RWBY Thread III: Time To Say Goodbye

[kokuenDG]

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.

 

[The Narrator]

It doesn't sound like it would be a speedy evacuatio

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Still, though, I feel like getting the tourists home isn't something that would take months. I mean, it's not like Vale would be shouldering the burden of transporting them entirely on its own. The other governments would be sending ships to recover their citizens, too.

But if there were outlying areas that had to be abandoned because they were not longer defensible, then the burden of evacuating them would fall on Vale. And the cost of housing and feeding the refugees would explain why Atlas would need to hold a charity benefit for them.

 

[Leingod]

So apparently Cinder's Semblance is "dust manipulation," the lowercase "d" being intentional (and an awful pun). Her glass stuff comes from her super-heating dust (I'm pretty sure it's just silicates in general, then, and "dust" is purely for the sake of said pun) into glass with uppercase "D" Dust and then using her Semblance to shape and control it even after its been formed, which is how she does stuff like her shattering and reforming arrows and (presumably) her screaming ground-explosion thing.

Basically she's Shatterbird from Worm, though she hasn't shown anywhere near the range and volume of controllable dust/glass that Shatterbird had. Still, it's a very powerful Semblance that she's using in a rather low-key way that makes it hard to pin down what she's actually doing.

Huh. A powerful Semblance used in a very low-key, hard-to-determine way? No wonder Cinder seemed impressed when Mercury described Pyrrha's surreptitious use of her Semblance.

Either we had this conversation and I just totally missed it somehow, or how the hell have we not seen this and had this conversation yet?

But if there were outlying areas that had to be abandoned because they were not longer defensible, then the burden of evacuating them would fall on Vale.

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As RNJR's trek through several destroyed settlements and Leo's speech to them about how chaotic things are makes clear, that's kind of exactly what's going on.

 

[Zam]

Still, though, I feel like getting the tourists home isn't something that would take months. I mean, it's not like Vale would be shouldering the burden of transporting them entirely on its own. The other governments would be sending ships to recover their citizens, too.

But if there were outlying areas that had to be abandoned because they were not longer defensible, then the burden of evacuating them would fall on Vale. And the cost of housing and feeding the refugees would explain why Atlas would need to hold a charity benefit for them.

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I mean, would they?

Atlas was closing its borders, Mistral was being partially managed by a traitor, and Vacuo is a borderline anarchic state and none of them know what is going on in Vale as global communications have been reduced to a crawl. Plus the trips are more dangerous too. Not saying they did nothing, but I could definitely see it being a very slow unsteady process.

Plus what you and Leingod noted, lots of outer settlements both in Vale and under Mistral's purview seem to be in danger as well, adding to the chaos.

 

[The Narrator]

Atlas was closing its borders,

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That was months after the festival and the attack, tho.

 

[Zam]

That was months after the festival and the attack, tho.

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Fair, though I feel the other points still stand, plus if I recall, Jac and Ironwood's discussion implied Ironwood had been doing this steadily for awhile, but that may have just been my take.

 

[Cosar]

As was noted, people were still being evacuated from Vale so most good means are likely clogged and they did seek out travel hubs, IE, the airship, it just didn't work out for them.

Could it have been handled better? Maybe, like showing a map of where they left from, where they landed and having an explanation as to why they had to take that path, but then people would be whining about them being 'rail roaded' and after a point one has to give the audience some credit I feel.

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If the evacuation is ongoing and as stressed as you imply, how did they cross the ocean? That generally requires some sort of vehicle, but if they used that why not just go to the destination?

And I'm confused about your second paragraph: is your position is that any explanation given for why the characters are taking these actions would be so convoluted that people would view it as contrived? If so, why are you defending them taking such actions? Because the issue isn't the explanation in that case, it's the actions taken.

 

[Zam]

If the evacuation is ongoing and as stressed as you imply, how did they cross the ocean? That generally requires some sort of vehicle, but if they used that why not just go to the destination?

And I'm confused about your second paragraph: is your position is that any explanation given for why the characters are taking these actions would be so convoluted that people would view it as contrived? If so, why are you defending them taking such actions? Because the issue isn't the explanation in that case, it's the actions taken.

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Well the main tourist we saw and who would logically be there was form and would as noted likely be from within the kingdoms, IE the very powerful, secure states over small villages ETC. Travel back to them is likely meant to be a direct, point A to point B, situation and with coms down, Grimm up and possible infrastructure damage, plus the Grimm invading Vale and the other outside issues, its likely A, taking time and B giving preference to people from those nations who are refugees rather than some students on a revenge mission. Thus RNJR likely needed to take some less commercial and direct means to Anima, which couldn't plop them off right at Mistral but probably some coastal town or air dock somewhere.

I'm saying people would likely complain no matter what because "Rationale/SB competence" doesn't serve an actual story all that well and or that they'd complain about having it explained to them as an info dump.

 

[The Narrator]

@Cosar

Shows give you sloppy writing sometimes. A lot of the time, actually. I think this week's episode of The Flash caused me go "Bullshit!" about a half-dozen times and that's on network television. You can gripe about it or you can ignore it or you can stop watching, but it's a lot more fun to try to take the puzzle pieces you've been given and put them together to form a picture that makes some sort of sense.

 

[Mook]

If the evacuation is ongoing and as stressed as you imply, how did they cross the ocean? That generally requires some sort of vehicle, but if they used that why not just go to the destination?

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Probably by taking a ferry from villages on the east coast of Sanus.



That's one of the sea routes we know is relatively safe and it would fit with the Ruby Character Short apparently taking place in the wilderness of Vale.

 

[Cosar]

@Cosar

Shows give you sloppy writing sometimes. A lot of the time, actually. I think this week's episode of The Flash caused me go "Bullshit!" about a half-dozen times and that's on network television. You can gripe about it or you can ignore it or you can stop watching, but it's a lot more fun to try to take the puzzle pieces you've been given and put them together to form a picture that makes some sort of sense.

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But that doesn't mean that it not bad writing.

 

[The Narrator]

But that doesn't mean that it not bad writing.

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True. But explaining every detail of how the characters got from point A to point B wouldn't necessarily have been good writing, either. Would you rather have a lot of expository dialogue about what route the characters took and why, or cut straight to the arrival and handwave the details. Either will get your writing criticized.

 

[Cosar]

True. But explaining every detail of how the characters got from point A to point B wouldn't necessarily have been good writing, either. Would you rather have a lot of expository dialogue about what route the characters took and why, or cut straight to the arrival and handwave the details. Either will get your writing criticized.

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You seem to be confused. I haven't argued that it necessarily is, or that doing either of those things are what should happen. My point is that this element was bad/sloppy writing. That's the core element under debate; some posters were arguing that it wasn't and that people who believed that it was had unreliable viewpoints.



A side point was about if it was sloppy then it was inevitable, but even there your comment doesn't work. I've already given a third option as to how to avoid needing to discuss this sort of thing (change the set up so that there's no issue between rwby seemingly taking the long way). Moreover, just because something else could be done badly doesn't mean that what's is done is the best way to handle it. So I'm really not sure what you're going for here.

Well the main tourist we saw and who would logically be there was form and would as noted likely be from within the kingdoms, IE the very powerful, secure states over small villages ETC. Travel back to them is likely meant to be a direct, point A to point B, situation and with coms down, Grimm up and possible infrastructure damage, plus the Grimm invading Vale and the other outside issues, its likely A, taking time and B giving preference to people from those nations who are refugees rather than some students on a revenge mission. Thus RNJR likely needed to take some less commercial and direct means to Anima, which couldn't plop them off right at Mistral but probably some coastal town or air dock somewhere.

I'm saying people would likely complain no matter what because "Rationale/SB competence" doesn't serve an actual story all that well and or that they'd complain about having it explained to them as an info dump.

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Nice head canon. So what is actually relayed to us in the show. You know, the information that actually matters as opposed to fandom stuff.

 

[The Narrator]

I've already given a third option as to how to avoid needing to discuss this sort of thing (change the set up so that there's no issue between rwby seemingly taking the long way).

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By having them go straight there between seasons? I wouldn't find that preferable at all. We already spent Volumes 1, 2, 3 & 5 at Academies and are on track to spend Volume 6 at one. I'd like to have at least one where they're out in the field doing the hard-traveling heroes shtick like Hunters are supposed to.

 

[Cosar]

By having them go straight there between seasons? I wouldn't find that preferable at all. We already spent Volumes 1, 2, 3 & 5 at Academies and are on track to spend Volume 6 at one. I'd like to have at least one where they're out in the field doing the hard-traveling heroes shtick like Hunters are supposed to.

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And again you add words to what I said in order to make a new argument. Why do you keep doing this? I never said that once they arrive in Haven they need to stay there. You probably wouldn't even need to change some episodes, just the framing device: rather than doing a cross continent trek they're doing an investigation.

Though, this is somewhat beside the point: I didn't say it would make them more like hard traveling heroes(though I'm not entirely sure where you're getting that from). The point is that it was another option to address the travel time debate, one that was not part of the false dichotomy that you presented. So do you have any defense for the arguments you made in your previous post? Any actual answer to what I posted?

 

[Zam]

Nice head canon. So what is actually relayed to us in the show. You know, the information that actually matters as opposed to fandom stuff.

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As I said earlier, sometimes a show needs to give the audience the benefit of the doubt and assume they'll put things together by context cues.

 

[Uncle]

I have a question regarding a scene in Season 1. So, our main characters were sitting in the cafeteria and saw Cardin and friends bullying Velvet. The characters commented on it but nobody did anything about it.

What are we, as an audience, supposed to take from this scene? Is RWBY trying to demonstrate the Bystander effect? Is it trying to imply that our characters, and everyone else in the cafeteria, have some subtle biases?

 

[Zam]

I have a question regarding a scene in Season 1. So, our main characters were sitting in the cafeteria and saw Cardin and friends bullying Velvet. The characters commented on it but nobody did anything about it.

What are we, as an audience, supposed to take from this scene? Is RWBY trying to demonstrate the Bystander effect? Is it trying to imply that our characters, and everyone else in the cafeteria, have some subtle biases?

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I generally like to take it as being indicative of a problem, barring Blake who likely didn't interfere to protect her cover, but we don't know if that was the writers intent sadly.

 

[Emma]

What are we, as an audience, supposed to take from this scene?

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This has been something people have been talking about since s1, and the answer is simply don't think about it. The writers just didn't realize how the scene fell apart until it was too late to do anything about it.

 

[Uncle]

I generally like to take it as being indicative of a problem, barring Blake who likely didn't interfere to protect her cover, but we don't know if that was the writers intent sadly.

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What's weird about the scene is that Prryha remarks that she hates people like Cardin and Yang remarks how tough it must be to be a Faunus. Yet, they never do anything and nobody calls them out on it. It would have interesting if someone said "You know, the people like Cardin can get away with their actions is because people like you don't take a stand against them."

You know what would have been better? If one of them went to a teacher or consoler about the incident, only to have their concerns brushed aside. Then you would have an example of institutional racism.

 

[Zam]

What's weird about the scene is that Prryha remarks that she hates people like Cardin and Yang remarks how tough it must be to be a Faunus. Yet, they never do anything and nobody calls them out on it. It would have interesting if someone said "You know, the people like Cardin can get away with their actions is because people like you don't take a stand against them."

You know what would have been better? If one of them went to a teacher or consoler about the incident, only to have their concerns brushed aside. Then you would have an example of institutional racism.

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I agree, but the arc ended up focusing on Jaune instead sadly

So Blake's anger, Pyrrha's disdain and Yang's empathy didn't get much expansion save Blake and Pyrrha insulting Cardin in class.

 

[Leingod]

Let's say there's a very good reason that when asked what part of RWBY they would go back in time and redo if they could, the writers answered with Jaune's Volume 1 arc. It's definitely where all their inexperience with writing and their not really knowing exactly what kind of audience they were telling this story to really caught up to them and just dragged the whole thing down.

 

[Terrabrand]

Namely in that Jaune doesn't start to improve until he starts moving past the attitude of "I don't/shouldn't need help from my peers to succeed even though I'm an idiot," like how Naruto learned Kage Bunshin in a few hours and made Genin despite being a lazy slacker and loudmouthed prankster because "dreams" and all that. Naruto never needed to ask his teammates to teach him to stop sucking. He just proves himself by being determined and some elite older ninja gets impressed and teaches him.

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We never see any sign Naruto is lazy. Yes, from the start we see him pranking, but we also see in eg chapter covers him apparentky doing stuff like one hundred punches a night. Indeed, one of our earliest plot threads is him lecturing Konohamaru about hard work and how there are no shortcuts to being hokage.

We also don't actually have that much evidence Shadow Clones are all that difficult. They are indicated to be a forbidden technique largely due to cost.

Now, I'll grant you that there are super lazy shonen protagonists, although the only example I can name off the top of my head is Jaden from Yu-Gi-Oh GX. But Naruto is a poor choice of examples given there is no evidence of laziness unless you count failure which... uh. Really isn't evidence of any such thing.

 

[Delphisage]

What really baffles me is why they thought "I cheated my way into Beacon" would be an excuse that anybody watching and thinking about this show would buy. I understand why they would make Jaune a loser for the sake of checkboxing, and why they would give the one male character in a show full of girls so much focus, but not where their excuse in Jaunedice came from, nor why they thought Forever Fall would fix it.

Now, I'll grant you that there are super lazy shonen protagonists, although the only example I can name off the top of my head is Jaden from Yu-Gi-Oh GX

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Wait, what?

 

[Zam]

So I worried making this comparison would feel reductive, but after thought I decided that doing so might raise awareness which would be a net positive. So here I go.

My general assumption for how the SDC operates is more or less along the same lines as the palm oil industry, which also allows for the whole "We pay them equally" thing to be addressed, IE, that doesn't mean Faunus aren't given unfair tasks, unsafe working conditions or aren't put in debt other ways like say through company stores that overcharge them for basic necessities.

Here, this video covers much of what I am referencing:

 

[Leingod]

We never see any sign Naruto is lazy. Yes, from the start we see him pranking, but we also see in eg chapter covers him apparentky doing stuff like one hundred punches a night. Indeed, one of our earliest plot threads is him lecturing Konohamaru about hard work and how there are no shortcuts to being hokage.

We also don't actually have that much evidence Shadow Clones are all that difficult. They are indicated to be a forbidden technique largely due to cost.

Now, I'll grant you that there are super lazy shonen protagonists, although the only example I can name off the top of my head is Jaden from Yu-Gi-Oh GX. But Naruto is a poor choice of examples given there is no evidence of laziness unless you count failure which... uh. Really isn't evidence of any such thing.

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Naruto, like Jaune, is completely ignorant of extremely basic concepts about the world he lives in and the profession he chose that he should have learned years ago (and in fact he has even less excuse than Jaune, because we know for a fact that Jaune never went to a combat school while Naruto went to a literal ninja academy); in fact, both of them are ignorant of the very name of the source of everyone's superpowers in this universe. Just a quick note, any notions you might have about anyone deliberately sabotaging him in the Academy is pure fanon.

Naruto, like Jaune, acknowledges that it's a long, hard road to his dream but still fully expects to be able to do it despite there being plenty of peers who are more skilled and have been working plenty hard themselves (the idea that Sasuke has ever coasted on talent is, again, fanon).

Naruto, like Jaune, is totally willing to throw himself into physical training, which is exciting and exactly what they imagine when they hear "training to be a Ninja/Huntsman," just like Jaune is willing to throw himself at Cardin over and over in a no-stakes sparring class no matter how badly his ass gets kicked, but both of them completely conk out the moment they have to sit down in a classroom and apply themselves mentally and come off as lazy slackers despite determination being noted both in and out of universe as one of their key traits.

Naruto, unlike Jaune, impresses several experienced adults in succession with his determination and other good qualities despite being a knucklehead who repeatedly skipped class to graffiti monuments and gets personal tutelage that he quickly absorbs and catches up, then races ahead, of his peers. Meanwhile, Jaune is repeatedly told by his teachers to shape up because his performance sucks no matter how "determined" he might be, and he needs to ask his peer for help and take a lot of late-night extra training sessions before he even begins to catch up with his friends, something he's still in the process of doing.