#rwby critique

[invested-in-your-future]

I just realized that, for some reason, RWBY doesn't really care about giving their villains a proper backstory.

Adam has a one-sentence backstory that does literally nothing for him and is delivered in the last second of his screen time.

Cinder's backstory comes way too late and is inconsequential to anything she has done until now. It doesn't explain her motivations or worldview, and it doesn't show us why she became the person she is.

Jacques is just sort of this vague rich person who doesn't even get to be a villain because the show throws away the build-up in favor of something completely random that has nothing to do with him.

Hazel's backstory exists solely to place him in Ozpin's path, rather than giving him logic and reasoning to justify it (because let's be frank, EVERYTHING about his reasoning falls apart the moment you think about it)—maybe because he was never supposed to exist.

Mercury and Emerald's backstories don't really do much for their characters, don't come into play in their decision-making or characterization, and are barely there.

Raven has one of the dumbest, most barebones motivations for her betrayal.

Sienna exists to get fridged so she doesn't even get the bare minimum.

Watts's backstory is there solely to give him a reason to do The Thing but doesn't really give him a worldview to explain WHY—maybe because he was never supposed to exist.

The only one with a backstory is Salem, and it's more of an Ozpin backstory than anything else. The whole origin story—presented as 110% truth and not some sort of unreliable narrator—basically just lays the guilt of her decisions solely on her rather than two manipulative omniscient beings randomly retconned into the story.

It's like the show genuinely believes people are either born evil or born good and nothing they do in their lives will change that, hence the V9 ridiculousness of decrying self-reflection or acceptance of one's flaws as evil.

It would be fine if only half the show's songs, including the best OP songs (the first three), weren't about how "we" should improve and overcome our pasts and learn from our mistakes, how everyone is imperfect, and how one can't rely on the childish naivety of good and evil growing up, because there's more to the world than stories.

Almost as if that simplistic worldview of good and evil wasn't the original intention before V4.

[tokufan400]

Ok, last thought on RWBY I have for a moment.

Anyone remember that scene in Vol 8 between Jaune and Yang about how she chose to save Mantle rather then go to Atlas? Yeah, that scene doesn't sit right with me. I've been going over some of the arguments people made for it in my head, and the wording and the way it was done doesn't sit with me, even to this day. It made it feel like Yang only cared about what Blake thought about her choice. Not Ruby, not Weiss, just Blake. I know they didn't mean for it to come off like that, but that's what it felt like to me when I first saw it. Honestly, it's probably one of the reason's I'm not personally big on Bumblee. The writing around it for the most part makes it feel like Yang and Blake are mostly focused on each other, not anyone else. Combined with the fact this was close to after Yang's argument with Ruby, and the scene does not paint Yang in a good light.

[ironwoodprotectionsquad]

So multiple times throughout the commentary the writers talk about cutting “unimportant” things in the episodes to ensure only the “important” things stayed…. Like WBY happily hugging Jaune instead of being worried about Ruby, or Jaune seeing Alyx in the midst. It just is so strange to me that a volume that’s supposed to be about team R/WBY focuses so much in Jaune especially when Ruby’s life is in danger and everyone should be worried about her.

[armed-and-rwby]

So, and I know this is kind of bad timing in June, but I can't deny any longer than Yang's character was seriously compromised after V5

This isn't really a scripted thing and I've not written analysis in a while, so forgive the loose formatting here, just something I needed to get out.

I think the overall issues can apply to more of the MCs than Yang, which I'll bring up later, but RWBY has an unfortunate tendency of resolving character arcs without much overlap with the plot, and Yang definitely gets it worse than most (and she's my favourite).

Back in V5, Yang was exploding with directions for her character and I think the writers worked hard to touch on all of them, from her recovery, to her growing mistrust of authority, to her issues with her mom, to her reconnecting with her team (and of course the deeper angst with Blake in that), but resolution for all of these largely fell short IMO. The last time she's even talked about the scheming of Oz was in V6 when she called him a bastard, Raven has never been mentioned or some up since V5, and I don't think she's even spoken to Weiss since their heart to heart in V5 outside of plot functional dialogue. The same can be said on her relationship with her sister, which, beyond her sacrifice in V8 and an unresolved conversation earlier in the volume about Salem and their mom, also haven't actually interacted with each other. The only thing really addressed was her lost arm, which was an extension of Bumblebey and closed off when they killed Adam in V6, a great fight with very little to do with the actual plot.

In V7 and 8, she's a complete third wheel, she talks with Robyn and fights the Ops in 7, and doesn't even get a fight in V8. Weiss certainly got it almost as bad, she was a bit more involved, but still not much given how this is her kingdom and her family that was so central to the plot. It's a condition of a bloated cast, which they've addressed a couple times, such as the start of V6 and all of V9 (though with their various guides, the girls don't make a lot of relevant decisions on the flow of that story either). It really did suck that we got to see Ruby's suicide through Yang's eyes, only for us to not see any of their reactions, and even when they see her it's all pretty surface level stuff (Yang even just repeats what Weiss tells her about Ruby).

My favourite scene in the whole show was her confronting her mom, I thought that was such a perfect direction for her character, tying together both her conviction to her family with her backstory of her mom to drive her arc forward in some unique ways, only to be sidelined in following chapters as her ship left port. And while this post isn't here to bash Bumblebey, I guess there's a bit of a warning that, since that was almost all of her drama and driving force for the last 4 volumes, with it canonized, I worry she'll only drift further away from the plot and her own unique character moments.

Wish I had some gifs or something to break up these paragraphs, but I'm just kind of vomiting out all these nagging issues that've been building up these last few years. Really does hurt to love a character like that and not see them utilized in the show

[ziggyplayedguitar96]

Did Yang remove some of her ribs???

[valentinerose529]

does anyone else get the feeling that RWBY might have done differently if it was a monster-of-the-week fantasy school type story instead of the chosen-ones-against-the-evil-mastermind path it's going now?

From a storytelling perspective, I think the plot could have been more consistent if it had remained in the schools with a smaller-scale plot. The gang moves to other schools as part of exchange student programs, and every few seasons end in an Amity tournament at the end of the school years, signifying the move to a new story arc. As the gang settles in the other schools, they get to uncover the backstories and whatnot of various characters.

This would require smaller-scale antagonists and villain-of-the-week setups with various cronies and schemes. Perhaps if it stuck with the season one villains: Ronan and Neo, whose main motivation was nefarious profit, and Cinder, whose original characterization was someone who was so cool and awesome that she simply had to be the best at everything, including gaining all four Maiden powers. You'd likely have to scrap characters like Salem and Oscar who are 100% related to the Big Destiny Plot, but honestly I think it would have remained consistent with the original vibes of the first few seasons.

And of course, you could return to the tried and true method of using classrooms for worldbuilding exposition--how better to explain your lore than to make the characters quiz each other with flash cards about the upcoming test on the king of Vale? Weapons upkeep class (perhaps taught by Professor Qrow, wouldn't that have been better than just hearing about him and Tai being teachers offscreen?) in which Ruby gets to present her scythe and excitedly talk about all the aspects of huntress weaponry?

I think i would have liked that better than the World of Remnant segments because I didn't even learn about those until halfway through season three. And I'm not the kind of person who likes having to find information elsewhere (a la authors posting important backstory details on Twitter), so honestly I would have liked the worldbuilding to, yknow, be in the story instead of as a side piece. But that's just me.

[richardsphere]

Rwby character-writing analasis thing.

Its really interesting to me how much RWBY as a series has changed in the post-beacon era. And while there are many differences i could write page-long essays about,  I think most of those are a story for another day. Today i want to talk about how the post S3 change in genre has negatively affected the strength of its characterwriting. (other topics might come up tangentially but wont be the focus.)

Beacon era RWBY was a verry slow, airy slice-of-life heavy show with only a bit of action sprinkled on top, like Fondant on a cake. It gave the characters plenty of time to breathe, interact and just share a chemistry together.  I’d even go so far as to say the early show was, 80 percent slice of life (at minimum), and maybe 20% action at most. Even “fight for our life” were permeated with moments of dialogue and lighthearted character-beats. (Ruby and Weiss talking out their squables mid-beowolf fight, Weiss VS Boarbatusk cutting to ruby’s little flags for example)  But it should also be noted that, With exception to Pyrrha, who the show knew had only 3 seasons to be fleshed out. Most characters were left deliberately sort-of vauge so they can be deepened out when we get to their arcs later. (certainly they were given “goals” like “find Raven” or “redeem the Fang”, but anything more specific was left out for future writers to resolve). But in a post-beacon world, the showrunners put them into a constant no-time-for-breaks pacing has prevented much of that filling in, as the show repeatedly denied them any moment for them to just “exist” (as well as the infamous stories about how any scenes that do allow characters to do so, having all chemistry surgically removed by production to “prevent romantic spoilers”.) They cut out so much of its slice-of-life moments, that all levity happens either off-screen (Yang+Blake at the disco) or in the background of “actually important” plot-beats. (Meeting Jaune’s sister taking second-seat to a critical debrief re:Ozpin-being-full-of-shit) Not to say there’s been no progress at all on filling out the blanks left behind in their early characterisation but: Ruby’s 6 seasons of constant trauma, ended on a resounding concluding note that “she was fine as-is in S1E1″, meaning nine collective seasons of character development, amounts to a great “Status quo, but now with Laser-eyes”. Yang’s raven-issues “resolved” at the fall of haven, and did so in a rather unsatisfying in the way. Because her and Raven never really explored the abandonment issues beyond a vague “i know you dont care about me, I’ve decided the feelings mutual now Portal me to my sister/Hand me the damn relic”. (which doesnt feel like a resolution, but the show tries to frame it as a “going no-contact” resolution) Blake and Weiss have both actually had their core struggles in the world removed and tranposed onto adjacent characters instead of actually resolving their established “goals” in the world at large. (Weiss no longer wants to redeem the family business, thats Willow and Whitley’s job now, Blake no longer wants to redeem the Fang, thats Ghira and Ilia’s job). and although we now know how Ren and Nora came to be together, their atlas arc only emphasises that even they still dont know who they are themselves.  Same for Ozpin, pf whom we now know how he came to be cursed, he spent so much time dormant “regaining his oldest memories” that we only know we dont know him either.  Six additional seasons of writing for these characters, and they are all (with possible exception to yang) either back at square one, or in BW’s case have somehow stumbled themselves back to square zero. The only character that’s gotten “more” fleshed out in a way that satisfies on a narrative level is Jaune. (to the point that i cant even fault elements of the fandom criticising the show for being “The Jaune Show”) And even that is only because of how well-realised Pyrrha was at time-of-death, It really says something about the drop quality in the shows post-beacon characterisation that Pyrrha is more well-written in absentia then the entirety of the shows namesake team combined. and that is just plain tragic.

[saltedsnails]

There’s something to be said about how vitriolic the FNDM is when it comes to content creators who make content that isn’t “canon”, specifically those that rewrite the story to be “better” or those that race-swap characters.

“Better” to someone may not mean “better” to someone else, the matter is subjective - and that’s okay. Someone who wants JNPR to be the main cast instead because they are “better” in their eyes than RWBY is as valid as the opposite. Your experiences shape your beliefs and no one can change that but you. However, that does not mean you should be tearing others down if they don’t agree with you.

Yes, engage in healthy conversation. Yes, write that Fix-It fic where Blake has a growth arc about accepting that she was the most privileged Faunus in all of Menagerie! Totally go for it! Bang out that art piece of POC character you want more attention for in the RWBY-sphere!

But what some of you don’t realize is that peoples experiences are different from your own, and you attack them for it. “They” don’t fit your perfect narrative. “They” don’t 100% whole heartedly accept your show. And you know what, that’s fine. Just because they don’t completely like your show doesn’t say anything bad about you as a person. Putting your entire self-image into a piece of media is dangerously unhealthy.

As I’ve gotten older in fandom spaces, I’ve seen some of the worst come and go: Hetalia, Undertale, Voltron, BNHA, literally an entire list at my disposal. Frankly, it’s gotten even worse as time has gone on. Some of you have this all-or-nothing mentality that dictates you must enjoy every single aspect of this media or you hate it with every atom in your body if you find a single instance of something you don’t agree with.

If someone has criticism that POC/LGBT+ rep needs to be shown more in RWBY, let them. In my opinion, it’s a valid criticism. If you don’t see it that way, then that’s on you. But you shouldn’t go around ripping peoples throats out, claiming internalized bigotry in some form or another, simply because you don’t like their opinion. You lack nuance and self-realization when you do these kinds of behaviors, and honestly, need to do better. Jumping down someone’s throat polarizes the community even more, and what good has that ever done for anybody?

- 🐌

[nottoxicfr]

Sometimes I go too hard on critiquing the RWBY soundtrack and I have to remind myself of this image. I am not immune to NAOKI

[sokumotanaka]

Neo being able to clone herself and have the clone actually fight has been a thing since V6. Her fight with Cinder ends when Cinder shatters it and it shows the real Neo watching from the Rafters. Being able to make more then one is the new thing

But doesn't that just prove the point of my post? That it comes out of nowhere? Neo vanishes for an undisclosed amount of time and then comes back and they forget the glass shattering thing and give her Sun's clones?

And besides that's not the problem, the problem is Semblance evolution has no rhythm or reason behind it, and they curb so much from MHA and Hunter X Hunter and still looked at both of these and said. "What if we gave her clones?"

Neo goes from being able to make physical illusions like this, and masking herself with them to summoning clones and I just don't see the correlation, like this be a good power for blake to Unlock, Flynt or Sun even- but the whole "each semblance is completely unique gets more embarrassing with time."

It just feels like they didn't really put much thought behind it besides what will illicit a reaction from people. Like how cool would it be if Neo could jump into reflective surfaces to maneuver and dodge attacks? OR do the same with her illusions and set one up and jump from one to one like Haku from Naruto?

I don't mean to make a big deal of it but the one thing I could at least give RWBY was "at least some of them have some pretty inventive powers." But as a person who appreciates a power system and likes discussing them, they really do barely explain things, As well as the many arguments I made in that semblance post go unaddressed.

(Like do semblances evolve and you can't do what you used too or can you do your old thing in addition to the new like stand powers? These are legitimate questions that should of been addressed vol 1, yet still aren't)

Thanks for the question however.

-Sokumo

[invested-in-your-future]

It's astonishing how easy it is to find an angle for Adam where his backstory hopefully makes him compelling and understandable, without excusing his actions or making him redeemable/good.

There are, like, ten different possible backstories that could work without leaving it to the last possible second—and most of them would likely help flesh out Blake as a character too.

It baffles me that the show didn't even try.

[tokufan400]

And before anyone says anything about the meme, I looked up the RWBY transcripts of the hell of it. No one ever apologizes for the shit they said to Ozpin in Vol 6. They just say 'we understand how you feel' and leave it at that. No one actually says "sorry for blaming you" or anything like that. It feels more like Ozpin's the only one apologizing when it should be both sides considering that Ruby and the others practically cursed him for choices he didn't want to make in the first place. This is more probably a nitpick, but it's one of those things you only notice when you stop and think or it gets pointed out to you.

[ironwoodprotectionsquad]

If you knew RW/BY “didn’t make the best choices and failed” why did Yang immediately shut down Ruby recognizing that Salem getting two of the four relics was bad? Why did she compare that kind of thinking to Ironwood with the heavy implication that that was bad? Why didn’t anyone ever get to go “we failed kind of badly” and not have anyone try and hand wave it away immediately? Yes Weiss comments that but Ruby says she “did her best” which kind of minimizes the moment and like two? Episodes later Weiss Yang and Blake are all declaring that they’re huntresses and not doubting that they’re good ones or that they did a good job. Having them doubt themselves and realize they failed and vow to do better would have shown the writers recognize the girls failed and need to do better not the bullshit that was volume 9.

Even Ruby who was recognizing their failures ended the volume not on a note of vowing to improve but deciding she’s perfect and doesn’t need to change at all. These are not actions of characters or writers aware they made mistakes and need to change, this more feels like the writers pretending to realize that the mains made mistakes and are doing half assed damage control to try and convince the fans they’re aware of the mistakes and are having their mains improve and reflect or whatever.

This commentary once again is pissing me off all over again about volume 9 and the bullshit that happened in it and I am not looking forward to when the Ironwood stuff comes up because that is going to be a shitshow.

[leonhaxor]

Something that bothers me, thinking about how Coco stopped Velvet in that scene.

Coco: (To Velvet) Hey, come on, you just spent all the semester building that up. Don't waste it here.

Also "don't waste it here." Bitch, Grimm are attacking a fucking population center. From the middle of downtown. What fucking situation do you think WOULDN'T be a waste, if defending civilians falls short. WHEN THAT SORT OF THING IS THE FUCKING BREAD AND BUTTER OF HUNTSMAN DUTIES?????

Like. I get the writers wanted to tickle the balls, but. Velvet gains weapon clones from photos. Just keep track of what you use and RETAKE THE FUCKING PHOTOS. Come up with whatever excuse you want, or just ASK to take more from those people. Why the damn secrecy, surely you used this in combat training classes before?? And if not, then how the fuck do you fight without it.

Better yet JUST USE THE ALTERNATIVE COMBAT STYLE IF YOU JUST HAVE TO OBEY COCO'S ORDER NOT TO USE THE CAMERA.

Hell, the books even state that Velvet tends to use photos of her team's weapons more often than not. JUST USE THOSE, THEY ARE INFINITELY EASIER TO REPLACE THAN THEY ALREADY ARE AT A FUCKING HUNTSMAN ACADEMY.

By happenstance, on a recent EFAP MauLer looked at the view numbers for the Hbomberguy review, and pondered if it was lower because he could have gone harder on the criticisms.

That last part, despite him not seeing the video (to my knowledge), is RIGHT ON THE DAMN MONEY.

CAUSE I SURE AS HELL DON'T RECALL HARRIS CALLING COCO OUT FOR THAT SHIT ANYWHERE NAR AS HARD AS I DID ON THE FUCKING FLY

Do you ever look at a rwby character that's training to be or already is a badge carrying law enforcement officer in canon and think to yourself "damn, I wouldn't trust this person to be a waterpark attendant, I wouldn't trust this person to hold my place in a line so I could use the bathroom, if this person offered me a car ride home so I didn't have to walk I would turn them down because I don't trust them to do that."

Because I do. And somehow the fact that they might not make the best hunters is something that's not ever even really talked about in the show, at all.

Yang? Joined the Hunter academies for the thrills, had a wildly out of control temper and tbh still does, showed some anti-faunus discrimination leading Blake around with a laser pointer, and these days responds to conflicts by launching into fight mode and wanting to solve things through violence, plus doesn't seem interested in working if it's boring if her reaction to Jaune's to-do list and her exasperation through V9 is anything to go by. And she's completely rejecting any and all opportunity to recognize flaws and grow as a person atm, and seems to think admitting flaws or rethinking your past choices is villainous behavior based on her 'that's what Ironwood thought' shut down when Ruby started questioning herself and her treatment of Ren.

Weiss? Starts out as a raging anti-faunus bigot suggesting they call the police on Blake and comparing Faunus to trash cans, idolizes her 'hero' grandfather despite the fact that he was a capitalistic billionare who (iirc) tried to strip Vacuo of its resources and built the SDC into the fabric of society. Recently, she pointed what was essentially a loaded gun in the face of an underage auraless civilian because he didn't immediately spring out of the way and let her enter his house - and no, him being her brother doesn't mean that was okay. She also doesn't actually seem concerned with doing actual work if it isn't super big and important and flashy.

Jaune? He wasn't even sort of ready to enter Beacon when he did. He cheated his way in when he didn't even know what aura was, and the only reason he didn't die was because of Pyrrha saving his ass and trying to train him, and even then, he was leagues behind the others and the only reason Cinder didn't murder him at Haven was author-plot armor. But now that he's got twenty some years of work under his belt (which I still really resent) he's also doing things like calling clearly sentient people stupid and treating them like five year olds, and yelling in the face of a seventeen year old that she's responsible for plans he had just as much of a hand in as she did and victim blaming her for being attacked by an evil villain who was trying to murder her.

(To be clear, for the above three characters, I'm not saying 'they point blank should not ever have been hunters because of their traits and/or flaws and/or flawed motivations, I'm just saying that I would've wanted there to be more of themselves and others questioning it and them working on their flaws specifically and squaring away some of their more selfish motivations before becoming law enforcement officers with badges.)

COCO? She likes being feared, her friends lovingly describe her as sadistic, she thinks letting teammates have a say is a sign of a weak leader, she's judgmental towards people from Vacuo, she gives strong anti-Faunus vibes and it's treated like it's okay because she's friends with Velvet, she tells Velvet NOT to fight when Grimm are bursting into Vale in V2 and then leisurely takes her time fighting one Grimm because she apparently can't be bothered to care when civilian's lives are on the line, she makes snap judgements about people for no reason, and also she's a big old hypocrite, and defies authority carelessly.

CARDIN?!?! You would think they would've at least addressed CARDIN properly, as a real actual significant problem, since he was a future badge carrying law enforcement officer who also targeted minorities, and tried to blackmail people, and gave off strong misogynist vibes, and liked knocking around his own teammates when they got in his way. Like???? The only thing we know changed in Cardin's behavior was that he was leaving Jaune and Jaune's friends alone because Jaune had 'stood up to him.' The writers didn't think that it was important that we as an audience got to see him either get hardcore checked and start being not that way, or get expelled and restricted from continuing on as a Hunter due to his behavior? We're just supposed to be like 'oh well, there's Cardin the anti-faunus power play loving blackmailer training to be a hunter, but that doesn't matter because the writers only cared about him to bully Jaune so who cares about him now?'

I'd like to actually engage with this story! I'd like to actually have the story of rwby discuss what being a hunter means and how some of these characters aren't well suited currently to be hunters. The writers have no interest in actually making their characters good Hunters or figuring out what being a 'good hunter' even means (case in point, V9,) and instead just expect everyone to be on board with absolutely no reflection. Why should I think Weiss deserves her hunter badge again? Why should I think Jaune deserves his hunter badge? I don't currently think they should be hunters because I feel like they haven't even thought about if they really want it or would be good at it. Because ever since V2, it's just been a foregone conclusion to the writers that the mains (all dropouts in their first year) are Hunters and deserve it and will be great at it, but they've never actually bothered to convince me of it with some of these characters. They expected their audience to just think it too, and shrug and accept it, and they now refuse to engage with the flaws their characters have either or whether or not their traits are well suited to the task of being a badge carrying law enforcement officer, so... Yeah. I wish that the show challenged the 'of course they're all destined to be hunters' thing.

[rompomo]

One of the dumbest critiques are people who say Sun was written out because of Blake and Yang.

For one, Blake and Yang had plenty of moments even with Sun around so wasn't like they needed him gone to develop their relationship, and two, Sun isn't even a main character or a student at Beacon, so it's a no-brainer that he wasn't going to stay long throughout the show and have time where we wouldn't see him.

It's also not like we would never see Sun again once he left. Sun is from Vacuo with one of the relics being hidden there, so it was pretty obvious we would see Sun again once the team reached Vacuo

It makes no sense logically for Sun to be around during volumes 6-9. He would have no role. Served no purpose plotwise and continued to abandon and neglect his team.

And I get it, Sun's a great character, but there's no reason for him to be around aimlessly in the story just because he's your favorite character or because you wanted blacksun canon and call that Sun being written out. It's a pretty shallow reason because we are going to see Sun again and the reason why he left in volume 6 was because he wanted to prioritize his team and be a better leader to them, which I'm very proud of him for doing

[strqyr]

as much as i love 'war' as a song, i do kinda wish the fight between team rwby and the ace-ops was presented more as a tragedy(?) rather than as a moment of ass kicking. ya know, like qrow vs clover was; it doesn't have to be this way, and as an audience you shouldn't want it to be this way, they should be allies, friends, etc, and maybe there was a way to prevent it from ending this way, but it was not the road taken.

obviously it would require for there to be more interactions between team rwby and the ace-ops beforehand in positive light; not only in terms of training—with team rwby taking the advice they get from these more experienced huntsmen and huntresses to heart—, but also on more personal level, but overall, as the fight is, it just feels tonally... off. it's mostly masked by the banger of a song—and the soundtrack in general—that plays in the background, but it's just... with salem in the horizon, i don't think a fight between allies should make me feel hyped in the moment.

i don't know if this is the best way to phrase this to really get across what i'm trying to say, but again, comparing team rwby vs the ace-ops with qrow vs clover, because of the difference in tone, the latter feels like it has more depth to it; that these characters are taken more seriously, while with team rwby it's like... as long as they look cool, it's fine, ya know?

but i want more than that. i want the same depth, the same seriousness for team rwby as other characters get in similar situations. but at times, it feels like the writing is either too unwilling, too afraid, or just too uncaring to do so.