surgeworks

28 – Volume 4, Episodes 8, 9, and 10 | Table of Contents | Volume 4 Final Thoughts
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Last time, we left off on some very unpleasant notes. Sun was the latest love interest to get smacked up, Qrow has slipped further into scorpionism, and the backstory episode concluded with what seems to be a very vicious Grimm heading for Jaune and Ruby.

Let’s get back into it.

V4E11, “Taking Control”

We open on Cinder, in the undisclosed headquarters where Salem’s faction meets up, surrounded by Beowolves, training with her powers. A slash of fire, and the two closest to her are sliced in half and burned to nothing.

The effort evidently strains her, and she’s almost taken off-guard by a Beringel—the gorilla-like Grimm that Ruby fought in her short—but she catches it in the chest, disintegrating it as well. She then collapses.

Salem calls an end to Cinder’s trial, dissatisfied. She recalls that Cinder claimed to want power, and asks if it was a lie. When a weary Cinder grits her teeth and shakes her head, Salem tells her to stop holding back. Before she can give any further advice, she’s interrupted by the opening of a door down the hall.

Preceded by the sounds of utterly pathetic crying, Tyrian wanders into the room, shivering and whimpering and still missing the end of his tail. Prostrating and face to the floor, he again brokenly murmurs that Salem will forgive him, must forgive him. The villainess herself finds this pathetic display and asks if he succeeded in his mission.

Tyrian tells her no, and this leads Salem to stalk around him all click-clack with an air of teacher-ly disappointment. Tyrian stammers out that he still did good, miss! Because he poisoned Qrow before his tail got the snip.

T: H-Have I done well? Have I pleased you?

S: …You disappoint me.

Said over her shoulder before she walks away. This miniscule reprimand comes with a grave sound cue in the backtrack, and Tyrian falls onto his palms again and dissolves into wailing despondency. Activated by the sound of nearby distress, a Beowolf tries to pounce on Tyrian, who smacks it away, before unfolding his blades and pouncing on it, brutally hacking away at it with tears streaming down his face.

The sobbing turns to maniacal laughter as the Grimm is minced, and Cinder looks on in evident disturbed silence.

Y.A.S. Queen: 9

This is another one of those scenes where I get what they were going for, but they still didn’t get it right. Tyrian, in the midst of his bizarre breakdown, descends into a fit of savagery, and butchers something that can’t fight back. It is supposed to make us unsettled as it displays how quickly Tyrian can fly off the handle and become violent if his emotions aren’t in check.

The reason it fails isn’t necessarily because the Grimm isn’t human, and so we can’t sympathize with it—the Grimm is a substantially smaller deal and lower threat than Tyrian, so the effect of horror at so much viciousness towards something weaker than himself remains intact. The problem comes because we haven’t actually seen Tyrian do anything like this to anyone that would matter. This display tells us of Tyrian’s instability, but not his savagery.

Yes, he fought Qrow to a standstill, visibly enjoys violence, etc. But Tyrian is talking the talk without walking the walk. This Grimm, while indeed weaker, is also something our heroes kill casually. What a character like Tyrian truly needs is some victims that matter, some crimes that heroes would be shocked at. Tyrian’s displays of violence before now have been strictly on orders from Salem, regardless of how much he seems to enjoy it, and he outright says Ruby is the only one who needs to worry about him, focusing mostly on her and engaging the others only as necessary. So with this outburst, where he doesn’t really kill anything I’d feel sorry for, I’m still left without anything to really convince me Tyrian is worth being afraid of.

Cinder slowly backs away, probably thinking “eesh, get it together”, and we pan up to the ceiling, spotting the broken moon through a domed window.

The next scene cut takes us to Patch, where Yang is putting the custom touches on her metal arm. Once it’s finished and she’s got it on, she goes to dust off her motorcycle, Bumblebee.

Taiyang appears in the door frame of the shed behind her, recalling that he didn’t tell her she was ready, but he doesn’t see fit to stop her. As it happens, he wanted a better goodbye than a letter, he says. But, he has an inkling that Yang is going to search for her mother, and will have an idea of where she is thanks to Qrow. But, Ruby is also out there, and Yang faces the decision of which person to go track down. When he asks her where she’s going, we don’t hear her answer.

Speaking of going places, a scene cut later and Weiss has a briefcase in her hand and is sneaking out.

She’s surprised by Klein, who bids her to be quiet and indicates he has her escape ready. They set off down the halls together, getting some ways through the building before Klein is summoned over the phone by Whitley. He says he’ll meet Weiss in the first floor library, and on her way there, Weiss opts to hide when hearing another argument between Ironwood and Jacques.

Jacques, who has apparently broken some china, has bristled at some latest measure Ironwood has taken. When Ironwood says he is basing his decisions off of intel Winter has given him, Jacques accuses Ironwood of “stealing” his daughter, and calls Ironwood a lunatic. Jacques, in my opinion, should take up playing in traffic to calm down and manage stress.

Winter’s intel, as it happens, says there’s a threat brewing in Mistral, so she’s at least doing her job correctly.

I: She’s been there for weeks. People are mobilizing, sudden spikes in weapon and dust trades—someone is about to make a play, and I do not trust Leo to stop them.

J: You’ve never trusted anyone other than yourself!

I: And for good reason! [slamming his hands on Jacques’ desk] …If Oz had just listened to me from the start…

J: [visibly intimidated] You need to get a grip.

Ironwood says that’s exactly what it’s doing—Atlas’ borders will be closed as of next week, with no travel in or out possible without permission from the Council. Weiss hears this, and realizes she needs to make her getaway asap. Jacques tries to bow up, saying that effectively means Ironwood’s own permission, and Ironwood, very clearly fed up with Jacques’ bitching, says “as a matter of fact, yeah”.

Ironwood makes to leave, and Weiss, right outside the door, is forced to basically glue the door shut with a gravity-dusted glyph. This stalls Ironwood just long enough that she can get to the first floor library (and which is kind of impressive considering Ironwood was putting his iron shoulder to the wood).

Finding Klein there, waiting in a hidden passage, she runs to him and hugs him,

and when he asks if she’s sure Mistral is safe, she replies thusly:

W: …No. But it’s where I’ll find Winter.

Oh? Really? Are you sure? *squint*

Spoiler alert, guys. Winter doesn’t show up at all in the Mistral arc.

Rooster Tease: 11

Road to Nowhere: 9

Just gonna go ahead and give it that right now. Remind me to give said Mistral arc double Someday points, too, because that’s both SSSN and Winter for “side cast who should be in that arc and blatantly aren’t”.

Klein affirms that if she needs family, she always has him, but he is again summoned away when splintering wood is heard, shortly followed by Jacques yelling. Weiss enters the hidden passage with one last “Thank you” to her faithful butler.

Back at Menagerie, Sun is recuperating.

A lovely scene that serves to remind me of the bullshit way he was injured, so I’m hard-pressed to enjoy the eye candy. But whatever, let’s have at that heartwarming.

Sun wakes up and notices Blake sitting nearby. Her head hung low, Blake spills her guts.

B: …This, is why, Sun. This is why I left them all behind. I am done seeing my friends hurt because of me.

S: …What are you—?

B: Shut up!

Blake, distraught, says she thinks of Ruby, Weiss, and Yang everyday, and views them as friends she loves more than she thought she ever would…and says she hopes they hate her for leaving.

*dryly* We’ll get to that in a bit, and I promise you it was fueled by fandom drama.

Blake rebuffs further attempts at coaxing reason from her, insisting that Ilia’s behavior is proof of the target on her back, and saying she’s not even the worst. We are still pointedly not talking about Adam, however.

Blake claims ownership of her choices and the consequences that come from them, determined to be the only one bearing them. But Sun checks her.

S: You think you’re being selfless, but you’re not. Yeah, that chameleon friend of yours got me pretty good. But I’d do it all again if it meant protecting you.

I’m still mad at this bullshit plot, but you, Sun, are a ray of sunshine and I love you without end.

He promises Blake that Yang would say the same (Which. Erm. Well…) and says that Blake can make her own choices, but so can others, and she has people choosing to help. So stop pushing them out, he says.

S: That hurts worse than anything the bad guys could do to us.

I am still annoyed over the Ilia Nonsense, but I am rapidly thawing given the manflesh on display. Sun’s abs are lovely, sure, but why have we not been talking more about his pecs? And his shoulders? And his biceps, wow, his biceps…

*smacking self on jaw* Alright, enough, back to the scene.

Sun says that if he goes up against “lizard girl” again, it doesn’t have to be for Blake’s sake, it’ll be to get even. He’s just trying to lift his arm when he has to wince thanks to his still-sore injury.

B: [chuckles] My hero…

Cue Kali falling through the door. See? Toldja that would be coming around soon. If it’s any consolation, Blake does muster some embarrassed indignation. Kali says her father needed to speak with her.

Ghira drops the cell phone on the table, revealing to us that it was actually Ilia’s phone they took, not Sun’s that they got back. So did he ever get his cell phone back? Seriously, Blake tossed that shit into the woods. Did they ever retrieve it? Anyway, Sun’s got his white jacket back on (sadface), and Ghira announces what they’ve learned: Adam Taurus is planning to overthrow Sienna Khan and stage a full-scale attack on Haven Academy, and if allowed to go as planned, it could mean Beacon’s fate all over again.

Sun says they’re going to destroy the White Fang once and for all, but Blake says they’re going to take it back instead. Internal reformist Blake is with us once again! Yippee...

So ends the bulk of the episode, leaving us with just enough time to return to the ruins of Kuroyuri, where Ren and Nora and sprinting to regroup with Jaune and Ruby, with Ren muttering “Not again” to himself as he runs.

When they get to the town square, out of breath, they’re relieved to find Jaune and Ruby unhurt, Qrow still laying against the dead cherry blossom tree. But just when Jaune asks if they heard that awful noise, too, Ren’s eyes go wide and he falls to his knees. There’s a soft sound of hooves approaching, and Nora fearfully murmurs Ren’s name.

The beast has arrived.

V4E12, “No Safe Haven”

*sigh* Get ready for the stupidest fucking seasonal boss ever, guys.

The black screen we fade into after the opening is peppered with the muffled, muted sounds of battle, machine gun fire and rifle shots reaching out through the darkness. The soundtrack remains dire as we start out on a long shot of the ruins.

Evidently the team is taking a pummeling.

Repelled, RNJR stare down the creature as it slowly approaches out of the dust, radiating its own smoky darkness. The red eyes of this equine thing peer hatefully outward, and it holds something on its back that drags along the ground.

Gimme like ten seconds, and then I’ll start my ranting.

A finger against the ground twitches, before the whole hand spasms and the creature’s top half shudders, swinging upright with a hoarse shriek, revealing itself to be a humanoid being with mask and horns and a jack-o-lantern-like mouth that glows from within past strips of fused flesh.

This creature is called the Nuckelavee, named after a demon from Orcadian mythology, and the only only first-hand account of one providing a picture well-recreated here. Though it faces four opponents, it turns its gaze instead to the sole vulnerable person in sight: Qrow. Jaune sees what’s happening and immediately sheathes Crocea Mors, sprinting for Qrow’s position. Seeking to intercept him, the Nuckelavee shows off its main method of attack:

Oh my god. Its arms stretch. Its arms fucking stretch, I—oh god, fucking Christ. I can’t, with this.

I’m not sure if this is better or worse than Neptune the Aquaphobe. Neptune the Aquaphobe was supposed to be funny, this is supposed to be intimidating. But before we address the arms, let’s take a moment to address the fact that RWBY has been engaging in some deceptive marketing with this thing.

They started dialing back on this very slightly at the end of Episode 10, with the creature’s frame against the house Ren and Nora were hiding under. However, in pretty much every major reference to this creature—both in the hoof prints and the silhouette and shadow it creates—we were led to believe that this creature was massive, big enough that a single hoof was about three times as big around as a person, maybe more.

Sure, it’s still fairly big, now, but it definitely does not match the picture we’ve been given. The horse part of it is about the same size as a regular horse, maybe a little bigger, and the humanoid part is pretty much to scale. Jaune’s whole body and then some was fitting inside the hoofprints seen earlier, but we’ll see him get kicked with one of those hooves in the course of his fight—they’re only about as big as his head.

Rooster Tease: 12

Which is important, because it should be massive. Grimm get stronger as they grow, and apparently never stop growing, This one is old enough to be intelligent, and collects trophies of its slaughters, for Christ’s sake. It not being massive is going to get points in just a sec, but for now—the stretchy arms bit.

This Grimm literally has these for arms:

How the fuck am I supposed to take these things seriously? It literally has Snap Hands for arms—they’re fucking stretchy toys! And don’t tell me it isn’t stretching, because I know you see that gif—once they extend out, they contract back into prior shape, like goddamn rubber.

This is the terrible and fearsome Grimm that has destroyed countless villages in a wide region of undefended Anima? This is all there is to it, a dude on a horse with rubber band arms? You dumb cockbite motherfuckers, who told you this was a good idea?!

I mean, just… *grabbing hair and pulling* You guys get why I’m boggling at this, right? This thing’s been getting the slasher movie villain treatment up until now, and yet this is how it kills people. I want you to imagine if this were Jason Voorhees—he walks up out of the woods, all masked and menacing, and then instead of stabbing you, he just stretches his arms at you like bungee cords. You can’t tell me you’d find that intimidating, you’d laugh your ass off!

That has to be some kind of point, which one fits best? Enemies? Fight Scene? LuLaRwe? Fuck it, giving all three.

Threatening Enemies: 9

Your Fight Scene Sucks: 54

LuLaRwe: 9

But, the scene itself. Don’t worry, we won’t be long before we’re back into this.

Jaune dodges the stretchy arm as it slams into the ground, and runs to grab Qrow and get him to safety. The Nuckelavee bears down on them, and Ren acts, flexing his Semblance around Jaune and Qrow to hide them. The creature stops short, confused, and Ren yells for Jaune to get Qrow to safety. Nora’s odd homing grenades start to pepper it, drawing its attention away.

See? Told you it wouldn’t be long.

*holding forehead in one hand* Guys, do you know what a fucking grenade is? What it does? Because we’re doing the thing we did with Coco’s M143 where apparently this is just 'not allowed'. Grenades explode with a lot of force. Prior episodes have shown this properly, with it being the only weapon that could force a Nevermore the size of a bus to retreat.

We’re also going to see bullets upon bullets strike this thing dead-on, along with blades, and neither one is going to shed any blood—

Evisceration Evasion: 19

—which would at least create the impression it’s just very thick-skinned. But that wouldn’t be much to go on, either, because this creature is not obeying the rules of this universe.

Aura is a thing, yes. It’s the set of rules that allows enough in-universe flexibility so that physics don’t make things much less exciting, removing things like mass and weight as factors along with blunt force and laceration injury. But this is a creature of Grimm—the Grimm explicitly do not have aura. As such, they are forced to obey the usual physics, meaning that if they aren’t planning on being carved up by scythes or smashed by hammers, they need to either be fucking huge or have lots of thick armor, or both.

This Grimm has neither of those advantages.

Threatening Enemies: 10

Your Fight Scene Sucks: 55

That is getting one here for Nora’s grenades, but we’re gonna keep at it every time this rears its ugly head. Every weapon on display here should be easily capable of laying the smackdown on this frail Halloween-costume-looking geezer Grimm. Hell, even Li Ren’s arrows, primitive and unoptimized though they were, should’ve been a significant threat to a Grimm of the Nuckelavee's size with no armor or aura.

This is turning out to be a very underwhelming Grimm morph.

But I could be generous. I could say that, hey, it may look silly—but it’s clearly a very effective threat, right? If you want, you could consider the Nuckelavee’s arms like really oversized slingshots with heavy ammo. It clearly has a deceptively long range. Between that and the horse’s speed, it must make a very effective fighter, right?

Except that it’s not. Despite the fact that this will be contradicted by the gif I just posted up there, and multiple times within the fight, the official word via commentary on this episode is that the Nuckelavee—a creature with two independent body halves—can only operate one at a time. Only one can move at once. It gains literally no benefit from its dual body plan and if it wants to attack in any fashion, it has to stand still.

Threatening Enemies: 11

I just want you to know that there were better ideas for a creature like this. When I saw the evil-looking silhouette and shadow in “Kuroyuri”, I figured it had to be one of two possibilities—either this was some unusually human-esque Grimm, a “dark knight” kind of being with the ability to use magic or weapons, or a true abomination—a creature that looked the way it did because it was amorphous, an amalgam of multiple beings, hence the rider atop the hooved half being dragged along the ground. A Grimm that grabbed and absorbed anything that got too near and incorporated it into its body plan. Either one of those would be more believably fearsome.

It Was Right There: 13

As it is, since there was no physical reason this thing should present a threat, magical or area-of-effect powers were my original go-to solution for this thing’s lack of bite behind all the volume-long buildup. In fact, the first thing I thought of was a radiating feeling of fear or dread that crippled fighters near it, an idea that RWBY actually would use two years later in Volume Six.

It Was Right There: 14

But the biggest “duh” moment with this thing is that the best idea for a more intimidating “boss” creature for this volume is already present here. Anyone thinking of it? It was the monster in the premier episode of this volume!

THE GEIST!!!

A creature with the power to possess and animate any inanimate object, multiple inanimate objects, and which presents a tricky fight given its adaptability in combat.

A creature like that genuinely could destroy one or multiple villages with ease! And if you wanted to spice it up even more, you could make it a believable source of drama and trauma for Ren’s backstory by making it so the creature can possess living things, too! Imagine little Lie Ren having to run away from his own possessed father as the village of Kuroyuri burns around him. Imagine poor little Ren crying because he’s been forced to use that knife his dad gave him to defend himself, at the cost of his parent’s life.

It would’ve been good!

It Was Right There: 15

The thing is, with no armor, no aura, and no grand amount of mass, this thing’s only real intimidating quality is that it looks spooky. It’s designed to be unsettling to look at, and sure, it is. It’s given the horror movie score and the twitchy movements, yes. But those are superficial—style alone does not make a threat compelling! We’ve covered that much with Tyrian!

But we have literally spent 1,300 words on this Grimm’s suck factor before the fight has even started, so let’s get back into it and put this shit behind us.

Jaune carries Qrow off and out of the way, and is about to get back to the fight when Qrow grabs his hand. The two share a somber look.

Jaune: 29

That one is for the fact that I know what that is supposed to be. If you wanted Qrow to have a solemn moment, where he shares a look with another person knowing that he might be dead before he sees them again—this scene of him wanting to say something but being unable to and the other person showing grim determination in the face of Qrow’s plight—it probably should’ve been his niece, not Jaune, who Qrow barely fucking knows.

But anyway, Jaune gets back into the fight.

Ruby gets smacked out of the air by one Nuck Puck (that’s what I’m calling its hands now) and Nora is floored by the other one. Those two down, it slings both its hands at Ren next, stopping his submachine gun fire short and getting a panicked, furious glare in response. While this is happening, Jaune (not Ruby) has this to say:

J: Guys! Keep moving! Go in a circle!

There was once a time when Ruby was considered a strategist in her own right, but that trait has been absorbed by Jaune now.

Jaune: 30

Nora’s grenades take its attention again, and the four of them begin utilizing their numbers, circling the beast and dodging its Nuck Pucks when it shoots them out while retaliating with their own fire.

This enables Jaune to get in close enough to strike at one of the creature’s legs, which does no visible damage (see the Evisceration point above) but apparently bothers it enough that the horse half just kicks Jaune away like a chump.

In response, Jaune does…this?

He...re-sheathes his sword, and transforms it into a two-handed claymore?

Okay, first off, why are we having Jaune moments right now? They’re coming one after another and I don’t get it. We’re in the ruins of Ren’s childhood home, it’s Ruby’s uncle whose life is on the line, why the hell is Jaune so prominent right now? It is not Jaune Time, he needs to sit down!

Jaune: 31

Second, that was not the right moment for that big reveal.

RWBY radiates “written on the fly” basically at all times from here on out, guys, but spoilers: there is a moment in Volume Five near the climax where this reveal would be much, much better served. Right now, Jaune is pulling out his new sword upgrade—the one made using metal left behind from his dead girlfriend, who was tragically slain. Right now, it makes no sense—there’s no gravitas to this moment because this Grimm is Ren’s personal enemy, not Jaune’s. Jaune has a personal enemy now, but this one isn’t it.

It Was Right There: 16

This is one of the reasons I call RWBY on being poorly-written, and don’t have patience for smug, snarky, derisive assholes who act like I just don’t understand good writing if it isn’t all handed to me at once—this wasn’t difficult. Just stick this reveal a volume later and you’re good. It’s going to be getting another Right There point when we get there, because not only is this a reveal that should’ve come later, but we actually do get a reveal at that specific episode that should’ve come now.

But, back to the fight. Jaune’s got a broadsword now, and hopefully sacrificing a defense for added offense will be worth it (spoilers: it won’t).

Well, Jaune’s latest slash to one of the horse legs does agitate it enough that it makes space and apparently gets really pissed.

It spins in place, its center of rotation not inhibited by its waist’s fusion to the horse body, and swings its Nuck Pucks around in a circle very fast, striking everyone nearby and rendering the seemingly-effective team tactic useless.

Then it twitches and shudders, and its spines grow out from its back, and it shrieks loud enough to hurt nearby ears, its mouth ripping itself open as it does.

Ren responds, leaping atop the dead sakura tree and firing Stormflower, and the Nuckelavee shoots a Nuck Puck at him. Ren tries to dodge, but isn’t fast enough, and is slammed into a house on the opposite street.

Nora calls out to Ruby, who swings her scythe and propels Nora over to Ren to intercept the other Nuck Puck before it can smash his head in. There’s a smash to black, and silence, and when we cut back in, we see that Nora is also pinned to the wall, dangling by her hammer which the Nuckelavee caught. There’s a moment where they both hang there, helpless, and Nora tells Ren to not look up her skirt.

The moment is ruined when the Nuckelavee grips Nora tight and swings her around, slamming her into the ground once, and then twice, flinging her away with her aura broken. Ren responds with rage, slashing wildly at the Nuck Puck holding him and shooting into its wrists for no evident damage.

Evisceration Evasion: 20

Didn’t that tactic work just fine on the Deathstalker from Volume One?

Jaune gets in a third slash on the horse’s rear legs, and I’m frankly wondering why he keeps doing that. It seems to bother the Nuckelavee enough that it drops Ren, though, who charges back into the fray, expressing livid fury at the creature that took his family away from him and threatens the new one he’s built.

Jaune yells at Ren to cut the Leroy Jenkins shit (nice black tie, kettle), but Ren doesn’t hear him. His aggressive rush only gets him punted with a Puck, and then grabbed by the legs and swung around like Nora earlier, causing him to lose Stormflower and breaking his aura as well when it smashes him against the ground like a toddler breaking a toy.

Nora and Ren collect themselves, and see the Nuckelavee stirring for a charge. Seeing this, Nora tackles Ren, sliding them both beneath a house. This house does not collapse on them as it would have, and when Ren peeks out, he sees Jaune futilely holding back the Nuckelavee’s front claws.

Ruby takes rifle shots, trying to take heat off of the other three and being the only one successfully dodging the Nuck Pucks.

Ren tries to rejoin the fight, but Nora grabs him by the arm to stop him. Ren protests angrily, trying to force her to let him go, but a sharp smack across the face stops this short.

Seriously, what is with the abundance of people hitting each other in the fucking face this volume? Stop it!

N: …No. I won’t let you kill yourself like this. After everything we’ve been through…I won’t let it end.

For a moment, Ren sees her as the crying, scared child she was the last time they were in this village, as tears well at the corners of her eyes.

N: Not like this.

Ren is forced to reign it in. Out of a sheath on his calf, he pulls out an old keepsake—the knife his father left him, which Stormflower’s blades were modeled off of.

Taking his hand, Nora leans close, and says that they can do this. Ren steels himself, and they return to the fight.

Ruby and Jaune regroup with Ren and Nora, and the Nuckelavee stalks some distance away, considering them. Ruby turns to Ren, noticing the knife in his hands. At last, she finally voices something akin to the strategist element she bore before, if only slightly. She says that Jaune and she can take care of the arms. Nora volunteers to take care of the horse, and that leaves the human half, the control center, to Ren.

Nora runs back between buildings and leaps atop one, and Ruby is firing Crescent Rose like mad, forcing the beast to attack her. She dodges, flying high, then recoil-shotting herself downward at high speed, slamming the blade into the ground just fast enough to pin the Nuckelavee’s right arm before it can retract.

From some distance away, a knife blade flies out, embedding itself in the horse’s thigh.

Jaune is up next. He stands there, vulnerable, Crocea Mors’ base sword in hand, but no shield. The Nuckelavee shoots its other arm at him, and it’s intercepted by Ren, who has the shield, who takes a flying tackle to crash into the hand before it can catch Jaune. At the ready, Jaune takes the sword and stabs it through the stretched-out arm, pinning it to the ground as well.

Nora, atop the nearby church, falls gracefully backwards, though she can’t help but grin as she brings Magnhild down on the horse creature’s head with awesome force, smashing it into the concrete with a wonderful finality.

Only one thing left. The Nuckelavee can no longer harm anyone, leaving Ren to take his vengeance however he likes. He walks up, grabbing the blade and yanking it out of the Grimm’s hide. It leans forward, shrieking its horrible cry directly in his face, but he stands unafraid.

The first strike is for his mother. The first severed arm literally snaps back on itself like rubber again, just in case you forgot.

The second strike is for his father, leaving the Grimm completely immobile.

The third strike, a swipe across the chest, is for all those that this thing has slain.

The final strike is for himself, and he slices the Nuckelavee’s head clean off.

So ends the decades-long terror spree of this horrible monster.

Nora tackles Ren in a hug full of relief and joy, but now that the fight is over, Ruby rushes off to Qrow—who is still breathing, if very slowly. He’s awake, and congratulates Ruby on a job well done. Right on time, help finally arrives, for reasons I can’t discern besides plot, but whatever.

Mistrali air skiffs come flying down, and Nora can be seen reporting on the situation. They load Qrow onto the deck and then they’re off. When asked, one of the officers says they were patrolling and saw the plume of Grimm smoke. Ruby worries that they won’t make it to help in time, but her attention is directed out the window:

Turns out Mistral was a lot closer than they thought. Ruby smiles, and tells Qrow they made it. She gets a hand squeeze to let her know he’s still there, and on the other skiff, Ren and Nora are smiling at the sight of Mistral, too. Ren’s hand slides over to Nora’s, surprising her. The notes of “Boop” (bleh) play as she bashfully leans her head on his shoulder.

Later, at a safe location, Ruby checks in on Qrow, who is in bed. Somber piano music and Casey Lee Williams’ vocals start up as Ruby sits down at a desk and begins penning a letter to Yang. In it, she apologizes for leaving so suddenly, and says she understands Yang’s dour viewpoint, as it’s been very hard on everyone lately.

We cut to an airship hangar, where a lone Weiss has bribed the captain into letting her hitch a ride, though he promises nothing should they get caught. Ruby’s narration continues as the ship takes off, describing the hardships her company has been through, and as we cut to a new scene of Blake at Menagerie, taking some White Fang effects out of a chest. Back at Patch, Yang is holding onto two pictures in her metal hand, one of a boat (called “The Pride”), and one of Team STRQ, representing her two choices of destination. On the next cut, though, we see that she and her bike are already on the boat, having set off on her journey.

R: You were angry when you said it, and I didn’t wanna listen, but you were right. Bad things do happen. All the time. Every day.

We see Taiyang holding the same picture of Team STRQ in a frame back at home, sorrowful but cheered up by the presence of Zwei.

R: Which is why I’m out here, to do whatever I can, wherever I can…and hopefully do some good.

Taiyang looks over to a more recent picture, though, showing Ruby with her team, with “New Friends!” written on it in her handwriting.

The next scene is of Jaune sitting down, arm over knee, staring at his own sword and shield, the only remains of Pyrrha Nikos. That’s still totally fucked up, by the way. But the camera pans slightly to show Nora and Ren walking into the room, representing the family Jaune still has. Ren sets his knife down next to Crocea Mors, and they sit down next to him.

Ruby’s narration continues on yet longer, to the point I’m getting the very strong sense that this is essentially filler, since there’s so much of the finale episode left. They pushed this shit to 28 minutes again despite having substantially less to wrap up than in Volume 3. It keeps up over scenes of Weiss looking out an airship’s window, Blake taking hold of the flag the Peaceful Version of the White Fang used, lowering it to find Sun Wukong smiling at her from across the room, and Yang freshly disembarked from the ship, revving her motorcycle and taking off.

There’s also Oscar, who is on a fairly nice-looking train cabin, sitting at a dinner table as the scenery goes by, a nearby poster indicating the destination as Haven Academy. As Ruby’s narration turns to the “plenty of people out there who are still lost”, we also see Ilia meeting up with Fennec and Corsac from the White Fang, the ones who radiated ~~furry bait~~ evil. We even cut to Cinder’s latest training session, wherein she has Emerald use her hallucination powers to provide her with imagined enemies to fight in order to practice—chiefly, a kneeling Ruby Rose that Cinder can ruthlessly strike down.

Ruby closes her narration, correcting a line that was going to say “for the people we lost” and changing it to say “for the people we haven’t lost yet”. To give you an idea how how much blatant filler this is, Ruby’s letter—written in extensive, thoughtful tones that don’t sound like they came from a 15, maybe 16-year-old—starts at 13:39 and reaches a minor stopping point at 17:56.

The previous record for blatant narration filler was Ozpin’s Vytal Festival historical anecdote in Volume Two, which clocked in at just a minute and forty-eight seconds, or just over two minutes if you count when the filler scene actually begins. Ruby just shattered that record—she narrated here for 4 minutes and 27 seconds, guys. Holy shit.

Tears stain Ruby’s longass letter to Yang, none of which so far has mentioned the Grimm they’ve dealt with or the destroyed villages or Qrow’s current condition. She wipes her eyes and continues—whoops, she’s not done narrating yet.

R: I miss you so much. I miss Weiss and Blake, too. But I think you’d all be proud to know that I made it to Mistral. All of us did. And we even ran into uncle Qrow along the way!

So, halting momentarily at 18:28, Ruby’s narration actually takes up 4 minutes and 49 seconds. Qrow stirs, and Ruby walks over to him, hearing a quip about her saving him for a change.

No, wait, she’s still not done! She’s still narrating!

We see Yang on her motorcycle, stopping at a fork in the road, literally pointing her towards her two possible destinations, Mistral or bandits.

To give you an idea, I copied the episode transcript from when she starts the letter to when she finishes it, and removed everything that wasn’t her talking. This is what it looks like:

This, laid over a bunch of slow panning shots of characters looking at objects or out windows that could’ve easily been condensed down into a minute or less!

Y: You are in so much trouble when I find you.

We do not see which road Yang chooses. But is there any real doubt as to which one she—

R: Until next time, your loving sister, Ruby Rose.

Christ, are you still going? Shut up!

R: Oh! Uh, P.s., I’ll be sure to give you the address of where we’ll be staying in Mistral.

*holding hands over face* Please… Please just stop.

But she keeps going, and doesn’t finish her letter narration until 20:15. 6 minutes and 26 seconds. She ran her goddamned mouth for 6 minutes and 26 seconds. It’s only 519 words long! To give you an idea, the actual, entire fight with the Nuckelavee, starting from when Jaune rejoins after getting Qrow to safety to when Ren decapitates the Nuck, runs from 3:26 to 10:16, only 6 minutes and 50 seconds.

We are still not done with this episode, which I guess is determined to take up as many pages on its own as the three episodes I recapped last post.

The scene where Ruby finally shuts the fuck up is set at Haven Academy, and someone is having tea in that set Ozpin gave the headmaster.

Watts: Salem always did say you were quite hospitable.

So, Headmaster Lionheart has turned traitor? What an interesting note to end it on. Looks like Ironwood was right.

They cut to black, and then there’s 5 minutes of credits, where they play “Armed and Ready”. I spot Paula Decanini’s name among the lead animators, which jumps out at me.

If I’m reading this comment from the Volume Two recaps correctly, apparently Miss Decanini is married to @pixarjem95’s cousin. It seems since this Volume, she’s been promoted to director, which hopefully means good things, but it’ll be difficult to tell because by the time they brought her on, they started letting multiple directors control different episodes in a volume. Because that makes sense.

Also, there is a post-credits scene.

Qrow is back to his full health, drinking at a bar, when he finds he has a visitor.

Os: Umm… I’m supposed to tell you… ‘I’d like my cane back’?

Qrow looks surprised for a moment, but then he simply nods and retrieves said cane. If I’m making the right inferences, Qrow has known the whole time that Ozpin wasn’t dead. Which I suppose tracks, since he referred to Ozpin as “missing” earlier in the Volume, but whatever.

Q: It’s good to see you again, Oz.

The episode and the volume both finally end with a cut to black.

Counts:

Jaune: 31
It Was Right There: 16
Fauxminism: 23
Hypocrisy: 18
Reliable Leaders: 19 + 8
Prowling Wolf Fallacy: 8
Threatening Enemies: 11
Love to Be a Part of It Someday: 31
Your Fight Scene Sucks: 55 + 20
- Evisceration Evasion: 20
Ill Logic: 58
Pay No Attention to the Man Behind the Veil: 19 + 7
- Wink Wink, Nudge Nudge: 3
- Band-Aid Brigade: 4
RSVP: 30
Road to Nowhere: 9
Y.A.S. Queen: 9
Rooster Tease: 12
LuLaRwe: 9
The Lovegood Fallacy: 4
How to Piss Off Gay People: 6
Invisembl: 2