#rosebird parents theory

[anthurak]

So I want to talk about this one visual detail from the Blacksmith’s epic lore-dump that’s been BUGGING ME ever since Volume 9.

Specifically this bit where the threads representing the Brothers of Light and Darkness transition to threads representing Team RWBY.

Now those who have been following me for a while might remember a few posts I’ve done theorizing that the Schnee semblance is NOT actually a semblance at all, but rather a hereditary power originating from the God of Darkness much like how the Silver Eyes seem to originate from the God of Light, essentially the ‘dark’ counterpart to the Silver Eyes. Owing to things such as the Schnee semblance working very differently from other semblances, having a lot of similarities to ancient magic which was specifically gifted to humanity by the God of Darkness, and most notably, the Schnee’s ability to summon Grimm, the very creations of the God of Darkness.

So as you can imagine, when I first watched this sequence I was watching VERY CAREFULLY for some connection between Weiss and the God of Darkness. Such as a thread representing GoD turning into a white thread representing Weiss.

Except… that’s NOT what happened.

Instead we got this sequence of the images of the two gods combining into a ying-yang symbol, which in turn became a red thread clearly representing RUBY, which was then joined by threads representing Weiss, Blake and Yang.

So that was… INTERESTING.

Now to be clear, I don’t think this somehow debunks the idea that the Schnee semblance is connected to the God of Darkness. There’s simply way too many existing threads otherwise, most notably the whole ‘being able to summon Grimm’ thing, which still feel VERY important.

Instead, what this sequence seems to be implying is that Ruby somehow has her OWN connection to the God of Darkness in ADDITION to her connection to the God of Light via her Silver Eyes.

So what might that connection even BE?

Weeeeelllll… remember what I said earlier about how old-world magic has been specifically noted to be a gift from the God of Darkness? And how we know from Salem’s and Ozma’s kids that magic can be inherited by a child from a parent?

Well guess who just so happens to have a bit of old-world magic, was very close to Summer, and looks weirdly a lot like Ruby? And also hasn’t been repeatedly debunked by the creators as a possible parent to Ruby.

It’s funny, I swear I wasn’t even looking for Rosebird Parents evidence with this one. Like at first I was thinking this might be hinting that Ruby might get eventually Grimm-Hybridized herself, but then I remembered ‘Hey, Raven has a connection to the God of Darkness…’

[short-wooloo]

Ruby and Weiss: combat skirts

Summer and Raven: combat skirts

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm

[anthurak]

Very well put :D

There really are just way too many characterization hoops to jump through (among other things) to justify Qrow being Ruby's dad. Not the least of which is what reason he would even have to keep that secret.

Whereas Raven being Ruby's dad slots just about perfectly in the characterization of Team STRQ and what little we can be sure of regarding their history so far. Like it's entirely possible that Summer and Raven even having Ruby together could have been the product of Summer trying to 'coax' Raven back to the family, in the classic misguided 'having a child together will save our relationship' ploy.

And of course said ploy not working fits perfectly into how prickly we see Summer acting towards Raven in Ruby's tree vision.

I think the reason I prefer the "Raven is Ruby’s real dad" over the "Qrow is Ruby’s real dad" is how the latter treats Qrow, Summer, and Tai.

Given what we know about Yang and Ruby growing up, Qrow being Ruby’s dad leaves a bad taste in my mouth where it gives us 4 situations: Qrow and Summer dating and Summer leaving him to help Taiyang with Yang, Qrow breaking things off with Summer after getting her pregnant, Qrow not knowing Ruby is his and not caring, or Qrow not wanting to raise Ruby and dropping her off with Taiyang. And all of these feel like it requires for some sort of cheating or relationship issues to take the forefront of the theory.

With Raven and Summer, it brings a different thought considering Raven left. It focuses less on any infidelity and more on the implications of the relationship Raven and Summer had before they hit a rocky spot that allows Summer to help Taiyang with Yang. Or at the very least, allows for the two to be intimate without hurting anyone beyond Taiyang with Raven already established to have left.

[bestworstcase]

Do you have thoughts you’d like to air on the Raven is actually Ruby’s dad theory? No prob if you’ve answered this before but could you link?

my general feeling on secret-biological-relation theories is that they’re usually something that arises from a misreading of narrative foiling (in that a bona fide narrative connection between two characters is taken to be foreshadowing for a literal material connection between the characters in-universe, rather than parsed as a narrative device that services theme; this also plays a role in why shipping narrative foils is so popular, because it follows from the textual thematic relationship) and in the case of secret parentage in particular, it is also often motivated at least in part by shipping (this is absolutely the case with summer/raven – and summer/qrow for that matter).

with rwby and the question of ruby’s parentage, such as it is, the fundamental issue i find in theories that taiyang isn’t ruby’s biological father, irrespective of Who the proposed alternative is, is that in practice each one boils down to two options:

#1, summer had an extramarital affair with raven that nobody else but the two of them knows about (in which case the only person who could reasonably reveal the truth is summer, because ruby is so much the spitting image of summer but for the fluffier hair she could’ve just as easily gotten from tai as from raven or qrow that no one would question she’s tai’s – especially given that we know now summer is a skilled liar!)

or

#2, everything was aboveboard (whether poly triad or open relationship or summer and tai actually having a platonic partnership or what-have-you), ruby’s true parentage is known to TRQ (and their friends/colleagues may have some general awareness of whatever the real situation was) and… nobody ever told ruby for Some Reason.

now personally i think – if we’re doing a theory in this vein – option #1 is both more interesting and more narratively plausible (because again: 9.10 flashback establishes that summer is a good liar and puts that trait squarely in focus), but the preference among the rosebird conspiracy crowd seems to overwhelmingly be for option #2, so we’ll focus on that one.

ON ITS FACE, i don’t think it’s crazy to speculate that the keeping secrets family might be keeping this secret, given e.g. yang wasn’t told about raven until summer’s disappearance (and may not really have been told so much as discovered, depending upon what “found out” means). why not hide effectively the same information from ruby?well.

for one thing, it then becomes narratively awkward to explain “yang knows raven is her mom, ruby knows raven is yang’s mom, and raven expressly claims yang as her daughter (and has a bond to her); but neither ruby nor yang know that raven is also ruby’s mom*, raven has evinced exactly zero of her i-don’t-care-she-said-caringly behavior toward ruby, nor used “bet your daddy and uncle didn’t tell you that ruby is also my daughter, did they?” as the mother of all trump cards in her “here’s why you shouldn’t blindly trust whatever you’re told QUESTION EVERYTHING” gambit, and when qrow called raven out for being a deadbeat mom to yang he said sweet fuck all to her about ruby.”

[*we do not do the insistently referring to the non-carrying parent as The Dad thing in this household, thank you.]

if the presumption is that raven being ruby’s parent is not secret-secret—as in, this is known information to TRQ—then it becomes untenable as a surprise twist once you reach v4 and have qrow and raven, in a private conversation, discussing her abandonment of only one of her two daughters. even if raven felt (for some reason) that ruby didn’t really ‘count’ as her daughter, qrow has zero. reason. to let that fly, and no reason at all to uphold a charade when it’s just himself and raven.

rwby is better than butchering his characterization in this one scene for the sake of a dramatic reveal down the line; there are ways you could write qrow’s dialogue there to include both girls while being vague about the specific biological relationship, and then it becomes punchy foreshadowing instead of a retroactive “…why does qrow not give a damn about raven abandoning ruby too?” moment.

and foreshadowing like that is one of rwby’s greatest strengths! they do this sort of dialogue sleight of hand all the time!

but say they did fumble that one moment—it happens, it’s not impossible—well… as a narrative secret this becomes really untenable after v5. even if raven flat out did not consider ruby to be her daughter whatsoever for her own labyrinthine raven branwen reasons, if she is aware of a direct biological relation between herself and yang’s sister of which yang has clearly been kept in the dark, and her goal is to shock yang with information that will break her trust in taiyang and qrow—which it is, that’s exactly why she does the whole shapeshifting song and dance—then why wouldn’t she drop that bomb?

you could not possibly design a more flawless QUESTION EVERYTHING ALSO NEVER TRUST DAD OR UNCLE ABOUT ANYTHING EVER AGAIN kick in the face for yang than “oh by the way, your sister? i’m her mother too. the only reason you know about me is because you went looking; if you hadn’t… well, they would have happily kept you in the dark your whole life, too.”

and if raven didn’t drop that bomb because she has her signature Complicated Feelings about ruby, then shouldn’t we expect to see a glimmer of that in her response to ruby, as opposed to what we plainly get—which is “hm. you sure are summer’s daughter. fireball in the face for you for one thousand years!!!”

in the reverse direction, we have the question of whether such a reveal really serves the narrative, and i don’t think it does.

the general thrust of the “for” argument here is that the revelation of such a frankly pointless lie about something that is only a big deal because the adults conspired to hide it would tie off all the existing threads about team strq being generally dysfunctional in a tidy little bow and highlight it by virtue of that dysfunction being emphatically Not Salem’s Fault. to an extent this is a line of thinking that i find not unreasonable because it is quite clear that team strq’s dysfunction was indeed Not Salem’s Fault – the shadow war was a significant stressor of course, but there is an awful lot of small interpersonal messiness simmering inside that pressure cooker.

HOWEVER,

rwby has spent Nine Whole Volumes meticulously slow-boiling “what happened the night summer rose met salem?” as THE central mystery – that is the question haunting this entire narrative, the missing piece of the puzzle, the answer that must be found and resolved before the story can end. and i promise. I PROMISE. that the answer to this question will not, in any configuration, principally concern the intra-team romantic fuck ups of team strq. LOWER THE FILTER SETTING ON YOUR SHIPPER GOGGLES THAT IS A SIDE DISH OR PERHAPS A GARNISH.

the problem for rosebird parents (and other ruby parentage theories) is that it’s very difficult to fit a reveal like that into the margins of The Most Important Narrative Reveal. (which is: summer joined salem.) narratively you put yourself into a corner where you have to balance exploding ruby and yang’s relationships with all of team strq at once against… resolving the actual central conflict of the story and dealing with the fallout of “OUR MOM JOINED YOU?!” and the end result is going to be either:

the parentage reveal just kind of falls flat and gets skimmed over quickly in a not very satisfying way because everyone has a bigger, unfortunately immortal fish to fry

the parentage reveal turns into a narrative black hole that eats up way too much runtime proportionate to its actual narrative importance and salem is like “…so should i come back when you kids are done yelling at your parents or…?”

neither one is a great idea. again, the optimal time for a ruby parentage reveal was v4/5, with raven’s entry proper into the story. doing this in v10, with everything else that is going to be going on in vacuo as the story enters its final arc, would not go well.

a secondary issue is the impact such a reveal would have on 1. the nascent dad’s chickens come home to roost arc, and 2. resolving matters between raven and yang in vacuo, however that shakes out.

for the first, any kind of “actually tai isn’t the dad” reveal inherently moves the focus of his character arc, from “tai neglected his kids and favored ruby, also why is he still in vale” to, you know, the lying. it dilutes the payoff for all the development with regard to neglect/favoritism by veering off at a wild angle right before the punch. there is a time and a place for narrative velociraptors in the bushes, but swerving like that isn’t it.

and for the second… there is no way to do a reveal that raven is secretly also ruby’s mom, at the point in the narrative where yang is meeting raven again after their confrontation now that raven is committed to trying, without drop-kicking yang and yang’s finding-her-mother storyline off the stage. sorry. you can’t do this without making it all about ruby and how ruby feels and how raven feels about ruby and summer and how yang feels about ruby having the same moms. like lol they are not going to do that, in the same way they’re not going to suddenly drop ruby’s summer rose identity disturbance storyline in favor of going “aaaaactually yang is raven’s and summer’s baby so let’s focus on how yang feels about learning summer is her biological mother for real.”

tertiary problem with the rosebird parents theory, and this isn’t a narrative issue but rather to do with the “explaining how two women made a baby” exercises, wearily taps the sign. Intersex Conditions Do Not Work That Way.

[yankthoudong]

RWBY questions game

i never get anything for ask games so i decided to just do it lmao. skipped and deleted the ones idk what they mean or i don't want to answer. unfortunately tumblr's numbered lists are silly so theyre incorrectly numbered now https://www.tumblr.com/thuskindlyshescatters/755265757960601600/rwby-ask-game?source=share

Favorite debunked fan theory? Qrowdad no question. I kinda believed it at the time, and the way CRWBY have backed away from it is absolutely hilarious especially if they make poly STR real and Summer/Qrow is one of the only nonromantic relationships on the team. Doubly so if Rosebird Parents comes real.

Rank the soundtracks! 9 >>> 6 > 7 > 4 > 8 > 1 > 2 > 5 >>> 3. i do think v3's is noticeably worse than the others but aside from that and v9 going off there's not much differential for me.

Favorite Ruby ship? HARGH this one has been rapidly changing for me over the last couple months. i love NND and have for a very long time, it might still be my answer, but i've fallen hardcore for gemstones lately too. (artificial gemstones is excellent as well, i think penny/emerald could be really cool.) but i've also gotten very into the idea of post-v9 complicated emotions ruby/neo lately. artificial gemstones if you make me choose.

Pick a design choice for the new outfits! GIVE 👏 RUBY 👏 MORE 👏 BELTS more seriously i'm curious if ruby will have any colors representing those who have fallen. obviously penny is the big one but i also think it would be cool if she has a little rainbow sleeve or somesuch with Summer, Penny, and Pyrrha all represented. Maybe Lionheart, Ozpin, Clover, and Ironwood too, representing the more negative aspects of her guilt. Also Neo

Favorite redhead in the show? Penny.

Favorite lines? "So, when she's ready, I'll be there for her. And, I know we're not as close... but I'm here for you, too." all of Ruby's speeches to Qrow in 6x9 and 6x10 "She'll find herself. One way... or another."

Any characters you wish had lived? Penny, Pyrrha, Roman. that answer hasn't changed since v3 lol.

Any characters you wish had died? honestly, the only characters i wanted to die were adam and jacques, and they're already dead, so...

Favorite soundtrack moments? all the RWBY soundtracks since i got back into the show have released either on my birthday or a few days before and i don't notice them until my birthday. that's been incredible for me, it feels like casey is giving me a present lol.

Favorite visuals/shots? Penny against the moon in V8 i think is the best-looking shot in the show. i also love the moment when the dust clears in blake + yang vs adam, it looks perfect. all of Tea Amidst Terrible Trouble looks amazing, it's the best episode imo. the fight animation in everyone vs ironwood is so smooth and i love it, also crescent rose during the first 10 seconds or so of ruby vs the cat in v9c10. the look ruby gives neo at the end of the fight is really impressive to me too - they managed to animate her expression subtly while giving it as much emotion as a real actor would have. that look says a thousand words of concern and worry and understanding and it's so impressive that they pulled it off.

Best idea for a RWBY crossover? RWBY X Homestuck fighting game. I will sacrifice both Miles Luna and Andrew Hussie to whatever god can make this happen.

Most nostalgic part of Poser animation? i love the way yang's semblance hair looked in the old days. the maya hair is cool too but there's something about how it moved in poser.

Favorite location? visually, the house in TATT. emotionally, RNJRWYOQ's house in mistral still feels so comfy to me, i want everyone to move there at the end of the show.

Theory for the Relic of Choice? it allows you to pinpoint a choice in your life and visualize what would've happened if you'd chosen differently. i don't think it lets you actually go back and change it, though - just take that into account for any future choices.

Theory for the Relic of Destruction? i don't have a serious one but i do think it'd be really funny if it's just like. A Really Good Normal Sword with a spirit that tells you to Kill

Favorite Weiss ship? Bee's Schnees and particularly freezerburn. i'm not much of a fan of bumblebee honestly but freezerburn and monochrome carry bee's schnees hardcore.

What are you looking forward to seeing in Vacuo? Emerald Emerald Emerald i need her character development i need her being awkward with RWBYJ because she doesn't know if they'll continue to accept her

Favorite RWBYxJL character design? imma be honest i didn't like those movies very much. i like jess's design alright.

Characters you want to see redeemed? i would say emerald but she's hopefully not in question at this point. honestly i think all of the villains should get a genuine chance at redemption but my next answer is definitely Neo. my perception of purpose is that, when your purpose is fulfilled and you ascend the normal way (unlike Ruby), your new purpose has to do with bettering your old purpose. whether you had ineffective means or insufficient ends, your target is going to be the same. so i think regardless of whether she comes back as herself or someone else, neo's new purpose will be about ruby. this could be a really cool spin on redemption imo.

Favorite trans character headcanon? urghhh so many characters are so trans in this show. trans ruby is near and dear to my heart though. but trans weiss also kicks ass

What would be your Aura color/color theme? i think it would be pink and green. which one my aura would be idk but they're my two favorite colors and i like how they look together

Favorite voice performance? Lindsay Jones in v9 especially 9x7 through 9x9. they did an incredible job of letting Ruby's emotions pour through and i love how gravelly she got. i've never heard a high-pitched gravelly voice before and it sounds amazing

Favorite opening to sing along to? Trust Love. v7 also has the best intro sequence overall and i will die on this hill

Free space, ask me anything! if you have more questions you wanna hit me with send me asks! i'm always happy to get asked things about my special interests tagging @starlightsaphron @scp-bumblebee. also tagging @yangs-right-arm to be done AFTER she actually watches v9 :p

[citadelofmythoughts]

Think part of the reason people are so defensive of Taiyang is that so many people try to write him as physically abusive in fanfics, to his kids AND his wives, despite him never being that. Also, the whole "qrow is ruby's father" theory being worshipped like a religion has led many disgusted with the theorists to try to defend the guy who the qrow theorists treat as an abomination. Sure, Tai is ranked above Jacques for sure, but he's still below Ghira in terms of good Dad. However, the defense for him came based on the irrationality of the hate groups. So, sadly, the whole debate gets complicated because of shippers. AGAIN. Funny thing is...Rosebird shippers seem to give him somewhat of a break, but really, RT could have done a much better job writing him. They wrote him like they wrote Nicholas Cage's fictional father in "National Treasure"

I'm going to take issue with one thing.

Why do you think Tai is badly written? Because to me the writing seems fine. Tai isn't a good father. That doesn't mean he isn't trying but trying and succeeding are two different things and you can hurt without meaning to.

I'll say this, Qrow was a lousy parental figure too. Seems to me that Ruby and Yang spent their childhoods not only trying to take care of each other but also the two parental figures they had left.

That's not bad writing, that's reality for a lot of people. Ruby and Yang became the wonderful, if flawed girls they are largely because they're innately good people with a bit of Summer's influence during their early years.

[deadbeatbirdmom]

I came across an interesting headcanon/theory that Rosebird aka Summer Rose and Raven Branwen are Yang's biological parents, while Tai's her adoptive father.

That got me wondering where Yang's blonde hair comes from if that was the case. It's already a different blonde to Tai's, rather brighter. More golden. I don't know exactly how hair genetics works in reality, and the rules seem different in Remnant from what little I do know anyway.

Maybe her hair was once more like Raven's, or in the case of this headcanon, maybe more like Summer's or something in between. Maybe Yang secretly bleaches/dyes her hair. Maybe her Semblance permanently changed the colour the first time it set her hair aglow/ablaze.

[alullinchaos]

read through a bunch of posts theorizing abt a possible rosebird as ruby's parents reveal and i don't think i believe in the theory but i have been enriched mentally. bc now i am thinking of all the reasons i could propose as counterarguments.

[bisexualisopod]

mine is @anthurak ‘s theory that raven is ruby’s dad. i’ll leave their master post on all the different parts of the theory that go into it, but i spent a few hours going through all of these a while ago and i have been in awe ever since

What is your favourite galaxy brained RWBY theory? Not the most likely, but the one that requires like seven tenuous leaps of logic to be even kinda plausible that if, IF, it were true blows open the doors to so many possibilities. I think for me, it's Glynda as the relic of choice. Like I don't even slightly want that one to be true, I much prefer her as a former teammate of Ironwood, but at the same time, the concept does deeply amuse me. I don't want it, but I really like it

oooh man... that's a tough one. the glynda as the relic of choice is a good one, but if i were to go a bit more humorous route, summer is zwei is definitely up there. i can't remember exactly how it went, but it was something like... if ozpin is the odin to raven and qrow's huginn and muninn, and odin had two wolves as well, with shapeshifting being a thing, it's not completely Out There™ that summer could be, well, zwei. who's also surprisingly durable for a dog.

like if that's not galaxy brained, then i don't know what is!

[tumblezwei]

What would your reaction be if Raven actually was Ruby's parent and Rosebird was a thing

If it was a legitimate thing, I'd mostly consider it on the same level as the Qrow Dad theory, a useless addition that creates pointless drama and does nothing for the characters or their arcs.

Team STRQ already has enough strife between it's members, I don't see why people thinking adding more soap opera-esque melodrama is an actual good idea other than to satiate their desire for subpar plot twists and being able to write angsty/sappy fanfic.

[hadesisqueer]

Okay so I just had the MOST INSANE crack theory just manifest itself into my brain right after I saw your post mentioning Rosebird as an explanation for Ruby looking like Raven. WHAT IF Raven and Taiyang are both Yang’s biological parents AND Ruby’s?? And Summer isn’t a biological parent at all, she’s actually adult!Ruby time-traveling to try to stop Salem sooner?? And Tai and Raven are the only ones who know the truth. Like OKAY I KNOW this isn’t plausible but JUST IMAGINE.

W-what?

[anthurak]

I'll probably be doing some more in-depth posts on this topic in the future, but I've started noticing that Ruby seems to actually have subtle but very notable differences from Summer. Which feels quite notable because before Volume 9, the general fandom consensus was always that Ruby was basically a carbon copy of Summer.

For example, we now know that Summer was actually the shortest member of Team STRQ. Which feels rather interesting given that Ruby is the second shortest member of Team RWBY, and has been for most of the show.

And wouldn't you know who DOES seem to be the second-shortest member of Team STRQ?

Yep. Raven.

A curious parallel, isn't it? XD

Also Summer being the shortest member of her team and prominently wearing white? Sounds oddly similar to Weiss, wouldn't you say? The Rosebird-Whiterose parallels continue XD

Also, since some will likely bring this up, yeah there is certainly a lot to discuss on how Yang actually seems to have taken a lot after Summer. Possibly more so than Ruby in a number of ways.

[anthurak]

Ever since I started posting about the Rosebird Parents theory, aka ‘Raven is Ruby’s real dad’, the most common question/criticism I’ve gotten regarding it* has been ‘What is the point of such a reveal?’ and ‘What does this add to the story?’

Well here is the answer:

A reveal that Taiyang isn’t Ruby’s father and that Raven IS would fit PERFECTLY into Ruby’s and Yang’s looming family drama, the dysfunctional MESS that is the STRQ family, and just how much said family FAILED Ruby and Yang as parents.

Raven being Ruby’s real father is the final, ultimate ‘dirty little secret’ of Team STRQ that they’ve kept from Ruby and Yang all these years.

Not some grand plot reveal tied up with Salem, the relics and/or Oz. But rather this much more PERSONAL and ugly product of STRQ’s numerous personal hangups, baggage and dysfunctions.

And far from being ‘out of character’, Tai and Qrow keeping such a secret from Ruby and Yang would be par for the course. Not just for them, but basically EVERY OTHER ADULT in the show. Whether it’s letting Yang think that Summer was her birth mother until Yang figured it out only AFTER Summer (supposedly) died, or Qrow letting Yang think he didn’t know anything about where Raven was despite having been in contact with her for YEARS and even having a pretty good idea where she is, or of course ALL THE OTHER SHIT the adults of RWBY have been hiding from their kids/students/charges.

And let’s not forget how Volume 9 ended with Ruby discovering a massive secret that was long kept from her and COMPLETELY changes something she once believed about her family. With the Blacksmith commenting “Who knows why they kept the secrets they did…”

Or how the last episode of Beyond has Ruby herself commenting to Yang “Maybe we don’t have the full picture…” in regards to Tai’s absence from Vacuo.

Throw in just how LITTLE we can truly be sure of regarding Team STRQ thanks to the aforementioned unreliable narrators and this is ABSOLUTELY telegraphing that Ruby and Yang are due for some MASSIVE reveals regarding their family in the near future. And given all the other hints or flat out statements as to what a hot fucking dysfunctional MESS Team STRQ truly is, those reveals are almost certain to be ugly and painful.

So a reveal that Tai and Qrow have actually been lying to Ruby and Yang for their ENTIRE LIVES in regards to who Ruby’s father ACTUALLY is?

Yeah, that sounds EXACTLY like something we could be expecting.

--

*At least as far as actual arguments go and not people just going ‘WAAAA! I don’t like Raven so this theory is bad!’ and ‘Well… you’re just crazy/stupid, so there!’

[anthurak]

So I think we all understand at this point that much of the Fairy Tales of Remnant and various other in-universe folktales and legends that have been told or otherwise mentioned up to now are IMPORTANT. That these stories, particularly the ones that are given some kind of focus, are meant to relate to specific events or characters and generally foreshadow things that will happen or be revealed in the show. Whether in the direct sense of ‘this story is actually relating real events that are significant to characters’ like The Story of the Seasons to the Maidens and Oz, or in more indirect, symbolic fashion like Oscar and Ozpin idly discussing The Girl Who Fell Through the World in Volume 8.

Suffice to say, fairy tales in RWBY clearly MEAN something. Especially if a fairy tale is clearly being connected to a character or characters.

To that end, going forward I think we should really be looking at The Warrior in the Woods, and in-particular the animated short, as being narratively tied to Summer, Raven and Taiyang. And specifically meant to foreshadow what Taiyang’s relationship with Summer and Raven was REALLY like.

For one, the connection the animated short draws is not exactly subtle. The short is flat out framed as Tai reading the story to Ruby and Yang for bedtime, with the boy in the story looking like a young version of Tai while the titular Warrior looks literally like a combination of Summer and Raven. And to top it all off, the story even broadly reflects what we already know about the relationships of the three; with the young man losing the woman he so admired and loved just like Tai lost Summer and Raven. Again, the connections are not in ANY way subtle here.

So with that base established, what more can we potentially glean as foreshadowing here?

Well, as I’ve stated in previous posts, I think it is telling that while the Boy in the story did love the Warrior, it is ultimately a tragic, doomed love that was never meant to be.

And more than that, the story notably only gives us the perspective of the boy, and never the Warrior. And likewise, we never learn how the Warrior truly felt about the boy. She clearly cared about him, enough to consider him something of a friend, but did she feel about him like he felt about her? The story never makes this clear, and I think that in and of itself is rather telling: Despite the boy’s attempts to reach out to her, the Warrior maintains her distance. Whatever growing care or affection she might have felt for the boy, it clearly wasn’t nearly enough to get her to break her isolation or duty to safeguard the village in secret. While the boy may have loved the Warrior, it was a love that in all likelihood, could not and was not returned.

So when we apply this to Taiyang, Summer and Raven, a rather bleak picture emerges: That Tai’s relationships with Raven or Summer were NEVER going to work out. Or that neither Summer NOR Raven actually loved Tai in the same way he loved either of them.

And the thing is, this IS supported even by what little we have seen of Tai, Summer and Raven. Just like in the story, we have been told of Tai’s love for Summer and Raven, yet told precious little of how either of THEM felt about Tai. And what little we HAVE been told or shown has left it rather questionable how either of them cared for Tai.

Raven has made it clear that she cares little for Taiyang in the present, which really raises the question of how or if the two were ever in a relationship in the past. And while the existence of Yang might imply some kind of relationship, let’s also consider the possibility that Yang was actually an unplanned pregnancy. The result of a possible drunken, one-night-stand between Raven and Tai. Which would certainly put Raven’s reluctance to be a mother in a VERY different context.

Then we have Summer, and thanks to Ruby’s tree-vision, I think we can count her feelings for Taiyang as being at best ‘ambiguous’.

For one, as I’ve stated elsewhere, Summer’s scene with Taiyang is curiously lacking in especially overt romantic gestures. A lack of noticeable flirting or particularly romantic physical acts like a kiss. They do hug, but as I’ve said before, RWBY has used these close, intimate hugs just as much if not more often to convey platonic or familial affection. Note also that Taiyang is the one to clearly initiate the hug, not Summer

More than any of that, it’s clear that Summer is putting on an act for Tai in this scene. In the scene she is clearly pensive and uncertain and maybe even afraid, but the moment Tai walks in, Summer immediately adopts a mask of ‘everything is normal, don’t worry about anything’. Which calls into question how much of anything Summer does/says in this exchange is truly genuine, and how much is simply an act for Tai’s benefit.

Summer clearly does not trust Taiyang with the truth of what she is ACTUALLY doing. And the clear ease with which Summer assumes this mask implies that this is likely far from the first time Summer has done this.

Just compare Summer’s scene with Tai to both her previous scene with the sleeping Ruby and Yang, and her following scene with Raven; both showing Summer not putting on any kind of act for anyone else.

Most notably, despite whatever resentment she might feel towards Raven for leaving them (or perhaps just leaving her), Summer clearly trusts Raven, more than ANYONE, with helping her on this mission she considered so vitally important.

Summer certainly cared for Taiyang, that much is clear. Otherwise she wouldn’t put so much effort into reassuring him that everything was fine.

But did she love Tai in way that he loved her? Or was it simply a role she went along with for his, and possibly more-so Ruby’s and Yang’s benefit? Given the clear emotional mask and barrier we see her put up when around Tai, I would call the answer, at BEST, ambiguous.

Which all ties perfectly into what we see in The Warrior in the Woods.

The boy in the story, who is presented as looking just like Tai, loved a mysterious but noble warrior, who is presented as looking like Raven AND Summer. But the love the boy felt could not or was not returned and the warrior would instead vanish into the night. Just like Summer and Raven did.

Oh, and the ending of the story match-cutting a shot of the ‘cross between Summer and Raven’ Warrior to a shot of Ruby who likewise has a lot of visual similarities to Raven as well as Summer MIGHT be hinting at something too…

[anthurak]

So I’ve been theorizing about Rosebird Parents, aka; ‘Raven is Ruby’s real dad’ for close to five years now, and it’s funny how in that time I haven’t actually touched on what feels like somehow both the most obvious AND most innocuous bit of potential foreshadowing to this theory.

I am of course speaking of Saphron, Terra and Adrian Cotta-Arc, aka; the wlw couple raising a child together.

Now on the one hand, yeah it is really easy to read this as a potential subtle hint towards Summer and Raven being Ruby’s parents; a case of the show ‘planting a seed’ in the audience’s head of the image of two women in a relationship raising a child together. Particularly as there is no mention an ex-husband/boyfriend or other kind of ‘sperm-donor’, leaving open the possibility that Saphron and Terra may have conceived Adrian themselves.

On the other hand… yeah it’s also possible to read a bit too much into this. It’s entirely possible that if Saphron and Terra are meant to hint towards anything, they could just as easily be meant as a hint towards Bumbleby, given their shared hair-colors and the fact that Volume 6 is so pivotal towards the development of Blake’s and Yang’s relationship.

And appearance-wise, while Adrian certainly looks a lot like Terra, his design doesn’t exactly have any stand-out elements that point to him also being Saphron’s biological kid.

At least not in the same obvious way as Raven being easily mistaken for Ruby’s mom.

So when it comes to ‘the Cotta-Arcs are foreshadowing Rosebird Parents’, my honest take is pretty much: ‘They might be, and they might not be.’

That. Being. Said.

If it IS ever mentioned, especially in-show, that Saphron and Terra really did conceive Adrian together…

Then I would consider that to be THE, smoking-gun evidence that Rosebird Parents is ABSOLUTELY a thing that is HAPPENING.

Because when you really get down to it, the prospect of ‘two woman normally can’t make a kid together’ is really the biggest ‘barrier’ to Rosebird Parents. It’s just one of those things that is generally a given in most stories. Something that the audience just assumes to be true.

But, if RWBY happens to put ‘two women can make a baby’ on the table as a thing that CAN and does happen in its setting?

Then that means EVERYING myself and others have been saying is now ALSO on the table.

Ruby looks nothing like Tai but enough like Raven that Raven can be confused for Ruby’s mother?

Summer and Raven seem to have been quite close with strong hints that at least Raven was in love with Summer?

Raven has all the classic traits we so often see in “I am your father” characters?

The creators have disproven Qrow being Ruby’s dad by saying she and Yang are half-sisters which is a relationship which would be unchanged by Raven being Ruby’s other parent?

ALL of that and MORE starts being a LOT more relevant.

It effectively takes a statement that ‘if Raven were a dude, we would ALL be expecting them to be Ruby’s real dad’ and says “Yeah, for all intents and purposes, she basically IS now.”

[anthurak]

One thing that always feels so funny for me when it comes to the Rosebird Parents Theory isn’t when people simply disagree with the theory, but rather people apparently seeing the prospect of a ‘Raven is Ruby’s real father’ reveal to be this totally unthinkable thing and how could anyone ever think this could happen?!

Because once you get past the whole ‘two ladies making a baby’ hurtle, Raven being Ruby’s dad really fits into so many well-known fantasy/sci-fi tropes. Many of which RWBY notably has not done yet, or have already been tied to Raven herself.

I mean, the mysterious villainous and/or anti-heroic loner with ties to the family pulling an ‘I am your Father’ reveal on the protagonist? That’s a fucking CLASSIC. Hell, let’s consider a few things about Raven:

Big, intimidating helmet.

Clear Samurai inspiration.

Wields a katana-like sword that technically has an energy blade (dust=energy) which is generally RED-colored.

Possesses mysterious and terrible over-worldly powers.

Has a mysterious past tied to our protagonist’(s) family.

Was probably in love with our protagonist’s (apparently) dead mother.

Yeah I’d say Raven makes for a pretty good Darth Vader-expy.*

Beyond that specific case, we’ve already seen the story connect Raven to a BUNCH of ‘mysterious and angsty deadbeat dad who left their kid for unclear reasons’ tropes when it comes to Yang. Why not have those apply to Ruby as well? People have been clamoring for years about wanting to see Summer’s narrative dynamic with Yang explored as much as the one she has with Ruby, so why not have the reverse be true with Raven and Ruby as well?

After all, it seems that the story has now given Ruby a reason to seek Raven for answers just as Yang once did.

And as I’ve noted in previous Rosebird Parents posts, No I don’t believe Raven also being Ruby’s deadbeat dad would be somehow ‘redundant’. Particularly because the context is completely different: Yang has known that Raven is her birth-mother for most of her life, whereas Ruby would only just now be finding out that Raven is her birth-father. Far from being redundant, this would allow the story to explore two very different responses of kids to an absent parent: One who has had to live with the knowledge of that absent parent for years, and one who hasn’t and has to deal with this NEW information suddenly getting dropped on her.

Plus, as I alluded to earlier, it’s rather notable that RWBY hasn’t done some big ‘dramatic parent reveal’, given how much of a staple it is to the genre. And given how reimagining, twisting and flipping classic and well-worn fairytale/folklore/fantasy tropes (often via playing with gender-roles) is basically RWBY’s bread and butter at this point, I’d say giving the series heroine an ‘I am your father’ reveal from a woman would fit PERFECTLY in this series.

And if you’re going to ask ‘but how do two ladies make baby?!?’,

Raven can be intersex. Boom. Done.

Alternatively, magic.

As an aside, yes Summer being trans is a perfectly viable alternative. I just think logistically speaking, Raven being intersex and being Ruby’s ‘father’ makes a dramatic reveal a bit more streamlined. Also, the idea of Raven managing to be BOTH a deadbeat mom AND a deadbeat dad is just too funny XD

*Of course, this comparison gets even more fun when we consider Summer having her own Vader-parallels, ie; Summer almost certainly being taken by Salem and given what we can probably assume to be a Vader-esque makeover via grimm-hybridization in setup for a big reveal. So when we combine this with Raven, I think we can view what happened on their last mission as ‘What if Padme/Obi-wan got turned into Vader INSTEAD of Anakin?’ Like Raven in the present is basically Anakin doing Obi-wan’s traumatized hermit shtick, except all angry and edgy because it’s still Anakin.