Otaku Kingly

Hello everyone! Sorry to both my Tumblr followers and any who might read my stories. My personal laptop has technical issues and I’m currently doing everything on the home computer. Added to that I do have a college class I have to do work for. Anyway, I decided to do something smaller for this post.

RWBY Volume 5 wrapped up quite a while ago and it was….something. Seriously guys, I’m enjoying reading the fan fiction than I am watching the actual show. Now Miles and Kerry have responded that they are looking at the fans’ responses and are moving with that going forward, but that still doesn’t change what they’ve already done. So, I decided to throw in my two cents, or rather ten points, of what I want to see in Volume 6 and beyond. These aren’t ranked in any particular order and keep in mind these are my personal opinions. If you agree that’s great, if you don’t be polite about it. Common courtesy, you know.

1. Show, Don’t Tell; Less Exposition Please.

One of the biggest complaints of Volume 5 is the overabundance exposition, often with the same information being repeated with little to no visuals to go along with it. I understand exposition is often necessary, but in a visual medium it’s incredibly important to show these things. Show us Faunus discrimination in Remnant, show us the mines of Mantle and how dangerous it can be, show us the devastation of the battles of The Great War and how it still affects the present. DON’T just talk about it and leave it at that. 

2. More Care in the Writing and the Fight Scenes

You know it makes sense that I would complain the former, but the fact that I’m complaining about the later is kind of a bad sign. Anyone who has read my writing would know that I SUCK at writing fight scenes and the fact that I find the Battle of Haven’s fights terrible is just sad. I’m not asking for Monty levels of quality (that will never happen), just some more polish and improvement. Also, with Rooster Teeth’s other shows and its new ones, I’m concerned over whether Miles and Kerry can really give RWBY the quality care it deserves. Perhaps they should think getting a professional fantasy/sci-fi writer to help.

3. More World Building 

Whatever you feel about Volume 4, the one thing it definitely has over 5 is the world building and that was not just confined to the World of Remnant videos. We were introduced to Menagerie, saw the upper crust of Atlesian society, touched on religion, and we saw how life was like outside of the kingdoms. As for World of Remnant, I actually rather like the series as its a way to give exposition without grounding the show to a halt to tell it to the audience. Volume 5…..not so much. Which is a same because the city of Mistral could have been amazing location to explore and interact with so a lot of missed potential there. For example, most of Mistral we’ve seen seems to based on Central Asia, but Pyrrha  was more Greco Roman and explaining this would have made Mistral a bit more complex than Vale is. Or perhaps the group could have taken a break from training to do some shopping, sightseeing, or take in a show and perhaps run into some familiar faces like the rest of team SSSN or team ABRN. It would have allowed us to care more about this city and be more concerned with protecting it. I really didn’t care so much about the city so it was hard for me to really get invested in the Battle of Haven. Any good fantasy writer will tell you that your world is just as much of a character as its inhabitants.

4. Give Ruby More to Do

For being the main character, Ruby really hasn’t been doing much to live up to the role. In fact, her adversaries have been getting more development than she has. I mean, she got a small scene with her and Oscar discussing how she’s handling losing Pyrrha and Penny, but we need more than that. She needs to do more than simply going along with things. Have her develop her silver eye powers, let her learn more about her mother and her past role in the conflict, put her in a situation that makes her question if what she is doing is the right thing to do. While the show is technically named after the team, that doesn’t change the fact that Ruby is the focus character and needs some serious development.

5. More Oscar, Less Ozcar

Another complaint I have with Volume 5 is how Oscar really wasn’t given much time to be himself bar that one scene with Ruby, mostly serving as Ozpin’s mouthpiece to the group. Which is a shame because it would have been great to see him interact with Jaune, Nora, and Ren. It would definitely allow Oscar to grow and be his own character that way, showing that while he and Ozpin may be like minded souls, they are not exactly the same and they won’t always agree. I’m looking forward to how the aftermath of Ozpin taking over against the farm boy’s will is handled. That is not something that can be just brushed aside and never talk about again.

6. No Backtracking on Renora

For all the issues with shipping in the RWBY community, no one can deny that Ren and Nora are absolutely adorable together. Which is why I want to see their relationship continue to grow and develop. Have them go on dates so they can just be cute or offer relationship advice to the other members with their own possible developing romances Though another thing I feel that needs to be touched on with these two is Nora’s backstory. It was noted in the flashback in Kuroyuri that Nora didn’t look like a native of the town, so how did she get there? Was she orphaned or abandoned? How did she go from a scared quiet girl to the exuberant pancake loving hammer wielder we know today? Also, if the two were originally from Anima, why did they enroll at Beacon? All good questions I hope will be answered in due time.

7. Jaune and Ozpin Talk

This is a talk that feels like a long time coming. While Cinder may have been the one to kill Pyrrha, it’s very clear that Jaune still holds Ozpin and his inner circle partly responsible for his partner’s death. As a result, I feel like a talk with him and Ozpin would be a good way for Jaune to be able to vent his frustrations in a much more healthy manner as well as allow him to understand what really happened those last few days before everything went wrong. Perhaps it would lead to a talk on how a leader’s duty is to help as many people as he can and sometimes that means sacrifice. I think that’s a good lesson for our blond to learn as he is the tactician and semi healer of the group. The other thing that I feel needs to be addressed is Jaune’s transcripts. I covered in a previous post on how there’s no way Ozpin didn’t know about it and this would be a great way to address why Ozpin let him into Beacon in the first place as well as reassure that what happened with Pyrrha was not his fault.

8. More on the Schnees

Since we’re going back to Atlas, I’d like to see more from Weiss’ family. Whitely could use some more development beyond “Jacques’ faithful little follower” and I would really like to see their mother make an appearance. Heck, it would nice to hear more about Nicolaus. Winter as a subordinate of Ironwood would play a role in the affairs in Atlas as would Jacques’ position as the head of the Schnee Dust Company. If anything, I would like to see Jacques realize that there is nothing he can do to make Weiss fall in line and have his actions come back to bite him. HARD.

9. More on the Villains

The thing about villains is that it is just as important to develop them as the heroes. While RWBY’s villains have been very good at messing things up for our good guys, their motivations haven’t been as well fleshed out. Now some villains like Roman Torchwick and Tyrion which are delightfully evil don’t need much of an explanation for why they do what they do, but the others do need some development. I have no problem with Hazel’s motivation being a personal one so much as it being a WEAK personal motivation. I mean, a training accident at Beacon doesn’t really translate to it being completely Ozpin’s fault and him being “evil.” I really hope there’s more to this situation. And then there’s the other questions to answer. What led to Watts being “disgraced?” Why did Cinder have such a fixation on power, acting as if she deserved said power by right? What does Adam want to make humanity pay for? Above all, what happened between Salem and Ozpin to cause this all in the first place? 

10. Team STRQ

There’s so much on this team that I really want to know. What were their dynamics back before Raven left and everything went wrong? What were Tai and Summer’s weapons? Their semblances? What’s Tai’s feelings on all of this? If Team STRQ was what interested Ozpin, what was Tai’s role? What was the nature of Tai and Summer’s relationship? Is Ruby really just like Summer or are there some notable differences that haven‘t been discussed yet? I feel like we’re due for a Team STRQ flashback some time in the future.

Qrow: Can’t a guy just smile ‘cause he feels like it?