#i personally understand what ozpin's trying to do

[chaikachi]

The Little Prince, The Rose, & The Aviator

AKA We just got confirmation that Oscar's main allusion is in fact The Little Prince so I wanted to gather all evidence that supports it in show thus far.

cross-posted from twitter

A brief summary for those who aren't familiar:

The Little Prince is a story about a young boy that travels to many worlds & meets many people. It is told out of chronological order from the perspective of an airplane pilot that the prince meets close to the end of his journey.

It explores themes around childhood and growing up, love, loss, friendship, loneliness, and hope, among other things. All ideas very prevalent in RWBY.

Part 1: The Little Prince

The first theme I want to touch on is that struggle of trying not to lose yourself as you grow up.

"Grown-ups never understand anything by themselves, and it is exhausting for children to have to provide explanations over and over again."

Oscar is the youngest of the group, and yet he is one of the characters most often shown trying to reason with the adults in the room.

Yes, we've mainly seen it with Hazel, Ironwood, and Oz... but while the rest of RWBYJNR are also 'just kids', he spends so much energy trying to reason with them and mediate conflicts there as well. All while still being the youngest of the bunch.

Another way this shows itself is in Oscar's resistance to merging with Oz. The merge is a very clear metaphor for how the people you meet and the things you experience can often change you. And how, when you're a kid, it all feels like its completely out of your control.

Speaking of the hoverbike scene, I want to shift to a different part of The Little Prince. The infamous moment with the fox and what it is to be 'tamed'. To be tamed is to create ties with others. To become important to them and for them to be important to you.

When Oscar is having a talk with Oz in v8 about how he finally felt like himself, the person he wanted to be, and felt like he was finally "part of the team"... There is a fox plushie lying on the ground as he passes by.

But we see that Oscar was right to feel this way later on.

Because just as he was "only a little boy like a hundred thousand other little boys" when he first met everyone... he had since been tamed, and tamed his friends in turn. And they fought tooth and nail to bring him back when he was captured by Salem.

Part 2: The Aviator & the Rose

In RWBY, most characters have a main allusion that is central to their arc and then secondary allusions for what roles they fill in relation to other characters. (Ex. Yang's main allusion is Goldilocks, but when thrown into the plot, she also becomes the Beauty to Blake's Beast, just as Blake was once the Beauty to Adam's Beast).

If we apply that metric to other characters here, we know that Ozpin's main allusion is The Wizard of Oz and Ruby is Little Red Riding Hood... so when placed within Oscar's story structure of The Little Prince, they become The Aviator and The (Ruby) Rose, respectively.

The aviator is a man that struggles to hold onto his childlike wonder. He tries, but he lives in a world of grown-ups so it becomes difficult with time. The little prince - much like Oscar with Ozpin - helps him remember some of the things that he's forgotten.

When the little prince meets him, the aviator is grumbly after crash landing his plane in the desert & is trying to fix it before he runs out of water.

Funny then, that when Oscar is crash landing a plane it is Oz that instructs him on how to do it.

When the aviator explains his circumstances, the prince laughs and exclaims that he "fell from the sky too". Which is an interesting tie in to the canon RWBY fairytale mentioned in Before the Fall, The Boy Who Fell From The Sky...

...as well as another fairytale we've seen mentioned in the show proper: The Girl Who Fell Through The World. A tale that was first talked about by Oscar, later expanded upon by Ozpin, and finally lived by Ruby Rose herself. (Yes her team also experienced it but it's very strongly emphasized Ruby and Alyx were paralleling each other in ways the others were not).

One thing about the little prince and the aviator is that by the end of their journey when it's time to say farewell, it's quite clear they've tamed each other as well. So much time spent by the pilot wishing to fix his plane and get out of the desert, but when it's finally time to say farewell, he does not want to go. This is not something we've gotten in show yet, but I'm willing to guess is going to be the basis for when the war is won and Oz is finally set free. Leaving the two of them to finally have to say goodbye.

And I realized I couldn't bear the thought of never hearing that laugh again. For me it was like a spring of resh water in the desert. "Little fellow, I want to hear you laugh again..."

Moving onto the Rose.

In the story, the little prince is enamored by her as soon as he sees her for the first time. As he gets to know her, she is described as many things. Some that fit Ruby well (miraculous, naïve) and some that she subverts (vain, self-centered).

Ruby might not be caught up on physical appearance, but she is convinced that she's the only one in all the world that can do what she has to do. It's a childish way of looking at things, and to believe you can't accept help from others is - in its own way - selfish.

In the book, the rose asks the little prince to tend to her. She's very needy with her demands and while the prince loves her dearly, it is a strained relationship. In RWBY, Oscar sees Ruby wilting very early on and decides to tend to her without waiting for her to ask. Of which we have... SO MANY EXAMPLES AND I DON'T HAVE A HIGH ENOUGH IMAGE LIMIT TO POST THEM ALL SO YOU GET 2.

Not pictured here, but still worthy of note: Oscar mediating when Ruby is being undermined in v8, Oscar talking the responsibility of telling Ironwood the truth in V7, the "food always makes me feel better" / "I made you a casserole because you were sad" scenes. The List Goes On.

Part 3: Other Easter Eggs & Evidence

There are also other fun little pieces that drive home just how much these characters allude to the book as well as the inspiration it's had on the show in general.

The first thing the little prince asks the aviator for is a drawing of a sheep that he can take home with him so that it can eat up the sprouts of baobab trees before they overgrow his entire planet and destroy it (and his rose) in the process...

The tree in the Ever After has maple leaves, but the shape of its trunk is very clearly not a maple. When compared to these illustrations, it seems to have pulled inspiration from baobabs... and what does the tree in the Ever After do?

Its roots consume the rose.

One of the lessons that's brought up repeatedly in the book is that:

"One sees clearly only with the heart. Anything essential is invisible to the eyes.”

This is brought up in a few different ways:

The little prince left his rose back home, so when he looks to the night sky, separated from her, he says:

"The stars are beautiful because of a flower you don’t see . . ."

When Ruby is in the Ever After, with no one to tend to her, she is in a town filled with paper stars.

It is brought up again in reference to the desert, which we have a wonderful tie-in now thanks to the animatic shared at RTX recently:

“What makes the desert beautiful,” the little prince said, “is that it hides a well somewhere . . .”

And again by the aviator in reference to the little prince himself.

What makes the little prince special is his loyalty to a flower. Ruby Rose, who inspired Oscar to keep fighting, who reminded him he was brave, and who's mission he has worn on his literal shoulders.

Two other lines in that passage I've highlighted I also want to mention.

"As the little prince was falling asleep, I picked him up in my arms, and started walking again. I was moved. It was as if I was carrying a fragile treasure."

This line about the little prince being a treasure (treasure is an rg song truthers rise up 🙌)

And the emphasis on lamps being symbolic of the Little Prince himself which... we've seen for Oscar A LOT.

"What moves me so deeply about this sleeping little prince is his loyalty to a flower - the image of a rose shining within him like the flame within a lamp, even when he's asleep... (...) Lamps must be protected: A gust of wind can blow them out..."

Also Ruby has been referred to as a "spark" by Oz before and when Oscar is worrying over Ruby at Brunswick farms, Maria tells him to "keep that fire fed" which is exactly what lamp lighters do. Just very deliberate use of that imagery here.

It ALSO ties into earlier in the novel where, among the little prince's many travels meeting plenty of confusing adults he doesn't understand, he encounters a lamplighter. And of all those that confused him, he found he could at least relate to this one and see value in his work.

There is also a matter of how the prince's first appearance is at sunrise:

That he is cited to live on a planet "scarcely bigger than himself" and "being in need of a friend". How we see Oscar very alone on his farm back in Mistral, just like the prince, only tending to his daily chores by himself, we never even see his aunt.

And while there are a few other bits and pieces i'm surely forgetting, the last big one I want to talk about is how both the beginning and end of the book start with a venomous snake.

The aviator shows us a drawing of a boa constrictor eating a wild beast...

...versus Oscar's first appearance coming immediately after he wakes from a nightmare of Tyrian, a venomous scorpion faunus, being sent to capture his rose.

And the story ends with the little prince in a desert getting bit by a venomous snake that sends him back to his rose and away from the aviator... thank goodness RWBY loves to subvert its fairytale origins, amiright?

"(The little prince) fell gently the way a tree falls, there wasn't even a sound..."

tl;dr Oscar is for sure The Little Prince, Ruby has always been his rose, RG canon, Tryian vs. Oscar in the desert real and #GREENLIGHTVOLUME10 SO WE CAN SEE IT HAPPEN ALREADY >:OOOO

Thank you for reading 💕

[howi99]

Project ARC remake 14

Ozpin: So, how was his first day?

Glynda: *sigh* He didn't want to hurt his adversary and dodged for the entire fight. His aura control is perfect but...

Ozpin: *sigh* No sign of his aura coming back?

Glynda: ... His physical wounds are healing. For now, that's what matters most...

Qrow: *sitting next to her* Amber is still recovering at the hospital, once she wakes up, we will finally know who attacked them. Maybe that could give us a clue on how to fix- i mean, how to heal him?

Glynda: *sigh* i hope so... *Looking at her scroll* Beside that, he seems to be adjusting correctly to his team. *Looking back at Ozpin* Him being partnered up with Mss Schnee wasn't just a hazard, was it?

Ozpin: In all honesty? It was. I know how the SDC and the Project ARC are both linked, but believe me when i said giving him more visibility wasn't my intention. I personally would prefer if James didn't know about Jaune. At least, not until the festival.

Qrow : I have to say, giving him Arc as his last name wasn't really the best idea to hide him from Atlas.

Glynda: *sigh* He only accepted this one... And mine, though that would have been an even worse giveaway... *Small smile* I'm just happy he thought of our real name first.

Qrow: It does mean that deep down, he's still your brother.

________

Nora: *looking at Jaune from afar* Hey Ru, don't you think Jaune looks a lot like Professor Goodwitch?

Ruby: *eating cookies* Mh?

Nora: Like, beside the hair color, they kinda have the same... I guess aura? And the way she acted with him-

Yang: What, you think they are secretly siblings? Why would they hide it?

Blake: *looking up from her book* ... Maybe it's not a choice? Or maybe we are reading in too deep? Besides, it's not really what's the weirdest about him.

Yang: Oh oh~ already sizing him up are ya?

Blake: *slightly Blushing* Not in that sense! I meant his Aura. And not only that, but the way he speaks.

Ruby: *gulping down the cookies* Ah~. Couldn't that just be him being a bit... Uh... *Look at Nora*

Nora: ... What?

Ruby: N-nothing!

Nora: You meant autistic?

Ruby: D-didn't want to assume!

Nora: *shrug* It's fine, but i don't have it. Or at least, i never got a diagnostic. *Point to Ren* He does.

Yang: But the way you act-

Nora: I've been living in the street for as long as i can remember. Social norm aren't really something i could learn.

Yang: Oh shit, i'm so sorry, i-

Nora: *shrug* Eh, not the first gal to make that mistake. And certainly not the last.

Ruby: S-so, what do you think for Jaune?

Nora: I don't think it's that.

Blake: Really?

Nora: He still understands most social queues and even apologized for his actions during the match. I don't really want to assume anything, but... It's more like he is broken.

Yang: What? Like mind break like in the book Blake's reading?

Blake: Hey!

Nora: No, more like... A part of him is missing? He did say he lost his memory, so it might be that.

Ruby: *sigh* i hope he gets better...

___________

Jaune: *looking at the dino nuggies in his plate* ... What are those?

Pyrrha: *awkwardly laughing* I uh... Didn't know what you'd like so i just took the first thing that grabbed my attention. Eh eh...

Jaune: ... (Glynda did tell me i should eat even though i do not require it. Something about fitting in and being able to use the energy to better heal). *Look at the t-rex looking one* I guess i can try them.

Ren: *drinking tea with Weiss* If you want, i could try making some food i learned to make during my travel?

Jaune: That would be nice.

Weiss: *looking at Ren* Do you perhaps know how to bake cakes?

Ren: I sadly only learned to make outdoor cuisine, but i'm more than willing to try.

[howlingday]

DADDY ISSUES

"The psychological effects of a strained or absence of a father figure in a relationship on a person's mental health and personal relationships."

===============================

Multi-Faceted Arena of Relationships

Ruby: So, what are you planning to do today, Weiss?

Weiss: Let's see... I have a date with Yatsuhashi later.

Ruby: Wait, I thought you were dating Sun?

Blake: I thought she was dating Neptune.

Yang: Last week, she was hanging out with that Mercury guy.

Weiss: Those didn't work out, but I'm sure that once I find some common ground with him, I'll be able to find the right one in him.

Blake: Will that be before or after you sleep with him?

Weiss: Well, who's to say it doesn't happen during?

===============================

Marrying Daddy

Weiss: So, um... Are you seeing anyone?

Ozpin: Ms. Schnee, as flattered as I am by your advances, you fail to understand the reason for your being here.

Weiss: And that is?

Ozpin: That you've been asking the faculty at Beacon, as well as those visiting our highly regarded academy that same question.

Weiss: I'm keeping ky options open!

Ozpin: And risking your career as a huntress, as well as the careers of others! I'm willing to let you off with a warning so long as you give me your word that you'll put an end to these inappropriate actions.

Weiss: ...Do you know if Ruby's uncle is single?

Ozpin: For fuck's sakes...

===============================

Avoiding Engaging Emotions

Jaune: Hey, Weiss, I was wondering if you wanted to study together later?

Weiss: And drag myself down to your level? Absolutely not.

Jaune: Oh, well, uh... Okay... (Walks away)

Ruby: Geez, Weiss! You didn't have to be so mean!

Weiss: Ruby, I am trying to focus on my career! After Professor Ozpin's "curfew," nobody's willing to get near me for any "outside academic activities" that could "jeopardize my future".

Blake: In other words, you can't sleep with half the school and have another pregnancy scare.

Yang: Yeah, and he's got a point. Besides, it doesn't mean you can't study with the rest of us.

Weiss: Actually, yes. It does. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go to the library. (Walks away)

Ruby: But... But movie night...

Blake: Don't worry about her, Ruby. We can still watch movies together.

===============================

Jaune: Oh! H-Hey, Weiss!

Weiss: Ugh!

Jaune: W-Wait! Hear me out! Listen, if... If you don't want me here, just say the word and I'm gone- BUT... If you let me study next to you, I'll keep quiet the entire time.

Weiss: ...Fine.

Some time later...

Jaune: ...Pfft!

Weiss: Mrrgh!

Jaune: Sorry! Sorry, it's just... I was reading about Nicholas Schnee.

Weiss: ...What's so funny about him?

Jaune: Well, it's... It's kind of stupid, but my dad's name is Nicholas, and your last name is Schnee, and... Like I said, it's pretty stupid.

Weiss: Uh-huh...

Jaune: ...

Weiss: ...What's your dad like?

Jaune: Huh? Oh, uh, y'know, like everybody else's dad.

Weiss: Somehow, I doubt that. My father was a negligent workaholic who constantly did whatever he could to belittle my successes.

Jaune: Oh, uh... Yeah, just like that.

Weiss: Huh?

Jaune: Dad was always busy, so it was just me, my mom, and my sisters. Grew up with lots of girly stuff in my childhood, and, well, Dad was never really happy about that. He'd get mad at Mom for letting me get into it and then he'd start yelling at me when I was doing that girly stuff.

Weiss: What kind of girly stuff?

Jaune: Well, when I was a lot younger, I used to sit with my legs crossed over like this. (Knee-over-knee)

Weiss: Huh. That's...

Jaune: Weird, right? But Dad set me straight, even if it was the only way he'd ever talk to me.

Weiss: My... My Dad would do the same thing, too. I had to be perfect at everything, even on my first try. And when I would do it perfect, he'd never be there to see it. In fact, I remember one day being really sick, and my father never bothered to visit me. My sister would tell me-

Jaune: "He's too busy"?

Weiss: Yes... Exactly.

Jaune: Dads, am I right?

Weiss: For once, I can actually agree with you on that.

Jaune: (Chuckles)

Weiss: (Smiles) Say... Jaune? How old are you, again?

Jaune: I'm seventeen. Why?

Weiss: What a coincidence. So am I.

[bestworstcase]

in re: oz understanding what salem meant i do not have the brainpower to go through the whole thing rn but it sort of comes down to,

#1, an “all just a big misunderstanding!” resolution feels pretty cheap and to my mind makes ozma seem just completely pathetic; earlier in the same episode we see him ask salem flat out “what are you saying?” when he doesn’t follow and salem clarifies without the slightest hesitation. the notion that after a decade or more married to this woman, ozma heard her say something this out of pocket, out of fucking nowhere, and didn’t AT LEAST go “…what are you saying?” to confirm that no yeah she really did just abruptly go mask-off on wanting to do genocide, is… pathetic. world’s most pathetic man. i do not believe that ozma has at any point in his lives been the kind of person who wouldn’t blink hard and go “excuse me??” in this scenario.

#2, the only person present during the lost fable who knows the full context of that conversation, aside from jinn, is oz. the only character on team good who has the requisite information to know what she meant. if there’s going to be any proactive motion on the heroes side toward correcting their own misperceptions of salem, ozma is going to have to be the one to provide more information. regardless of what salem herself does to surprise them, i don’t think these kids will be able to get to “let’s try talking to her?” until they have a reason to believe that she doesn’t like. want to massacre humankind.

#3, it makes a ton of sense for there to be a miscommunication on this specific point between ozma and the kids, because a) after the shock of the lost fable nobody was asking follow-up questions aside from “how could you hide all that?” and “what the fuck is your plan to beat her?” and then oz got punched in the face and screamed at and locked himself away for months to reflect on all this. meanwhile the kids focused on the immediate problem of how to beat salem secure in the assumption that they now have all the facts. the question of salem’s motivation never comes up at all until ozpin brings it up with hazel, explicitly in a bid to scare hazel into turning against her, and he misrepresents the nature of salem’s curse in order to make his case. which is to say, ozpin is lying about one thing when he claims salem wants to end the world – it isn’t unlikely that he’s lying about the rest too.

and that’s a recipe for misunderstanding, if ozma knows what salem meant but no one on his side is asking questions about or discussing her intentions – how is he to know they misunderstood something she said until they voice their misconception?

#4, it’s a lot more compelling for the conflict between salem and ozma to be genuinely about what it seems—she believes the gods are fallible tyrants who can be defeated and should be rejected and replaced, he believes that they are absolute cosmic authorities who can only be obeyed and that her defiance is tantamount to a death-wish. they are on the same page about this and before ozpin’s lifetime, both resolutely believed that the other was a) wrong and b) beyond reason, and thus the immovable detente. then ozma experienced the first shattering crisis of faith during the great war (salem was right about what it takes to unite the world) and ozpin spends his whole lifetime reeling while he treads water; and meanwhile salem acts on the presumption that he has not changed, seeming to confirm ozpin’s worst fears (that she despises him, that she will never forgive him, that she’ll burn the world down with her for the sake of defying the gods one last time, and so he is still fated to be her eternal enemy). and there’s the storm.

layered over top of that is all the fairytale propaganda ozma has spent lifetimes meticulously weaving to obscure the true conflict (because he fears she’ll rally people against the gods again if he doesn’t poison the well) – so long that he half-believes it himself, until jinn causes him to relive all of that; the story salem told him that he desperately didn’t want to believe, his lies, her trust, his choice to plug his ears and blame her for the cruelty of his god. not for nothing does he crawl out of this hole with the wistful yearning for reconciliation song playing underneath in the very moment salem arrives in atlas! shattering though it was – it also reminds him of what’s really true, what’s important to him. what he wants.

(#5, it really doesn’t make sense to me for that ^ to happen if ozma is under the impression that salem just wants to kill everybody and/or do grotesque magical eugenics – “the enemy was right” is an odd thought to insinuate that he’s having if he isn’t clear on what salem was right about.)

and #6, i think it makes the reconciliation easier for the conflict to not be predicated on a misunderstanding. consider how salem might feel in the event she asked why ozma did all of this and his answer boiled down to “i assumed you wanted to commit genocide and use our daughters to breed a new race of magically empowered humans and it didn’t occur to me to question that assumption EVEN A LITTLE BIT at any point in our history. forgive me?” like – jesus christ. whereas “i remembered what you told me the gods had done to you and to the world the last time you rebelled against them and i got scared” is so much less awful, and so much more natural to forgive. she’s scared of the gods too. and if there’s any inkling in there of ozma having been scared for her, scared of what the gods might do to her if she failed, all the more so. it just… fits together better with the set up so clearly leading toward a romantic reconciliation.

[valenshawke]

I can't say I'm terribly surprised by (some) of the reaction to this episode.

There's a contingent of fans that one (or more) of the characters and ships.

But trying to apply a dichotomy of who is right and who is wrong really fails to get a bunch of points.

Yang, Blake, and Weiss acted according to how they were brought up and socialized. An excellent post by phoenix-fells gets at what Yang is doing. And this post by bumblebyaf gets at how much Ruby has actually been through it.

Ruby likely has some in-universe PTSD at this point because... I mean... look at what she's been through? Ruby has BEEN THROUGH IT and hasn't had much in the way of support.

As a character-building moment, I am all in for it and I was happy that she finally got to be angry and vent her frustrations. Was logical? Of course not. But it was EMOTIONAL. And she's has had to mask her true feelings or just bury them because she's the leader of Team RWBY, she's the one everyone depends on, she's a huntress, she's the one everyone must count on.

If there's any group or individuals in the series that are wrong and have failed all them, especially Ruby, it's the fucking adults. From TaiYang's emotional shutdown (as someone who lost a parent before I was a teenager and saw first hand what that'll do to one's spouse, I can sympathize and understand. Still doesn't make it right, still has a ton of negative consequences), to Ozpin making her the leader despite being 15 while Weiss, Blake, and Yang are 17, to Ironwood's general misguided evil-for-the-greater-good strategy of killing anyone/letting everyone else die to save his piece of the world, to the other older Hunters and Huntresses just treating them as equals and not realizing they might be licensed but they still some maturity and guidance and support. Ruby, sometimes, got that from Qrow. Sometimes. Most of the time, she's had no one to vent to, no one to really show vulnerability to, no time to be vulnerable (even by herself).

"But Val," you say, "she had that opportunity after the fall of Beacon and immediately formed a new team with Jaune, Ren, and Nora. She's HAD the opportunity to at least take time to herself and mope." Did she? Did she really? Or did she act exactly as what was expected of her by everyone else that was still around? Did she think she probably owed it to her now scattered and broken-up team to try to salvage something? She might have had a choice at the most basic level. But given her personality type, her own beliefs on duty, I don't think she really DID have a choice. And again, she bottled up the grief and sadness, and kept going despite the fall of beacon, the death of Pyrrha, and the first death of Penny from earlier.

Ruby is going to feel guilty and horrible about what she just did. It's going to add to her breakdown. It'll be interesting to see if the writers draw from the Volume 4 (boo-hiss, I know) episode where Yang has to work through her trauma.

Ruby's ascension is going to be the most interesting. What aspects of her will change? What kind of leader will she be going forward? Yeah, I still see this being the case, the show IS called RWBY.

But yikes on the some of the reaction. For all the criticism that Ruby has developed the least by virtue of her role in the story, it was clear that the writer's have been setting up her breakdown and growth and we're finally getting it. After all, if you want to learn, you have to suffer.

[dextixer]

"Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me", "Once its happenstance, twice its a coincidence, thrice is deliberate", " The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. "

Many quotes/sayings exist in many different languages and many different cultures, all carrying the same meaning. The meaning that while mistakes can and WILL happen, a person should learn from those mistakes to not repeat them. Making mistakes is natural, understandable. Repeating those same mistakes over and over however, indicates a problem, a problem that rarely has an excuse.

RT is no different in this regard. As always, we are at the point where the crew commentary is released, that part of the year when many a critic and fan can read the thought of the crew producing RWBY, and despair at what they see.

It was revealed and i think known a bit before the recent days that RWBY Volume 9 had an entire episode cut, in the second part of the show. It was "unforseen" complications that lead the crew needing to cut a lot of stuff and keep the "most important" parts of the episodes, thats why after Ruby suicide the cut-away seemed so strange.

While i did not see CRWBY make any excuses (yet) about this besides saying that it happened, many fans are already doing it for them, simply saying that these are just "expected" things in production, that CRWBY are not to blame, and yet, they are.

Priorities

First of all, CRWBY are the ones who decide on what parts of the show to prioritize in production. On Twitter Eddy Rivas confirmed that episodes 1-7 were fully produced before episodes 8+ were. The argument presented there is that the solution of "Cutting things from 1-7 and add more to 8+" doesnt work because they were both done at different times of production.

While that is true it does pose a question on why exactly does CRWBY keep doing this then? This problem is not new, the fact that many of RWBY volumes are very back-ended and it causes problems is not new and has been known for a long time now. This is the reason why in most of the Volumes, critics usually focus on things that happen at the end of the Volume, because that is when most of the problems with things like writing occur.

So why continue doing this? So many of RWBY plotlines can be better distributed alongside the entire Volume instead of trying to cram it in at the last second. Lets take for example a character like Oscar. Volume 7 proved that Oscar and his relationship/changes due to Ozpin can be very well done if its all distributed properly in the Volume. Compare this to V6 where it all has to happen offscreen just because "There is no time" to explore Oscar.

Why is then so much of V9 so back-ended? Apparently there was going to be an explanation there that Neo gained her new powers because she landed in the God of Darkness acre. The Ascencion phenomena was going to be expanded upon. We have Ruby and her suicide. We have Jaunes break-down. We have Rubys break-down and i could go on.... and on.... There is just SO MUCH there, why?

The explanations of Neos powers could have been done earlier in the Volume. Ascencion could have been distributed during the entire V9 etc.

Instead we have parts of an episode focused on a talking trash panda that ends up not mattering as an example?

It just feels like the wrong things are prioritized in the show and most of them are back-loaded to such an extent that its INEVITABLE that it will cause a point of failure. Just like it did the REST of the times with the preceding Volumes. Why has that lesson not been learned yet?

When one builds something, the most important first parts are a skeleton. You can do the rest later, but you should have the MAIN feature of your product finished first, everything else is extra. And yet it seems that RWBY constantly tries to do everything at once and then when they inevitably fail to actually finish it all, they start cutting important stuff.

Ambition

The other problem is that there is just SO MUCH SHIT that they want to do. They want to use the Ever After to confirm BB and to further give their relationship time. They want to focus on Neo, her new powers (Now related to the God of Darkness). They want the Ever-After to explore Ruby and Jaune and their developments after V8. They want to explore the concepts of acceptance and reincarnation. They want to develop a new character, Little. They want to connect the Ever-After with the gods of RWBY. Thats just SOME of what they tried to focus on, and at the end of the day, isnt it a bit much?

This always happens with RWBY, the show writers dont seem to understand their limitations and they try to cram as MANY ideas as they can into a Volume, when that Volume wont be able to properly develop those ideas in the first place. This is why a lot of RWBY kingdom arcs feel like they miss an entire extra Volume, be it Mistral or Atlas. They simply have no time to develop the concepts they want.

But instead of cutting down on them and focusing on whats most important, they keep stuffing more and more things into the show. And then decide "Well, people will understand/guess what we kept offscreen".

Did you know that Neo got her new powers with Jabberwocker (Basically, literal fucking death?) because she landed in an Acre that belonged to the gods of RWBY? Well, we were supposed to "Guess" or "Understand" that according to the writers. HOW? I have no idea. But we were "Supposed to".

This is the kind of thing, this bloat that plagues many an indie development. Where the developers/makers just add more and more features that pop into their heads, instead of focusing on what they already have and is important.

Understandable in V1-V3. But holy hell RT is a full on corporation right now, so now its no longer understandable.

End Word

Anyways, apologies for being missing in a large capacity for this, entire month i think? Way too much stuff to do, also got involved with wiki editing, which takes a lot of time. Next thread will be next week and i will focus on the suicide/reincarnation/acceptance message that the Volume tried to portray, because the crew commentary has given me more info to talk about.

"Budget" and "Cuts" stop being excuses for the shows writing when its a regular occurrence.

[blue-cheeseinmyoffwhites]

Very late, but, https://www.tumblr.com/blue-cheeseinmyoffwhites/756639587329277952/rwby-asks-are-open-im-bored?source=share

Who's you're favorite character?

Quick shoutout to the lovely @tumblingxelian for their amazing RWBY content check them out on YT

Let’s do Top 5

Mercury Black

This is solely because of his fighting style. If I could fuck up some stuff with my legs I’d probably be a dick about it too. I started RWBY during V2 & he was one of the first faces I met. I remember LOVING his design & liking his cool laid-back attitude. He started gaining my attention in Volume 3 after his fight with Coco & Yatsu, then won me over after his fight with Yang. I remember being baffled after his prosthetic reveal, & after learning about his allusion it all came together. For the longest time I was trying to decode his semblance (I thought it was something to do with wind manipulation) then V6 came around & shut all that down. I understand he hasn’t been very popular as of late, but I think he has so much potential & they just need to give him more screentime in V10+

Sun Wukong

I appreciate an unconditionally positive character. Sun & Mercury have always just been so cool to me. His design is great too, I like his monkey traits & how he shows his abs. His weapon is genuinely top 5 in the series, & his semblance matches his bright personality. One of my favorite fight scenes is Blake & Sun vs Sea Feilong & his contribution played a big part of that. I did like his appearance in V4-V5 & I was excited to see his gun-chucks return against Ilia. I think he is a great foil to Blake & serves her character arc really well.

Cinder Fall

Sorry but Cinder Fall is just that bitch. I hate everything she does & that’s why I love her. She knows what she wants & can easily get people on her side to do her bidding. She actually pushes the narrative & I consider her to be the main antagonist. The animators take real care when it comes to her battles. She has not missed a SINGLE fight she has been in. Seriously every one has been a hit: Glynda, Amber, Ozpin, Pyrrha, Raven, Neo, Winter, Penny, etc etc. Anytime there is a fight involving Cinder it’s going to be rememberable in some way, especially the Raven vs Cinder fight. I vividly remember my mind going numb watching it for the first time. I do feel they made her a little OP but it’s whatever. I really like her character arc & how she’s slowly turning into a Grimm. I loved her backstory, a lot of people didn’t because it’s just “Cinderella but dark” but like…..that’s kinda the entire point of this series, dark retellings of fairytales. She’s a great foil to Ruby & actually learns from her to gain victory in V8. I just want them to have a proper fight.

Qrow Branwen

Qrow Qrow Qrow. I love their man & want to give him hugs. If there’s one thing RWBY does amazingly, it is setup & payoff. I love his they slowly teased him in V1-V2 as a badass & then finally let us visualize it in V3. He doesn’t take crap from anyone & says what’s on his mind. Love Love LOVE his relationship with Ruby (forever holding onto my cracktheory that he’s her real dad). He acts as her mentor & influenced her fighting style. I like how he became the leader of the team for some time & how his laid-back attitude conflicts with him suddenly having to take care of 8 kids. But he does it anyway. His fight scenes are also amazing. He always looks so confident. His first appearance in V3 he had that super dynamic fight against Winter. In V4 he fought Tyrian & showed Team RNJR (& us) the difference between students & Huntsmen. V7 is where he really shined for me. He finally had a relationship that wasn’t affected by his semblance & can just chill for a while. I very much enjoyed his relationship with Clover & was heartbroken by what happened after. But those last 2 fights with them were pretty great. I hope his semblance evolves into Good Luck as well.

Yang Xiao Long

I like all members of Team RWBY but Yang stands out for obvious reasons. She had the best Trailer for one. Also her fighting style is the most different from her teammates. They’re all swing-swing-slash & she’s all punch-punch-kick. Like Cinder, Yang gets the best treatment when it comes to fight scenes. She’s been marketed as the strongest member & it shows over & over again. Her semblance is super cool & makes her look like a Goddess. I like how her character arc revolves around her fighting style & we can actually see her improvement throughout the volumes. I like how she is the most vocal about the whole trust situation in V5-V8. She lost her arm for this war, she of all people deserves some answers. I really adore her relationship with Blake & I think their story is perfect. She’s the heart of the team & it’s most present in V5 when she is the one reuniting the team.

[ironwoodprotectionsquad]

Okay so I wanted to talk more about the poll listing Hero as a villain song and how little sense it makes to me. Admittedly Les Poissons also doesn't make a ton of sense as Louis is more of an antagonist not a villain but at least Sebastian sees him as a villain so it kind of works. But Hero is called well Hero for a reason, and classifying it as a villain song is strange to put it mildly.

The first lines from Hero that most fans heard where:

I would die Without regret, I'd offer up my life With zero reservations I would fly Into the sun, if that would keep our dream alive

I say most fans heard as those are the lines the song starts on in R/WBY during the Gravity fight. The first lines of the song are:

Take my hand I'm here to protect you Nothing will stop me Understand There's no sacrifice that I won't make I'll risk it all to keep you safe Trust me to be strong I'll be your hero, just hold on

Now regardless of which lines a fan heard first, both convey that James is willing to die to protect people. He is willing to sacrifice himself to protect people and keep them safe. That is not the mindset of a villain. It doesn't meet any criteria for a villain song. TVtropes describes a villain song as: "The Villain Song is an over-the-top, gloating cackle about their Evil Plan, philosophy of life, or why they do what they do" They also mention a villain song can be someone else singing about the villain and what they've done like Cruella Deville or it can be a villain trying to trick or manipulate someone to do what they want like Friends on the Other Side or Poor Unfortunate Souls.

Now lets take a look at every version of villain songs. Hero doesn't discuss some evil plan or really any plan. It's about James's desire to protect people, which definitely isn't villainous. James isn't singing it so it's not him talking about his philosophy and their is no mention about why he does what he does, only a desire to help people. No one else is even singing the song so its not like Cruella Deville and again their is no villainous deeds being discussed so even if someone else was singing about it, it doesn't work as a villain song.

Now some people might argue that it is James tying to manipulate people but again, James is not singing it, so he can't be manipulating someone when he is silently fighting a known terrorist and trying to stop him form destroying Amity Tower and killing everyone. And again, even if he was singing it, it doesn't make any sense to be "manipulating" Watts as Watts works for Salem and is helping end the world. He is not a hero in any sense so the argument James is manipulating a villain because he is a villain despite his only goal at the moment being to stop a terrorist makes no sense.

So, the song doesn't match any sort of definition of what a villain song is. Furthermore, the lyrics are not those of a villain. RW/BY songs are said to be the characters own inner thoughts. A villain would not think about being willing to die for someone or a greater goal. They would not think about offering comfort and kindness.

Now this goes more into head cannon territory but for me parts of Hero like:

Deliver you from harm Shelter in my arms The fear will surely fade Know right now the plan I made will guide us home We'll survive this storm

or: Hope's not gone, just hold on

Are words James wishes might be said to him. Just look a t how happy he is when he's told Ozpin is back and in Atlas.

Vs how crushed he is when he finds out Ozpin is gone again.

For me personally this always read as someone who is tired but carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders because their isn't anyone else who can carry it. He has to but hopes their is someone who can help him, but when he realizes that isn't the case he continues carrying the burden and continues to stand tall and offer hope and shelter to people the best he can.

Back from head cannon territory, I want to focus on this line here: Hope's not gone, just hold on

Offering assurances that the war is not lost, that they just need to keep holding on and not lose hope. Those are not the inner thoughts of a villain. They're the inner thoughts of a Hero. The very name of the song.

Even if we could convince ourselves that Hero has lyrics of a villain song. James is not yet a villain when the song plays (yet is used vey loosely here as volume 8 is just. So bad. He shouldn't have been a villain ever but that's another post). He is actively fighting Watts, someone who works for Salem, someone who is trying to end the world. He is actively working to keep people alive when this song plays. Trying to apply Hero as a villain song to an arc that happens in a volume the song never plays in makes little sense.

The writers themselves said the ending of volume 7 was supposed to be a trolley problem with no clear right answer. So calling him a villain in volume 7 also just doesn't work based on the writers own words. But again, even if the writers now say James was clearly the villain at the end of volume 7, that doesn't fix the issue of James clearly being the hero in the Gravity fight where the song Hero plays.

I don't know how else to put this, but saying Hero is a villain song is so laughably wrong it's crazy I have to discuss this at all.

[lilithfairen]

https://www.reddit.com/r/RWBYcritics/s/d5igtnp6JX

Celtic’s response

This is pretty damn hilarious, for elaboration:

First point, the Lack of Focus on Grimm

Every instance of Grimm that Celtic Phoenix mentions are things that he copied from canon.

Second point, the Lack of Focus on Team RWBY

Every instance he cites as "creating character arcs" for the main characters revolves around "women can't get along".

Third point, too many side characters

So let's quote Celtic Phoenix's own words: "Every story is going to have a cast of side characters"

But they'd better all be white male characters, yanno.

Fourth point (related to the third), side characters getting too involved in the plot

RWBY is a fantastic example of side characters being involved with storylines without diverting focus away from the main characters.

Fixing RWBY has the most inconsequential white dude tell one of the heroines to stay in the kitchen.

Pyrrha explaining aura

Given how terrible Celtic Phoenix is at foreshadowing and revealing information, I'm guessing this took the form of a terrible infodump rather than quick exposition, a la the show proper.

Not mentioning Salem until Volume 4

A solid example of how Celtic Phoenix doesn't understand the purpose of foreshadowing.

Replacing Oscar with Roman as Ozpin's host

Roman and Ozpin are nothing alike, no matter how much Celtic Phoenix wants to insist otherwise. A person genuinely trying to do the right thing, no matter how flawed his choices are, is nothing like an inherently selfish villain. It's purely about Roman being a character Celtic Phoenix identifies with—a racist, misogynistic white dude—more than a darker-skinned boy like Oscar.

Also worth noting is that Celtic Phoenix tries to claim Jaune is given too much focus in the show proper...when Fixing RWBY naturally has Ruby gets the solution to making her team of women (who can't get along) from Jaune, a male character. And Celtic Phoenix even goes ahead and says that if Jaune became Ozpin's host, "the main complaint I'd end up getting is that I was replacing Ruby with Jaune as the main character, because that's what he would effectively become." ...which of course completely ignores how Celtic Phoenix shamelessly made Roman the main character and reduced Ruby to his sidekick.

So in short, Celtic Phoenix is still a fucking hack, like every other RWBY "fix" creator~

[arc-misadventures]

could a Kryptonian AU work with Jaune's mother Kara Danvers A.K.A Supergirl making Jaune and all his sisters half-Kryptonian. but being half-Kryptonian means their power is taking longer to develop with only the oldest sister having all the powers. Jaune himself only has super strength, stamina, and durability that is more than enough to get into beacon which everyone writes off as a semblance. it is also why he's not allowed to spar with people cause his super strength could very quickly kill someone even though Jaune always holds back against people, Grim not so much he killed the Giant Nevermore by throwing a Death Stalker at it.

I’m Super…! Something, IDK?

Ozpin: So… You defeated a a Nevermore, a big one at that, by throwing a Death Stalker at it.

Jaune: I was just throwing away the… arachnid…? I think Scorpions are arachnids… Anyway, I was just throwing the, Stalker away, I just so happened to hit the, Nevermore in the process. Wish I had that filmed, it was really cool…

Ozpin: I see… So then you ran to the spot where they landed, and made sure they were dead.

Jaune: Yeah, but they weren’t there when I went to check up on them. Just a giant crater, I think they escaped…

Ozpin: …

Ozpin: Evidently you need some understanding of Grimm… So, your mother is, Supergirl, A.K.A. Kara Danverse…

Jaune: Arc.

Ozpin: Excuse me?

Jaune: Arc, Mom’s name is, Kara Arc. She married my dad after all so now she’s, Kara Arc.

Ozpin: Acheius Arc? He’s your father?

Jaune: Yeah, Dad had a strong enough Aura, and semblance to handle mom, and her super powers. They went at it a lot… I have a lot of siblings because of that…

Ozpin: You didn’t need to share that with me…

Jaune: Ha! Tell that to my parents…

Ozpin: …

Jaune: …

Ozpin: Mr. Arc?

Jaune: Yes?

Ozpin: Do you have any plans for the future?

Jaune: No.

Ozpin: Then how would you like to attend, Beacon Academy?

Jaune: What’s that?

Ozpin: It’s a academy to train, Huntsman, and Huntresses to fight against the, Grimm.

Jaune: Cool.

Ozpin: Would you like to attend?

Jaune: …

Jaune: Mom, Ozpin is trying to make me go to a Hunter Academy… thingy…?

Ozpin: …

Ozpin: Mr. Arc? Your Mother isn’t…?

Jaune: Shh! Mom is talking.

Ozpin: Oh, yes: super hearing. I forgot Mrs. Arc had that ability.

Jaune: Mom, no, that’s not a good reason to join a school!

Ozpin: What reason is she talking about?

Jaune: She wants me to go to, Beacon to start a harem.

Ozpin: She wants you to what?!

Jaune: Grandbabies, Ozpin, I want lots of grandchildren. A Huntsman Academy is a good place to find… Mom?!

Ozpin: What did you mother say?

Jaune: ‘Woman with aura will be able to endure the sexual prowess of, Arc men. Perfect for…’ I’m not saying that, Mom…

Ozpin: Okay…? So would you attend, Beacon Academy.

Jaune: Well, ignoring, Mom’s comments… Sounds like fun! I have nothing else to do! So let’s go to school!

Ozpin: Very well. Glynda, can you come in now.

Glynda: Hello, Mr. Arc, my name is, Glynda Goodwitch. I knew your mother years ago, when I was a student. She was a great role, all be it a rather energetic, and eccentric person.

Jaune: Oh, hello! Eh…? You’re in your late twenties?

Glynda: How did you know that?

Jaune: Mom, she’s talking about you. Don’t know what your age has to do with anything. Eh? She wants me to tell you something…

Glynda: And, what is it that you want to tell me, Kara?

Jaune: Eh? That doesn’t make any sense? Alright, alright, I’ll tell her! Sheesh. ‘Tye fruit is ripe, and ready to harvest.’ The hell does that mean?

Glynda: Grrrr…!!! Kara, I know you see yourself as my surrogate mother, quit trying to make it a reality by hooking me up with your son!

Jaune: …

Ozpin: Is your mother always like this; trying to hook you up with woman?

Jaune: Shut up, Ozpin. You, and Salem are still are still stuck in the world’s greatest divorce case in history. Don’t you judge me on my romantic relationships.

Ozpin: How good is her hearing…?!

Jaune: You’re singing in the shower is atrocious.

Ozpin: She heard me?!

Jaune: We all did…

Ozpin: Oh no…

[etinceelle]

So idk why, but my brain has been kinda wild trying to think about how RWBY could end with what we now know with the Ever After. And the Blacksmith directly talking about the 2 Brothers being in the wrong and fighting isn't the true balance, it really made me curious-

So if the two Brothers are in the wrong, if the way they see things isn't good, if the true balance it to be able to "repair yourself and become something new", is that something that could be applied to Remnant in the end too ?

What if the brothers are summoned (because at this point they'll probably be back with the Relics), and they can actually make a change with them, idk how but somehow ? Other question, what if the brothers ascend ? Because they technically can.

Since they're Afterans, what if they go back to the Ever After (we know they have a door waiting for them) and ascend and become something different. And their balance being restored could influence the fate of Remnant as well. I'm really just throwing ideas in the wild so don't take me too much seriously but I'm really curious to see where this could all go. What if this "true balance", this idea of being repaired and basically ascension, was applied to Remnant too ?

That would mean all the characters we knew who died (Pyrrha, Penny, Clover, Ironwood, Lionheart, Watts, Vernal, Amber, Roman...) COULD come back, but be different. It would be like a Little/Somewhat situation. That would mean kinda like Somewhat, they would remember the most important things/people to them (like them feeling familiar with Ruby, remembering she's a huntress). So we could potentially have similar looking characters, but memories completely lost, a new person but better.

Ozpin and Salem would be free of their immortality and curse, but they wouldn't die die, they would reincarne and maybe have a chance to do things differently and BETTER. Oscar would be free of Ozpin and be able to be his own person.

The Blacksmith knows the Brothers are in the wrong (at least that's how I interpret this), but she doesn't intervene because people have to come to the tree. Like she was "waiting for Jaune for a long time" and she knew he needed help, but HE had to come to her. She's like the holy therapist (xD) and people have to go through their journey to understand things on their own and finally understand they might need some help. Like yeah, the brothers created amazing things, but maybe they could need some help too.

So just like Jaune finally came to her to be fixed, like Ruby came to her too (even if that wasn't her first intention-), maybe the Blacksmith/tree is waiting for the brothers to come back from their own journey to be fixed too. I really went far on this one but I'm really excited to see where these new informations about the RWBY lore will take us, and how it will influence the story and our characters (because there WILL be a volume 10 of course :) )

It was the 1 am rambling now I'll go back to the stuff I have to do-

[maskyartist]

Okay I’m making this it’s own post cause I’m fucking losing my mind, but mostly over one thing and that’s Roman Torchwick and how he’s characterized in this single moment

Now keep in mind I haven’t watched the full episode, nor have I gotten the chance to read Roman Holiday (a damn shame I know), but I don’t think I need to rn to ramble about this point cause it just hit me like a train.

CRWBY never forgot about Roman. They didn’t just kill him off and make Neo go solo.

They set this up from the start.

The fact that Neo is silent means we can never truly know what’s going on in her head. We don’t know her thoughts. We don’t know her feelings. All we knew was she was mad for Roman and went to get Cinder for it, then Ruby herself. But never the full extent of it all.

Neo’s muteness made US, the audience, almost forget about Roman to watch her perform as a side piece to a lot of the villains. Never truly forgetting, but assuming he wouldn’t be brought up again. The hat and scarf would be reminders but never would they actually mention Roman because they killed him off in such an unceremonious way.

So to actually see THIS

To see just how deep these two went, to get full in show confirmation that they were partners in every sense of the word (romantic or platonic take it how u will but I love some Gelato so this fed me well), only to have him SPEAK? It throws you off.

Not only is it confirmation that Roman was never forgotten, but it also proves one thing about Neo that I think is so important.

She had nothing beyond Roman. “One Thing” was right. She had Roman, and he was taken away from her. And for the rest of the series, through every adventure, every appearance, every moment she was and wasn’t on screen-

She was thinking of him. Remembering him. Keeping him in her thoughts.

I understand that Neo talking through Roman makes sense and that’s why he’s got the most speaking lines, but I do find it interesting that everyone else from the “dead people lineup” is so quiet. Such a caricature of themselves.

Neo never met them personally, she doesn’t even know Leo or Clover, and Penny, Pyrrha, Ironwood, and Ozpin are all based on Ruby’s own memories Wonderland is probably pulling from her. But even they’re barebones. The only ones who have speaking lines are Penny, Pyrrha, and Ozpin and they are extremely generic.

Meanwhile, Roman is fully fleshed out. A whole person. He has his attitude, his emotions, his reactions, Neo never forgot him. She never forgot his exact self.

She uses him as her mic because he was always her voice. He was the one who made things make sense.

The line “That’s what I offered her back on Remnant.” just proves how long Neo’s thought of him. Never forgetting their promises, never forgetting his words, never forgetting him.

How many nights did Neo stay up thinking of him? How many times did she create his illusion just to play pretend for a little longer?

Everyone forgot Roman. After his death, he practically never existed. Left everyone’s minds. He wasn’t important by that point because he wasn’t an immediate threat.

But Neo never forgot.

And somehow that’s more terrifying then I thought it would be… The idea of her constantly thinking about him, trying to keep him alive in her mind. It’s no longer just about Ruby killing Roman, it’s that she forgot. That’s what ticked Neo off even more, that Ruby didn’t even view what she did as important enough to remember.

“That’s what this is about?! You still blame me for What happened to Torchwick!”

As if to say “Really? That’s all this is? Just him?”

To her, it’s mockery. As if he wasn’t even worth her time when Roman meant everything to Neo. He was her whole world, judging by, once again-

“Always loved the idea of a place to run away from it all… Do whatever you want! I offered that to her back on Remnant.”

Roman took care of reality, while Neo was able to live in her fantasy world. He handled the world. She just had to live in it, perform for it, and enjoy whatever popped up next. He brought her the escape she’s always wanted. A world where no one could hurt her, no one could catch her… Just Roman and Neo. Partners in crime. In everything.

Roman was Neo’s whole world, her One Thing…and that was stolen from her.

She didn’t have the power to make that known before. But with Wonderland…she can do anything she wants.

[kitkatopinions]

Do you think Glynda would have been the only one to side with Ozpin, or at least not hold much of a grudge against him, treating him empathy, after his big secret reveal in V6? She's already displayed a great deal of uncond trust towards him when she talked with Ironwood about him having doubts about Ozpin

Honestly, if the only thing that changed was Glynda's inclusion and the same writers were still doing the same things... I don't think Glynda would've sided with Ozpin at all, because the writers love to write "and then RWBYJNOR think blah blah blah," or "and then RWBYJNORQ want XYZ." They struggle to do plotlines where people can disagree without being framed as One Hundred Percent Bad In The Wrong Needs To Change Might Be Evil. I feel like if they had Glynda be a more prominent role and involved in the story up to V6, they would've had her also be so furious and disappointed in and angry at Ozpin just like Qrow, even if it didn't make any sense.

Logically though, what I think would happen if the writers cared about consistency and making their characters have an original thought, I think that Glynda would be the most on board with Ozpin and have the least problems with him out of anyone.

I think Qrow should've sided with Ozpin, but been personally very hurt by Ozpin's lack of trust in him, creating conflict for them to work through later. I think Yang should've been against Ozpin, resolving that he can't be trusted because he lied to them and (however temporarily) icing him out and not looking to him as a leader. I think Weiss should've been mostly on Yang's side, albeit with a bit more sympathy towards Oz, sort of in the camp of "I get where he's coming from but clearly we can't trust him to be honest or to always have our best interests at heart." I think Blake should've actually taken the stance of "you guys don't know what it's like, maybe he should've told the truth, but it's easier to say 'you should trust us' than it is to actually trust people after you've been hurt so many times, I've been there and I get it" and she should've been way more sympathetic towards Ozpin because of her backstory. I think once Jaune heard about it later, he should've had problems too and been willing to work with Ozpin, but hesitant with him and frequently doubting the legitimacy of his claims and tending to rely on himself and Ruby and not really think of Ozpin as any sort of reliable guide to be consulted in plans. Ren should take kind of the same stance as Jaune, albeit with a more logical thought process of "we should only do what he says if we think he's right, everything else doesn't matter as much." And I actually think Nora should've been fully on board with Ozpin, easily assuming that he only lied to them and/or didn't trust them because he'd been hurt in the past, and that she doesn't really care and still likes him. And I think that Ironwood should've - when he eventually heard - been somewhat hurt as well, but understand the logic of it, but also just resolve to work all the harder himself, knowing that Ozpin is not always a safety net and knowing that Ozpin doesn't always share everything important. And Glynda would fully on Ozpin's side except unlike Qrow (who I feel has a very emotional and personal connection to Ozpin and would fall back on believing in Ozpin because he loves him more than because it logically makes sense) and Nora (who I honestly think is just a very loyal follower with strong intuition and a good judge of character but doesn't really have much logic behind 100% trusting Oz,) Glynda would instead completely get where Oz is coming from, completely understand why he did the things he did, completely agree with them, and just keep trusting him completely. As for Ruby (who is the most important person here,) I think that she should've been kind of in-between and not sure what to think, feeling confused on how she's supposed to react, trying to make everyone happy at once, and be understanding but also a good strong leader herself, and tries to rely more on herself instead of others in the wake of what happened.

Basically, if I was the RWBY writer, I think Glynda would side with Ozpin because that's what I think makes the most sense for her character. Everyone should be having different reactions because what Ozpin did is nuanced, not just pure evil, and I think that with what Glynda was like in V1-3, the natural thing and what would make the most sense would be her understanding and supporting Ozpin. However, I think if the writers included her, she wouldn't side with Ozpin at all, because they didn't want it to be a nuanced conversation and a chance to show the range of their characters where some people agreed with Ozpin, some people didn't, and some people were kind of in-between. They just wanted to say 'Ozpin is bad and dumb and we should all be against him,' and so they couldn't have Glynda do anything but agree with Team RWBY... Unless they made her into one of those characters that temporarily disagrees with Team RWBY so they can all be like 😮🫢😞😠 and then they either take it back later of become an antagonist.

[howlingday]

In the dark au I used Penny as a example because of the firsts ep of volume 1 and I imagine the scenario of Ozpin or Glynda putting Jaune on a mission to look at Penny while she is in beacon/vale

"What happened?"

"Good afternoon to you, too, Ja-"

"What? Happened?"

The headmaster of Beacon sighed as the headmaster of Atlas glared through the screen at him. Rubbing his eyes, he felt he knew this conversation was going to come up yet did nothing to prepare for it. He thought he had a few days, at least, before this call came. Hell, he expected Lisa Lavender trying to make contact with him first before anyone else. But here he was, fuming at his Valian counterpart.

"Would you believe a series of unfortunate circumstances?"

"Students are dead, Oz." Ironwood replied. "The public need to have faith in us to ensure humanity's survival. Having only one student survive initiation tells a lot more about Beacon's standards than it does about those who take part in it."

"I am aware, James." He removed his glasses, revealing dark bags under his eyes. "I am aware."

The general didn't respond, save for the softening of his hardened look. He then gave a sigh and shook his head. "You haven't gotten any sleep, have you?"

"Not since the morning of initiation, no." Little over 24 hours. Thank goodness for the high amount of sugar in his mug. "I'm assuming things are not much better in Atlas?"

"The media have been on me since the tragedy came out. Not to mention how much Schnee has been breathing down my neck to keep quiet about his daughter."

"It's to be expected of a father to be concerned with his child, is it not?"

"Any other man, yes. But you don't know him like I do. He's not angry that his daughter died. He's panicking because someone with his name failed to meet the expectations of a distant school."

"Speaking of family names, how is your second?"

"Working. Despite being given emergency leave to spend time with her family. I'm almost tempted to place her under house arrest just to make sure she's grieving properly."

"People grieve in their own ways, James."

"Yes, but the way she's choosing to grieve puts my men at risk, Oz. Not that you'd understand."

That last comment wasn't made with any scathing intention, despite how Ozpin felt at the moment. Long ago, before he was the headmaster of Beacon Academy, he did know how to lead his own battalion of soldiers. However, such memories did little to comfort those in the present.

"You're right." He nodded. "Will you be attending the memorial?"

"I intend to, if only so I know Winter will also be in attendance. Should I expect anyone of note at the memorial?"

"Of note in what regard?"

"I'm traveling with the CEO of the Schnee Dust Company and his family. You know what regard I am referring to."

"Messages have been delivered to the families. Should they not wish to participate and only want the remains returned for their own individual funerals, then I should receive notices of the fact." James held his signature firm look. Oz sighed. "Ghira Belladonna has long since denounced his association with the White Fang."

"He is still a person of interest to both the White Fang and Atlas."

"James-"

"I don't intend to arrest someone outside of Atlas, Oz, but if I'm forced to act as a huntsman-"

"Then we shall act together." Ozpin finished. "Is there anything else you wish to discuss with me, James?"

"Yes, just one more." James was quiet for a moment, but Oz was a patient man. The fact the words didn't come right out of his mouth meant that James was still uncertain about the topic he was going to present. Either his answer would be to dismiss his earlier statement, or to get to the heart of the matter. "I may have a new student for you to enroll."

[bestworstcase]

thing abt the theory that (raven / summer / the last spring maiden) asked the lamp’s first question is it’s like—i don’t understand how you can propose with any seriousness that someone other than ozpin used that question without interrogating how that person learned jinn’s name. it’s a mandatory presupposition, and yet…?

in V6 ozpin PANICS when the girls start to question him. he tries to forcibly suppress oscar to protect this secret; oscar has to fight past him to force the words out. the man lunges at ruby in desperation to stop jinn from answering her. in V7 ironwood remarks that ozpin told them all that there were no questions left. half of V8 is salem trying to drag the “password” out of ozpin or oscar because the lamp is useless without knowledge of how to use it. you think ozpin would just… let slip jinn’s name to summer or raven or the maiden capable of opening the lamp’s vault? that’s absurd.

this is not a narratively inconsequential detail. jinn’s name and the knowledge of how to summon her is a huge deal in V6 and literally the cornerstone of salem’s part in V8. and it’s made crystal clear that ozpin does not share it with anyone.

which doesn’t make it impossible for raven or summer or the spring maiden to have found it out somehow—but, like, “somehow” matters actually. i think the most plausible somehow is if the lamp itself has a way to provide instructions if approached in the right way. notably no character has ever tried asking the lamp how it works or how to use it, and well. 6.2 “why does it matter who carries it?”/“he’s trying to stop you.” right? there’s room here to interpret ozpin’s intense anxiety as rooted in a real possibility that ruby might either release jinn or unlock the lamp’s user manual if she keeps asking questions while holding it.

but then in V8 we also have salem talking to the lamp (“i have questions for you”), and she understands how the staff works (“you say they used the staff; i assume you rid the world of their creation. what did you create in its stead?”)—so like, there’s a nonzero chance salem knows there are beings inside the relics and even if she doesn’t she, um, talks to the lamp conversationally hello. we’ve also seen that salem Thinks Aloud when she’s trying to figure out something she doesn’t understand (V4, “what are you planning?”).

out of all the characters in this story, salem most seems the type to, like, pick up the magical lamp and go “how do you work?”—but does it make sense for jinn’s name to be so important narratively if it’s on the magical equivalent of a post-it note somewhere?

and then too like—

this is a matter of taste maybe. but there’s, i think, this tendency to look at the lost fable and its emotional aftermath and try to retrofit that to whatever happened with summer and raven; there’s an unspoken presupposition that the world has not changed very much in the last twelve or fourteen years. but they didn’t. even before V9 that was clear—in V1-3 ozpin et al are very much not doing business-as-usual, they’re rattled by what happened to amber—and that glimpse we got in V9 is like, summer gets called away on an urgent secret mission in the dead of night and tai is like “pfft can’t wait for it to turn out another false alarm” about it. ozpin’s irrational paranoia was an inside joke to them.

there’s a crucial piece missing here—why did summer rose do the things she did?—and the lamp feels… like a cop-out. she reflects tai’s casual attitude. the face she shows raven is curtly confident. neither is real; before she puts on the smile and turns around she looks distraught. the last thing she says to her girls is “i love you just the way you are.” she is the reflection in ruby’s mirror. she was “the best of us.” and “you were born to hypnotize them all.” mirrored eyes, you know?

ruby believed in ozpin. she believed in the fairytales she tried so hard to live up to.

did summer?

the thing about the lost fable is it’s a clean break, right. yang twitches the curtain with the revelation that ozpin gave the branwens magic and qrow smooths it over and ozpin promises to be honest with them. a few weeks later, they catch him in another lie of omission and argue and jinn lays out his entire fucking life story in technicolor for them. it’s a sudden, shattering shock.

raven says she needed answers, and that the longer she looked for them and the more she learned, the more horrifying the world became. she tells yang to question everything. she says she “tried to leave”—tried. does that sound like raven asked one question (out of three) and decided to fuck off forever?

tai says raven’s flaws are what tore the team apart. twelve years later qrow is still trying to get her to come back. summer planned her rogue mission with raven behind their backs. every new kernel we get about these people suggests an interminable, convoluted mess.

ruby sounds just like her mother. summer doesn’t sound very much like ruby. “we,” ruby says, and “i,” says summer. summer rose never lies, but she plans a rogue mission with raven behind tai’s and qrow’s back and nobody suspects a thing, and when ruby asks qrow tells her summer’s last mission was a summer secret in the same tone ruby said ozpin secret. cut to the heart of this thing and it’s obvious that nobody really knew summer, only the things summer let them see. and i think—ultimately—summer left, and never came back, not because of something she learned but because she had to break the mirror.

[dragynkeep]

Why wasn’t ruby’s question to jinn “what is salem and ozpin hiding?” a lot of jinns story was from both their perspectives and it was weird that ozpin knew so much of what happened to salem without her own personal bias…

It really was just an excuse to have an exposition dump around the college level gods story that MK really wanted to do, rather than actually giving us interesting characterisation for both Ozpin and Salem.

'Cause what we got was all the mystery around Ozpin boiling down to a traumatised abused man trying his best to protect the world from his abusive wife, who murdered him and his children, and a sexist bunch of tropes of a woman who was just too emotional to think logically and bumbled through her story and now wants to die ig??

And the gods are assholes. Great Greek storytelling there.

I honestly would've had the story without the gods. It just over complicated the story by adding another set of Big Bads after Salem did that to Cinder, and actively takes away Salem's agency because she's now just reacting to what all the men around her had done.

Especially since Ozpin didn't see half of what happened in the actual flashback. How can he hide something that he doesn't know? Now we got our heroes forcibly dragging someone's abusive past out, getting mad at THEM for not being able to defeat their abusive ex, physically and verbally assaulting them right after retraumatising them, and then not once showing any sympathy for him until they had to do shit without him.

Who does that remind me of? Oh, it's Blake. It's literally Blake.

The girl who hid her abusive past with an evil ex, who wants to kill her and all of humanity, and can't beat him until her friends actively show her support and understanding despite how her fuck ups personally impacted them.

The difference is how the show treats them. Blake is constantly coddled even when she's being told off, the worst done to her is Sun explaining to her how her mentality is bad for her and her friends right after waking up from nearly dying, Yang letting go of her anger long before Blake returns and only getting annoyed when she actively infantilises her, and everyone understanding why Blake left and being all happy smiles when she comes back.

But with Ozpin, everyone immediately suspects him when they find out he gave Qrow and Raven the ability to turn into birds, a power that has no downsides and is actively a gift that Qrow does not care, meaning they're overreacting again. Then they get annoyed when he keeps the secret of the relic attracting Grimm, something that isn't brought up again in the show even with them having the lamp out in the open for the rest of the time they had it.

And then they forcibly get an outside force to tell them his past, something that Ozpin/Ozma does not want to tell them because it's fucking traumatising, and then they get angry at him without any ounce of empathy for the shit he went through.

Like??? These are our heroes???? Okay.