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doctor-ciel · 5 years

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You know, we talk about how RWBY subverts a lot of (usually gendered) tropes, especially anime ones, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone talk about Summer.

To clarify, she’s a subversion of the “shonen anime protagonist’s dead mom” trope. This trope(to my knowledge, I haven’t actually watched a whole lot of anime with dead moms) usually involves a mom who died when the protagonist was very young, she usually had brown hair and was the embodiment of every child’s fantasy of a perfect mom: baking cookies, softly drying our tears when we scrape our knee, etcetera etcetera. And Summer was all of these things(Yang even calls her “Supermom”), but this is where she stops fulfilling the trope: Summer was a huntress. Not just that, she was a silver-eyed warrior, something that is canonically something of fables. She didn’t die of a sickness or anything, she died on the battlefield.

All of “Indomitable” really embodies this, but here’s my personal favorite line(s):

[Photo ID: A screenshot of some of the lyrics to the song “Indomitable.” It reads, “There’s a light that shines/ And its power is mine!/ Though our body’s weak and breakable/ The spirit is indomitable!/ Don’t be afraid!/ Get up, get going/ A step every day/ I’ll meet you there/ When we strive, we transcend/ Even death cannot end our climb!” End ID.]

That...... does not sound like something a Dead Anime Mom would say. Dead anime moms aren’t supposed to be powerful warriors that proudly own immense power, who have songs called “Indomitable.” When they’re telling people to not be afraid and to continue onward, it’s supposed to be towards their child(in the song it’s not actually quite clear who she’s saying it to, further showing her embodiment of being a true hero and huntress because she’s kind of saying it to everyone) and it’s supposed to come from a place of support, from someone that’s supposed to represent “home.” You know, typical mom stuff. But instead, we get something entirely different from Summer. “I’ll meet you there”? That’s saying that the mom is, and always has been, a part of The Fight. And “when we strive we transcend, even death cannot end our climb”? Yeah.

And because the protagonist, Ruby, is also a girl, she has a very different relationship with her Dead Mom than all the guy protagonists. For guy protagonists, the Dead Mom is just their mother, who has been fridged in a backstory to make the story more compelling or whatever. Their relationship with their dad is different, whatever kind of person or character the dad may be; the protagonist has a strong connection to him, and usually is even supposed to parallel him in some way. Not Ruby. Ruby is constantly being compared to her mom, is constantly hearing about her mom’s heroism, Summer’s shrouded in mystery, and she is supposed to be representative of The Right Thing To Do(something that Ruby, a “simple, honest soul” and “the embodiment of purity” is supposed to strive to do). Meanwhile Tai is just supposed to be Her Dad. I love the guy, but(for Ruby at least) that’s all he really is. The Dad. It’s a nice subversion of how the protagonist’s parents are supposed to be, and I appreciate RWBY for doing that.

#rwby #summer rose #ruby rose #meta #rwby soundtrack #indomitable #rwby meta

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goliath-de-senfina-sango · 6 years

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Who wants to read my discord chat thoughts? Everyone? yes? ok

Rex - Today at 9:33 PM So i'm not sure any of you care to hear but its my channel so here i shallramble So i was thinking about digimon earlier Hikari's crest? A dumb crest Now i thought she was nice, she power boosted everyone etcetera but like Light isn't a personality trait that can be measured Its not a character trait to develop overtime or display You're basically calling her a demigod and closing the book there So i thought to myself: what personality traits does Hikari show? Two came to mind Empathy and Compassion Ok 1 trait two names Hikari felt deeply for all sentient life she encountered She, as an 8 year old girl, gave up herself to save the lives of the other people around her To a vampire she just watched murder someone else RIGHT in front of her She heals digimon she saw hurt with her simple fury at seeing them hurt and killed in front of her So I'm calling Hikari the chosen child of empathy of course other things in Digimon could've been expanded upon frankly I know that tey were literally making things up as they went so i don't blame them but if each character could be boiled down to one character trait that they are supposed to embody then things would've gone differently had they been planning things out a bit more for instance, Yamato (matt) would've been a bit more friendly toward everyone, like, genuinely friendly. He's supposed to embody friendship within the group and he does a poor job of it frankly Yamato could've even gone a whole like character arc about how he needs to be more friendly toward everyone else in the group. like htere's a billion ways to express friendship between people and there's various different members of the group Yamato was basically defined as the big brother to Takeru and while that's fine it's not what his arcs shoulda been about like, him bouncing off the others a bit more besides TK (I don't remember him even bouncing that much off TK) and Tai woulda been fun and interesting! Encouraging Izzy to talk with the group and share his ideas a bit more giving Jo some one on one talk about his fears an insecurities sharing his two cents with Mimi and how she complains about everything - and I mean making sure she understands that everyone does know she's upset, but so is everyone else and they're al there for each other Tai leading them as the head of a fight ready to dive in and do what it takes to win Matt as the second in command making sure everyone stays together hell, Matt being a big brother could tie into how he interacts with everyone, treating them like he does TK - worried about their safety and trying to get them behind him or make sure they're running away ahead of him also i'd have changed the order of some things like when Genai appeared the first time he shoulda been like "So you're missing a kid. Here, come to my place and we'll chat" and then explain to the kids whyt hey need to be int he digital world nad then he'll tell them about the 8th child back on Earth and then send them back cause I know full well that Gennai coulda sent them home any fuckin time or even send Tai back alone, have him do the thing with agumon in the real world while the rest of the team searches for primary village and I know Takeru is young and all digimon recylcle themselves into eggs after death but like i want Patamon's egg to appear in primary village and then Gennai takes them there while Tai is out finding the 8th child Matt and Sora together are consoling him best they can about his dead partner, reminding him that Patamon isn't really dead and with his world thrown into dispair, that's what sets Takeru on his own arc to growing into the role of the Chosen child of Hope cause he rises up from the devistating event and pushes forward with the hope that he'll find patamon's egg, and he'll be with his best friend again and no matter what happens he'll always find his partner again i'm not even sure how to structure Koushiro's arc other than what happened in canon honestly he was always, and I mean always on the search for more information maybe his curiousity gets the better of him and the group on their way to try and find the gate between worlds where Gennai says Tai will reappear (coincidentally where Vamdemon is waiting for them as well, imagine that) and so he gets afraid that his thirst for knowledge and information is going to get him killed, since Kuagamon isn't the strongest mon out there? idk man, Izzy literally just shoved his digivice into the damn laptop and reprogramed his digimon to evolve instead of going through character growth of course that could be how he reaches the next stage this time! Rex - Today at 10:00 PM some event that actually makes him think that giving up his knowledge really is for the best and then once he regains it, he finds the code for evolving to perfect form somewhere int eh files of data that the digimon he traded his curiosity to has stored up and Kabuterimon evoles into megakaburterimon i fuckin forget some things though gonna look up the trait of reliability and get back to this rant

#Rexy Rambles #Digimon #Digimon Adventure #Yagami Hikari #Yagami Taichi #Yamato Ishida #takaishi takeru #Kido Jo #koushiro izumi

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