Volume: 2, chapter: 8 Field Trip
RWBY watch thread
God she's beautiful
Not much to say about this episode. I like the first scene showing the difference between Ozpin and Ironwood. And I thought the zeiw gags were funny.
One touch I like is that the Vacuo students don't have uniforms. It adds upon Sun's "not exactly a suit and tie kind of place" comment.
I like the show showing some of the logistics of being a huntress. Such as how they divide up missions. Search and rescue, Search and destroy, village protection, etc. I like stuff like that. It's one of the reasons I loved my hero academia so much. They would always delve into the logistics of hero work often. That's about it.
Oh yea, this episode reminded me there were no real consequences for all the destruction caused in episode 4. No police,? No investigation? No punishment? I get it wasn't technically their fault, but their should be at least some consequences. More than just a joke a few episode later. That brings my opinion of ep 5 and the volume as a whole a bit.
"Are we going to do something about it or just stay the course and continue to ignore what's right in front of us?"
When Ozpin is talking about "the war" during his monologue to the freshman, he mentions that one of the things being fought for was the right for individualism and self-expression. This is a bit ironic as 3 of the 4 schools in this scene have student uniforms. I wonder if this was done on purpose, hinting at a certain internal hypocrisy at what Beacon preaches vs what it practices (in all honestly it was probably just an oversight; I don't think the writers are that clever).
On that note, some of the writing with Blake is also a bit funny like that. Blake initially joined the White Fang because she believed in fair treatment for the Faunus, in not being treated like animals. Yet she's given some stereotypical cat features; afraid of dogs, chasing laser pointers etc. Wasn't there even a tuna joke this season? To be clear I don't actually think this is a big deal, and the laser pointer scene in particular was just Yang trying to get her attention. I'm only noting it to point out the dual instincts the writers seem to have - with writing a goofy anime show for a company whose entire background is internet humor, and writing something more self-serious.
The characters being named after colors in response to tyranny in the war, I could take it or leave it. In general, I think sometimes stories can get too invested in the "lore" stuff, and explain things that don't necessarily need explaining. You see this a lot in comic books, where modern writers try to reverse engineer a character made in the 40s or 50s that was probably invented from free thought association. It can work, but I think it requires a lot of commitment. But the name thing doesn't get dwelled on much here, so it's not a big deal. It seems to just exist so there's something to point out and say "see, there's a reason for this." (1/2)
(2/2) Anyway, I did overall appreciate Ozpin's characterization here. In the first episode of the season, he talks about letting the kids simply be kids. In this episode, he's bending the rules so the RWBY girls can continue their manhunt. He fulfills the "gentle mentor" archetype pretty well, shepherding the kids and encouraging their independence. It can be a bit heavy handed, but that's not the worst thing in the world.
"Teamwork and persistence have carried you far. But you must understand, the things that await you beyond the protection of the Kingdom will not care."
one of the things being fought for was the right for individualism and self-expression. This is a bit ironic as 3 of the 4 schools in this scene have student uniforms.
Lol. I didn't even think about this. I really wish we got more on this war. We have 9 volumes and barley anything. And with the direction the stories heading I Don't think we'll get anymore. It's all about the conflict with Salem now.
I think it's a balancing thing. For me personally, world-building and background lore should be secondary to the story/themes/characters. It kind of works like that here by tying the color-names of the characters into the response from the war, although it still feels a bit arbitrary. But I agree that it's frustrating when characters like the teachers or the White Fang are always bringing "The War" and yet it's always vague. I remember there were 2d shorts to flesh out some of the details of the magic system and stuff, I wonder if there were any details of the war in there. I can't remember off the top of my head
Aww, puppy.
the franchise and threads are so dead
You're thinking of the world of remnant series. It's still up on YouTube. I wanna see the war for 2 reasons: 1.) I think it would be cool to see mass huntsmen on huntsman warfare. 2.) Jaune. They keep implying his ancestors were a big deal during the war. But how? what did they do exactly?
It's cause they took a 2 year break for a movie no one cared about. I have no idea what they were thinking. They completely killed the hype and community around their show. If they didn't take that break. We'd be in volume 11 by now. Image all the hype around FINALLY seeing vacuo. Now it feels too little too late.
To be honest, RWBY was already dying, that stupid movie was just the final straw.
When volume 8 came out, I didn't get the feeling the community was any smaller than it was before. Maybe it's cause I'm miss remembering, but that's what I remember.
what the fuck, lindsay got skinny
looks at her twitter
removed they/them
now only identifies as bpd and autistic
lmao
she's post wall but she looks better than she has for like 10 years
What little worldbuilding we have regarding the Great War is just plain dumb. It's approximately as far from the current day as WW2 is from us, and apparently back then only Mantle had guns as standard-issue weaponry, with everyone else somehow managing to fight a world-spanning conflict with swords and bows. This is rather odd given that the setting just eighty years later is very clearly futuristic.
And the reasons for the war, fucking hell. You don't fight decade-long wars over someone else making art you don't like.
My headcanon is that it was actually a WW1 style clash of empires scuffling over land and resources, and Vale made a big ol' cope about it actually being about freedom and expression when it was really just them fighting everyone else for colonial possessions.
However, one thing they mention that I do think is neat is that the Kingdoms were once larger, holding more land and towns in their territories, but the war caused them to regress as fighters were called away to the front and the Grimm encroached upon them. They still haven't recovered fully since.
Is this why Ruby's voice is so different now? I know losing or gaining weight can make your voice change.
My headcannon is because of aura, guns aren't as effective as in our world, so melee weapon are still viable.
I also like to believe that this war started the "it's also a gun" trend in remnant. And the basic melee weapon are from the early stages of the war. Like it's just the "meta" of the world evolving.
the funniest bit with blake is that it was later revealed to be a bonna fide princess
and she just went incognito????
went incognito
she did a shit job of it honestly
didn't change her name and only added the bow to hide her ears (that twitch)
I remember Blake told Ozpin that she learned to fight to survive in the streets. I guess that's another RWBY retcon, not the first and neither the last
Lindsay gave me a spook.
Very drastic change.
Healthy, but drastic.
Gets treated for mental illness, gets rid of pronouns.
kek
No fucking way that's Lindsay
I think Ozpin's monologues, all of them, are just indicative of how "by the seat of their pants" RWBY's world building was and to an extent always has been. They drop a lot of really neat implications, especially when, as you noted, the reality we see in the show doesn't match what we're told. If we look at RWBY in hindsight with that idea, a lot of the failures of certain themes to materialize make sense. A ton of the implications of the setting seem to be completely accidental, which makes sense with the vast array of contradictions we see throughout the show.
The Faunus as a whole are another example of this, with us being told as early as the 2nd episode that there are protests around them and that they're oppressed, but also we don't see any instances of them being discriminated against in Vale, materially or superficially. Even Cardin is just a massive asshole moreso than a racist in specific. We're told they're oppressed, yet they're everywhere you look, smiling as much as anyone else, and no one comments on their ubiquity. At the same time, several dozen of them sign up for the White Fang in one night, apparently, and all of them are fine with the idea of using hijacked military hardware to overthrow the government.
A part of that is incompetence by the writers, sure, but I think in addition to that it's just that there was no real planning done in the early stages. There's way too many instances of dropping the narrative ball for me to believe half of what happened in the show was planned. Even the Fall of Beacon, which we know was planned, seems kind of half assed and poorly thought out in retrospect - and it's barely mentioned afterwards. RWBY throws out interesting ideas, teases at doing something with them, then forgets about them and does a lore dump about the Gods or the Gods' mom.
All the same, this is good commentary and I'm glad we can still see this years later and with the property in limbo.
Also, I love Arkos
Sienna Khan had less than ten minutes of screentime, and this was enough to completely rot my brain and electrify my heart.
What was the fucking point of Sienna? I honestly thought Adam was the leader of the White Fang, so to just introduce the "real" leader of the White Fang to just kill her off immediately to make Adam the leader felt meaningless to me.
Now, if you'll excuse me, HNNNRRHHHHHGHHHHGHHH BRWON CATGUIRL I'M COOOMIN'
What was the fucking point of Sienna?
Short version: Kick the Dog with a lot of extra steps.
Long version: Getting across that the idealized RWBY, the one we saw in the trailers, was fridged in favour of the crazy incel arc for Adam, and a win for Bee fags to feel good about.
What was the fucking point of Sienna?
The vilify Adam, nothing else
Not him but Adam was already plenty villified by the end of V3. Anyone questioning whether he was a stock villain or not by the time he killed Sienna was clinging to the old headcanons/theories of what he could be
Missing the point, fren
They made him lame as hell. It's what their crowd does.
People still though he was at least cool at the end of V3
Vol.4-5 the writers made it their mission to make Adam as pathetic as possible until the end, kinda the same what they did with Ironwood but here they have 3 volumes to do so instead of speedrunning it in just one
Oh, well no shit, but say that instead of saying "villified" or "fridged" or whatever. Ironwood was villified/character assassinated, Adam was just lameified.
You think Salem ever puts on some headphones and dances around her palace in her pajamas?
A part of that is incompetence by the writers, sure, but I think in addition to that it's just that there was no real planning done in the early stages.
I go back and forth on this myself. Rewatching the show from volume 1, there's a lot of hints and foreshadows of what was going to happen in later volumes. Stuff with Ozpin in particular really stands out. I don't think they had much of a plan, but they seemed to have at least had "concepts of a plan" (heh). Like I think the first episode of Volume 1 really does drop a few hints of a larger story and I think the crew had some ideas about where they were going to take the show. But in general I do agree with the overall point - a lot of this world/story isn't fleshed out and at times contradictory. A lot of the frustration I've had towards volume 2 is due to the fact that the writing team insists on keeping details vague, which in practice means the plot wheels are spinning in place, the antagonists have vague motivations, and the stakes aren't really that clear.
It's frustrating, but like you said there's interesting ideas thrown out there and you just can't help but be hooked in by them.