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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
    • Leingod said:
    Yeah, because they're mooks with handguns. They're no threat at all to anyone except the other mooks, and Adam demonstrated literally seconds ago that he could easily and trivially take them out without killing them at no threat to himself. It would have been exactly as easy to do what he did literally seconds ago and just launch his scabbard or just shoot the guy with it - we saw literally seconds ago that both options can take them out without killing them - but instead he says, "Fuck it, he dies" and uses his Semblance. If you were easily and safely taking out a bunch of guys with a nightstick or taser or something, and then you suddenly decide "Fuck it" and gun the last guy down in cold blood even though what you were doing was working just fine and nothing was stopping you from continuing to do it? That's suddenly a lot iffier, especially when you do it from behind at a guy who was pretty much just brainlessly plugging away at a truck that showed no signs of caring.

    Like, if Adam hadn't done that last part, I'd be right with you that Ghira was being a total tool. But he did, and he didn't need to, he wasn't even being attacked by that point so you can't really argue it's the heat of the moment, he'd already demonstrated he could rip through them like tissue paper without using lethal force so you can't argue necessity, he pretty much just did it because he wanted to, and that really isn't an attitude Sienna should have been praising him for.

    Like, unless he's been lead to believe a gun has kryptonite bullets, it's not "lethal self-defense" if Superman murders a guy for shooting at him, because he's Superman. He's proved a thousand times over that a guy shooting at him presents exactly zero threat.
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    Yep not like we saw a dozen 'mooks' who could have been killed by those bullets that where only safe as lone as the rednecks didn't decide to flank. I mean they are mooks so they don't deserve safety or their lives if they aren't named characters. Also the short has Ghira telling people to not fight back as he tries to do reasoned discourse to people who are shooting him in the face and trying to kill everyone. Every time he gets shot he hides behind the truck again and isn't supermaning it at all. Supermaning is when you stand there not giving a shit about the bullets and try and talk things out. It also frames the person who fought back and the person who supported him fighting back as unambiguously the bad guys with the rest of the mooks as gullible for following someone who would fight back. I mean sure Adam is a bad guy but why even put him in a position like this then? Why introduce KKK Kill Squads into RWBY only to use them to show how bad the bad guys are and frame Ghira as the true leader by not even defending anyone except by trying to talk at the people shooting at them for being Faunus? It is an issue of framing.
     
    Tasrill said:
    Welp RWBY still seems on the 'only real solution to racism is being a model minority that is so good Jesus will tell you to chill' thing. When getting ambushed by the KKK with them literally shooting people in the face, fighting back is something only bad guys do and lethal self defence against them is even worse, it makes you Adam.
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    While I'm not strictly sure that was the intent I do see your point.
     
    Tasrill said:
    Welp RWBY still seems on the 'only real solution to racism is being a model minority that is so good Jesus will tell you to chill' thing. When getting ambushed by the KKK with them literally shooting people in the face, fighting back is something only bad guys do and lethal self defence against them is even worse, it makes you Adam.
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    Fighting back isn't neccesarily the bad thing, but it doesn't help your cause. Of the parties involved, only Ghira and maybe Sienna if we stretch it a bit were actually trying to find an amicable solution. It's hard to use logic and reasoning against a foe that cares for neither. Adam chose to go lethal, something which only made the bad situation worse, and he got praised for it, ensuring that it would only get worse.

    If he'd stuck to non-lethal takedowns, and gotten praised, we might see a very different Adam today. (I mean... we probably wouldn't, but we might)
     
    Mook said:
    I think that's a highly inaccurate read on the situation.

    Adam didn't have to kill that guy. That guy was a complete mook. Adam could have easily stopped him just by shooting his sword (handle first) at him like he did against the other KKK-wannabes. He could have rushed in with his super speed and knocked him down. Heck Adam could have just shot him with his gun and the guy would probably just have been knocked unconscious instead of being killed, thanks to Aura. The only reason that guy died was because Adam chose to use his Semblance to unleash a single overpowered attack that broke the guy's Aura and kept going through his flesh.
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    Whether there were actually other options is less important than whether Adam thought he had other options. And given that we saw Ghira's aura flare after he got hit with a shot earlier in the short, there's reason to think that his aura was down at the time, meaning he could actually have died there. So Adam had to make a split second decision, and he couldn't know what options would be fast enough to stop the guy before he got off his shot. While his choice may have been sub-optimal, I maintain that it was reasonable given the circumstance.

    If that was deliberate malice on Adam's part or him getting carried away is uncertain. But Ghira scolding him was not the problem in that situation. It was Sienna encouraging him. Praising him. He killed a man in cold blood and got cheered for it. And that made him want more. If Ghira made a mistake in this situation its that he didn't just knock those people down himself and then try to talk with them after the fight was over, when Adam killed that guy the situation was already beyond salvaging because Ghira could not encourage that sort of behavior but he had already lost to much credibility to reel Adam in.
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    While I agree that Sienna was by far the bigger problem here, I maintain that Ghira also made a mistake in his handling of the situation. A far more understandable mistake, and one made for far better reasons, but a mistake nonetheless. Adam saved his life, at the cost of one of their enemies. Now, encouraging killing is very bad, but scolding Adam for saving his life wasn't exactly a great decision either. The ideal solution would have been acknowledging the saving of his life, but still treating the loss as tragic, without being overly condemning - at least in the moment. Bring up other options in an after action report once everyone's calmed down a bit, and is more able to look at the situation rationally.


    Tasrill said:
    Welp RWBY still seems on the 'only real solution to racism is being a model minority that is so good Jesus will tell you to chill' thing. When getting ambushed by the KKK with them literally shooting people in the face, fighting back is something only bad guys do and lethal self defence against them is even worse, it makes you Adam.
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    I don't think Ghira was intended to be the one correct way to do things. It felt like that scene was trying to show his flaws. To show how he took non-violence to an extreme. To show that the Fang's complaints about his leadership weren't entirely unreasonable.
     
    Ghira came off really badly to me. Like, he didn't even seem horrified...he seemed like he didn't grasp the seriousness of the situation.Though it's not like Sienna's reaction wasn't problematic either but hers felt closer to appropriate.

    Nice to see more Khan but the fact she's cool and apparently a really good fighter makes it more jarring that she died so easily. Though she apparently has an incredible blind spot for homicidal compatriots. Given his actions in the short and her supposedly good judgement I would have expected her to keep him next to her.

    Also, overuse of spin to block and the fact that people are straight up ignoring bullets that should be hitting them.

    But it was fun! Not sure if it's *good* but I at least enjoyed the fights enough.
     
    Hydroplatypus said:
    Whether there were actually other options is less important than whether Adam thought he had other options. And given that we saw Ghira's aura flare after he got hit with a shot earlier in the short, there's reason to think that his aura was down at the time, meaning he could actually have died there. So Adam had to make a split second decision, and he couldn't know what options would be fast enough to stop the guy before he got off his shot. While his choice may have been sub-optimal, I maintain that it was reasonable given the circumstance.
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    After re watching the short I saw something important for the whole scene, before unleashing the Moon Slice he was going to stright up execute someone, he was standing on top of one of the humans holding his sword high in a reverse grip, in exactly the same way that he did latter on the short during the SDC raid, BTW that is a classic Matador pose only missing the cape, and the only one that could see him at the moment was Gira.
     
    Dream Logic said:
    Ghira came off really badly to me. Like, he didn't even seem horrified...he seemed like he didn't grasp the seriousness of the situation.Though it's not like Sienna's reaction wasn't problematic either but hers felt closer to appropriate.

    Nice to see more Khan but the fact she's cool and apparently a really good fighter makes it more jarring that she died so easily. Though she apparently has an incredible blind spot for homicidal compatriots. Given his actions in the short and her supposedly good judgement I would have expected her to keep him next to her.

    Also, overuse of spin to block and the fact that people are straight up ignoring bullets that should be hitting them.
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    While I agree that Ghira was way to passive in this situation (which I'm pretty sure is intentional since this is showing why Sienna and Adam became so much more popular) I do feel that in his defense it should be pointed out that Adam did just prove that he could easily take out any of those fighters in an instant, without doing any serious harm to them. So Ghira is absolutely right that Adam escalating to straight up murder against the leader was completely unnecessary and hurt their cause for no reason. If Adam had just shot his sheathe at him or something then Ghira would likely have had nothing but praise for him. And if Adam hadn't resorted to murder then no real harm would have been done, so the White Fang would have had an opportunity to convert at least hardcore anti-Faunus extremists, instead Adam ensured that those people would only be even more convinced that Faunus are bad.

    Honestly I felt like the trailer did a good job of making it clear why she died so easily. Aside from making a clear distinction between Sienna in her asskicking days with a more practical outfit and her weapon at hand compared to the political chairwarmer Sienna in impractical blinged out robes and with a reliance on bodyguards instead of her own weapon, the short also makes it pretty clear that Sienna trusted Adam and was grooming him to become her right hand man, and potentially even her successor. She got ganked so easily because even with his betrayal she truly did not expect him to kill her, she probably figured he would force her to step aside, like she did with Ghira. Her lack of judgement with him also makes sense, as someone who is all to willing to break a few human eggheads in order to make the omelette of equal rights for the Faunus its easy for her to mistake Adam's brutality as him just being a passionate defender of the Faunus who isn't afraid to get his hands dirty. Basically she sees herself in him, not realizing that the actual cause of his brutality is simply that he enjoys it and enjoys being lionized for it.

    The fight scenes definitively had some wonky moments but they did also give us Adam being the one who taught Chibi Blake her leet sword kicking ninja skillz:
     
    Mook said:
    While I agree that Ghira was way to passive in this situation (which I'm pretty sure is intentional since this is showing why Sienna and Adam became so much more popular) I do feel that in his defense it should be pointed out that Adam did just prove that he could easily take out any of those fighters in an instant, without doing any serious harm to them. So Ghira is absolutely right that Adam escalating to straight up murder against the leader was completely unnecessary and hurt their cause for no reason. If Adam had just shot his sheathe at him or something then Ghira would likely have had nothing but praise for him. And if Adam hadn't resorted to murder then no real harm would have been done, so the White Fang would have had an opportunity to convert at least hardcore anti-Faunus extremists, instead Adam ensured that those people would only be even more convinced that Faunus are bad.
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    Eh I find the idea they could have changed the minds of people who seemingly ambushed them with intent to murder and have probably murdered plenty of other Faunus who were less well armed unlikely at best myself.

    Though I do find it funny that Ghira didn't even seem all that horrified on any kind of morale level by what Adam did and was just like "Dude, this messes up my brand." OK half joking but still XD
    Dream Logic said:
    Ghira came off really badly to me. Like, he didn't even seem horrified...he seemed like he didn't grasp the seriousness of the situation.Though it's not like Sienna's reaction wasn't problematic either but hers felt closer to appropriate.

    Nice to see more Khan but the fact she's cool and apparently a really good fighter makes it more jarring that she died so easily. Though she apparently has an incredible blind spot for homicidal compatriots. Given his actions in the short and her supposedly good judgement I would have expected her to keep him next to her.
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    I'm unclear if they intended to show Ghira's approach as flawed myself so its hard for me to say given everything that was going on but I can see your point.

    Agreed on pretty much all fronts. Someone made an interesting post bout how she's a somewhat ranged fighter which explains why Adam (A coward) only struck when he had several soldiers aiming weapons at her and struck close and from behind and another noted that Sienna up until that point had seemed fond of Adam, seeing him as a comrade and ally so she probably wasn't expecting him to straight up and coldly try and ice her.
     
    No one's mentioned Adam's clothing and mask gaining their swirling patterns throughout the short? What is he, getting his jacket embroidered between fights :V?
     
    I was directed to a really insightful breakdown of Adam's manipulation and abuse of Blake in the short and felt it would be good to share, with permission granted by the original author.
     
    Jakobstj said:
    Clearly the final showdown between them will involve both of them throwing/firing their blades at each other and then kicking them back.
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    Adam&Blake: BEHOLD! THIS PEERLESS SWORD KICKING TECHNIQUE HAS BEEN PASSED DOWN THE WHITE FANG FOR GENERATIONS!

    WhoAmEye said:
    EVERY STITCH IS ANOTHER KILL
    FEAR ME
    yeah sure whatever, knitting ninja
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    Look, some master swordsmen practice calligraphy, Adam has embroidery. Don't judge him, its a perfectly fine hobby for a man to have.
    :p
     
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    Apropos of nothing, I'm of the opinion that fans ascribe way too much significance to "team leader" and "partners" and all that. It's been outright stated that a lot of Huntsman teams don't actually stick together past graduation, the "team leader" has absolutely no actual authority or rights past what their teammates are willing to give them, and the only significance of being someone's "partner" is that it's the person you met in the forest before you got stuck with the other half of your team. Ruby and Weiss are close friends, and yes, they have been assigned as partners, but that doesn't mean that a mission to find the woman who destroyed Beacon Academy, killed Pyrrha Nikos and Professor Ozpin, masterminded the death of Penny Polendina, and caused an untold amount of deaths (worldwide, apparently) by bringing Grimm into Vale, hacking the Atlesian mechs and destroying the CCT network is going to all just get shoved aside because Weiss's dad is kind of a jerk as far as Ruby knows.

    Again, apropos of nothing, but it seems to come up a lot in fanfiction and discussions where people ascribe a lot more significance to being partners or being team leader than the positions actually warrant. Like saying that the MC of a quest has to be team leader because "player agency."
     
    Leingod said:
    Apropos of nothing, I'm of the opinion that fans ascribe way too much significance to "team leader" and "partners" and all that. It's been outright stated that a lot of Huntsman teams don't actually stick together past graduation, the "team leader" has absolutely no actual authority or rights past what their teammates are willing to give them, and the only significance of being someone's "partner" is that it's the person you met in the forest before you got stuck with the other half of your team. Ruby and Weiss are close friends, and yes, they have been assigned as partners, but that doesn't mean that a mission to find the woman who destroyed Beacon Academy, killed Pyrrha Nikos and Professor Ozpin, masterminded the death of Penny Polendina, and caused an untold amount of deaths (worldwide, apparently) by bringing Grimm into Vale, hacking the Atlesian mechs and destroying the CCT network is going to all just get shoved aside because Weiss's dad is kind of a jerk as far as Ruby knows.

    Again, apropos of nothing, but it seems to come up a lot in fanfiction and discussions where people ascribe a lot more significance to being partners or being team leader than the positions actually warrant. Like saying that the MC of a quest has to be team leader because "player agency."
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    I can kind of get you, at least on the quest/leader front, however the early show gave a lot of emphasis to Ruby being leader and the duties involved and the shows spent a fair bit of time developing partner based relationships and giving them a lot of weight, so whatever they might mean in universe, narratively, I think they are meant to be quite important.
     
    Zam said:
    I can kind of get you, at least on the quest/leader front, however the early show gave a lot of emphasis to Ruby being leader and the duties involved and the shows spent a fair bit of time developing partner based relationships and giving them a lot of weight, so whatever they might mean in universe, narratively, I think they are meant to be quite important.
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    Yeah, those things were important to Ruby (and to Weiss), but they weren't things that were enforced and mandated by the school system itself. I've pointed this out before: there do not seem to be any special rules regarding partners or leaders. No one ever tells Weiss to stop trying to undercut Ruby's authority because it's a rule or anything, but because she needs to be a good teammate before she can even think about being a good leader and should trust that Ozpin knows what he's doing, and so on.

    "Team leader" is a position that has absolutely no authority that your team is not willing to cede to you. "Partner" is a term that means nothing after Initiation except what you make of it, and neither does the team itself once you graduate. They aren't enforced paradigms; they're nebulous social templates that every team has to define in their own way, which is probably part of the lesson Ozpin is trying to teach by structuring it this way.
     
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    Leingod said:
    Yeah, those things were important to Ruby (and to Weiss), but they weren't things that were enforced and mandated by the school system itself. I've pointed this out before: there do not seem to be any special rules regarding partners or leaders. No one ever tells Weiss to stop trying to undercut Ruby's authority because it's a rule or anything, but because she needs to be a good teammate before she can even think about being a good leader and should trust that Ozpin knows what he's doing, and so on.

    "Team leader" is a position that has absolutely no authority that your team is not willing to cede to you. "Partner" is a term that means nothing after Initiation except what you make of it, and neither does the team itself once you graduate. They aren't enforced paradigms; they're nebulous social templates that every team has to define in their own way, which is probably part of the lesson Ozpin is trying to teach by structuring it this way.
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    We can take as example team STRQ, who after graduation kinda separated to all do their own things, well there's that thing with Tai knocking up Raven then Summer, but aside Tai and Summer founding a family, the other half of the team lived thei own adventures, and it wasn't presented as something outside of the ordinary.
     
    The best thing about this short is that it firmly establishes that Sienna is just as much of a shitheel as Adam. Instead of making sure everyone is alright including Ghira, she instead immediately uses the tragedy of the situation to push her own agenda forward. You have no idea how frustrating it has been to see people constantly say that she was reasonable and rational. Remember that when we meet her, her only concern is that Adam started a war he didn't think they would win. What she didn't say is as important as what she did say. She didn't have a word to say about the hundreds of human and faunus lives lost, she didn't care about the CCT going down or that an Academy dedicated to training Hunters to fight against the murderous hellbeasts, just that she didn't think her White Fang would win in open conflict.
     
    Leingod said:
    Yeah, those things were important to Ruby (and to Weiss), but they weren't things that were enforced and mandated by the school system itself. I've pointed this out before: there do not seem to be any special rules regarding partners or leaders. No one ever tells Weiss to stop trying to undercut Ruby's authority because it's a rule or anything, but because she needs to be a good teammate before she can even think about being a good leader and should trust that Ozpin knows what he's doing, and so on.

    "Team leader" is a position that has absolutely no authority that your team is not willing to cede to you. "Partner" is a term that means nothing after Initiation except what you make of it, and neither does the team itself once you graduate. They aren't enforced paradigms; they're nebulous social templates that every team has to define in their own way, which is probably part of the lesson Ozpin is trying to teach by structuring it this way.
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    I suppose I am having trouble grasping where you're going with this, I get the issue with quests, but the show did seem to place a lot of emphasis on the duties of a leader and importance of partners, especially with Ruby being the one to call out attacks in battle, (Or Jaune) and the closeness or dedication/passion shown or emphasized in most of the major partnerships.
     
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