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Volume 2, First Arc (Part I) | Table of Contents | Volume 2, Second Arc (Part I)
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V2E4, “Painting the Town”
Painkillers and chocolate. Yeah, that’s the stuff.
We open up exactly where we left off, with Penny having just revealed metal under her skin. She describes herself as the world’s ‘first synthetic person capable of generating an aura’. Which means she has a soul—I’ll ruminate on that in the next volume, but for now, I’m mostly just glad it’s out of the way. Don’t believe me? Ruby assures Penny she is real, and no different from herself. She’s not like those other machines, those weapon-laden droids Holo-wood was showing off *stifling a laugh* no, not at all. More seriously, though: Ruby is taking this very well, and Penny is extremely appreciative, hugging her tight and declaring her the best friend anyone could have.
Penny reveals that her father is ‘very sweet’ and is the one who built her—assisted by General Ironwood, of course. I don’t know about you, but that speaks ‘gay’ to me! Penny describes that Ironwood and his soldiers are just as protective as her father, being unsure she’s ready to interact with the general human populace just yet.
P: One day, it will be my job to save the world…but I still have a lot left to learn. That’s why my father let me come to the Vytal Festival. I want to see what it’s like in the rest of the world, and test myself in the tournament.
R: Penny, what are you talking about? Save the world from what, we’re in a time of peace!
R: Penny, what are you talking about? Save the world from what, we’re in a time of peace!
Exactly! As far as you should know, Ruby, considering you had to have the plot whispered in your ear and yet have managed no investigation thus far! But I digress. Penny ominously says “That’s not what Mr. Ironwood said”, so apparently those ‘concerns’ of his run deep. But no more time for talk! The Atlesian soldiers from before have finally caught up, and Penny shoves Ruby in a dumpster so she won’t get caught, making her promise not to tell anyone her secret—and because we’ve seen how long secrets last in recent episodes, we hear this and laugh.
Penny bluffs the arriving officers, despite hiccups giving her away when she lies, and is led away by the oblivious but stern soldiers.
We cut to how Yang and Neptune are doing—and now it’s nighttime! Ow. Yang rolls up on Bumblebee, her motorbike, with Neptune behind her, right up to the very same nightclub where her trailer was set. She disembarks, as does Neptune after shaking himself off and asking where they are.
Now this, I believe would take as much time as it has to reopen after the way she wrecked it. The club doesn’t seem to be welcoming patrons yet, but this doesn’t stop Yang, who barges in anyway. Naturally, this doesn’t go over too well.
Her theme music starts to skip, prompting her to glare at the DJ with the bear mask until he cuts it off.
Junior wisely decides to try negotiation before this lunatic attacks everyone in his bar again and pushes his way to the front. 'Blondie' claims he still owes her a drink (he…doesn’t? Since when?) and drags him off. Neptune, affected, comments “What a woman…” before turning and seeing the Malachite twins. His charm doesn’t work on them, and they walk off.
Somewhere else, Blake is touching a set of claw marks gouged into a wall and peering around a corner, watching some guy welcome some faunus into what seems to be a warehouse. She says this is the place, and Sun asks if she’s sure before warding off a glare in response. And I don’t know why. That wasn’t a rude or dumb question, so why the dirty look?
She takes off her bow and approaches the warehouse entrance, but Sun stops her short, with a White Fang mask in hand.
S: I don’t get it. If you believe what you’re doing is right, why hide who you are?
I would dearly love Rooster Teeth to stop asking very privileged questions out of the mouth of a disadvantaged minority character like Sun, just saying. Blake remarks on the Grimm-like masks, saying they’re a symbol—humanity wanted to make monsters of them, so monsters they became, and such. Dark, Sun accurately comments, and she says that the guy who came up with it was, too. They don the masks and walk in.
The recruitment meeting is started by a very…buff goon with a full-face mask, a wide, high collar, and a tribal tattoo on his right arm. He introduces a ‘very special guest’, that being Torchwick. The audience, composed of faunus, is of course inclined to boo and hiss.
Torchwick gives a very weaksauce speech, prompting Sun to whisper to Blake if this is going somewhere. He seems to be trying to rile them up against a ‘common enemy’, that being the people in charge running the kingdoms. While about as unpolished as Ozpin’s generic wise mentor speeches, it has the same effect, inspiring his audience.
That colorful background character is way more interesting than his speech, but she doesn’t grab as much of my attention as this.
Okay, hold up, what the goddamn shit is that doing here?!
He can’t have that. He can’t! He’s a well-known criminal, and none of his associates has any connections that we know of to the Atlesian military or Schnee Corp! I can think of exactly one person in his little faction who possesses a notable talent for thievery, but even with her abilities (even the ones that would be spoilers) there’s no fucking way they could’ve gotten ahold of this (and don’t talk about characters introduced in the future volumes—if their influence were being felt here, these idiots wouldn’t have to scrounge up dust from every shop in Vale)! That’s a prototype manned weapon! They aren’t even finished, let alone on any markets, underground or otherwise! With how proudly James ‘big fat military dick’ Ironwood was showing these off, I guarantee you they’d be zealously guarded and under strict manufacturing and anti-theft protocols!!! There is no way in hell that Torchwick can have one the same evening they were introduced!!!
You know what? That just made me angry enough to give you five Ill Logic points.
Ill Logic: 14
No one is that good a thief, Rooster Teeth.
And ya know what? It’s got a big fat White Fang symbol painted on the shoulder—but I’ll remark on that later.
S: That’s a big robot.
B: How did he get that?
B: How did he get that?
RT: As some of you may have heard, this right here [he raps on the leg of the Paladin] is Atlas’ newest line of defense against all the scary things in the world.
Which explains neither how you have it nor the rust on it.
RT: Thanks to my employer…
Who can’t have any access to this any more than you can.
Roman describes that many ‘brothers’ have already moved down to an operation in the ‘southeast’. This sort of artillery is provided to any who would join them. Oh. Oh, so we just have more of these lying around? I’m about to throw something.
By now, the audience is fully in his support. Blake mentions, as the crowd of new recruits begins to move forward, that they need to leave.
We cut back to Junior’s club.
J: I don’t know.
Y: How can you not know?!
Y: How can you not know?!
I don't know either, Yang. I worked in food service for two years, but that doesn't mean I know all the underground secrets, and while the ladies waitressing may have thought they knew all the hot gossip, I can promise you they couldn't tell you anything useful. Owning a nightclub does not equate to knowing all the juicy lines of information in the criminal underworld. Your assumption has made an ass of you.
Junior confirms that he hasn’t seen Roman since the Yellow Trailer, and has conducted no business with him except to loan him out the men he used to attack Ruby, who never came back—implying Roman or his employers killed them, which is a fast way to make sure you run short on both minions and people willing to supply them. Neptune tries to help with the ‘interrogation’, only to be brushed off by both Junior and Yang, the latter of whom makes a threat to the tune of violence if she doesn’t find out what she wants.
Goddamn, Yang, do you always just beat up random people for not being able to tell you things they have no way of knowing? Chill a bit!
She finally gets the hint and leaves in a huff.
N: We get everything we need?
Y: Well, we got everything we can.
Y: Well, we got everything we can.
Which was nothing. Seriously, they got nothing from coming here. Absolute jack shit. This was useless and neither of them got anything done. I hate life.
The scene cuts back to the White Fang recruitment, with all the new recruits now uniformly outfitted, save Sun and Blake, who now stick out like sore thumbs. Sun whispers, asking what they’re gonna do, and Blake thinks on it. Torchwick, predictably, lands his eye on them, so now it’s urgent that they leave. Blake looks around, and then spots a power cable box, commenting that Torchwick can’t see in the dark, right before she gets out Gambol Shroud and shoots it.
Ill Logic: 15
No, Torchwick can’t see you, but every last other person in the warehouse can, you idiot!
There’s a lot of mechanical sounds, scuffs and scrapes, and the sound of Blake yelling for Sun to follow her over a black screen. And then…!
Blake and Sun flee (with Blake’s bow somehow back on her head…did you really have time to put that back on?) and the Paladin, piloted by Torchwick, chases them right out onto the street.
*impatient face* Wait for it.
Sun, in a rather uncharacteristic panic, asks if Blake has some backup. She does, in fact, and gets to calling her teammates on her phone. Because, they were prepared for this sort of scenario, I guess? Weiss and Ruby are exactly where we left them midday despite it being night now, and they come a-running to converge on Sun and Blake.
Yang and Neptune get on the bike and give chase! Sun and Blake, perhaps understandably in their race for their lives (but all the same stupidly), lead the mech exactly where it shouldn’t go—onto a busy freeway. They’re using cars as stepping stones while Torchwick powers through them, undoubtedly leading to massive civilian losses as cars are tossed this way and that way.
No, wait, it’s not over yet, there’s still more. Yang rides up behind Torchwick and bids Neptune to slow the mech down, only for them to have to do some hellacious dodging and weaving as Torchwick intentionally plows through a whole slew of cars to try and shake them off.
Neptune survives the onslaught and grabs his weapon, which unfolds into what I’m told is some sort of rail gun! He blasts the robot in the back, slowing it down enough for Yang to get close, then leaping up, stabbing his gun-turned-guandao-turned-trident into the mech’s back!
Torchwick’s Paladin has taken its first hits, and now has Neptune hanging on. Torchwick’s trying to shake him off, so Sun intervenes!
Oh wow—he’s actually got a similar power to Blake, but his is way more advanced! Both clones hit the Paladin, and Sun whips out his shotgun-nunchuck-bo staff that I love so much, leaps forward, and then—!
—and then...they...just get rung out, I guess.
And then Weiss shows up and...no. No, no, wait a minute, hold right the fuck up. We are not continuing this recap until I hash out just what the fuck happened here. Because seriously, what the fuck happened here?!
In case it is not clear to some of you what I am upset about, Sun and Neptune just got knocked right out of the episode. They just exited the scene and will not be back to participate any further. A magical crane from Heaven labeled “Cockbite Construction” just descended from offscreen and lifted them right out of the events here.
No, wait, I think you need to understand the full extent. What did we just see these two do?
- Neptune showed off his weapon.
- Sun showed off his Semblance.
Could you make it more obvious what you were trying to do? This is fucking RWBY for Christ’s sake! Weapons and semblances are what people are here to see! They drive a huge amount of interest in the characters of this show, and 100% of the original characters produced for this series start with “what’s a cool weapon concept?” or “what’s a cool Semblance idea?” because that’s the part of the show they think is oh-so-cool! That’s the hook! That’s what draws people in and gets them excited, especially for those lovely fight scenes that have attracted so many people! We just had a scene where two new characters, already very intriguing to an audience that had waited over an eight month hiatus, display a badass weapon and an insanely cool power…
…and both accomplished nothing. Rooster Teeth hastily had the 'important' bits shown to pacify people and then kicked them out. They showed them off, did nothing with them, and then were removed from the scene, all in the span of a few secondw.
*removes his glasses, leans back in his chair* If I were to ask you what incredibly important rule of writing I’m thinking of right now, I hope you wouldn’t have too much trouble guessing the answer. It’s this one: don’t introduce something you don’t intend to use. Do not put something in a scene that doesn’t matter to that scene!!!
And while I’m on that? It’s not just that they should have accomplished something. They could have accomplished something! Go back up there and look at that glowing blue guandao blade Neptune whipped out. You probably thought ‘electric weapon’, right? Well, you’re not wrong! That weapon does have an electric shock feature, and Neptune didn’t use it. Neptune stabbed a robotic mech with a taser and then forgot to press the trigger, purely so he wouldn’t get in the way. He could’ve ended this scene himself!
And I am trying to wrap my head around this, because even with how flawed and hack-ey I know Rooster Teeth’s authorities are, I can’t see this as an accident. The entire format of the scene tells me this was done on purpose. It’s too short, curt, and deliberate. Someone up at house laid down on paper that these two characters were to show off the things audiences were excited about to shut them up, and then get booted from the scene with nothing contributed and nothing more said.
I…just…God…
Your Fight Scene Sucks: 9
Two points apiece for Sun and Neptune each.
Love to Be a Part of It Someday: 5
And the same four points for this one. I should’ve added more because that was fucking obscene. Actually, you know what? Have one of these, too, ya fucks.
Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Veil: 4
And yeah, there really is no more said about it. Ctrl+f the names Sun and Neptune on this page, and see if you get any results inbetween now and the words “Ruby pauses”.
*lengthy sigh* How do I even muster enthusiasm for this scene now?
Anyway, Weiss leaps down from a road above, directly in the path of the Paladin, and readies her rapier. When she determines the moment is right, she stabs the blade into the ground, creating a large sheet of ice for the Paladin to slip on! It goes careening past her, landing down below the freeways where it can’t hurt anyone. Err...a bit late for that, I might say.
And actually, I’m going to interject here with more points—because if you were going to dedicate an animation to the Paladin going skidding off the road, shocking it into malfunction would’ve worked just fine. Even if you for some reason didn’t want the two other characters who were in this scene to be involved, there was an easy out—have them say that they did their part now, and now they need to go check on the wounded civilians Torchwick just ran over with a giant robot. It’s that easy.
It Was Right There: 3
But anyway, RWBY readies themselves for a fight with a giant mech. It advances, but Ruby calls out “Freezerburn!”
…That’s the name of the Yang x Weiss fan ship. Rooster Teeth are, for this scene, using ship names as the names of combination attacks.
Exactly what do you people think you’re doing? That’s a real sweet nod to your fans and all, but I don’t wanna be thinking about that lewd, sappy fanart I saw the other day while I’m watching a really cool fight scene. Not to mention, you’re eating away at that gap between your show and your fans again—that gap is there for your health, guys, don’t say I didn’t warn you.
*sigh* Freezerburn involves Weiss making another pool of ice along the ground, and Yang launching herself high into the air. She ignites a shell in her gauntlet, plunging down fist-first to turn the ice sheet into a fine mist that will work great for obscuring their movements.
As the mist hides them from view, laser sights are turned on all over the robot, seeming to try and detect them via heat or motion. Torchwick spots Yang shoots at her, only for Ruby to launch herself at the mech and bounce her scythe blade off its face, before declaring “Checkmate!”.
The ship this is referring to is
Growing frustrated, Torchwick decides to unleash some heat-seeking missiles. Again with some help from Weiss, the two of them successfully dodge the first volley, but Torchwick nips that and fires at Weiss before she can land, taking her out for a little while. No worries, she gets the last laugh by powering up Blake!
That special clockwork glyph under Blake’s feet is a very advanced form of Weiss’s semblance—it’s called time dilation. Meaning, yes, she slowed time down for the person affected by the glyph. No, that’s not utterly broken or anything… She also seems to have sent some sort of dust into the mix, too, to power up Blake’s weapons, because when Torchwick fires another volley of missiles, she answers with a rapid series of strikes to send out energy waves, carving each missile in half before it can even get close to her.
Ruby speeds past her, calling out “Ladybug!”, the ship name for Ruby x Blake. Blake turns immediately, the glyph and dust exhausted, and joins Ruby in double-teaming the Paladin mech. Each of them attacks at the same time, leaping from one side of the mech to the other in rapid succession to confuse it. Once that’s done, they leap high, both of them bringing down their blades on the joint where one of the arms attaches to the torso, successfully severing it.
Yang sees an opportunity and runs to join in, launching herself atop the mech! She brings her mighty fist down time after time, pounding right on the cockpit where Torchwick is. Unfortunately, he responds by backing up at high speed, plowing straight through two concrete road supports with Yang in the way and slamming her up against the third. Just as she’s peeling off the cracked support, he transforms one gun arm into a fist and punches her through that one, too. Owch.
Blake calls out in concern, but Ruby holds her back—this is Yang’s big moment! Ruby describes Yang’s Semblance—with each hit, she gets stronger, absorbing energy to power up her own attacks. This is demonstrated immediately by her catching the Paladin’s next punch, then shattering it to pieces with her retaliating punch.
While vocals for a song I’m not too fond of (“Die”) start up, I’m over here scratching my head. Did we really organize this whole fight scene just to show off Yang’s Semblance? Dude, Weiss can control time. Yang’s not that impressive by comparison.
So, Torchwick kicks Yang away, and Ruby calls out “Bumblebee!” The ship name is spelled “Bumbleby” to differentiate it from the motorcycle, by the way. Blake turns and launches her Gambol Shroud in kusarigama form, so Yang can grab onto the gun as she grounds herself.
Torchwick’s mech still has two legs and is mobile, so with Weiss freshly recovered, Ruby unveils her final combo attack: Ice Flower! (White Rose, Ruby x Weiss)
Weiss prepares several glyphs filled with ice dust, allowing Ruby to fire her rifle through them and propel blasts of ice that freeze the Paladin mech in place. This keeps it still long enough for Blake to send Yang hurtling straight into it with all her power, smashing the entire thing to scrap metal!
It looks like the end for Torchwick…but wait! Remember that short, colorful woman who was with him at the recruitment meeting?
This is Neo, and she looks fabulous. She arrives to stop any further harm to Torchwick, somehow also summoning an airship to pick him up behind an illusion Yang then shatters.
So that’s that, then. Torchwick’s beaten, but gone, and they have almost nothing to show for their fight. Except tons of civilian bodies, I suppose.
Yang comments that he must’ve gotten a new henchmen, and Weiss, the clever bitch, says Neo made their plans ‘fall apart’, which is an actual pun, who’d have thought. Yang judges her, not because this wasn’t the time for jokes, but because she didn’t think it was very good. Oh, piss off, Yang, you’re on thin ice with me today.
They leave, but Ruby pauses.
R: Wait…where are Sun and Neptune?
I’ll tell you where they are, Ruby—they’re over at some noodle stand, eating. Neptune turns to Sun and says “They’re probably fine, right?” and Sun replies “Probably”.
You know, I wasn’t initially sure who to be madder at. I was first angry at these two idiots for just leaving RWBY to their fates. Then I turned around and got mad at RWBY for just leaving Sun and Neptune to their fates first and completely forgetting about them once they vanished from eyesight, possibly injured. Then I got mad at Rooster Teeth, because what the goddamn hell-fucking shit-shoveling whore-bitch of a FUCK?!?!?
You think you’re funny, Rooster Teeth? That wasn’t funny. That was you kicking me in the dick, twice. Fuck you.
Love to Be a Part of It Someday: 6
And I can’t even end the post here. This is going to be the longest post I’ve ever made thus far, because Rooster Teeth are not done kicking me in the dick. First, let’s talk about Torchwick, yeah? Here’s what Torchwick did in this scene:
- Unveiled a very powerful piece of stolen equipment to recruits who were not yet assured of loyalty and could’ve fled the building and blabbed, not just of the stolen Paladin prototype, but where Atlesian military units could find more, because he took care to mention “south east”.
- Stamped a fucking White Fang emblem on the thing, so that it cannot possibly be mistaken for a mech being piloted by Atlesian military units and cannot even benefit from confusion it otherwise would’ve sown.
- Smashed that mech through the building and manned it through downtown and across a very busy freeway, killing and injuring scores of people and ensuring countless more lived to tell authorities all about the big Paladin prototype mech that had a White Fang insignia on it. At this point, he has publicly exposed the White Fang’s designs and their capacity for terrorism, pretty much single-handedly ensuring not only that the White Fang would lose any valuable recruits turned off by mass murder, but also bringing down a shit ton of attention and artillery on the White Fang and anyone associated with them now that the news’ headlines are going to read “White Fang kill hundreds in Atlesian mech”. He has just fucked the White Fang over entirely, drawing the ire of at least two full nations full of Huntsmen and their militaries down on their heads and losing any underground invisibility they once took advantage of.
- And last but not least, let's not forget--he got the Paladin that obviously took some effort to steal wrecked before it could be used in any actual plans.
Torchwick, were this a sensible world, would be fucked, guys. He’d be skinned, salted, and dipped in glass shards and only once Cinder stopped incinerating everything within a mile radius would she finally be calm enough to kill him. He just destroyed everything.
Threatening Enemies: 2
Except, yeah, throw all of that out. None of that matters. No one’s even going to be mad at Torchwick or even remember that this happened, actually. That’s a promise. Not lying. Look at my face and tell me I’m lying.
So you know what that means? It means a Road to Nowhere for every bullet. No, I don’t care if Rooster Teeth didn’t intentionally write Torchwick killing any chance for the scheme to work, that’s what they did, and the fact that they’re going to, come next episode, completely forget this happened and not bother to write out any of the ramifications of it means it gets the points.
Road to Nowhere: 5
And that’s not all they’re going to forget. All those civilian losses I mentioned? Window dressing.
Yes, you heard me right. Torchwick sent cars flying like bowling pins for no other reason than someone at RT thought it looked cool. None of those people mattered and the deaths of at least a hundred people will not register to anyone in-story or out. Not even Blake, who is technically responsible for this and is going to spend the next few episodes in a very bad mood over what happened here.
That, MKG, is fucking abominable.
Road to Nowhere: 6
Hold it right there, did you hear me say I was done? Fuck no. Remember how mad I got that Sun and Neptune were essentially thrown out unceremoniously after accomplishing nothing? They’re not the only ones.
Blake and Sun technically heard something useful (but this was completely independent of Sun’s help) by hearing aforementioned “south east”, but Yang got nothing out of Junior (as anyone could’ve predicted) and Ruby didn’t even help get the oh-so-sensitive files! There was no reason for Yang or Ruby to go anywhere nor for Sun and Neptune to even tag along! By far the most important info we got was Penny’s robot status, and that was independent of the investigation! Another point, then!
Road to Nowhere: 7
Sunshine and rainbows, guys! Cool fight scenes! That’s all this plot was! Just an excuse for a fight scene!
I fucking hate life. I’m going to bed.
Counts:
- Jaune: 7
- It Was Right There: 3
- Fauxminism: 5
- Hypocrisy: 1
- Ice Cream Queens: 0
- Reliable Leaders: 4
- Prowling Wolf Fallacy: 0
- Prowling Wolf Fallacy: 0
- Threatening Enemies: 2
- Love to Be a Part of It Someday: 6
- Your Fight Scene Sucks: 9 + 2
- Evisceration Evasion: 2
- Evisceration Evasion: 2
- Ill Logic: 15
- Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Veil: 4
- Wink Wink, Nudge Nudge: 0
- Band-Aid Brigade: 0
- Wink Wink, Nudge Nudge: 0
- RSVP: 21
- Road to Nowhere: 7
- Y.A.S. Queen: 3
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Volume 2, First Arc (Part I) | Table of Contents | Volume 2, Second Arc (Part I)
no subject
Date: 2024-02-05 02:01 am (UTC)From:ETA: Also gotta say the complete lack of concern for NPCs on the part of the writers is very much another Homestuck point. In that, we're not supposed to care that multiple entire populated planets are destroyed, and finding out a character keeps and possibly rapes slaves is reacted to by the POV character with "ew, he's gross, I don't wanna hang out with him", not even bothering to ask the victims' names, let alone try to help them.
no subject
Date: 2024-02-05 07:59 pm (UTC)From:As for the civilians, yeah, it still bothers me to this day how that just...goes uncommented on. Like, people died, bro. You can't tell me they didn't. Yet next episode it's all fun and prom games.