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RWBY Thread III: Time To Say Goodbye

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Stop: So gotta few things that need to be said real quick.
  • Staff Post
    • so gotta few things that need to be said real quick.
    We get a lot of reports from this thread. A lot of it is just a series of people yelling at each other over arguments that have been rehashed hundreds of times since the end of the recent Volume. And I get that the last Volume - and RWBY in general, really - has some controversial moments that people will want to discuss, argue about, debate, etc.

    That's fine. We're not going to stop people from doing that, because that's literally what the point of the thread is. However, there's just a point where it gets to be a bit too much, and arguments about whether or not Ironwood was morally justified in his actions in the recent Volume, or if RWBY and her team were in the right for withholding information from Ironwood out of distrust, or whatever flavor of argument of the day descend into insulting other posters, expressing a demeaning attitude towards other's opinions, and just being overall unpleasant. That tends to happen a lot in this thread. We want it to stop happening in this thread.

    So! As of now the thread is in a higher state of moderation. What that means is that any future infractions will result in a weeklong boot from the thread, and repeated offenders will likely be permanently removed. So please, everyone endeavor to actually respect the other's arguments, and even if you strongly disagree with them please stay civil and mindful when it comes to responding to others.

    In addition, users should refrain from talking about off-site users in the thread. Bear in mind that this does not mean that you cannot continue to post tumblr posts, for example, that add onto the discussion in the thread, with the caveat that it's related to RWBY of course. But any objections to offsite users in the thread should be handled via PM, or they'll be treated as thread violations and infracted as such.
     
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  • Staff Post
    • gman391 said:
    To push back slightly. While in principle there's nothing wrong with Ironwood's semblance be "The American Military's whole thing" there was I think a problem with presentation. Much like there are signs for when Yang, or Ren use their emotion based semblance, I think there needed to be a much clearer sign that Ironwood was or wasn't using his. As it was on my first watch I hadn't even played the Amity Arena game and never saw any sign personally that he was using his semblance. Just being a dickhead.

    If it was more signposted when Ironwood was using his semblance to enable his bad decision making I think it would go over better. But then I also think that Ironwood didn't have a semblance until Amity Arena meant he needed one and they just sort of had to wing one that wouldn't mess up the story too much.
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    Well, how can we visually cue the audience into Mettle?
    Yang's and Ren's make sense. For Yang red eyes are usually a cue for anger/rage and she goes Super Saiyan. Meanwhile Ren mutes/dampens emotions, so a color drain makes visual sense for a cue.
    But for Mettle? What can we really do? I think the closest we got to a visual cue was when Ironwood's eyes darkened right before he shot Oscar.
     
    Epsilon Rose said:
    According to the wiki, his semblance is passive, not something he consciously activates:
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    The Wiki is also edited by people who think Blake & Yang are "just friends" and that Adam was a mentor not an abuser, its not a reliable source for the behaviors of shitty men.

    Plus, we literally see him turn it on before he shoots Oscar and when he announces his bomb Mantle plan.
    Epsilon Rose said:
    You're doing that thing where you strawman my statements while being incredibly rude, again. Please stop.

    Also, Ren's semblance is clearly activated or, at the very least, it has a heightened activated state that we see him consciously using. Ironwood's semblance does not have similar manifestations.

    It is possible that it has a constant dampening effect on his emotions, since they are generally fairly subdued, but not to the point where it could be considered a disorder.
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    I wasn't... Talking to you?

    That post is directed at someone totally separate from you who was making an entirely different argument?

    Lazurman said:
    I'd have liked to see him reflect on that, come to terms with it. But now he's dead as a doornail. He passed the point of no return long ago.
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    I think this post covers my own take on that to one degree or another, but that's just me and I can see your take regardless.

    View: https://anthurak.tumblr.com/post/667438097744707584/james-ironwood-spent-all-of-the-first-8-volumes
     
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    Epsilon Rose said:
    That's generous, given the litany of things he did leading up to it, but I basically agree with you.

    The reason I said the comparison gets slightly uncomfortable, is because the writers, arguably, retconned him into having a mental illness that conveniently explains his dickery and just sort of leaves that aspect unaddressed. I get that it was most likely chosen with little thought, as a simple semblance that wouldn't disrupt anything they'd already shown, but I'm not sure if that actually makes it better any more than another show just happening to pick minority villains for a predominantly white cast, because no one really thought the casting through, is made better by its carelessness. I mean, they very easily could have chosen something else for an innocuous semblance. Maybe he has preternaturally good aim, to tie in with his deagles (they're not exactly typical huntsman weapons), or some ability to naturally graft inorganic matter to his body, to tie in with his prosthesis and transhuman themes.
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    Well, the LAST of my sympathy vanished then.

    And well, I never saw it as a mental illness that explains his dickishness. The dickishness comes from his upbringing, the military culture, the yes-man culture around him, and the inability to consider the fact he might be wrong. The PTSD is a separate issue.
     
    Pugman said:
    Well, how can we visually cue the audience into Mettle?
    Yang's and Ren's make sense. For Yang red eyes are usually a cue for anger/rage and she goes Super Saiyan. Meanwhile Ren mutes/dampens emotions, so a color drain makes visual sense for a cue.
    But for Mettle? What can we really do? I think the closest we got to a visual cue was when Ironwood's eyes darkened right before he shot Oscar.
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    I would go with his eyes turning white. His eyes are normally blue, so making them just pure white would clue people in I think.
     
    Zam said:
    I think this post covers my own take on that to one degree or another, but that's just me and I can see your take regardless.

    View: https://anthurak.tumblr.com/post/667438097744707584/james-ironwood-spent-all-of-the-first-8-volumes
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    On this I have 2 things.
    1 - Oz and Ironwood kind of fell to the same thing.
    Oz - "How do I destroy Salem?"
    Jinn - "You can't."
    When faced with a foe they could not take out they suddenly had no actual plan.

    2- *ahem*
    Cinder - *turns smuggly to Ironwood* "And that's Check-" *gets shot in the face*

    gman391 said:
    I would go with his eyes turning white. His eyes are normally blue, so making them just pure white would clue people in I think.
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    So have them devoid of color in a sense to show him blocking out pain and reason? A kind of "glassy eyed" look?
     
    Zam said:
    I wasn't... Talking to you?

    That post is directed at someone totally separate from you who was making an entirely different argument?
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    Apologies, I thought you were, given the flow of discourse, but on reread I can see you replying to Psyga as a discreet comment.



    Zam said:
    The Wiki is also edited by people who think Bale & Yang are "just friends" and that Adam was a mentor not an abuser, its not a reliable source for the behaviors of shitty men.

    Plus, we literally see him turn it on before he shoots Oscar and when he announces his bomb Mantle plan.
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    Do we? I suppose that's one interpretation of that scene, but we have so little information on the semblance, and any activation is subtle enough, that it's hard to definitively say that's what's happening. More importantly, even if his semblance is discretely activating then, we have no indication that it's something he did consciously. Again, we simply don't have enough information to make those statements, which is one of the problems with their treatment of his semblance.

    gman391 said:
    I would go with his eyes turning white. His eyes are normally blue, so making them just pure white would clue people in I think.
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    Personally, given the name and Ironwoods general theme, I'd go with giving his skin and the white of his eyes a metallic sheen and greyer tone or maybe giving him a more robotic appearance. An audio queue would also work well.
     
    Epsilon Rose said:
    Do we? I suppose that's one interpretation of that scene, but we have so little information on the semblance, and any activation is subtle enough, that it's hard to definitively say that's what's happening. More importantly, even if his semblance is discretely activating then, we have no indication that it's something he did consciously. Again, we simply don't have enough information to make those statements, which is one of the problems with their treatment of his semblance.
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    Mostly an aside, but Miles once tried to correct some fanon on the Wiki and got banned for it.

    I don't really agree, I feel whenever Ironwood makes or doubles down on his bad decisions his eyes lose all color and that, that's a reasonable indicator.

    As it is I don't think Mettle really added anything to character, nothing he did felt out of character to me before I learned of it so either way (Shrugs)
    Epsilon Rose said:
    Personally, given the name and Ironwoods general theme, I'd go with giving his skin and the white of his eyes a metallic sheen and greyer tone or maybe giving him a more robotic appearance. An audio queue would also work well.
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    Given Penny is a robot and one of the most people, people out there, I think having Ironwood appear more robotic to indicate a lack of humanity would confuse the themes, a lot.
     
    Zam said:
    As it is I don't think Mettle really added anything to character, nothing he did felt out of character to me before I learned of it so either way (Shrugs)
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    I can definitely agree with that and think he would have been a stronger character without it (that is, he acts the exact same way and they just never mention Mettle).

    Zam said:
    Given Penny is a robot and one of the most people, people out there, I think having Ironwood appear more robotic to indicate a lack of humanity would confuse the themes, a lot.
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    Fair.
     
    Zam said:
    The Wiki is also edited by people who think Blake & Yang are "just friends" and that Adam was a mentor not an abuser, its not a reliable source for the behaviors of shitty men.
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    I just checked the Wiki and their is a bit of contradictions on what's their and what you said. It does say Yang and Partners but later on does discuss how close they are becoming and instance to show that closeness. As for Adam It shows a link citation to a 2013 interview with RT about RWBY where Monty described Blake trailer "...scene was shot like she is an apprentice". Also it calls Adam a "crazy, abusive ex boyfriend" with a citation from RWBY volume 3 directors commentary with the time stamp of when it was used to describe him. Also can you show a link to of Miles getting banned from the wiki? I am trying to find it but cant.

    Pugman said:
    Well, how can we visually cue the audience into Mettle?
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    I mean if its passive a way to do it is maybe it could be similar to CIPA, which is a hereditary diseases that causes people to not feel pain or sweat. So have something minor that should cause a reaction doesn't. An example being spilling a hot cup of coffee on himself but him not noticing cause he is so focused on a his assignment that it doesn't register. So someone has to tell him that he spilled it on himself.
     
    MonochromeXClown said:
    I just checked the Wiki and their is a bit of contradictions on what's their and what you said. It does say Yang and Partners but later on does discuss how close they are becoming and instance to show that closeness. As for Adam It shows a link citation to a 2013 interview with RT about RWBY where Monty described Blake trailer "...scene was shot like she is an apprentice". Also it calls Adam a "crazy, abusive ex boyfriend" with a citation from RWBY volume 3 directors commentary with the time stamp of when it was used to describe him. Also can you show a link to of Miles getting banned from the wiki? I am trying to find it but cant.
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    Maybe the editors have changed since I last used it, most of this stuff was was referenced a couple of years ago primarily so I don't have the receipts on me at all times as I never expected things to change there :/
     
    Zam said:
    Given Penny is a robot and one of the most people, people out there, I think having Ironwood appear more robotic to indicate a lack of humanity would confuse the themes, a lot.
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    In the V8 commentary, the writers outright say that Ironwood getting another metal arm was a sign of him losing his humanity, so it seems that they've changed their minds about what constitutes a "real person". This is the same season where Penny's transformation into a human is something she takes as a major improvement in her life after all, with no confusion, disorientation, or sign she misses all her robot bits.

    To be clear, I'm not happy with this thematic shift, it's some ableist garbage they've untinkingly copied out of 80's cyberpunk, but their work and commentary support it.
     
    mr_stibbons said:
    In the V8 commentary, the writers outright say that Ironwood getting another metal arm was a sign of him losing his humanity, so it seems that they've changed their minds about what constitutes a "real person". This is the same season where Penny's transformation into a human is something she takes as a major improvement in her life after all, with no confusion, disorientation, or sign she misses all her robot bits.
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    I viewed that as an Ironwood specific thing, this is a guy who always made it a point to hide his prosthetics in comparison to wearing it out, loud and proud like Yang and Ironwood always treated Penny as a product not a person. Thus, in his eyes he's becoming less human.
     
    mr_stibbons said:
    In the V8 commentary, the writers outright say that Ironwood getting another metal arm was a sign of him losing his humanity,
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    V7, actually, and it was him sacrificing his arm to stop Watts from doing God knows what to Amity Arena. Given he had the Seer which was set to be a jellygram for Salem, things would not have been pleasant if Ironwood decided to be the "better man" and not pulled that arm out.
     
    mr_stibbons said:
    In the V8 commentary, the writers outright say that Ironwood getting another metal arm was a sign of him losing his humanity, so it seems that they've changed their minds about what constitutes a "real person". This is the same season where Penny's transformation into a human is something she takes as a major improvement in her life after all, with no confusion, disorientation, or sign she misses all her robot bits.

    To be clear, I'm not happy with this thematic shift, it's some ableist garbage they've untinkingly copied out of 80's cyberpunk, but their work and commentary support it.
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    And yet we have had other characters lose limbs and not lose their shit.
    Also, recall the context.
    If getting the arm is him losing/giving up his humanity then remember why he has that new left arm.
    He was still sane after he flayed it to choke Watts.
    When did he lose the arm?
    In the few hours between the end of V7 where everything is falling apart around him and V8 where he is trying to regain order and control of everything.
    Now, think back to V7 and recall that Ironwood was pondering if Salem's lack of humanity what made her strong
    So, putting it all together, this is NOT an albeist message. This is Ironwood making the choice to ditch humanity, both his own and his people, to get the job done and do what he thinks is the right thing and that was to abandon Mantle and escape with Atlas.
     
    Psyga315 said:
    V7, actually, and it was him sacrificing his arm to stop Watts from doing God knows what to Amity Arena. Given he had the Seer which was set to be a jellygram for Salem, things would not have been pleasant if Ironwood decided to be the "better man" and not pulled that arm out.
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    Granted he could have gone for the shield generators and take a small ring of burned skin instead of flaying his own arm if he hadn't been so focused on always pushing without a second thought.
     
    Pugman said:
    On this I have 2 things.
    1 - Oz and Ironwood kind of fell to the same thing.
    Oz - "How do I destroy Salem?"
    Jinn - "You can't."
    When faced with a foe they could not take out they suddenly had no actual plan.
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    Because stalemates only work if the other side gives up and Salem is never going to do that, not helped by her being able to bury a kingdom in Grimm and frankly not only not give a shit this means everyone knows she is a thing but pretty clearly sees this as totally great for her.

    Frankly it just gives the impression humanity only still exists because she couldn't be bothered to put them down before then.

    Especially since the one thing Ruby and Ironwood basically agreed on was that after she and her army were blown up the best thing to do was run the fuck away before she got back.
     
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