#i headcanon that nora and ruby fight over food

[doctor-plagueis]

RWBY Booty Tier List

Hi I said it would happen so now it's gonna happen, time to rate asses and explain why I gave them that rating...

(also they are in order from flattest to phattest)

[This took way too long (T-T) ]

Starting with D TIER Aka Flat as fuck

Raven: Ya go to the lowest tier in D tier ya all-tits-no-ass having ass, you deadbeat fucko (I really don't like parents who leave their children, how'd you guess?).

Weiss : Sorry girl but even with all your dance training, your Sperm donor's DNA is in you, if it was just your mom's DNA you'd rocket up to A TIER, still more ass than Raven tho, which says a lot about Raven since Weiss is as flat as a wooden plank (sorry @naughtyweiss your girl has no ass).

All of team NDGO: these bitches show up once or twice, and, in the novels they do something bad? I didn't read it, but they like sacrifice some people to the Grimm or something? Anyways they have almost no ass too little to actually matter.

C TIER Aka Too much muscle

Pyrrha : Sorry unbeatable girl your life style is just too healthy, with all her exercises and no fat foods she has no cushioning, I'm sorry Pyrrha you just have too much muscle.

Reese : With all her skating she must have some muscle in the back, like literally, her muscles are trained to keep her on the board during combat so her ass is super firm, but that's a bit of a downside since it's too firm, kinda hard actually like really hard.

Also she gives me party animal girl vibes, that doesn't affect anything just thought I'd mention it.

Elm: Have you seen how tall and beefy that girl is? Now does this affect her backside...mmm...kind of? Her ass is just and, I mean just muscle which is bad because no cushioning.

But her thighs tho mm~mm delicious.

Yang : Yang is all about her upper body, she's proud of her tits and her arms, she is Miss "punch first ask later" after all, so i can actually see her skipping some leg days, like Reese her booty is alot of muscle but not so much cushion, sorry Yang.

Arslan : Like Yang, Arslan is all about working out and honing her body to peak physical fighting ability, however, this girl has genetics on her side, her tits aren't as big as Yang’s however, she make up for having a tentsy little bit of cushion for the pushin' not really enough to be B TIER though.

B TIER Aka Now were gettin' good

Penny Ver.2 : Penny Version 1 was pure metal (at least in my headcanon) so she was all legs no butt, however, Penny Version 2 (again in my headcanon) had synthetic skin, now I'm not saying Pietro is some weird pervert giving his child a fat ass, but he was "generous" which was inaccurate as...

Penny (human) : Penny as a human never had the chance to exercise [fuck you RT (T-T)], so her booty was a little lacking but it was still bigger and rounder than her robot body.

Ruby: Now you and I both know that with all the sweets Ruby eats she isn't exactly thin, good thing though is all the fat goes to her ass, Ruby has that fatty y'all!

Neo : I'm sure people will question this one but, Neo's height is a detrement on her ass, since she's so short her ass has to be proportional to her actual height, so for women her height she has so much ass but compared to the others in this list it isn't as much.

Coco: Coco takes care of her fashion and her body. She does squats often and keeps a balance between fat and firmness. Unfortunately genetics gave her a cute face but not a phat ass, sorry queen.

Summer: Same as Ruby except she has that MILFY boost to her hips and booty (she also has bigger tits but, oh well this isn't the Titty Tier list so...).

Winter : Training for the military helped null the taint of Jacques DNA in her, so she took a bit more of her mother’s blessed genes, her ass isn't exactly impressive like the girls in A TIER but it's nothing to scoff at either, unlike her sister (sorry Weissey).

Miltiades "Miltia" : both sisters wear heels, however, Miltia has bigger boobs than her twin while Mel has a bigger booty, still wearing heels and being as acrobatic as they both are requires a lot of lower body training, and also since they work at a club as security they do know how to seduce people, and that did affected their rating.

A TIER Aka Nearly perfectly fuckable

Harriet : Now to be one hundred percent honest Harriet has more thighs than ass, however, with her focus on speed and the training she does, she must have a nice fuckable ass, not the biggest or roundest but really, really nice.

Melanie: Both sisters are guards for Junior's club, but, I like to think that Mel also works as a Stripper or Lap dancer (Hooker if you got enough to buy her services and have a dick big enough, she's a bit of a size queen), so she worked on making her already fat ass even better and also took the time to hone her sex appeal, those being her twerking and lapdancing.

Velvet : Bunny gal has some phat Bunny Buns if ya catch my meaning, like go back to volume 3 and get a good look at her costume, girl's got hips and ass like she was bred for it!

Willow: Have you seen her in the newest volumes?? She has a chance (admittedly small) against the legendary bellabooties Gahtdayum!

Too bad she wasted it with a nearly sterile fucking shit pile of a human like Jacques, ugh... (How he managed to have 3 children baffles me, must've taken half the world’s supply of Viagra)

[Side note our favorite Schnee femboy took after his mom, if he was on the list he'd be just below Harriet hehe].

A+ TIER Candidates for the Bubble Booty Brigade (BBB)

Glynda : Glynda is a professional huntress, she is a teacher and she's decked out in dominatrix gear, can I make it any clearer?

Salem : Salem is the original MILF, the thiccest witch of remnant , and also, she has magic and is technically a monster girl sooo... that gives her extra points (who would've guessed I like monster girls hehe).

The next entry might be blasphemous for some and for that I apologize but...

Blake and Kali : I'm sorry kitties, even though the belabooties are know world wide they are not yet in the BBB. Blake has the firmer booty because of her time in the Fang but Kali has the MILF bonus.

Because of their similarities and their diferences they tie for top of A+ tier.

S TIER The BUBBLE BOOTY BRIGADE

The three heavenly asses of remnant, only three girl stand a top the mountain of the perfect Bubble Booty and they are in order...

May Zedong : May has been depicted by the fandom as being really curvy, especially the cow udders she calls breasts, however she hides her curves under her clothes. The same applies to the fucking badonk she hides in her baggy pants, so much so in fact, that May should be number two of the BBB but because she's so shy about her body she's demoted to number three, still, being a member of the Brigade is a blesing of itself.

Emerald Sustrai : As stated in the previous entry Em should be number three, but because May is so shy and Emerald isn't they swaped places. Em is number two because of one singular thing, she knows her ass is her best atribute, and she fucking flaunts it, she knows she can make men and futas pitch tents, and make women stare like horndogs just by walking past them. Not only that, but she wear clothes that accentuate her ass from short shorts to miniskirts, she knows how to make anyone undeserving cream themselves just by swaying her hips a little and winking. Her seduction skills boosted her above everyone else except one.

NORA VALKYRIE THE ONE TRUE BUBBLE BOOTY OF REMNANT

Every single step a jiggle, every single jump or tiny hop and the world stops to stare, every time she passes by jaws hit the floor, every man woman and futa either wants Nora or wants to be Nora.

Nora's voluptuous cheeks are legendary and the worst part of it all is: She does know the effect she has on people, and she gives zero shits about it.

Because no one is worthy of her divine ass cheeks, except for two men: Jaune Arc and Lie Ren.

She's found her studs the ones who care for her, love her, give her the world AND the ones who have huge bitch breaking cocks to fuck her into the sheets like rutting animals.Every.Single.Night.

Every day of her life is one big teasing session for her studs, she purposefully wear skirts just short enough to see the glorious bounce, she always finds excuses to bend over, she sits on their laps as often as possible.

Just so she can have the mind blowing three ways she has every night.

All hail Booty Queen Nora Valkyrie.

Now everyone thank you for being patient this was something i spent a few days writing (like 3-4 days) and I only wrote this for that time so I hope y'all like it.

Some chacters are missing I know, but I really am comfortable with how it is now.

As always this SHOULD NOT AFFECT YOUR WRITING.

This was a thought experiment of mine, and like I always say in this sort of thing WRITE HOW YOU WANT TO WRITE I hope this was clear.

Thanks for reading and please if you so desire share it with friends.

But for now see ya!

#Rwby #NSFW-ish #raven branwen #weiss schnee #team ndgo #pyrrha nikos #reese chloris #elm ederne #yang xiao long #arslan altan #penny polendina #ruby rose #neopolitian (rwby) #coco adel #summer rose #winter schnee #Miltiades Malachite #Harriet bree #melanie malachite #Velvet scarlatina #willow schnee #glynda goodwitch #rwby salem #blake belladonna #kali belladonna #may zedong #emerald sustrai #nora valkyrie

[itsclydebitches]

The lack of action from our "heroes" is eerily similar to a Nostalgia Critic sketch I saw when I still watched his show. The idea was that to parallel what was reviewed in the episode, Fantastic Four, where the heroes barely did anything for most of it, Doug and his friends got superpowers and only choose to sit on the couch and watch Netflix while the world is under attack. The only difference is that was meant to lampoon the movie, and wasn't meant to be taken seriously.

Massive replay incoming! I haven’t seen the Fantastic Four, but I do still have a lot of thoughts on this choice and how badly it came across... 

Though we can absolutely debate the merits/detriments of having 3/4ths of your title characters keeping to the sidelines while the Big Bad is here, I 100% believe that this could have been improved immensely if RWBY a) were more consistently written and b) allowed its characters to tackle conflicts central to what’s currently going on, not conflicts made up just for the sake of having a conflict (Yang randomly fights with Ruby, Ren has criticisms and then never brings them up again, etc.) 

So what do I mean by this. I mean that the fandom isn’t necessarily wrong to argue things like, “RWB needs to be there to help Nora and Penny” or “They need time to regain their aura.” The problem is that the show never established these needs as necessary. The viewers have simply assumed those needs are there and judge the group’s actions accordingly. But for those of us asking questions like, “But how does Ruby standing by the window benefit Nora?” or “How long does it really take them to regain their strength?” we’re never given answers and thus are left with the belief that these needs do not exist and the group’s choices are not justified. It becomes, as you say, akin to a parody. 

So how do we fix this? By having the show acknowledge those questions and provide believable answers. A few minor tweaks might include: 

Having someone ask how long they’re just going to sit there. Let another character argue that they need to rest up before they do anything else. They can’t help others if they’re collapsing themselves. Then, keep these limitations consistent across the volume. In the last episode, Ren was suddenly using his semblance again, despite his aura breaking with very little time having passed between the two moments. So if he only needs a tiny chunk of time in horrific conditions to recover, why does team RWB supposedly need the whole day and night in complete safety, with heat, food, etc.? If “We have to recover” is meant to be a justification, show us elsewhere what lacking that results in: Ren, Jaune, and Oscar do not get their aura/energy back, they’re making mistakes, at the end of their rope, and generally not functioning because look, their conditions are so much worse. This is why a mansion break is necessary. 

Have the group actively be trying to solve their problems. We didn’t start with “Someone needs to watch over Nora” we started with “Nora is incredibly injured and needs help”... but no one ever tried to get her help. Have them cycle through and reject some possibilities. Then have Weiss think of calling Klein and approach Whitley to see if he knows how to contact him. There, your protagonists are active and Weiss is helping to repair this relationship. As it stands, the group appears content to continue sitting around while Nora suffers, despite knowing she needs medical attention. We know, emotionally, they’re not actually content, but that’s what the actions imply. Where’s the scene where Ruby frantically asks May if the Happy Huntresses have any doctors and is it possible to bring one here? Where’s Blake hesitantly asking if it’s worth going back to Ironwood to get her help? The fandom assumes that sitting in the mansion = devotion to helping Nora, but we don’t actually see them trying to help Nora. Not in any meaningful way beyond putting cold towels on her head. What are they willing to risk and sacrifice for their teammate? Because sitting drinking tea while they hope things will magically fix themselves doesn’t convey much. We’re not talking here about how much the fandom assumes the group will do for Nora, we’re talking about what their actual actions read like. 

Establish then why it takes three powerful fighters to watch over one unconscious woman already being cared for in a comparatively safe environment. The fandom acts as if Nora is a target when she’s not. No one is explicitly after her. If anything, given the initial assumption that the Hound was after Ruby as a SEW, she puts Nora in more danger by hanging around. Have the group debate the merits of being here to defend her if, by chance, something happens vs. putting their skills to use during a battle where very few huntsmen remain. 

This debate should include the fact that half their team is missing. Not gone, missing. Last RWB saw they were going down to Mantle to help with general needs and low-level grimm activity. Now they’ve been MIA for hours. Blake, as the assumed love interest, and Ruby, as the sister, should be particularly desperate to find out what’s happened to Yang. If the group has to stay in the mansion for plot reasons, have Weiss talk them out of running into Mantle without a plan. What if what happened to the others happens to you too? The point is, May shouldn’t be the one concerned about the rest of the team and May shouldn’t be the one out looking for information. 

Let the group actually decide something for once. Show us that they were going to help Mantle or Atlas and then, oh no, Penny interrupted those plans. As it is though, that scene frames it like Ruby will happily continue hanging out in the mansion until something else  — something more dangerous than May’s demand to choose  — forces her to take action. Indeed, that’s precisely what happened with the Hound. 

Have Weiss or Blake begin to question why Ruby isn’t doing anything. Weiss has a whole conversation with May about how she wants to protect her home now. Blake is all about faunus rights and protection, with a whole faunus population freezing to death down below. Have one of them threaten to walk out, or actually do it with a, “You don’t need me to watch Nora sleep. I’m going to go do what I can.” These characters are supposed to be people with differing motivations and goals, yet whenever that should matter they’re suddenly happy to follow Ruby, even if by all logic there should be disagreement. 

Have Nora wake up and tell them to do something other than waiting by her bedside. Let her be the one to get them back on their feet, showing them that she’s fine  — she will be fine  — and imploring them to help even though she can’t right now. 

Explain to the audience what the group plans to do with all these civilians once they’re in the ships. Are they coming to the mansion? Try to fly them out of the kingdom? This is the one thing they’ve done since Amity and we’re given no indication what the actual plan is, let alone any debate about its merits. 

Have Ruby be the one to see Penny in her controlled state, not Whitley, and give us some insight into what that means for her. I’ve likewise seen a lot about how Ruby doesn’t just need to look after a sick Penny, she needs to be there to protect Penny and others from her... but does Ruby even know what’s going on? Penny clash-lands without an explanation, she’s busy with the Hound, Whitley and Willow see her heading to the vault, the Hound knocks Penny out, Ruby is distracted by reunions and Ironwood’s threat. The imagined scene where Ruby learns what’s happening to her friend and weighs the dangers of leaving a controlled Penny alone in the mansion are just that: imagined. 

That’s really just a small sampling of options here. As said, there are plenty of ways to tweak this plot to make the heroes seem far less passive than they come across here. The fandom often claims that those who criticize this plot-line don’t understand “show don’t tell.” Meaning, RWBY supposedly showed us something rather than telling us in a hand-holding way and we just didn’t understand it. It becomes more of an insult than an argument, the claim that RWBY wrote something nuanced, it’s not their fault you couldn’t grasp it. But it’s not that we missed the answers here, they simply don’t exist, and the fandom has made up their own answers instead, mapping it onto the canon and assuming that’s what RT intended all along. One individual’s ability to come up with a answer does not mean the story actually gave one, it just means we’re all writing RWBY fanfic in our heads while we watch the show. 

And this is by no means an isolated incident. It happens every episode. Our latest bout of headcanons has come about due to the questions, “Why does kinetic energy only hurt grimm?” and “If it only hurts grimm, why was Hazel supposedly destroyed?” Each viewer is providing a different answer  — “Kinetic energy is different in this world,” “It has to do with the amount of dust in Hazel’s body,” “The blast went in one direction, towards Hazel, and decimated everything in its path, but the aftershocks only hurt grimm”  — all of these complicated, unsubstantiated, and ultimately noncanonical explanations... rather than just saying, “Yeah, it doesn’t make sense based on what the show has told us.” The mansion issue is just a particularly egregious example because we recognize that there’s a major problem with taking your main characters out of the action like that. Yet rather than acknowledging the problems with the writing, many fans are determined to fill in those answers themselves until it makes sense. And it does make sense! So many of these explanations would work, but right now they do not exist within RWBY. If we’re supposed to have an answer like, “The group knows they need to go help, but they’re just too traumatized and exhausted to do it. They know it’s wrong, but they can’t move” then tell us that. Show us that. Make it clear for the audience what the takeaway is. Because when you leave it entirely up to viewer interpret, you might indeed get a lot of “They’re just traumatized and need a break” explanations... but you’ll also get a lot of, “Wow, they’re a really cowardly and callous group, huh?” explanations too. One half of the fandom shouldn’t be mad at the other half for interpreting a completely subjective plot-line differently from them, everyone should be mad that our writers didn’t bother to include the canonical explanations from the get-go. 

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #mymetas #Anonymous

[kitkatopinions]

Mercury Black.

Mercury for the RWBY asks post! One of my favorites in the Villains Group!

My top three ships for the character

I’ve shipped some pretty weird things for Mercury via fan fiction, so this list is a little bit weird, but uh... Mercury/Yang could have such an interesting dynamic and relationship if Mercury gets redeemed and works hard to be better. Another fun one is Whitley/Mercury. I’m sorry lol, but while writing a fic with a mutual wherein Mercury and Whitley were forced to interact as Watts was living in Schnee Manor and using Jacques, and the two of them ran away from their abusers together and had to rely on each other to survive... I started kinda shipping these two! It only works in AU fics right now (and was less weird when I thought Whitley was fifteen and Mercury was sixteen/seventeen.) Also, I don’t hate Mercury/Emerald. I tend to see them more as siblings, but dang, there’s some good artwork that has made me start seeing the chemistry there.

My three least favorite ships for the character

Mercury/Oscar is... Not my favorite. XD They’d have older brother, younger brother energy only and that’s it. Nora/Mercury is something I don’t think would work at all. And Adam/Mercury... Ew, I mean, it’s kinda ew. But I literally had to look up a list of ships and go ‘I don’t hate that’ for a lot of them to find three I definitely don’t like. He’s pretty easy to ship with a lot of people!

My biggest criticism for the character

There isn’t enough of it. The character Mercury does have is pretty good, but he’s used so sparingly that I almost forget he’s a character at times. He should’ve had a bigger role in the story, they should’ve put more emphasis on his relationships with more than just Emerald, they shouldn’t have dropped him out of season eight before he could do anything. We need to know more about him and see him vulnerable and have him be relevant to the plot again, or he’s in danger of becoming boring.

My favorite thing about the character

I love his versatility. I already talked about him being easy to ship with a lot of people, but it’s more than that. The knowledge that he just goes with things even if they’re crazy (”I killed my dad and then this lady showed up talking about destiny and took me to a castle with a magic demon woman so here I am”) makes him a character that can be put into a lot of situations. You want to get him redeemed? Throw him into a situation where he’s with the right people and away from the wrong ones and his character naturally starts adjusting to fit that. You want him to be sad and whumped? Isolate him with someone like Tyrian or Watts and let him suffer. Want him to be a hero from the get go? If Ironwood or Qrow had found him instead of Cinder, he can be! He can go to Beacon or be in Atlas as the friend of Penny! He’d adjust to that! Want him to be a wildcard grayer scale character who isn’t on the heroes side or Salem’s side? If Roman and Neo had found him instead of Cinder, he can be that! He can view Roman as a father figure. He could’ve run away from home when he was younger, found Ren and Nora, and become attached to them. He could’ve been friends with Team SSSN if he’d been sent to Haven before moving to Beacon. He could’ve been found by Raven and the tribe and become attached to them. He’s a character you can put into almost any scenario on any side and it’d work!

A headcanon I have about them

In my headcanons, Mercury was raised isolated and didn’t go to school, so Emerald saying he’s socially awkward wasn’t a lie at all. Mercury can’t hold a real conversation with anyone outside of talking about plans and illegal action... And Emerald, who he doesn’t want to admit is his best friend. Also when he went to Beacon, he started getting interested in all kinds of hobbies and things he’d never heard about before. He liked going to the library because there were always kids reading and playing games that looked interesting. He loved checking out the booths at the Vytal Festival and trying foods and wondering what the hell cotton candy even was. Emerald was constantly rolling her eyes about it, but she secretly found it endearing and it made her feel a little less cynical herself.

What I would change about them if I was making a re-write

He needs to be involved. I don’t know why he constantly got shafted, but he should’ve had a proper second fight with Yang, he could’ve gotten dropped into Atlas with Watts instead of Tyrian (or along with Tyrian.) And I know this is a bit of an unpopular opinion, but I think Mercury should’ve been the one to start his redemption in season eight and Emerald should’ve been given time to work through her Cinder issues some and get redeemed maybe in season nine. Like I said, Mercury is versatile, he never had someone who he was committed to and believed in amongst Salem’s followers outside of Emerald, he didn’t care about the cause, and he’s deeply connected to the trauma of being abused by his father. Like many Merc fans, I think he should’ve gotten a wake up call when he saw Oscar getting abused, and tried to convince Emerald to leave with him, and I think Emerald should have said she had to stay and try to talk to Cinder about what she’d heard Oscar tell Hazel. Mercury is reluctant, but agrees, and he’s the one who starts escaping with Oscar. Yang’s frustration and hesitance in trusting him would be more personal, but at the same time, it wouldn’t be Penny’s murderer that everyone (and Penny!) is working with so easily, then, either.

What I I think of their character allusion and what (if anything) I would change about it

Mercury (mythology) was the god of messengers, thieves, commerce, travelers, and trade. His predecessor in Greek mythology, Hermes, was a messenger of the gods and called ‘a divine trickster.’ If that sounds weird, it’s because it is. If that sounds like it fits more with Emerald, that’s because it does. Emerald, the thief, who steals from sales people and takes the reins in every deception and most conversations with other people, who carried out Cinder’s orders from Salem and was arguably one of the biggest contributors to the Fall of Beacon (messenger of gods,) who was the one to tell Salem why they’d failed in Haven, and then later was the one delivering Oscar back to the group and the first face Ironwood sees when he realizes he’s been tricked by Ruby’s group. Emerald could be argued as the messenger role here. I truly believe that they made Mercury based off of the god of Roman/Greek mythology only because he has special shoes. Mercury does connect to Hermes/Mercury as a guide to the dead, leading them to the Underworld. As an assassin, this is treated literally in the RWBY world, but he isn’t really utilized in that way! Other than murdering his abusive father, Mercury’s direct kill count is at one the same as Emerald (who is Penny’s murderer, period.) The only other connection is a very lose one - Hermes’ role as a boundary crosser reflects Mercury’s loose morals and his easy slide into villainy, but also his potential to cross over to another side at the drop of a hat as I already established. As I already said, I’d have Mercury either replace Tyrian when Watts goes to Atlas, or I’d have him join the two, and act as an assassin there, increasing his role of guiding the dead to the Underworld. And having him be the one to deliver Ozpin/Oscar makes him more of a messenger of the gods, but I would also give him some important information about Salem to deliver to Ozpin as well. And I’d also have Salem ask him and Emerald to tell her what had happened at Haven and have him play more of a role when Cinder went to talk to Raven in the mid seasons. I’d have Mercury used to deliver information from Cinder to Roman in the early seasons, and just over all increase his connections to the various big names around him and give him a lot of information. I might also have Watts add some sort of Iron Man/Shadow the Hedgehog sort of flight capabilities to his boots in the seventh and eighth season sort of like Penny’s flight abilities just to get the whole ‘winged shoes’ thing. But I’d make sure that his flight is sporadic and rough-around-the-edges, worse than Penny’s, and something he can’t always rely on or use for long. Idk, I just think that’d fit with his personality really well.

[theladypeace]

Got any more evil Oscar Headcanons

Evil Oscar Headcanons

You bet your ass I do

- Before everything went down, Ironwood had noticed how distant Oscar was from everyone. He had assumed that it was because Oscar was the youngest and least experienced.

- he tried bonding with Oscar, but he had only irritated Oscar even more. James had offered him hot chocolate often because Oz liked it, he asked him questions only Oz knew, etc.

- Oscar pretended to be friends with James instead of snapping no matter how badly he wanted to.

- Oscar’s new parents are Tyrian and Arthur. His new siblings are Cinder and Neo (and probably Emerald and Mercury if he meets them).

- Tyrian and Watts actually got so close to Oscar that they started treating him like a son.

- Oscar doesn’t like Long Memory because it’s a constant reminder of Ozpin, so Tyrian is teaching him how to use scimitar curved swords.

- Oscar knows sign language and Neo was so excited when she found out. They talk shit about Cinder right in front of her.

- Everyone has been concerned for Oscar. He isolates himself from the group, is barely around, and he seems to have stopped taking care of himself.

- Oscar either ignores qrwbyjnr or has an attitude when talking to them. He even picks fights and throws insults at the group.

- Oscar is very much visibly tired. He has dark circles under his eyes and he stays up in the middle of the night. Sometimes he just stares at the wall or ceiling while in bed.

- His teammates have noticed Oscar’s obvious weight loss. Ren starts cooking and baking food for Oscar and he leaves it with him. Ren, Jaune, and Nora come back to find the plate still there. Sometimes Oscar only takes a few bites and other times he just throws it in the trash can for them to see.

- After Qrow punched him into a tree and Jaune pinned him against a wall, bruises have formed on Oscar’s face and back. He refuses to let Jaune heal him because he doesn’t trust Jaune anymore and he wants the people who caused those bruises to look at it and feel bad.

- Oscar is what he calls the “third party”. He’s not with qrwbyjnr, but he’s not with Salem either. He’s playing both sides, making both sides think he’s loyal to them, but his only loyalty is to himself and only himself.

- After meeting Cinder and Neo, Oscar returned back to the Schnee Manor fast enough to find Jacques Schnee being interrogated by Ironwood, the council, Robyn, and Winter. Rwbyjnor were called into the dining room and later ordered to go to Mantle when grimm began to attack.

- Oscar stayed behind and he was planning on telling James everything about Oz, so he could get James on the path of paranoia and fear. but then he bumped into Ruby and she agreed that they should tell him. This only helped his plan. Ruby obviously still trusted him and now no one would question why Oscar told Ironwood everything.

- Oscar is scared of Salem. He wants nothing to do with her, he only worked with her people to mess with qrwbyjnr.

- Now that Salem is here, I think Oscar would go solo.

- perhaps he would play with his enemies’ minds. Oscar would anger Hazel and bring up his dead sister, Gretchen. He might bring up Ozpin to Qrow in order to upset and confuse him.

- Ozpin is back which means he can take control of Oscar. Oscar knows this. He’s strong enough to keep Oz at bay, but he worries that if he falls asleep, Oz will take over.

- so Oscar stays wide awake and ignores Ozpin’s concerns.

- FANFIC TIME 👇

- “You need to rest,” Ozpin keeps telling him.

- Oscar groaned. “I miss it when you were quiet.”

- “Oscar.”

- “Piss off,” Oscar mumbles. He stops walking for a moment. He tries standing up straighter, using Long Memory as support. Guess getting chased by an Anime-looking tiny woman and Atlas guards, then getting shot off a cliff takes a lot out of you. Oscar sighed and kept walking.

- “Why are you doing this, Oscar?”

- “Why? Did you see what they did to me?” Oscar then scoffed, “I guess you wouldn’t know since you left me all alone for months.”

- “I’m truly sorry about that. I shouldn’t have left you.”

- “But you did,” Oscar replied in a snarl. “I didn’t even know who I was anymore. I still don’t. I just want to go back to my farm, be with my aunt, sleep in my bed.”

- “I’m sorry.”

- “Doesn’t matter anymore.” Oscar looked up at the sky. Thunder and lighting and shadows came closer to Atlas. “I just need to figure out what to do now.”

#rwby #oscar pine #evil oscar pine #villain!oscar pine #rwby headcanons #ozpin #tyrian callows #arthur watts #nuts and volts #cinder fall #neopolitian #jnor #jnr #james ironwood #salem #long post

[laulink]

got any monochrome headcanons?

OH DO I

- I think I already mentioned it, but @good-rwbyaus opened my eyes with one of their skits on Weiss singing for Blake (and their kids). Since then, one of my favourite headcanons is that Weiss will sing for her girlfriend/wife and, later on, for their children. The evening lullaby becomes sort of a tradition that Weiss wouldn’t break for the WORLD. Even when she’s away, she calls her children right before bedtime to ask about their day and sing them the lullaby Willow used to sing to her when she was a child (Willow herself was taught this lullaby by her father, Nicolas, who learned it from his own father. It is one of Nicolas’s and Willow’s dearest memories with their respective fathers and it becomes one of Weiss’ favourite things to do for her children). When her children grow up, Weiss starts singing the lullaby to them less and less, seeing as they don’t need it as much anymore to fall asleep, but she will still sing it to Blake sometimes, especially when she has nightmare, and her children pick up singing and an instrument to sing other songs with their mother. I actually imagine that most of the RWBY character songs in the show will be written and sung by their children based on their parents’ experiences and lives.

- when Blake and Weiss get married, I imagine them taking both of their names, resulting in them being called Blake and Weiss Belladonna-Schnee. This is because Weiss, as expressed in the series, is still attached to her family name and wants to erase her father’s legacy with it by writing her own legacy over his. So she wouldn’t abandon her name upon marriage. Blake is similar in that she wants to keep her family name because of its history for the Faunus : Ghira Belladonna was the one who created and led the original White Fang for years, is the chief of Menagerie and both him and Blake had a hand in creating the New White Fang and taking down the old one. Because of that, I think that Blake would want to keep the Belladonna name because of its significance for recent Faunus history. At the same time, joining the Belladonna and Schnee names show that the two sides of the war between Faunus and Humans can live together without one upping or swallowing the other, in equality. Both Blake and Weiss liked the message it sent, and so they decided to join their names and pass both of them down to their children.

- after Jacques was arrested, the company was returned to Willow, seeing as how Whitley was too young to run it. But Willow has a hard time balancing her family situation, this new, stressing job and trying to recover from her addiction, so, after the war, she asks Weiss for help, seeing as she was actually taught, when she was still heiress, how to manage the company. Long story short, Willow, Weiss and Whitley all work together to keep the SDC running and undo all the shit Jacques did and give their workers better working conditions, equal pay, etc. A few years later, the SDC is finally on the right track, all the racist shits on the board of directors were forced to sell their shares to the Schnee family and, at about the same time as Weiss’ wedding with Blake occured, Willow gave Weiss ownership of the company. The organisation didn’t change though, Willow kept her position in the company, but she felt Weiss deserved this. Weiss took the opportunity to change the company’s name to the Belladonna-Schnee Dust Company, to show that the company was taking a fresh start with a new CEO, a new name and new policies in terms of human/Faunus equality.

- Blake is shit at dancing modern dances because she doesn’t understand the moves and most of them recquire her to more or less dance on her own, so she doesn’t have a partner, to move with, but, thanks to Weiss, she discovers that she is actually pretty good at ballroom dancing. It is lucky because it’s one of Weiss’ favourite things to do and Blake, as a good romantic, has always dreamed of waltzing with her lover. They will always dance together when there’s an opportunity to do so, be it at a party or a festival, and sometimes even in the privacy of Weiss’ office or their bedroom when the night is getting long and they just want to hold each other close and sway to the rhythm of a music Weiss is humming. 

- I like to think that Weiss and Blake would live in the Schnee Manor with Willow, Winter, Whitley and their respective partners and children. Willow would want to stay in the house her father built and reclaim it as her own and her children wouldn’t want to leave her alone in this big Manor. Plus, they figure that if they all live together and without Jacques, they might actually make good memories in this house. Ruby and Penny would join them with their daughter too whenever they are in Atlas and Jaune, Ren, Nora and their children would also be welcomed to stay over whenever they visited their friends. (Yang is married to Winter so she’s there all year long, much to Weiss’ (fake) dismay =P) Thanks to all those people, the Schnee Manor becomes a warm, happy, lively place =) The fact that the children get to grow up all together and see their aunts and uncles on a daily basis is a big plus for everyone involved.

- Weiss works for the BSDC and Blake is a member of the High Council of the White Fang, but they still take missions as Huntresses from time to time (since Salem’s disappearance wouldn’t make the Grimm disappear). They can’t always take their missions together, but always try their best to do so. And because the BSDC is so pro-Faunus rights, they work together closely on improving working conditions for the BSDC employees while the BSDC provides official support and funds for the White Fang. Sometimes, Blake and Weiss will sit through a Kingdom’s Council meeting to discuss new Faunus rights laws and accomodations and let me tell you, Blake and Weiss Belladonna-Schnee are a mean combo to deal with. They have different approaches and domains of knowledge when it comes to Faunus rights and legistlation, which means that they complete each other’s arguments and points toward the proposed laws. The progressive Councilmen and Councilwomen who want to propose laws for Faunus rights can always turn to them for advice or to ask them to come defend it during a meeting. Their racist counterparts always pale when they hear that the Belladonna-Schnee couple is going to attend and speak during the meeting x)

- on a related note, Weiss and Blake are literally the strongest, most awesome, most ICONIC power couple Remnant has EVER seen. It’s kinda scary, actually, for some people, how powerful the Belladonna-Schnee family is. Not only are Blake and Weiss extremely strong and skilled Huntresses, they also have a lot of wealth, political power and a great reputation, not to mention how powerful and influential their loved ones and family members are. Blake Belladonna-Schnee is a war hero, as is her wife, is one of the most respected members of the High Council of the White Fang, the most respected and influential organisation for Faunus rights all across Remnant, and her father is Ghira Belladonna, highly respected former leader of the White Fang and actual chief of Menagerie. Weiss Belladonna-Schnee is the owner of one of the largest companies in all of Remnant, is one of the richest people of the world and is the sister of General Schnee, the leader of the strongest military in Remnant. Both of them have ties to all the other war heroes that helped save the world from Salem, one of which is married to the first synthetic human able to produce an aura and another is the daughter of a Maiden who is also the Headmistress of Haven Academy AND Willow Schnee’s lover (yes, I headcanon that Raven will be redeemed, become Haven’s Headmistress and grow closer to Willow to the point where they start dating. Fight me)

- Weiss, upon becoming a mother, learned how to bake cakes and cookies (Yang was the one who taught her) because she wanted to do something nice for her children to eat all on her own, no cake butler involved. Blake would join her when she had the time (usually when the children were napping) and either help or try to steal as much dough as she could depending on her mood. When she was feeling more teasing, the baking session would quickly devolve into a food fight, leaving both women covered in flour, milk and eggs, but also laughing their hearts out. As the children grew up, this became a family activity and the food fights, while less common because Weiss and Blake tried to be responsible adults in front of their children, were even more funny with the kittens involved~

#that's all I can think of right now without delving too far in my ideas for their kids and whatnot #rwby #weiss schnee #blake belladonna #monochrome #checkmating #Anonymous

[the-rwby-headcanons]

Team RWBY plus girls of Team JNPR pajama party, go.

Pajama party headcanons!•Nora and Phyrra are always invited, just gives Jaune and Ren an excuse to play video games all night lol•Nora brings the face masks!•Ruby's first sleep over is at Beacon so Yang is making it special•Disney movies are a must•Weiss has her father's servants bring junk food galore •Blake sets up the blanket fort•Ruby bakes cookies and other snacks•Ozpin thought that it would be a good bonding thing so he lets them use the kitchens•Sometimes Velvet and Coco join them •If they do the rest of team CVFY chills in JNPR's dorm room•They have smash bros tournaments •Ruby is bouncy and excited the whole day•"IS IT TIME YET!?" "Ruby, its only 3pm"•When they all go to RWBY's dorm pjs are already on and ready•Blake surprisingly has everything planned out•Gossiping, scrapbooking, makeovers, pranking the boys, watching disney movies, taking cute quizzes online, prank calling people, more gossiping, baking, the works!•Braid train is awesome•the order is Yang, Ruby, Weiss, Blake, Phyrra, and Nora!•Sometimes they invite Jaune and Ren since they have braiding skills on point•The pillow fight is almost as bad as the food fight•Weiss has to make sure Nora doesn't eat everything in one bite•They sit in a circle and gossip about the boys•Nora confesses that she likes ren•Everyone fangirls and hands money over for bets•Ruby said she would confess this sleep over and everyone else said other times•Ruby is now 400 lien richer•To make Nora less embarrassed Phyrra admits to liking Jaune•Cue more screaming•Glynda has to come down and tell them to be quieter but she gets roped into the sleepover•They start to braid her hair, paint her nails, and chat•Glynda felt weird being called Goodwitch at the moment so she has them Call her Glynda•"Don't get used to it."•Everyone asks her about her Huntress adventures and she may have exaggerated a few just to entertain•But the most popular topic is:•"DO YOU LIKE OZPIN?!"•Glynda has never been so flustered•"H-He's just my frie- colleague!!!"•Aint nobody buying it•They catch Glynda up on what she missed before hand •"Dang it now i owe Oz 300 lien."•confusion •"*Sigh* Ozpin made a bet between the other professors, he predicted that the girls liked the boys but they were clueless, Port said only Nora like ren, Oobleck said Phyrra liked jaune, Peach said the guys liked the girls and the girls didnt know, and i said that the guys knew but theyre obviously clueless."•Nora EXE has stopped working•Everyone tries to figure out who Ruby likes•"GUYS ARE GROSS!" "HEY!!!" "SORRY JAUNE!"•The cookies that were made that night were legendary•Glynda left before the movies, but she did end up in the makeover part, she looked amazing the next day•Nora is surprisingly good at makeup •Weiss is actually kinda bad at it•Blake ate the cucumbers that were for the spa thing•Blake sets up the snacks while Yang puts the movies on•They all fell asleep during Tangled :)

#RWBY #JNPR #sleep over headcanons #Ruby Rose headcanons #Weiss Schnee #Blake Belladonna #Yang Xiao Long #Glynda Goodwitch #Nora Valkyrie #Phyrra Nikos #Headcanons

[dyde21]

Jaune was never weak...

He was just unskilled. Bit of a rambling train of thoughts ahead. Now, like most things, this comes down to interpretation. But I personally have never liked the portrayal as jaune as physically weak. From the beginning jaune was many things; clumsy, goofy, unskilled, over-zealous, made questionable decisions outside of battle, even underconfident. But he's never been shown to be physically weak. Hear me out. Early on when he fought the death stalker with team jnpr, I believe he deflected the claw with his shield, like pyrrha. That would have turned me into a smear on the ground. He lept from the tree a distance to save Weiss, who then landed on his back. More of a moment of comedy than physical prowess for sure, but to do that then keep moving like nothing was wrong is impressive. When pyrrha raised his shield, he was the one who braced his foot down and deflected the blow, I personally don't believe her semblance would let her block it, rather set jaune up to himself. Of course, it is only fair to mention the food fight, he was hit by turkey, then out of the fight. Not very impressive durability, right? Well Monty mentioned in the commentary, time is limited. Some people are removed from scenes to allow time for other characters, its the drawback of media, so I think jaune got the shaft in that fight rather than being "weak". Now don't get me wrong, this doesn't mean he was a strong fighter. Any of the other characters could kick his butt. Physical strength is only so much. But I don't think jaune arc was physically weak. I think a puberty-caused, mass of testosterone, was physically on par with most of the other students. I mean, in his dress he was shown to have an actually impressive build, not something built up easily. We have no idea what his life was like before beacon, he could have done hard labor for his family in a farm everyday for all we know. Clearly there are other students who are stronger. Yang and Nora for example, cardin too. This is where my opinion is just my opinion and many will probably disagree. But! I personally think his physical strength was higher than Blake and Weiss. I would say Ruby, since she relies on momentum to swing her scythe, but some scenes she waves it like a fan, so who knows. Again, this last opinion may be headcanon/fanfic corrupting my opinion of canon, but I don't think he would be much physically weaker than Pyrrha. Her muscles seem more stamina and endurance then physical brute strength. Biologically Jaune is beginning to approach his peak years, and he's training very hard, seemingly harder than others at the school. Pyrrha has pulled off incredibly skill manuevers, but never a strength one like yatsuhashi (aside from throwing that one grimm to alpha centauri during the breach, but again that seemed more like a display of comedy than a realistic depiction.) So yeah, in the end I don't think jaune was weak. Unskilled as hell, clumsy, still couldn't beat his friends in a fight, definitely not the strongest, but not physically weak. These are just my opinion, and I totally understand if you disagree, just wanted to vent my thoughts and frustrations. Also, posted from mobile so sorry for errors.

#dyde-speaks #jaune arc #I still don't think he's weak #I could be wrong #and forgetting something #But that's how I interpret it #maybe I'll write a fic

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY Recaps: Vol. 5 Rest and Resolutions + Alone Together

This is a re-posting from December 8th, 2017 in an effort to get all my recaps fully on tumblr. Thanks!

Hello, everyone! I apologize for the two week gap between reviews. Academia caught up with me in the worst way possible, but that is behind us now, hallelujah. There's a lot to cover in our last two episodes, so let's dive straight in.

First off, Ozpin is the Wizard theory confirmed.

We all knew it was coming, but it's still nice to finally have validation for that idea. Often times writers will deliberately askew what the viewers expect to happen in a failed attempt at originality (see Sherlock's season 3 premiere), but if you've planted the hints there's every reason to follow through with them. In true RWBY fashion though, this information leads to even more questions. I'm particularly interested in this balance between history and storytelling. That is, the version of Ozpin-as-Wizard that we hear about is explicitly a fairy tale and we all know that time has a tendency to twist events, especially when people begin to view them as just old wive's tales, rather than actual truth. All we really know is that Ozpin indeed gave much of his power to four girls, creating the original Maidens. However:

Did he really isolate himself like the story says? Honestly, if I'd been dealing with all Ozpin's shit I'd probably hide in the woods too.

How soon after receiving the curse did all this go down?

Depending on that timing, did Ozpin have reincarnations before he was the Wizard? Or is that his original form? A lot of fans still assume that he was also the King of Vale, though where that fits into the timeline is a little unclear.

Did Ozpin know at the time that his magic was finite? Or was this the event that clued him in?

Did he give the four women magic in a deliberate attempt to stop Salem? Or, like the story implies, was there a broader reason, the desire to give these women the power to continue spreading hope? That would certainly fit with the show's "honest soul" theme (and perhaps an indicator that characters like Ruby have something to teach Ozpin even as he teaches them, just as the original Maidens did).

Are the Maidens' powers connected to their original gifts? Winter is the Maiden of creation and encouraged Ozpin to meditate and reflect. Summer is destruction and, interestingly, told Ozpin to "step outside and embrace the world." Spring brought food and flowers to revitalize his garden and is the Maiden of knowledge, while Fall is choice and reminded Ozpin to be thankful for what he has. I can see some similarities among all that...

We might not ever get answers to questions like these. Unlike other fantasy series, RWBY is rather restricted by its medium--you can't spend page after page explaining nuanced world building as you would in a novel; we've only got about fifteen minutes max each episode and plenty of more important issues to tackle first. Still, it's something.

Besides that confirmation, "Rest and Resolutions" really lives up to its name. We have all the kids enjoying a happy meal together, with only Oscar noticeably absent. (I know, I know, he's housing Ozpin's soul and Ozpin needs to have Important Conversations with Qrow about the missing huntsmen, but let the kid hang out a bit with people closer to his age, yeah?) Much of this volume has been recap of one form or another, so as to make sure that each character is caught up on what everyone else has been doing and are aware of the information that others/the viewer already knows about. Ruby and co.'s conversation works similarly, only these callbacks are meant to induce a sense of nostalgia rather than act as firm plot foundation.

Jaune recounts "loosing" the map on their travels. Jaune. You literally threw it away when you realized that an entire town had been besieged by grimm. Like, I get that losing their map isn't great, but at least the guy is really invested in the welfare of others?

(cough--comforting Pyrrha instead of watching the door--cough)

(It's actually a personality "flaw" that, as we've seen twice now, can cause some serious consequences.)

The kids take turn complimenting one another (aww) and Ruby says that Ren was "out of control" during the fight against the Nuckelavee. I've seen a few autistic!Ren headcanons over the years and this perhaps can be read as evidence to support that. Ren drastically misreads the tone and intention of Ruby's comment, apologizing quite sincerely for his behavior and personal investment in that fight. It's only when Ruby clarifies that she meant it as a compliment that Ren understands... and thanks her. There's a lot of acceptance and support in this moment.

Weiss alludes to summoning her boar during the party (Ruby: "You did not!") and when Nora doesn't believe her Weiss summons the boar right next to her, startling the hell out of poor Nora. This really shows how much Weiss has improved. There's no hesitation, no need to concentrate--she just summons it up with pure ease right in the middle of a conversation.

I was actually rather surprised by Nora's reaction. Yeah, the jump scare was played for humor, but that combined with her horror at Yang detaching her arm... Nora seems a little... skittish to me?  I might be reading too much into things (I almost certainly am), but between these two moments, the joke about her eating, watching her sneak food last episode... they all read as not so subtle indicators of stress to me. And who can blame the girl.

Other nostalgic moments include our Vol. 1-3 nicknames: Ice Queen and Vomit Boy. The group has a long-overdue acknowledgement of how much they've grown since they were at school, with Ruby in particular delivering the iconic line that she tried to "1v1 a Nevermore on our second day of school." And the Death Stalker, Ruby. God bless this trigger-happy child.

There's also talk of Yang's arm. It did my heart good to see Ruby ooo-ing over the mechanics and Yang looking damn proud of it for once. The arm wrestling contest between her and Nora was, of course, fantastic. Yang's not just embracing this new part of her but actively using it to her advantage... that's exactly where we all knew she'd end up. Can't hold this girl down for long.

Yang: "It's no replacement for the real thing, but I'll make good use of it."

There's a radical tone change once dinner is over and Ozpin rejoins the conversation. Yang is clearly distrustful of him after her talk with Raven (despite the fact that Yang has no reason to trust Raven...) and in true Ozpin style he tries to console her with wisdom and compliments: "Your mother must trust you a great deal" if she told you all that.

Yeah. Sorry, Oz. You know as well as the audience that Raven told those secrets to manipulate her, not because she trusts her. That little strategy fell flat.

Ozpin confirms most of what Raven said though, including that he turned her and Qrow into birds. What Raven of course failed to mention was that they both agreed to the transformation. Whether that agreement was a strong and enthusiastic "Yes!" or the kind of consent that Pyrrha gave--a very complicated scenario with no good choices on the table--is hard to say. My own assumption is that Raven was probably thrilled to be given such a useful power, especially when she intended to turn it against the very community who gave it to her. She only regrets it now that her life hasn't turned out quite as planned. She, like others, is looking to use Ozpin as her scapegoat. 

In fact, we're given no explanation for Raven or Yang's anger here. Raven I can conceptualize--she's the type to blame others for her problems--but Yang? What exactly is so horrific about being turned into a kick-ass bird? As Ozpin describes it, this magic allows Qrow and Raven to "see more" and to be "unburdened" in ways that the normal huntsmen or huntress is not. This ability allows them to spy on Salem rather inconspicuously and, as we've seen in the case of Qrow, is useful in terms of keeping track of other people--like your wayward niece who goes off to try and take on the forces of darkness alone. As far as we've been told there's no downside to this ability beyond the fact that Ozpin's magic is finite, but that hardly effects Qrow. He transforms when he chooses, it doesn't seem to cause him any pain, it grants him an ability outside of his bad luck semblance, he already lives in a world where half the population has animal traits... seriously, where's this anger coming from? Just the fact that magic is an unknown to Yang and therefore scary? It's really unclear and frankly worrying considering how much Yang is basing her accusations and demands around that anger. 

Because the irony is that Yang demands no more secrets from Ozpin. He insists he doesn't keep secrets from them, just plays certain pieces of information close to the chest, but Yang says 'tomato tomahto’ even though, as we’ve just established, that wasn’t Ozpin’s secret to tell. And it has no repercussions that impact the rest of the group. Certainly not the girl who just showed up. I mean, maybe there is still a downside? They’ll definitely be a real backlash if the kids discover there is some horrific consequence to Qrow and Raven's ability and Ozpin didn’t say anything... but again, that’s not fair to Ozpin. Isn’t anyone going to ask Qrow why he kept this from his family? Or ask Yang why she’s suddenly on the side of the mother who abandoned her and is a known killer? Putting all this on Ozpin is, again, pretty worrying. 

Perhaps the most moving moment of the episode though is when Ozpin tells the kids that they can still leave. (Except Oscar of course. This poor kid. He got dragged into this fast and is the only one who's truly stuck with it.) He emphasizes that abstaining from battle is not the same thing as retreat and reminds us that these are just kids and they can't be expected to shoulder it all. No one stands except for Yang... but she's not leaving, just making it clear that whatever Ruby decides to do she'll follow her lead. It re-emphasizes that Ruby isn't just a strategic leader like Jaune is. She's the moral compass of the group. Once Ruby decides to keep fighting--and we know she always will--the rest of her family follows. That’s... not always a good thing though. Everyone needs a reason for fighting this kind of war and I don’t think ‘because Ruby is fighting it too’ is powerful enough to carry them through whatever new hardships they’ll face. 

Because you can’t keep the peace for long. We're left with one hell of a cliff-hanger as Emerald, Mercury, Cinder, and Watts approach Raven's camp, the whole gang demanding an audience--or more likely a Maiden. Every fan who cried over the fact that Emerald isn't in the opening finally got to see their fave prepping for a fight and I for one am looking forward to a real battle this Volume. None of the measly stuff we've seen with Blake or in training. For the first time this will, presumably, be Maiden vs. Maiden and I expect something epic.

Luckily the episode airs soon!

Before that though we have the heart-wrenching episode "Alone Together," wherein three fourths of Team RWBY finally get some downtime together. Ruby is up very early due to difficulty sleeping (who can blame her) and she soon realizes that Weiss and Yang are in the same boat. Loved Yang's sisterly "Boop" with her hair (pick that up from Nora, did you?) and Weiss knows her friends well, dumping an unholy amount of sugar into Ruby's coffee to make sure she likes it. "Nice Weiss strikes again!"

I'm quite liking Nice Weiss this Volume. What a step up from Ice Queen.

There's a bit more recapping--Ruby is called out on her priorities. That fact that they're all together at Haven Academy; that's what she can't believe?--before the conversation quickly turns to when they'll see Blake again. We've watched Yang deal rather well with the loss of her arm this past Volume and she kept a comparatively cool head around her mother. This though... this is what's really been festering.

Yang says that Blake "made her choice" and expresses very little interest in seeing her again. Weiss and Ruby are, understandably, shocked. With shaking hands and a flash of red eyes, Yang finally reveals what's truly been holding her back. Not her arm, not Raven, not any anger at Ruby, but the fact that Blake ran from them. Again.  

It's an understandable flaw on Blake's part, and it's equally understandable that this would nevertheless frustrate and upset Yang. I love that it's Weiss who helps her see Blake's perspective in all this: that after finally opening up to them, everything she'd feared actually did come to pass. The family she'd found was torn apart. Beacon fell. Adam hurt Yang in the worst possible way. She brought down the metaphorical walls around her heart and the literal walls of Beacon crumbled. As far as Blake is concerned, getting close to others really did bring nothing but misery. It's not logical, but emotions rarely are. Of course she's going to try and get as far away from them as possible after that, as well as return to her parents. It was a move born equally from a desire to protect herself as well as others.

It says a great deal about Yang's maturity that she does understand Blake's perspective rather quickly (even if, interestingly, she can’t understand Ozpin’s. A difference in who she actually cares for). Notably this is done through Weiss' own experiences, her admission that they've all experienced their own versions of loneliness. Yang says she doesn't blame Blake for the decision any longer; she's just upset that Blake hasn't realized yet (as Yang herself has) that things are easier when you stick together. That she, Ruby, and Weiss could have supported Blake through this... and that they need her support too. Yang resolves to be there for Blake just as soon as she's ready. The girl has a wealth of love within her. And yes, a lot of that stems from adopting the role of caretaker early, looking after Ruby as a big sister, but the fact that Yang can separate her current desire to protect her friends from that difficult childhood is huge. She knows how trauma has shaped her and she's prepared to make the best of it.

Ruby finally does check up on them and lets out a heartfelt sigh. Everything's okay.

Now, I'll be real interested to see if Yang's shaking lessens after she's reconciled with Blake...

Meanwhile, there's Ilia. And you all know what I'm going to discuss here.

There's a lot to say about her meeting with Blake--the well-played betrayal; our look at how Blake might end up in Mistral; the introduction of a very cool spider faunus; Ilia's speech about how there's no right or wrong, no innocents, just doing "what's best for us" that reminded me strongly of Roman's own speech--but for now, especially given how long this review already is, I want to focus in on her sexuality.

(FYI what I have below was originally written as a separate post, so apologies for the repetition.)

In the past week I've seen numerous complaints about how the fandom is “whining” about finally getting what they want. I’m one of the “whiners,” and this, to be frank, is not what I asked for.

Let’s start with the acknowledgment that yes, no matter who Rooster Teeth chose as their first LBGTQIA character, some people were going to be disappointed. Either because the choice doesn’t fit their ship or because of the dichotomy we’re seeing now: the Good vs. Evil gay character divide. It’s a simple disagreement on the surface that nevertheless houses a lot of important questions and concerns: should you make your gay character one of the Good Guys in order provide positive representation, or should you make them one of the Bad Guys in order to provide diverse representation? Do you send the message that being gay is wonderful by associating it with the heroes, or something that’s natural by associating it with the villains--making a statement that anyone can be LGBTQIA, not just the ones you’re rooting for?

The answer to this dilemma is that you do both. You provide variety in order to likewise provide true, diverse representation. However, the reality is that we haven’t reached a point in most media where you get lots and lots of gay characters to provide lots and lots of diversity… so therefore I feel rather strongly that the first character should be a positive portrayal.

Why? Because we’re not living in a positive world. Because we’re still a part of societies where LGBTQIA people are ridiculed, discriminated, and murdered. Because the idea that it’s not just okay, but fantastic to be gay is FAR from universal.

Because we have a very long, awful history of villains associated with gay stereotypes. Because there’s literally a Psycho Lesbian trope with plenty of examples to choose from. Because we don’t live in a culture where you can casually throw out ‘gay’ + ‘bad guy’ and expect your audience to separate the two critically.

Which brings me back to Ilia.

For all these reasons I was truly disappointed to see that she was our first LBGTQIA character. Out of a wealth of women in this show who love each other in healthy and nuanced ways, they were all bypassed for a character who is currently one of the Bad Guys.

Is Ilia pure evil? Of course not. I’ve mentioned previously about how much we see her struggling with her choices, but she’s currently not on a good path either. More importantly, the way her sexuality is revealed does nothing but position it badly. Let’s break that scene down just a bit. The first LGBTQIA content we’re given is:

A woman who is working for an extremist group that in turn is working for the Big Bad

Ilia reveals her sexuality after having her henchmen abuse Blake, attacking her, forcing her onto her knees, and announcing that they’re currently attempting to murder her parents

Ilia says that she wanted Blake to look at her like she once looked at Adam, intentionally or not drawing parallels between her love and Blake’s abuse

She positions her sexuality as at least partly a justification for her actions. Illia is subtly blaming Blake: if you’d paid more attention to me, maybe none of this would have happened. It actively positions all this horror as at least partly a consequence of same sex attraction

Does all of this craft a rather complex, LGBTQIA character? Absolutely, but it’s also one that left a rather sour taste in my mouth. Overt, same-sex attraction is still so rare in our media and frankly I’m sick of it. I’m sick of vague comments, queer baiting, or promises of something “coming later.” I’m equally sick of burying our gays and having same-sex attraction presented as something that only those who are otherwise sick in their morals would experience. Is it so much to ask for something reaffirming in a series that keeps growing in popularity and influence?

Will there be more LGBTQIA characters in RWBY? I assume so, I hope so, but for now all we have is Ilia. A character who, I’d also like to point out, we barely know. I’m sure she’s lots of fans’ fave, but I for one have little interest in this side character… and her position as a side character makes me nervous for her survival. Her sexuality only compounds that.

Rooster Teeth had a huge opportunity here. LGBTQIA viewers have waited five years to see someone like them in this series and it could have been a really magnificent reveal. It could have been Yang realizing her feelings as she worked through her anger at Blake. Or Weiss realizing hers for Yang as they get closer this Volume. Or Ruby for Weiss. Or Weiss for Blake. Hell, give us a throwaway line about Port and Oobleck being happy husbands, or let Ren be pan, or let Oz admit to same-sex attraction after having lived thousands of years…. I don’t care. I’ll take any ship wars that develop as a consequence. All I wanted was to see a character I know and love embracing their sexuality in a way that reaffirmed how proud I am of my own.

Instead it’s Ilia, admitting feelings for Blake while she plots to kill her parents. While she hurts her and betrays her. Sorry if I find that a little difficult to watch. Sorry if I need to “whine” about it just a bit.

So yes. Needless to say I'm disappointed. After that I couldn't really appreciate Ghira's transformation and concern for his wife, or Kali's badass, "Get out of my house!" As said, the whole scene with Ilia left a bad taste in my mouth. I know Rooster Teeth can do better.

Hopefully we do get better. Preferably soon. This is the perfect, filler kind of Volume to set up more characterization, including queer sexualities, and we've got four more episodes until the hiatus.

Tick, tock, RT.

Other Details of Note

Nora, what exactly happened with you and that punch?

I liked the gears on the wall clock. Which begs the question: where did this house come from? Is it a safe place that Ozpin had set up long before Beacon's fall?

They ate ALL that food. Everything they'd prepared while expecting who knows how many huntsmen/huntresses. Never underestimate the appetites of a group of teenagers.

James and Glynda get mentioned this volume! Everyone rejoice! Now if only we got to see them on screen...

Nora exclaiming about how Qrow and Raven are named after birds was pretty hilarious. It's not like we weren't already thinking it. Despite all the jokes on tumblr though, there's no way Ozpin chose those forms specifically because of the Branwens' names. If anything, this seems to act as evidence that a person's semblance/abilities draws on their personality, rather than the other way around.

There are a number of bird motifs throughout "Alone Together," including our opening shot of Ruby watching them fly overhead and a pair of carved ducks on display in the bedroom where Yang and Weiss chat. It's a nice nod to one of this Volume's major themes. (Or, if we buy into this headcanon that this place is a safe house purchased specifically for Qrow, then Ozpin needs to get called out on his on-the-nose decorating lol).

Yang staring at the team photo hurt in so many ways. Excellent touch there.

We have that acknowledged parallel between Weiss and Ruby, in which Yang (and the audience) expects it to be Ruby knocking on the door, trying to talk. The difference is that now, months later, Yang is actually in a position to open up to someone and that someone is Weiss, now just as much a sister to Yang as Ruby is.  

Confirmation that Weiss' mom is an alcoholic. We knew that was coming too...but still. Yikes.

Yang cries! Let all the children keep crying! It's good and natural!

There's a "nocturnal section" of Menagerie. Of course there is. God I can't believe I didn't think of that.

Ilia can completely blend in with the shadows. It's official now: all Volume 1-3's shadow people are just really, really shy chameleon faunuses. Spread the word.

That blow Blake took seemed to hit her pretty hard. Kind of like how Oscar staggered when he got hit without his aura... could Blake really trust Ilia enough to attend this meeting without proper protection? She might, which makes Ilia's betrayal all the worse. In the episode where Yang talks of letting Blake support and be supported by others, she was finally willing to do that with an old friend. Obviously having that backfire won't help Blake to open up any further.

GIF credit: http://knowyourmeme.com/photos/841077-rwby

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