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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
    • Aioria said:
    Mind, their relationship was still disturbing. What with that thing Blake said where he tried to gradatively get her more used to hurting humans.
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    Been a while since I saw that part. All I really remembered was a certain homicidal callousness in the trailer, and like the idea of the Black Panther Expies having a genuinely good cause they took too far instead of just being That Cult.
    Imrix said:
    I would honestly call the reveal of Adam as a creepy shitstain one of the best bits of writing in Rwby.
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    Okay, why? I'm always interested in well reasoned opinions.
     
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    ...
    ...
    I think I would like to tender a formal apology. I joined this thread, initially, that I might advertise a discussion thread for fanwork, specifically the kind that celebrates the potential of canon. I then proceeded to read some of the archives, and was reminded of a very upsetting issue I'd had with said canon, and hadn't really gotten to talk through with others.
    I then wrote a rather impassioned post about said issue, and undermined my original intent; I was not here to denigrate RWBY, nor its writers, but rather to see if we could do better - because at it's core, it's awesome. Please accept my regrets and requests for reconciliation, and know that my invitation stands.

    -Horatio Von Becker
     
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    HoratioVonBecker said:
    Okay, why? I'm always interested in well reasoned opinions.
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    Because I like how the group that people talk about like it had good intentions then turned to shit, actually turned out to be pretty shit. I like how RoosterTeeth didn't halfarse Adam's evil, playing the creepy ex-boyfriend angle to the hilt. I was amused by how the reveal trolled the fanbase. I like the new light it shines on Blake leaving the White Fang, and the kind of feelings she's working through as a result.

    Basically, I like that the villainous terrorist is a fittingly unambiguous, threatening and hateable arsehole. If you want a long-form essay about why I like these things then you ain't getting it, but those are my reasons.
     
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    Imrix said:
    Because I like how the group that people talk about like it had good intentions then turned to shit, actually turned out to be pretty shit. I like how RoosterTeeth didn't halfarse Adam's evil, playing the creepy ex-boyfriend angle to the hilt. I was amused by how the reveal trolled the fanbase. I like the new light it shines on Blake leaving the White Fang, and the kind of feelings she's working through as a result.

    Basically, I like that the villainous terrorist is a fittingly unambiguous arsehole.
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    I see. I was not expecting that.
    cB557 said:
    As someone who just watched through the series a few weeks ago, could I hear more about this?
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    The White Fang is inspired by the Black Panthers, going by the "faunus are heavily discriminated against" thing from when Blake told her backstory. People were, understandably, expecting them to be sympathetic.
     
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    cB557 said:
    As someone who just watched through the series a few weeks ago, could I hear more about this?
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    Adam Taurus has had something of a low-key Draco In Leather Pants treatment among the fandom, largely due to his lack of characterisation, although I suspect his prettyboy ninja badass look played a part as well. There's been a lot of fics that gave him sympathetic treatment to varying degrees, so I greatly enjoyed the schadenfreude of witnessing shippers react to the reveal that his canon portrayal is that of an abusive edgelord douche.
     
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    Imrix said:
    Adam Taurus has had something of a low-key Draco In Leather Pants treatment among the fandom, largely due to his lack of characterization, although I suspect his prettyboy ninja badass look played a part as well. There's been a lot of fics that gave him sympathetic treatment to varying degrees, so it amused me greatly to witness shippers react to the reveal that his canon portrayal is that of an abusive edgelord douchenozzle.
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    Adam hadn't had enough screentime for it to be Leather Pants. Sure, he was working with Cinder, but given that Cinder hadn't seemed particularly genocidal to the audience, it seemed reasonable to assume he didn't know her true intentions.

    Hmm. If the fan interpretation wasn't as sympathetic, would you still have liked the twist?
    (Huh. Edit Wars can be fun.)
     
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    HoratioVonBecker said:
    The White Fang is inspired by the Black Panthers, going by the "faunus are heavily discriminated against" thing from when Blake told her backstory. People were, understandably, expecting them to be sympathetic.
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    Yeah, this. The parallels drawn between the Faunus on Remnant and the American Civil Rights movement of the 60s are pretty strong, especially with the show going out of its way to show that anti-Faunus discrimination is a very real thing that should be opposed. So the set-up was for an extremist group that took a good idea too far, and led to bigotry and criminal violence going back the other way. Adam's complete lack of personality in the Black Trailer other than not caring about Schnee casualties did nothing to derail that. Then in V2E1 Blake is still, based on her sketches, remembering him with semi-fondness, again implying that "here is a good person who got carried away and went too far," making it more of a "Why did it have to come to this?" tragedy that he had to be stopped. Then again in V2E...7, was it (the flashback episode), it becomes pretty clear that Cinder hijacked the White Fang through threats of violence into joining her, giving Adam more "reluctantly evil" points.

    Then he shows up in person, gets a few lines, and it's clear that he's not only a bigot and a terrorist, but he's also an abusive douchecanoe of a human being. Nothing sympathetic or redemptive at all, just a blot on Remnant that needs to be forcibly squashed out.

    (Honestly, we should have seen this coming. Remember Ruby in the Red Trailer? Weiss in the White Trailer? They've done this to us before!)
     
    Imrix said:
    Yeah, just for the other reasons I gave.
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    Reasons, plural? I only saw one.
    DezoPenguin said:
    Yeah, this. The parallels drawn between the Faunus on Remnant and the American Civil Rights movement of the 60s are pretty strong, especially with the show going out of its way to show that anti-Faunus discrimination is a very real thing that should be opposed. So the set-up was for an extremist group that took a good idea too far, and led to bigotry and criminal violence going back the other way. Adam's complete lack of personality in the Black Trailer other than not caring about Schnee casualties did nothing to derail that. Then in V2E1 Blake is still, based on her sketches, remembering him with semi-fondness, again implying that "here is a good person who got carried away and went too far," making it more of a "Why did it have to come to this?" tragedy that he had to be stopped. Then again in V2E...7, was it (the flashback episode), it becomes pretty clear that Cinder hijacked the White Fang through threats of violence into joining her, giving Adam more "reluctantly evil" points.

    Then he shows up in person, gets a few lines, and it's clear that he's not only a bigot and a terrorist, but he's also an abusive douchecanoe of a human being. Nothing sympathetic or redemptive at all, just a blot on Remnant that needs to be forcibly squashed out.

    (Honestly, we should have seen this coming. Remember Ruby in the Red Trailer? Weiss in the White Trailer? They've done this to us before!)
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    I have no idea how to Rate that. 'Pained laughter' seems most appropriate.
     
    HoratioVonBecker said:
    Reasons, plural? I only saw one.
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    You should practice better reading comprehension then. Here, I'll cut out the fan interpretation part to make it easy.
    Imrix said:
    Because I like how the group that people talk about like it had good intentions then turned to shit, actually turned out to be pretty shit. I like how RoosterTeeth didn't halfarse Adam's evil, playing the creepy ex-boyfriend angle to the hilt. ... I like the new light it shines on Blake leaving the White Fang, and the kind of feelings she's working through as a result.

    Basically, I like that the villainous terrorist is a fittingly unambiguous, threatening and hateable arsehole. If you want a long-form essay about why I like these things then you ain't getting it, but those are my reasons.
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    DezoPenguin said:
    So the set-up was for an extremist group that took a good idea too far, and led to bigotry and criminal violence going back the other way.
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    I dunno, that seems like it's still pretty valid to me. I mean people kind of gloss over the point that Blake left Adam and the White Fang more than a year ago, when things started going places she didn't like. That means at least a year for their descent from an extremist-turned-militant activist group into a terrorist army to continue, with Cinder at the helm. Basically every positive portrayal of the White Fang has been Blake reminiscing over what once was, as I recall.
     
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    Imrix said:
    I dunno, that seems like it's still pretty valid to me. I mean people kind of gloss over the point that Blake left Adam and the White Fang more than a year ago, when things started going places she didn't like. That means at least a year for their descent from an extremist-turned-militant activist group into a terrorist army to continue, with Cinder at the helm.
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    Do you have citation on the "year ago" thing? Because I've never been able to find a source on the timeline of the Black trailer.
     
    Imrix said:
    I dunno, that seems like it's still pretty valid to me. I mean people kind of gloss over the point that Blake left Adam and the White Fang more than a year ago, when things started going places she didn't like. That means at least a year for their descent from an extremist-turned-militant activist group into a terrorist army to continue, with Cinder at the helm.
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    Oh, sure, the White Fang itself is what it is. But Adam Taurus personally being 100% pure villain is something else entirely.
     
    Imrix said:
    You should practice better reading comprehension then. Here, I'll cut out the fan interpretation part to make it easy.
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    Still difficult, but I think I get your point now.
    Imrix said:
    I dunno, that seems like it's still pretty valid to me. I mean people kind of gloss over the point that Blake left Adam and the White Fang more than a year ago, when things started going places she didn't like. That means at least a year for their descent from an extremist-turned-militant activist group into a terrorist army to continue, with Cinder at the helm.
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    Doesn't really explain why he's not more regretful. Even a Creepy Possessive Cult Leader would use her name, instead of just pretending they're still together.
    I guess mind control might explain it, but they'd kind of need to drop a hint or two that that's even possible.
     
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    skaianDestiny said:
    Do you have citation on the "year ago" thing? Because I've never been able to find a source on the timeline of the Black trailer.
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    Ruby seems to join Beacon sometime in Spring and Season 1 carries on through Fall, Season 2 opens with Ruby declaring they've just got back from a two week break to their second semester, with the Vytal Festival at the end of the year. I don't know when exactly the Black trailer is, but it's been at least a year. Probably longer, Blake likely took some time to distance herself from her old life.
    HoratioVonBecker said:
    Doesn't really explain why he's not more regretful. Even a Creepy Possessive Cult Leader would use her name, instead of just pretending they're still together.
    I guess mind control might explain it, but they'd kind of need to hint that that's possible beforehand.
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    DezoPenguin said:
    Oh, sure, the White Fang itself is what it is. But Adam Taurus personally being 100% pure villain is something else entirely.
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    It seems pretty simple to me? He's had a year or more to turn bitter and hateful with Cinder whispering in his ear, when he was already walking an ugly path. No mind control needed, just time, anger and a mentally unhealthy path in life.
     
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    So out of curiosity is the manga canon with the series? If so then the next arc which focuses on Blake could answer some of our questions in regards to her relationship with Adam.
     
    I'm finding I like the "Adam is being mind controlled by a custom Grimm" explanation more and more, actually. It has a synergy with his Beauty and the Beast roots we just haven't seen yet.
     
    Tython82 said:
    So out of curiosity is the manga canon with the series? If so then the next arc which focuses on Blake could answer some of our questions in regards to her relationship with Adam.
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    I don't think there's been word either way at this point, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was. I mean, it's giving us more backstory than we got in the show so....
     
    Tython82 said:
    So out of curiosity is the manga canon with the series? If so then the next arc which focuses on Blake could answer some of our questions in regards to her relationship with Adam.
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    I believe one of the RWBY streams (the end Volume 3 one I believe) answered with something along the lines of, "it is until it isn't", meaning that until it completely contradicts with the story in the animation, you can think of it as canon.
     
    Imrix said:
    I like the new light it shines on Blake leaving the White Fang, and the kind of feelings she's working through as a result.
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    The only thing I don't like about it is how it completely undercuts the White Fang's role in the story. As part of Blake's story arc and as a portrayal of abuse, it's actually really good but as it relates to the themes and meta-narrative, not so much.

    As far as we can tell, the only instance of Faunus discrimination ever shown was Cardin pulling Velvet's ear and taunting her in Vol 1. Given how he tormented Jaune and seems to be a general ass, I don't even think we can say it was specifically racially motivated beyond Cardin was dick and he saw a victim. We're told that there was a Faunus revolution in the semi-distant past (Oobleck described it as 'seeming like ancient history') but we don't really see any evidence of anything that suggests discrimination continues. Seriously, have we even heard so much as a racial slur? When Cardin was being a bully, those cops chasing Sun after he sneaked into Vale saying something, maybe a comment about Blake trying to pass, something that came across as explicitly racist that wasn't immediately laughed down, went ignored or even agreed with? Something unintentionally racist (other than again, Cardin's moment)?

    The White Fang are obviously inspired by groups like the Black Panthers and other revolutionary civil rights groups that grew out of the shittyness of Jim Crow. The White Fang are actually worse than them (in that they're actively using organized violence as opposed to the threat of it) and they're literally teaming up with soulless abominations to genocide an entire kingdom. Are Faunus being treated as de facto slaves, lynched for miscegenation, beaten or imprisoned, anything to inspire that level of anger?

    Blake talks about how their violence worked, but that's always annoyed me. The Black Panthers were always held up as being violent and dangerous in order to strip legitimacy from the CRM. Shame and cognitive dissonance work far better than fear. To be trite, fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to them suffering as the majoirty group acts on that and punishes them. I wonder if there's an upcoming immense backlash against Faunus given the White Fang's role in the events of the Vytal Festival.

    Adam being abusive is just one more black mark that turns the White Fang from something that could've been dark grey to a shade of black. Looking at this as a world deliberately constructed by an author to tell a story, it doesn't really put civil rights and anti-discrimination movements in a good place. The most visible group arguing for it are filled with evil, petty abusers jerked around by their chains at the will of a malevolent madwoman, eagerly anticipating the chance to kill their enemies and willing to arbitrarily throw their lives away to genocide everything — including their fellow Faunus — just to get back at the majority group.

    That the amount of discrimination shown is basically nonexistent only makes it worse. The story would've been far more compelling if race played any role at all, depicting moderate groups, extremists, reformists, etc. I would've been excited if we had a moment of unintentional racism that was pointed out and corrected. Weiss' criticism is directed solely at the White Fang and dropped basically immediately, there was no history, evidence or struggle involved. We're simply told that racism exists (and I hate tell don't show).

    Instead, all we get is something that looks conjured out of racist fantasies about groups like the Black Panthers or BLM.

    Imrix said:
    Ruby seems to join Beacon sometime in Spring and the season carries on through Fall, Season 2 opens with Ruby declaring they've just got back from a two week break to their second semester, with the Vytal Festival at the end of the year. I don't know when exactly the Black trailer is, but it's been at least a year. Probably longer for Blake to distance herself.
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    That seems really weak. We know that Vol 2 starts after 'a holiday break' but we don't know anything about how that relates to anything else. Was that some type of autumn break and the Vytal Festival occur before winter (given the snow we see when Yang is injured) and that implies school starts sometime in the summer?

    If Blake and Adam attacked the train in Forever Fall, there's no real indication to when that could've occurred at all. It could've been a week, just enough time for Blake to get back to Vale, do Beacon's tests for non-combat school students and then be admitted. In Japan — for example due to some animesque inspiration — you can still write make up exams to get into school while the rest of your class is getting their introductory speeches. As long as it occurred before Beacon started, it could've occurred at literally any time
     
    Redium said:
    As far as we can tell, the only instance of Faunus discrimination ever shown was Cardin pulling Velvet's ear and taunting her in Vol 1.
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    It's not quite that bad, nobody ever denies the Schnee Dust Company treat their Faunus workers badly and Blake apparently feels the need to hide her ears to avoid discrimination, but it's fairly thin, yeah.
    Redium said:
    That seems really weak.
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    It's pretty thin, yeah, but it's what we got and it seems like the simplest read of events.
     
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