haven't watched his content. He's said multiple times how much he loves the show, he's just frustrated it doesn't live up to the potential he thinks it has.

This section is voicing my rebuttals to larger criticisms of the show by people who admit they don't properly watch and engage with the project and purposefully look for things to pick apart, regardless of if it's true. While there are legitimate criticisms to be had about the project, they are harder to come by as they get drowned out by a flooding of this low brow shit flinging.

Some people think being dissatisfied is wrong, as I've previously mentioned

They, for some reason, think that having expectations for a show is invalid. I've already discussed how terrible that mindset is. But the main recurring criticisms of Fixing RWBY are mainly perpetuated by Eren and Lilith and a handful of their friends, which get spread around to others who think like them. We know Lilith is dishonest because she, by her own admission, skims his content and doesn't properly evaluate it, looking for things to take out of context or at face value to shit on. EngineGear at least has the decency to honestly summarize without comment. So let's go through some of their criticisms, shall we?

Special mention goes out to EngineGear, who had been one of the people throwing around the idea that Raymond kept Fixing RWBY behind a paywall simply because, as a youtuber, he had his discord as a patreon reward. When I calmly explained why his discord had nothing to do with FRWBY, and how his criticism cannot be put against Raymond without also demonizing non-critic youtubers and other artists who get paid for their fan content, he deleted the reddit post from his little saltmine, r/RWBYCynics. I appreciate his honesty in recognizing his mistake and deleting the post.

We're certainly off to a start here. The implication of this post is implying that Celtic Phoenix, and to a larger part his volunteer team - the Sketchy Huntsman - are racist.

Okay, so, there is practically no information about Oscar in terms of background or creation information to confirm anything other than what fairy tale character they could graft onto him. Who knows, there might be some obscure podcast or interview or tweet or however many different methods the writers have used to supplement their poor writing skills. I'm not about to go on a wild goose chase for something that might not even exist. His concept art says he has sunburnt skin. That makes sense, he's a farmer. He's out in the sun all day. So it stands to reason he has a farmer's tan. Even if he doesn't, the guy has my skin tone and I'm not what you would call non-European in origin.

Let's nevermind for a moment that this is incredibly American-centric thinking. This is an ancient relic of the past where we divided ourselves up into Reds, Whites, Blacks, and Yellows (... huh. I... didn't mean to sort them like that;; ) and sometimes Browns. It still has its uses in the modern day, and of course there is just acknowledgment of visual differences, but it should also be acknowledged that the terms are arbitrary descriptors of shades of the same colour (brown). All humans regardless of how much melanin is in your skin, is a shade of brown. Skin can have an underside of red, blue, green, yellow and determine whether their skin looks cold or warm. Europeans can naturally get pretty dark, being born with natural olive skin and there are non-Europeans who can be born with light skin. Europeans (or descent) can run between Type I-IV and non-Europeans can range from Type III-VI. What's more, we don't know anything about the migratory history of Remnant or whether skin types are random like faunus apparently are.

The main RWBY characters have ridiculously translucent, even glowing skin lighter than Type I that no actual human being would have. Blake and Weiss are beyond even anime pale, so someone looks at a character who has realistically coloured 'white' skin and all of a sudden they're poc. There's no problems with headcanoning that. But that's what it is. Your headcanon. And you're accusing Raymond of racism for getting rid of a character you headcanon as being poc. The same goes for Lionheart, who looks to have an (albeit sickly) ashy grey skin tone. Not dark enough to definitively be poc. It's a headcanon that you can choose to have, but should not weaponize to vilify someone you disagree with.

This is gonna be a general onsen post, one that is going to have some overlap with the faunus heat cycles section below. Mistral is meant to have vague connections to Asian culture. Onsen, or bathhouses/hot springs, are a very important part of Asian culture. Not only that, but they were and are also important to the Ancient Greeks, Ancient Romans, Turkish, and many other societies as places of community, healing and relaxation.

From a meta standpoint, an onsen episode, like a beach episode, is easy on the overworked animators to create, and thus become a staple of anime. But they aren't used purely for fanservice.

Fruits Basket used the onsen episode as another way for Momiji to pay back Tohru for the Valentines chocolates, further establishing his bond with her, for the characters in general to bond, another way for Tohru to show how much she thinks of her mother in everything that she does, and as foreshadowing to Ritsu's arrival by meeting his mother, who owned the facility. Ritsu's mother is one of the few zodiac parents who has a good relationship with their child and was able to give Tohru some insight into the family. Plus, another moment of Yuki showing his affection for Tohru and growing desires to see her as happy as she made him.

Outlaw Star's onsen episode is very raunchy to the point where American syndication cut the episode entirely from television. And because of that the American audiences missed out on an incredibly important plot detail. The episode was heavy in many establishing things, generally being wacky, but also an important, unskippable element to the story.

Blue Seed is an anime that I never got to watch, though my old video store had the sequel OVA Blue Seed 2, which featured three episodes. One of those episodes featured an onsen, and a bomb rigged to explode once the water level got too high or low or the timer ran out. It was a thrilling episode featuring a tense plot and showed the cultural differences between the characters and their one (American) gaijin friend.

There are other examples of onsen episodes in anime that aren't just for fanservice, so to suggest that they only exist in this way is absurd. The female members of the Sketchy Huntsmen, particularly the Asian members advocated hard for this scene, practically twisting Raymond's arm to put it in because it was thematically important, and culturally, for the character moments the cast (especially Weiss and Yang) would go through. By ignoring all of the context to what went on in this scene to say it was purely for Raymond to be gross is to wave away the cultural significance of onsen to Asian culture as being reduced to nothing more than stripteases and ignore when characters do have important moments between one another.

Roman also didn't say anything about Weiss being a man. He said she was flat-chested. He thought Ren was a woman because he was beautiful and had a gentle, feminine face and thin physique and justified it by talking about how women are varied. The joke is making fun of Roman for being an unobservant ass, not at Ren for being feminine and certainly not at Weiss. How badly did you not pay attention to this scene to get so offended that you had to make it about you and your expectation to be slighted. Again, pareidolia. Trans people, rest easy. Not every joke involving gender and being seen as the opposite gender is about you specifically or meant to slight you specifically. And I mean this genuinely. If you think that it is, kindly take a chill pill and reduce your ego before you hurt yourself. Your blood pressure will thank you.

Does this screenshot of a Rated T game upset you?

Faunus heat cycles were treated more or less the same as the onsen scene. Subverting the expectation that this sexual concept can only be used for cheap hentai games and anime. Realistically any trope or concept can be used in a more serious story setting, including sexual concepts like heat cycles. There’s no rules that just because something is used often as one thing that it cannot be used serve a different purpose. That’s the beauty of writing. In this case, Raymond used the heat cycles as one of many minuscule differences between the species to further exacerbate racial tensions and drive xenophobia, which would in turn affect the world on a global scale. Wow that kinda sounds like stuff that happens in real life! What a concept!

To those of you weirdos that think heat cycles are gross still, chew on this: Real life humans have evolved the ability to have sex and get pregnant 365 days of the year. If you think about it, our heat cycles never turn off. And the reason why we have periods is presumed to make sure that if we do get pregnant at any time we can attempt to abort a dead foetus before it potentially goes septic and kills us. Fascinating stuff, but that’s not all. Humans might actually have a heat cycle on top of that after all. There are days during the reproductive cycle where women are more receptive to the idea of sex, and finds normally unpleasant bodily odours more pleasant and men are attracted to the odours of women during this time.

Basically this means that women have periods of subtle extra heat that make them more receptive to sex on top of the fact that humans are basically horny all the time. This is something that is a biological fact within human beings and it can influence society of a variety of ways in the wider context of the world, so why is it so far-fetched and disgusting that a faunus would have a more non-primate mammalian estrus?

Now this is a new one. Ilia did turn away from her destructive spiral. Just like in real life that doesn't mean you get off scot free. She got a reduced sentence and some privileges for her help. She’s being rewarded by getting to go out and have fun at the festival and she said she’d rather be in the (presumably) solitude of a jail cell than have to deal with Sun (and his loud, boisterous energy). What’s offensive about that? Also hmm... 3 poc faunus. Well, faunus are all Remnant's version of poc so you can't mean them specifically do you mean... these three?

Those two on the right are looking pretty damn pale to be poc could it be that you're lying, Eren? And maybe that even if it weren't the case it wouldn't matter because it's a legitimate police technique at the very least seen in procedurals on television and are used regardless of the suspects' skin colour? You trying to slither the idea that Raymond is racist because he dares to have something at all happen to a non-white character is rather slimy.

A lot to go over here, so let's get started shall we? First of all, it absolutely tickles me that changing Shay D. Mann into Shiloh would cause Eren to go into such a big tizzy. Like, it's such a small thing and yet it's one of the main complaints they had about V5, which in my opinion means that Raymond was doing something right. Apparently upgrading a character from a tertiary to a secondary position if there's a need for it is blasphemy.

Okay, so let's go over the concept of character hierarchies. Primary Characters (which there is 8), secondary characters (which there are at least 15), and tertiary characters, which outnumber the stars. Honestly these could be broken down further into Main Characters (Ruby, Weiss, Jaune, etc), Primary characters (Nora, Qrow, Oscar, etc), Secondary characters (Raven, Ironwood, Ace-Ops, etc), Tertiary characters (Whitely, Willow, etc) and then Quaternary characters (Henry Marigold, Dust Shop Guy, Background people).

A quaternary character being upgraded to a tertiary character... what a terrible concept. I also don't understand this predilection for playing up the severity of Shay's actions, acting as though he's straight up assaulted her. He was drunk and tried to flirt. When she ignored it, he tried touching her hair. I've had a more eventful night in real life at a bar dealing with drunk guys who didn't mean any harm and one of them stuck his fingers in my mouth (I had on vampire fangs and that blew his drunk mind). He returns, bruised from his punch and worse for the wear with friends and Yang makes him lead her to camp.

He's not a good guy, obviously, and Shiloh is still not a good guy. But he's more human. He has people he cares about and his own set of morals, even if they may be looser than our protagonist's. If you don't think terrible people can't also have people they care about, I don't know what to say. You're mad because a criminal character, along with the rest of his tribe, got nuance beyond 'bandit'. I do not see the problem.

Shiloh is also not married to Raven, Eren. You do know that people can have children out of wedlock, right?

Gotta ask how Vernal was ruined in FRWBY. He says a lot of basically nothing and doesn't explain himself, acting as though his incoherent rambles are meant to be enough.

Oh yeah, Vernal was such a unique character all right with how... there she was. Existing. I'm supposed to be impressed? Ohhh. Ahhh. Her hair is very pixie cut. Such non-feminine (except it totally is Eren you silly), much discount bargain bin Yang outfit. It's not like Raven isn't literally a palette swap of Yang anyway so I don't know why you clowns complain about Lily, who has different features than both her mother and Yang while still being unique and yet sleep on this.

Raven also didn't dismiss Vernal's death in FRWBY. She refused to outwardly express her grief or accept that her poor actions got her daughter killed. That whole scene with her trying to destroy and then hide the relic was her focusing her feelings because she's not a very mature person. Sorry, that bit of character writing might be a bit subtle for those who are used to blunt-force character writing so it's understandable if you don't get it.

Now this is a weird claim. Let's look at it shall we? Zooming in for the visually impaired on Ruby's face, we indeed do see her looking at Roman and she has a very light amount of colour on her. There's also a white shine that was popular about 7 years ago with a lot of artists. You know, the artists that would put what I like to call blushies/sunburns on cheeks, shoulders, breasts and knees all had this style of redness for parts of the body that are naturally darker in places or have redness. Though with some artists the breasts were a weird one, I've always thought. It's not a style I go for in my own work, but I'm not going to care if that's what an artist likes to do.

Also most blushes, even ones by the artist herself go over the nose to differentiate between a blush and healthy cheeks.

But they claim that Roman doesn't have the blushies so the idea that this artist puts them on everything is false! So let's have a look at the Clockwork Reject.

Well, how can you tell he has no blushies when his hair is covering his face?

Could it be...?

Darker discolouration right beneath his eye that lightens up by his nose? It's almost like... a blushie hidden in shadow!

That settles it for anyone still furiously grasping at straws, desperately looking for any tiny little thing they can twist and warp into being something problematic.

Also one final point that these people are implying that Ruby is being shipped with either Roman or Ozpin. As far as I'm aware RubyxOzpin is kind of a popular ship (heck... RubyxOzpinxRoman was featured in a recent fic we read in the Tundra). It's not Rosegarden or Whiterose, but it's still fairly widespread. Why you gotta ship-shame?

So there's this idea going around that rewrites always sideline the heroines of the story (as though canon RWBY doesn't do that already). I can't speak for all rewrites, because I don't follow any except for FRWBY and I'm starting to get into Remnants. So for all I know every single other rewrite out there features Jaune or some other male character as the protagonists instead of RWBY.

Roman effectively replaces Oscar in FRWBY. A criminal who has found himself in unusual circumstances and now has to work with his former adversaries to complete a common goal.

How does this lead to Roman taking centre stage? Beats me. The fact that he... technically does things, unlike Oscar, I guess.

Now, I happen to like Oscar. I think he's a cute little muffin that wound up in a bad situation. But I also don't deny that he's been squandered as a character and as much as I've given Raymond shit for removing Oscar from his place in the plot, I won't deny that at least he's done something with the character he's put in farmboy's place.

Also Ruby being "reduced" to Roman's sidekick is very interesting phrasing by Lilith here. She tries very hard to manipulate language to give the most uncharitable interpretations as possible. The context for the scene is that the characters are being proactive in searching for leads and Roman is going to go check with his sources and connections in Mistral. Ruby goes with him to keep an eye on him.

She's his handler, not his sidekick. There's a difference.

You... ever get the feeling that Eren doesn't actually understand RWBY or it's characters?

Like... I think Ozpin did nothing wrong in V6. Jinn had no right to air out his dirty laundry like that just to show that Salem couldn't be killed. But while he may be supportive, I don't know if necessarily I would call him kind. In some aspects, sure. But Ozpin is meant to be a calculating character, striving to do what he can to hold back Salem at all costs. He is meant to be a morally grey character, not quite as good of a character as Dumbledore, but he does have that theme of leading pigs to the slaughter. Except these 'pigs' signed up for this job and know how dangerous it is unlike Harry until the end so the analogy doesn't quite work for Ozpin. (By the way, notice his contradiction there by saying Dumbledore is made morally grey by making him evil. Those are two distinct concepts, Eren. Maybe you should look up what morally grey is.) But the terrible way the characters treat him and Oscar's body afterwards makes many of us more sympathetic to him than to be against him. He's morally grey, but we don't mind it, and view him as being someone who is still ultimately good.

"They removed another poc character"

Sweetheart... Gretchen has to actually be a character. She's just a name said on the lips of a couple of characters. We don't even get to see anything of her. Summer got the same treatment, but at least she got a gravestone and characters sort of talked about how great she was, attempting to characterize her post mortem but doing it poorly. Eventually she got a cheap palette swap model. We at least were interested in Summer and who she was and how she disappeared even if we might have only cared because Ruby did and she's the main protagonist. Is anyone interested in Gretchen? And I mean truly, genuinely interested in Gretchen to the same degree that we are interested in Ruby? What about Raven? May Marigold? Even Summer? Gretchen is a fridged tool who only exists as justification for Hazel to be a relatively nice guy but still align himself with the villains. She is not, in and of herself, a character. At least with Magnus, we see the shell that Osma resides in and it hits us that this used to be a person. A person who had family who loved him and miss him and that is why Hazel is here. Do we know anything about the body in canon other than he'd once been a farmer?

The concept that an organization has to be single minded in a goal, no matter what it is, or else it is no longer that thing, is funny to me.

No, Eren. The White Fang is still a faunus rights group in FRWBY. It's just that there are people within the organization who have very strong opinions about how to go about achieving their goals and don't mind stepping over their fellows to get to that goal. That's what we call politics.

I don't even know why this is an issue when the White Fang and the racism plotline were not well done in RWBY and that is an undisputed fact that M&K admitted to. There is nothing wrong with trying to bandage that up and adding human elements to behind the scenes stuff - things that M&K themselves tried to implement but were just too inexperienced as writers to be able to pull off. It really shouldn't be that controversial to say that they reached beyond their means with what they wanted to do with RWBY, which is partially why it's such a mess. And I want to emphasize that I don't think they're incapable of pulling it off just because of the colour of their skin. They didn't do their proper research or think about a complicated topic well enough and rushed through it because they didn't know what they were doing as writers. They also admitted to not knowing what they were doing in the writing department for the first several years of the show so it shouldn't be controversial to criticize them as inexperienced writers pushing out a subpar written product.

While we're on the subject...

In a big ol' rant titled "The Problems with Fixing RWBY" you would think there would be a lot more pointing out the problems with FRWBY and not... pointing out the differences between FRWBY and canon. There's no explanation for why these things are an issue. He just presents these as though they speak for themselves, but they don't. And most of his points are like this, by the way. I could be lazy and answer 'why is this a problem?' to most of them. But I'll do the work for Eren since he's so bad at argumentation.

I'm going to assume here that Eren is trying in a very roundabout and sloppy way to accuse Raymond of saying 'the N word' without actually saying it. One of the fans of his project had been the one to suggest 'Critter' as a slur for the faunus, and due to the similarities between the two words, Raymond thought it would be a clear parallel as being the harshest, dirtiest, derogatory term in his version.

Jockey makes sense as a mocking, derogatory euphemism for someone who is for faunus rights and is faunus friendly as someone who might not themselves be. We know what a jockey is so the imagery that invokes speaks for itself. That's how language works and we have non-offensive examples of it in real life of 'white whale' and 'foxy' and 'bought the farm'.

As for the claim that Raymond said there's no racism in America, that's quite the accusation. You better damn well have a link to a sound clip that isn't out of context or else it's best to just forget about the idea of that. Saying that as a throwaway statement to just hang there without any evidence to back it up leads to speculation and witchhunting. I strongly oppose anyone, even you, being accused of anything of the sort without strong evidence to justify it. Innocent until proven guilty.

Moving on to Cardin and Velvet. Again, I don't see what the issue is. As someone who partook in some Dramonie back in the HP days, I enjoy a good story about a racist getting humbled and humiliated by the fact that he falls in love with someone he considers beneath him. Though that isn't the case with Cardin and Velvet.

Cardin's whole arc is that he was a racist and held certain viewpoints and beliefs. Being forced to work with Velvet and spend time with her on a school project, and the lack of evidence to support his biases led Cardin to begrudgingly break out of his racist mindset and come to respect Velvet as a person, and eventually a friend. By the events of the Fall of Beacon, Cardin is no longer racist for the most part and views Velvet as an ally and companion.

Starting from that point, it's no wonder we can see these two growing close and eventually getting into a relationship. It's all in how the ship is handled, not the ship itself. However, it's not confirmed they'll even get together in the first place. Raymond has only talked about his approval of the idea.

If I can go of on a slight tangent for a moment... like, holy shit, Eren really has it out for the concept of smaller bit characters getting any kind of development. As though the very idea of characters being more than cardboard cutouts is a grievous sin. He claims that small bit characters getting any time to flourish at all takes time away from the main cast.

That isn't the problem, nor is that the ultimate problem with canon RWBY. (Like it's so very transparent what these people are trying to do is to criticize Critic Rewrites by saying the exact same things the critics say about RWBY. But the thing is that criticisms of both aren't 1-1 and so instead of engaging with the rewrites in good faith, they just regurgitate argumentative points of critics without understanding why we make these criticisms in the first place as a sort of 'gotcha' to try and shame critics into silence. A sort of 'how do YOU like it' thing. Nevermind the fact that most creators don't read the majority of the criticisms they get online and will never see it and the complaints are mostly for other fans to consume and agree or disagree with. Nevermind that critics are just fans with as much power and influence over the show as everyone else - which is none.

They don't want to see critics as fans because that means they can't build a boogeyman for themselves. It's a bullying tactic, straight up.)

The problem with RWBY's character bloat was that the main girls weren't being handled properly in the first place. People thought that if there were less characters to juggle, then there would be more time to focus on the characters that mattered. But I don't think that would solve the problem, ultimately. We've seen when they cut the cast and they still struggle with properly implementing character stuff. It gets better, for sure, but the problems persist.

Finding a balance between proper arcs for your main cast while sprinkling in quality of life things for your other characters is the goal. Not focusing on your characters doing basically nothing other than having technical screen time and bloating the rest of the time with splotches of cardboard zooming past.

A lot of people are interested in the side characters, Eren. It shouldn't be an issue for them to get a little attention on the side as a treat to the main plot and that should be the goal for RWBY.

The final point to touch on is the injuries the characters sustain. All I can say is... why is this a 'problem'? Yang lost her arm in canon. The presumption was the Fall of Beacon was a situation that was more than the students in training could handle, and many people (presumably) got injured or killed. But all of that is off screen and swept under the rug and forgotten about. It's hard to take seriously as something that is supposed to be the greatest challenge the students ever faced, even more than they can handle when we see no one struggling, no one getting their aura broken and having to fight differently, getting hurt or anything. All of that storytelling happens off screen and that is bad writing. Telling us people got hurt instead of showing us is bad writing. So again, I ask, if it's okay for characters like Yang to get injured, why is it a problem for Velvet, Neptune and Cardin who had been more prominent characters in Fixing?

Eren didn't understand the concept of volunteer work and how that differentiated between being exploited. Many of the artists came out in defense of Raymond on this, so thankfully, I don't think this argument is used anymore. From the look of it, this argument was the only time people who make these arguments tried to be nice to the artists. Now they're just fellow 'haters' who Raymond collected like Pokemon cards to work on his project. And I'd show a screenshot of calling the artists haters, but honestly I'm running low on my picture limit. You'd think there wouldn't be so many 'haters' but when anyone who voices any dissent toward the show can be considered a 'hater', they exist in abundance. The victim mentality knows no limits.

There were other criticisms about art, legitimate ones, and they were sorted out.

"The entire Brunswick Arc ... is now devoted to Roman."

Did Raymond say that? Or are you just pulling shit out of your ass? I've noticed a lot of people make baseless assumptions like this. Like how someone thinks Emerald is going to be killed by Ironwood when FRWBY V8 rolls around. Which is absolutely stupid. You guys comprehend that the point of the project is to stick as close to canon as he can, correct? That is a thing that can be understood by your goopy goblin brains? My goopy goblin brain can get that, so if not, what's your excuse?

Like yes, things are going to be different from canon. But they're not going into wild AU territory.

Changing Ozpin's host to Roman doesn't affect the trajectory of the story because Oscar was a thing in canon. Emerald isn't going to be killed in FRWBY because Emerald is going to be a thing moving forward that he needs to account for. Understood? Okay good.

As for the Brunswick arc, yes, a lot of it probably will focus on Roman. But that doesn't mean he's going to lean RNJRWBY against a wall to collect dust. This is a leap of logic that I can't comprehend, it's as if Eren thinks that scenes and scenarios that last an entire episode can only exist for one character. Maybe that's because that's what canon does.

I already actually ranted about Eren's apparent dislike of the side characters. So I presume that one of his so-called complaints that he says he does have about RWBY, but from my recollection he's never talked about because that is VERBOTEN, is the fact that RWBY has character bloat.

I think this is all that I really wanted to address, so I'll close this out on the, frankly nothingburger criticism that is 'How dare you title your project a thing I don't approve of'.

Some people like to argue that Raymond wouldn't get hate if he just titled it differently. But I hope that I showed you that with how they attack any and all rewrites, including SYTOkun's RWBY Remnants and other, usually unnamed, "Jaune Main" rewrites, that argument holds no water. These people dislike the concept of rewrites entirely and think it's okay to harass and criticize the work not based on how it functions, but for the fact that it exists at all. Ultimately the message is that this fan content is not Approved to be within their holy space.

They call Raymond arrogant for thinking he' better than other fallible human beings simply because they happen to hold jobs working at a company and Raymond does not. As though that is supposed to magically make them better as writers. Fact of the matter is, there are plenty of writers out there who are likely better than MKEK, and their personal credentials of whether or not they worked for Big Company XYZ doesn't matter. At the end of the day, this is opinion. Opinion that you're free to disagree with and it doesn't make anyone arrogant to think their skills are better. He put his money where his mouth is. But also no one is holding a gun to your head to consume fan content that you aren't interested in. If you feel that you have to because it appears on your dash and that just makes you the big mads, then maybe turn off your screen for a while. Read a book. Go for a swim (or don't if you're in the Northern Hemisphere right now it's December. Go skiing). Do something.

Its not arrogant of Raymond to call his work Fixing RWBY. Its merely a statement of intent with the work. If you have a problem with that then you are saying that is a problem with you. No work is perfect, no work is untouchable. There is always going to be something wrong with it and someone will always be unsatisfied and wish something would be different. That is the value we have as individual people.

Ultimately I am not saying they cannot dislike FRWBY. The work can be criticized. But it does need to actually be engaged with properly in order to be criticized. Critics engage with RWBY, but we aren't afforded the same courtesy.

It says a lot about a person who tries to control another fan into how to think, act, speak or consume content within a fandom space. If you want positive content in the fandom, then don't go after other fans with vitriol, and if you have issue with something they create, then look at it from a constructive standpoint and critique it with the desire for it to get changed. If an artist does not accept every single criticism, that is something you have to get over. They have the ultimate decision in the end.

I'm an old. I'm tired. I've said my piece. Thank you for reading my novella-length complaint and goodnight.

[thatorigamiguy]

Hey, how goes it?

A warm welcome to those of you who have come upon my humble blog. If you’re here, then it’s probably because of my various writings(shitposts) relating to RWBY. Or you may have been following me back when I was active a year ago, also when I was writing RWBY posts. Regardless of whether you’re an old mutual, or a new one, I’m happy to have you here and appreciate you taking the time to read my goofy posts.

I keep my asks off by default, mostly because I really don’t take requests due to being fairly sporadic in my writing process and due to being fairly busy in my personal life. However, I’m always open on messaging and I’m more than happy to either workshop ideas with people(whether it’s shitposts or original ideas), have questions about my posts, or just want to shoot the shit. 

And with that said, thanks once again to those who read my content and I hope to share more writings with you guys for years to come. You’re all truly wonderful people.  Story links will be posted down here for ease of access. ________________________________________________________

The Mac and Cheese Saga

Not Yet

Cuddling 

Bite

Surfs Up

Smash?

Distraction

Thing of Beauty

Performance Anxiety

Breaking News

Adoption(SMB/Doom)

Toothbrush

Special Call?

Alive Me

Special Senses?

Honey Fritters

Vacuum

Do You Mind?

WHAT IS THE SAUCE

[shallitickleyournerdbutton]

After the heartache of the Volume 8 finale, I would like to return to a happier point in the show and suggest some memes/jokes that I like to think the students at Beacon would have had. More closely inline with the RWBY Chibi-verse, than the actual show - where Nothing Bad Ever Happened.

"Who's child is this?" being used to refer to Ruby - the youngest student at Beacon - when she's left unsupervised and/or doing something odd.

"I'd let Glynda punish/whip me for one corn chip."

Every now and again "Missing - Have you seen this person?" posters for Professor Peach will pop up around campus. No one knows who it is that keeps making them.

Vomit Boy candids being taken and shared any time Jaune is Suffering™️ on some form of transport.

The Great One plush of Pyrrha exists in-universe... and becomes the go-to prize for any stupid competition between the students. There's at least a dozen of these dolls on campus now, owned by various people and won as "spoils of war."

There's a dedicated chalkboard in the combat room for tallying how many times Nora has launched someone into the stratosphere. Notable mentions are listed on the board alongside her of other people who have achieved this feat - including Yang, Yatsuhashi, and Glynda.

(She launched both Port and Oobleck one day when they kept annoying her. Sometimes, their screams can still be heard if you listen closely enough.)

"There's that old guy again..." "Oh, shopkeep? Yea, he's everywhere. Don't think too much about it."

This leads to "Don't think too much about it." becoming something of a slogan for every time anything unusual happens.

"Candy canes, kids! One for Sun Wukong, one for Yang Xiao-Long, ooh four for Coco Adel, you go Coco!"

"I--"

"Andnoneforweissschneebye~"

Team STRQ having something akin to legend status at Beacon, whispered in hushed voices for fear and reverence of their names. There's a war between the students regarding team JNPR as their successors vs. the students who insist JNPR are not anywhere near worthy of such a title.

"How many team CRDLs does it take to beat Pyrrha?"

Blurry fancam-style videos of the Qrow vs. Winter fight out in the courtyard being traded around like baseball cards with other students. Some try and manufacture a "rematch" of this with the materials they've got - trying to get Ruby and Weiss to fight each other. 

That weird sing-song "HellOooOo~" that Yang sometimes does being mimicked by everyone. And I mean everyone.

Any time there's a significant lull in conversations or classes, someone often asks "Why are we here?" which never fails to make everyone in the vicinity groan.

"Ozpin is compensating for something" jokes about his office chair - including at least one popular response being "it's the war crimes", without them knowing just how accurate they actually are.

"On a scale of Ren-Nora, how excited do you want me to be?"

"Ladies Love Lavender" referring to Lisa Lavender having her own in-universe fandom mostly comprised of women. (Lavender being associated with lesbians irl, and I just think this would be funny.)

The sight of Ren just picking up and carrying Nora away from something is so commonplace that other people start doing it to their friends when they Need To Stop.

"Why is Blake's bow so big?" "Because it's full of secrets."

Blake being a closet faunus being such a poorly hidden secret that by the time she finally takes off the bow no one actually even notices. 

The betting pool surrounding exactly what it is in Ozpin's cup - coffee being one of the least popular options, and souls being the top choice.

Using Yatsuhasi as a unit of measurement. 

Photoshopping adorable images of Velvet onto various "cute" animal memes.

Everyone wanting to be spanked by Coco Adel. 

"I'd let Fox blow me up too."

"Why is Weiss' hair so long?" "To reflect the length of her father's crimes."

Everyone mimicking Pyrrha's memetic "I'm sorry!" anytime they apologise for anything. Even going as far to do it while apologising to things that don't require apologies - like inanimate objects.

"Are Port and Oobleck, you know... 💅?"

In fact, just that 💅 being used to refer to a large number of people at Beacon. Actual LGBT students picking this up and using it towards grimm when they're attacked to question the sexuality/homophobia of the grimm targeting them over their peers.

Threatening Neptune with water anytime he flirts with a girl who is clearly Not Interested in him.

No one knowing who, exactly, the other two members of team SSSN are - with wild theories abounding about who they may be. Popular choices include Shopkeep, Zwei, and Professor Peach.

This persists even after their tournament fights where they're shown. Scarlet and Sage are perfectly content with this, and participate.

"Arslan's/Pyrrha's back must be aching from constantly carrying her entire team."

And the respective responses of, "Reese/Nora are alright."

Similar jokes about Glynda also carrying the entire faculty/academy on her back.

"Salutations!"

The war between the "Irondaddy" fanbase, and his haters - who refer to him with various derogatory versions of his name. "Metalpenis", "Coppercock", "Chromeshaft", etc.

Anytime someone is doing something ~questionable~ donning a pair of glasses and/or imitating Oz or Oobleck pushing them back up their nose with accompanying menacing body language. (Kubrick Stare optional.)

Mercury having a foot fetish, courtesy of the people who caught him sniffing shoes at the festival.

"Did <character> just die?" "You know, it was really unclear." any time someone takes some insane damage in a fight and isn't seen for some time afterwards.

Everyone trying to locate and get a pic of the ~mysterious~ fourth member of team CMSN, who has only ever been spotted once - her tournament fight in the first round. Beacon's version of "Where's Wally?"

The Sympathy Fund for Emerald and her one-sided crush on Cinder. "She could honestly do so much better."

People offering themselves up as tribute to spar with Pyrrha/Yang/Coco/Sun just so they can be beaten up by the hottest people on campus.

"I drink milk!" being used as a defensive argument in wildly inappropriate contexts.

Naming grimm really boring names and attempting to keep them as pets. 

The innumerous times Port has allowed a "zoo-break" to happen under his watch and everyone having to assist in recovering his prized subjects.

"Where the fuck are all the fourth years?" "Ozpin's soul collection."

Candid shots of Glynda Suffering™️ being shared similarly to the ones of Vomit Boy.

Ranking people based on their Patience Levels - Pyrrha, Ren, Glynda, Emerald, and Fox being frequent top markers based on the bullshit they put up with from their respective teams.

"Saint Pyrrha" being a common nickname for her, and her neverending niceness towards people who absolutely do not not deserve it.

Weiss' "Hey!" being replicated amongst the student body and slowly growing more and more high-pitched in its replication until it eventually just becomes a shrill noise. Even so, everyone still knows what it means - and Weiss is absolutely unamused by all of this.

In fact, a lot of early!Weiss' comments being mercilessly mocked by everyone - "I'm a victim!" being one of them.

Renowned fear permitting amongst the student body regarding Yang's red eyes meaning Serious Business. Morphs into references of "going full Yang" to mean having rage-fuelled temper tantrums.

"Never miss a beat, never miss a beat" becoming a mantra for focusing on a task. This inspires several remixes of Neon saying it, and again with no one knowing who it is making them.

By all means, feel free to add any more that you all think of! I could use a laugh!

Also, check the notes for additions!

[itsclydebitches]

On the topic of Ice Queendom being only the "cliff notes" of RWBY volume 1 and 2... honestly, volume 1 and 2 were already sort of cliffnotes in and of themselves. They were great, I love them even now after all the bullshit, but there was very little plot and most of the character work was less development and more establishment and jumpcuts.

Given how often Volumes 1-3 are lumped together, I suspect it's easy to fall into the trap of feeling like the important Volume 3 plot existed in 1 and 2, when in fact it was mostly self-contained missions/setup for 3. Which, again, if Ice Queendom swerves into an entirely new story, much of that content wouldn't even make sense now. There's no need for the girls to go to Mountain Glenn and stop the train if the White Fang won't be antagonists. There's no need to establish Penny's worries if there will be no Tournament where her android nature is revealed. No need to show us all the scenes with Oz's in-group if Salem's war is not the primary conflict of this tale. Yeah, not a whole lot happens in Volumes 1-2 and out of that small pool I can think of a lot of content that becomes superfluous if the plot immediately deviates. People have to remember that stories are built around what's coming next, so if what comes next is completely new... what came before it has to change too. I can easily picture an episode one where the group passes initiation and works through some inner conflicts (Weiss' jealousy, Ruby's leadership doubts), and an episode two where they go to some classes, JNPR bonds, maybe we see the food fight or, if there's a time skip, the dance, and then we're good to go. That recap may well focus purely on characterization with a few hints at the upcoming plot (Weiss seeing creepy things maybe) because most of our canon plot is directly connected to events that will presumably not be a part of Ice Queendom. At least not in the manner we originally witnessed them.

Also, just as a side note, but emphasizing how little plot actually exists in Volumes 1-2 re-highlights the problem with the Jaundiced arc. Out of an original Volume with so little going on, devoting four episodes (with additional scenes before and after) focusing on just one character out of eight, who's not even a member of the title team, makes things feel really unbalanced. I mean, you remove that arc and that's already a seventh of the entire Volumes 1-2 content gone. So cut the stuff that didn't work the first time, cut the stuff that exists for where original RWBY was heading, trim out some fun but ultimately unnecessary scenes (they'll always still exist in the canon), focus on establishing the characters prior to developing in this new plot... and yeah, I think recapping two whole Volumes in two episodes, absurd as it sounds on paper, is actually very doable.

[dextixer]

The problems with gatekeeping in parts of the RWBY fandom and the difference between quality of a product and its enjoyment value. (And extra)

While i am "cooking" my next batch of threads, mostly covering RWBY: Arowfell for now, i have decided to cover some issues that i am seeing rising up once again. Its not uncommon for critics of the show to be maligned in any and every way imaginable. However, from time to time a trend and an "opinion" is spread or attempted to be spread in the community, and it is my belief that such things need to receive push-back before they become common-place, otherwise it can lead to.... Poor decisions as back in the past.

What am i talking about? Well, first of all, the increasing sentiment of gatekeeping and some parts of the fandom seemingly deciding to choose who is a "fan" of the show or not. The strange purity testing that seems to be taking place on reddit of all places. At the same time, there is the related issue of people seemingly thinking that criticizing a work means inherent dislikeability of it, which is a very wrong conclusion to draw in my opinion. And the last but not least is the somewhat strange sentiment that critics are out there to stop fans from enjoying the show.

Critics do not care if you watch the show

I think this claim should be addressed first despite its position in the intro. There has seemingly been an increase in a very peculiar sentiment, the sentiment that critics do what they do out of some kind of malice, or with an intent to get people to not watch the show.

Now, do not worry, i can tell you very simply and openyl. We critics simply do not care of what you do in your free time. Why should we? Many people here spend very little time on RWBY or being involved with the RWBY community, at least in comparison to the rest of our lives. For example, i log in multiple times a day, but rarely write unless a thread interests me, and i only have 2 days of making posts weekly. I have other things to do in my life like Cross-stitching as a hobby and of course, work.

The same applies to many other critics too. Many critics have jobs, some worry about education, others belong in other fandoms and visit them more often, or maybe they have other hobbies besides engaging with a fandom at all.

Let us be real here, what would any of us gain by getting other people to not watch or enjoy the show? Especially since it is something that we most likely would never even find out about? It just makes no sense.

This has been especially prevalent during my critiques of RWBY: Arowfell, people were questioning if they should buy the game, or if i am doing the critique threads to stop people from playing the game. To which i could only say "I do not care" nor other critics. Of course, as long as it does not involve supporting a corporation like RT. Then we do care, but watching/enjoying RWBY content is mostly unrelated to that.

Look, there is no need for this self-victimization and thinking that critics are "out to get you", we aren't. Especially since many of us (With a few exceptions) still enjoy the show ourselves. And just honestly want it to get better. Which actually leads to the next point.

Gatekeeping and purity testing does not a good fandom make

Yes, critics do enjoy the show, they express it differently, but they still do, at least most of them. Criticizing or only criticizing something does not show that a person is not enjoying the thing they are playing at hand. For example, go to any Paradox game forums and see what most often liked memes are, they are memes of either funny occurrences or some part of the game that is bad. And those are the games where people will spend 200+ hours playing, and thats the lowest estimate.

At the end of the day there are too many ways to express enjoyment of a show or to interact with the fandom. Be it making fan-art, making AMV's, making fanfictions, rewrites. There are so many ways to engage with the fandom and a person can choose any of them. It is their choice to make and it does not indicate their enjoyment of the show.

An artist might even HATE a show that they make art for. Its possible, because artists do also get paid for their work. One cannot judge people just by their content, at least not entirely, especially with things like these.

Not to mention. Where does this purity testing end? So if i mostly criticize a show im not a fan now? Ok. Who is next? The people who half criticize and half praise the show? The people who criticize the show at all? And before anyone accuses me of "Overstating" things, one of the main deciding factors of the critic sub forming was the belief that the main sub was hostile to critique post V6, which it kind of was and i experienced it myself first hand.

Hell, fan-artists have been harassed over the art they make. Cosplayers were harassed over characters they chose to dress as. These things can easily escalate. Purity testing is an never ending spiral of doom.

Also, i have to say that accusations of people not being "fans" of the show because they criticize it to be rude at best. Especially since i do not think any of us unlocked mind reading powers just yet. This kind of claim is usually tied in with the claim that a critic "must not enjoy the show" and that they should "leave the fandom for something they are fan of" and the like.

To which i can only say...

Something does not need to be good to be enjoyable.

I think this is a concept forgoten by many people. A person does not have to consider a creation to be perfect for it to be enjoyable, i would know, i have prepared food and alchoholic coctains that i KNEW were very off the mark from what they were supposed to be, and yet they were still tasty.

All media usually follows the same pattern too. I dont think anyone on earth thinks that "The Room" is a good movie, that does not make it enjoyable. Harry Potter has huge amount of problems, especially with its world-building, yet it is an immensely enjoyable world.

Hell, i am a fan of 40k and my favorite Chapter is Blood Ravens, a chapter whose creator cant write for shite and a setting that has LOTS of silly writing in it. And yet, i still enjoy it.

Or look at Video games. Fallout New Vegas, Skyrim, they are not great games. They have massive problems. And yet they are beloved and cherished and enjoyed even now, more than a decade after their creation.

Almost every creation on this earth, if not all creation has flaws. We love things despite those flaws. A critic might point out how RWBY has many problems, and still enjoy it. Because we love things despite their flaws. Otherwise we would not even be in the fandom, at least most of us. There are exceptions of course, those who seemingly do enjoy the belief that RWBY isnt doing well, or that it will end badly, but those are exceptions rather than a rule.

But the RWBY community should really remember how scuffed the early RWBY volumes were, how many things we could say about them. Anyone remember the Cinder roof running? And yet we all enjoyed those Volumes. Despite their scuff.

The same applies to most of the critics.

Ending Word

I do not think there is more for me to say about these points. Just to clarify, i am doing this almost as an "outreach" program from the critic side, basically trying to tell you that we arent these "scary" and faceless mass of people who want to stop people from liking RWBY. What i want to show is that we are fans like any other, just making different choices in our expressions. That is it.

Of course, any questions and additional discussion would be welcome if anyone wants to ask questions or add on with their experiences.

Also, do be aware that this is not calling out the entire fandom and the like, this is me pushing back against some of the narratives i have been seeing recently, nothing more, nothing less.

[sapphicneige]

So, hi, I'm back, mostly after a short hiatus so let's give you another writing update!

I'm currently about 4000 words into the first draft for chapter 4 of I don't ever think I can ever learn how to love you right. Which I want to say is like... 50% of the way through. I'm not sure when I'll be able to complete it by, but it's definitely not going to be by the end of the year.

I have also decided to move end of a life above silver linings in my priority list. So, once this chapter is finished, I'm going to try and share effort between end of a life and I don't ever think I can ever learn how to love you right.

I don't think silver linings is done, but I just am currently struggling to really know exactly what I want to do with this next chapter, so I am putting it on a small backburner while I work on other stories.

If you follow me for either Warrior Nun or for RWBY, you'll both hopefully be getting content soon. My passion for the latter has been reignited by rereading a story that just always gives me a ton of motivation and that also inspired end of a life in the first place, so I really want to get back to working on that, especially as the first drafts of all the chapters up till 10 are already done and just need editing / reworking, etc.

Hopefully, it won't be too much longer till I'm back in full swing with my writing and I can start posting things more frequently again. I am still recovering from work kicking my ass in the runup to christmas tho, so hopefully it will be soon.

Anyway I think that's all from me. See you soon!