#I know ice queendom is like sort of canon but not really

[averagemrfox]

Beacon Blake fully believing she’s a coward while allowing herself to become possessed by the nightmare grimm just to save Weiss. Girl pls

[powertaco]

What are your thoughts on WR development overall and your thoughts on WR being developed/made canon in V10?

Ugh I am going to ramble about everything here I can feel it...well you asked for it. I apologize for none of it, and if you all hate me at the end well I don't mind.

Volume 6 and before are pretty much great. They go from kinda at odds to tentative friends, learning to trust, and rely on each other, best friends, pining over one and other and V6 was a loooot of WR for us to feast on.

Afterward I felt like it got sidetracked. There could be various reasons for this (in hindsight I feel like Penny being given a way bigger role so her death could hit harder is to blame for part of this because realistically how long has Ruby known Penny? A month?)

Even if you don't like the ship they're supposed to be canon best friends so I take personal issue with almost all of volume 9.

I think it was sloppy writing that didn't move the story forward, and even though I don't care about Bees I feel like they still got shafted since they basically were forced to confess to move things along, and them doing so made them miss out on the sister/supposed friend and her problems, and only showcased the worst sides of the relationship.

For example Yang let's Ruby scream at Weiss but only moves to do something when Blake gets yelled at. Blake and Ruby still have...less dialogue than Ruby does with Ren I think etc.

Jaune was too present merely because his entire deal took away from Ruby's imo.

I've said it before but frankly Nora falling and learning who she is away from Ren so when she sees him in V10 she's ready for the relationship is far more satisfying to me narratively.

Leave Jaune above ground so he has to deal with the fact that he thinks he failed his friends and they all died and let him learn from that experience instead.

This also doesn't take into account that Jaune's one interesting change in 9 (being old) is taken away via random deaging (although I guess this makes deaging canon and hey young maria this is how dwr can still win! more at 11!)

Generally when characters go through a volume you want some sort of arc for them to go and change through. Weiss gets none of that. Out of all the characters nothing really happens to her, and she doesn't change at all. She's just sad about Atlas. Neat.

There's no time for it just like there's no real time for Ruby.

In Ruby's own words 'gotta help Jaune right?' and they do. Ruby removes herself from the census, which is how its framed, and they stop to...help Jaune.

There are a few moments that are WR'ish in 9. The Nevermore summon, Weiss believing in Ruby, and calling her name first etc, but overall Weiss's main job is to backslide.

I said it before but in the market Neo, the perfect assassin is after Ruby, and they split up. Weiss goes 'gross nosehairs', and ditches her best friend who she already knows by that point is NOT doing well.

This is not Volume 1. This Weiss is not that petty, and she's literally had to manhandle corpses. The fact that she wouldn't stay near her canonical best friend, and leader is asinine, and only happens so she can be alone to meet the smith.

Even if Weiss can't help Ruby fight Neo she's an extra pair of eyes (and Neo doesn't care how crowded it is in the market), and just being there for Ruby can help.

With all that said RWBY is big into symbolism. When WR are together in almost all the side spin off material it means something. Manga Anthologies has them making heart eyes and flirting like every other page. Ice Queendom was a love letter to WhiteRose (precious?). The movies, etc.

When their weapons rest next to each other on screen like the Bees do? It means something. When their flowers break ranks to be near each other (and Weiss's flower is the lily please note)? This means something.

Ruby can stand and jump from missile to missile but has to wrap her arms around Weiss to stay seated?

If Chibi continues it's pattern of predicting things in the main plot then the fact that Weiss is the woodsman in the fairy tale means a loooot as in several versions of that fairy tale the woodsman marries little red after helping her deal with the wolf problem (which varies by the story).

They're the knight and princess for each other. Ruby comes into Weiss's live turns it upside down, and helps her change. Likes her for her genuinely and wants to be her friend at the start. Through this she changes the world for Weiss, and helps her grow, and Weiss in turn helps Ruby be the leader she can be.

But yeah I guess that's just friends things and they should date some guys they've had like a half a dozen lines with instead? I don't get it really.

She and Oscar punch each other in the face, and they talk about strategy. Oscar has a younger kid crush on her, and Ruby is awkward because that's her headmaster in this kids head. Oh right he went in for a hug she ignored. Peak romance.

Jaune and Weiss have almost no interactions, and when he saves her at Haven her response isn't to be like 'omg i love you' it's 'keep doing it i have work to do'. Are they friends now? Sure, but that's about as far as it goes.

It remains that outside of group hugs the only person that's allowed to initiate contact with Weiss almost all the time outside of battle is Ruby.

Ruby knows when she needs help and will guide her away when she needs it, but other people don't' touch Weiss unless she does it first because they know she doesn't like it...except Ruby.

I have tried to look at other relationships for them, and I honestly don't see them as realistic.

Even Penny would need a lot more development to make it work. I get that it's cute and wholesome but they've known each other for again a month, and Penny just defers to Ruby.

Ruby needs a partner and equal not a submissive enabler. That's a relationship you have with a pet, and not a person.

Now if Maria were young and hot that'd be different...

Anyway...

Ruby and Weiss are partners. If they're allowed to have the much needed conversations they never seem to get, ie haven, ever after, Ruby's mom, everything, etc.

Then is it possible? Maybe. If they do go WR I suspect it'll be more hints, and slow ramp up until the final season.

I would expect it either on the eve of the final battle, or literally during it maybe as in Weiss gets feds up with waiting, and decides to do something about it.

More likely at this point is they'll both just end up single with maybe faint hints so fans can imagine what they want for it.

Would I prefer it if it was WR so the team can truly be family? Yes, but I don't even know if we're getting a volume 10 at all to be honest. The fact that it wasn't announced at the last festival, and we get an extended eppy, and then nothing after the last movie?

Not making me feel super confident. I could be wrong though. On many things. Except Young Maria.

[curestardust]

Dust Watched: RWBY: Ice Queendom

Genres: Action, Fantasy, Female Protagonists // 12 episodes

As usual, I'll try to stay objective but I don't promise that this review will make complete sense for people who haven't seen the original RWBY. That is because I actually started following it when the "White Trailer" was released in 2013. While I haven't been following the show that closely for the past few years (but I'm caught up on it), I'm sure there will be some things my brain doesn't even realise needs an explanation for new people just because of how ingrained some of it is. But I'll try.

✧  story  ✧

First off, despite the first 3 episodes adapting the beginning of the original show somewhat accurately (except better), this actually isn't a full adaptation of it but rather a sort of "extra arc" that could've happened in the original show as it doesn't disturb any canonical events.

For people who don't know about RWBY, this anime probably feels rushed yet slow at the same time. The worldbuilding speedruns through the first 3 episodes but then we enter a Samsara that's main focus is the character building of Team RWBY. Obviously, for me this wasn't a bad thing. In fact, it was fantastic! RWBY (orig) is notoriously bad at good character arcs or interactions so for ME this was something to fill that hole. But for those who don't know the universe, they might be disappointed that they don't really get to see or explore this world further than what we're given. Oh but don't worry if you don't understand this Aura, Semblance, Silver Eyes stuff. The writers don't either! :)

Sidenotes: I really like these Nightmare Grimm. I was mad pissed that they didn't animate the Sun/Penny vs Roman and co. fight but after I relaized that these characters don't have much of a role, I wasn't bothered by it... as much. Give me anime Penny fight scene!!!

✧  characters  ✧

Now, listen, for new people, these characters might seem a bit underdeveloped. They meet, become buddy-buddy besties in a few days, enough to risk their lives for each other? To be honest, the show did have some blunders. Weiss spends a lot of time being racist (Faunus-phobic?) towards Blake and before we enter the Nightmare arc, they don't actually make up. Then, even in the dream, Blake is outcast by Weiss. All in all, Blake would've absolutely no reason to put as much trust in Weiss as she does in the anime nor put herself in so much risk. However...

In the original show, Weiss and Blake have spoken like 3 damn sentences to each other. And here comes my salt. Because I don't write reviews of non-anime I've never really gotten to complain to anyone about how much I HATE the character writing in RWBY (orig).

Here's the thing: the writers don't like Team RWBY. Or they don't understand them. Either way, they can't write these four to save their goddamn lives. Despite Volume 9 coming out after this anime and having a very similar concept and goal it's soooooooo much worse. Even if you hated "Ice Queendom", was the friendship between Team RWBY realistic? Earned? Like they actually became friends? Because in RWBY (orig) they STILL feel like they're just mere acquintances instead of a close group of friends who have been through hell. So listen... even if this anime just by itself isn't particularly good, I didn't realize how much I've been starving for some actual good Team RWBY interaction. I gobbled this UP, okay?!

Whew... now that that's out of the way, some sidenotes: really liked Shion's character, design, powers, presentation *chef kiss*. Team JNPR were just extra fodder, they felt pretty meh. LOVED that despite them shoehorning Jaune into the story (again) he actually didn't take away screentime or agency from Team RWBY and just had his own mini character arc instead of becoming the deus ex machina pseudo MC *cough Volume 9 cough*.

✧  art  ✧

Oof, boy. There are a few, and I mean I could count them on one hand, really beautifully animated fight scenes but outside of that, the anime looks not... very good. The rest of the fight scenes look downright comical, very frequent off-model shots throughout, minimal movement, numerous animation mistakes (minor but still), and smudged backgrounds in the last few episodes especially are prevalent. The only thing stopping it from being downright ugly is the close-up shots which they focused the most on after the figh scenes. All in all, it feels rushed? Unfortunate, as RWBY's signature has always been its fight choreographies. But! Those like 5-6 fight scenes they actually put work into? Go so fucking hard.

Oh, and the winter outfits are really cute!

✧  sound ✧

OP/ED's are fantastic, I especially loved how they got something for the OP that sounded so close to Jeff and Casey's style. The classical renditions of the iconic RWBY tracks were also a nice touch.

Also the characters being voices by people with actual experience in VA work?? An incredible experience. (Yes, the bar is this low, I'm just glad I didn't cringe multiple times while watching the anime as opposed to the show.)

✧  overview ✧

All in all, if we don't take RWBY (orig) into consideration, this isn't a particularly good anime. And it's not even guaranteed that people who have watched the show will like this anime. I don't think there are any winners here besides maybe Monty who I'm sure would've been ecstatic to see his brainchild in anime form, regardless of its shortcomings. Rest in Peace, my man.

EDIT: Oh, right, I almost forgot. Watch the original 4 teasers!!! They STILL hold up today!

My Rating: 6/10

[neptunevasilias]

Pinned post below 🌌💙

Basic info:

Chris, 20, he/him, transmasc/mlm/asexual, white, USAmerican

My main blog is @doctor-ciel

I don’t mind spam likes/reblogs, in fact PLEASE DO. I mostly reblog because I like to curate fanart. I do this for myself but also so that other people can look through my tags.

I used to have the url @/scathing-eyes, I changed it back in 2020 when the old owner gave it to me. That was so long ago that I doubt many people even recognize me as that url, but since I think the old owner of this url had at least a moderately sizable following(it’s hard to tell follower count on tumblr), I like to have this clarification somewhere that’s easy to see.

RWBY info:

Been a fan since the V4/5 hiatus

I am The Neptune/Seamonkeys/Team SSSN Guy. I know most people don’t care about or like Neptune, I’m fine with that

I haven’t watched any of the Justice League stuff, or ice queendom, or anything else that came out after volume 8 except for volume 9, the V9 animatic, and RWBY Beyond. I also haven’t read the manga or the comics. I haven’t finished Roman Holiday. I have, of course, read After the Fall and Before the Dawn, you could also call me The Before The Dawn Guy (that book sucks btw. I’ve read it several times)

Most of my blog is reblogs. I especially like to reblog old fanart and fanart of obscure characters/ships

On that note, I have a tagging system but sometimes I only come back later to tag posts properly. I’m on-and-off working through my archive and fixing everything, but there are upwards of 13,000 posts here

I use this emoji ☀️ on all SSSNN-related posts because I like being able to browse all the posts on my favorite guys at once

I’m not a RWDE blog, but I sometimes post and reblog criticism because RWBY, like any work, is flawed (although it is especially so). Blacklist the tag “rwde”

I don’t really interact with the larger fandom, and I don’t use any other social media, so a lot of discourse flies over my head. By nature as The Team SSSN Guy, a lot of discourse has nothing to do with me anyway

I sometimes reblog art of my boyfriend’s OC, Roan Wood, and their friend’s OC, Nicole Vermillion

Personal projects:

I run @rwby-heritageposts, but it’s on hiatus right now until I get a better idea of what I’m doing with it

Ever since 2020 (before then, really) I’ve been developing a fanfic for Team SSSN. It started out as a post-V6 fic, then when Before the Dawn came out it turned into a rewrite of the book, but it’s gradually become a rewrite/extended canon of SSSN’s entire timeline. God willing, I will publish it someday. If you want to see what it will look like stylistically, I’ve posted an excerpt here

Over the years I’ve also mentioned writing a meta about seamonkeys/SSSN. Nothing of the sort has been posted yet. I kept scrapping and rewriting it, then for a while gave up on it entirely. Now I’m compiling everything I’ve ever said about them on discord (and tumblr), with the intention to use it as notes to finally, for real, write The Big Seamonkeys Meta. As of writing this, that document is almost 200 pages long and I’m nowhere near compiling everything.

[littlemisssquiggles]

Well there's another Ruby project and sadly like all the others is set in volumes one through three cuz I guess they're the most popular ones that the fandom loves or whatever and sadly we won't see Oscar in it like usual but on the bright side we do get to see ozpin again it's going to be a ruby au movie ozpin in it and they picked a good voice actor for him so I guess I'm happy with that

Hello anon-chan! Yes, I’ve seen all the hype for the new RWBY anime project. Watched the trailer and for the most part, it’s looking mighty cool. Wasn’t sure about the art style when I first saw the promo art but upon seeing trailer, I’m digging what I’m seeing so far for now.

My one gripe with this Ice Queendom project is that personally, I find its premise to be a little redundant in my opinion. Yet RWBY project that takes place during the Beacon timeline? Never mind that it’s animated but…why are we going back to V1 Beacon again?

Of all the potential FRESH new stories that they could’ve told from the World of RWBY that fans actually wanted to see---like Team STRQ’s story, Ozpin’s story, shoot even Summer Rose’s story--- why pick the one that’s already been done or rather, we already know the conclusion to?

Even if RWBY Ice Queendom is meant to be seen as some kind of alternate story, I personally don’t see the point of its existence since the main RWBY animated series has long moved past the events of RWBY Volume 1 and Beacon.

Y’know for a series that likes to use the phrase "keep moving forward”, often times than naught, RWBY has a tendency to backpedal and “revisit” a lot of previous ideas; bringing back old characters long written out of the story purely out of fanfare and repeating similar story beats.

And now they’re basically sort of doing it again with this 2D anime series. So basically it’s V1 but with a whole new spin on the story that’s more focused on…Weiss? Okay…but why? Why are we getting THIS story now of all times when the main canon story has long moved past RWBY V1 since what feels like donkey years ago?

It’s not even about “Oscar not being in this series”. It’s more like…why are we back at Beacon at all?

Why are we doing a “brand new story” from the World of RWBY…during Beacon V1 timeline as a new animated series…when we’ve long moved passed this plot point?

I get that the Beacon Trilogy is popular with the fan community (can’t really confirm that for sure) but…so?

For me, it’s almost feels like all those folks who’ve been screeching that RT should “cancel the current RWBY series and reboot the whole thing from the ground up” sort of got their wish with this… and I’m over here standing like…WHY THOUGH?

I dunno m’fam. For the sake of sounding like a Negative Nancy, I guess I’m in the mini-mini-minority who isn’t really bigging up Ice Queendom that much.

Don’t get me wrong, I am interested in it as a RWBY project and will be checking it out whenever it comes out this year. But forgive me if I’m not frothing at the mouth and exploding into puffs of pure unadulterated excitement for this new RWBY project like everyone else. I guess I’m still in that very exasperated phase that’s come to be exhausted by the way RWBY has been handled up until this point.

Instead of completely gushing over this project like other fans are doing, I’m over here like…why? Why does this project exist? Why are you expanding upon or telling a new/alternate story from the V1 Beacon timeline…when we’ve long moved away from the Beacon timeline?

You should be getting us hyped for V9, not teasing us with yet another new appetizer project with a story that dates all the way back to V1. Why?! Why THIS of all the prospective ideas you could’ve done, huh?

I mean it’s nice to see Ozpin again in the flesh with Pyrhha (rocking a lovely dress that strangely looks an awful lot like a red version of the one Weiss wore back in V4 during her concert at Schnee Manor while she was in Atlas) but…it’s not enough to get me hyped for this. I know these characters are dead canonically and the main story has long moved past them.

If anything, the main bright-sided takeaway of this project for this squiggle meister is that if it’s successful (which it’s already proving to be given the general excitement from the FNDM) then it can prospectively open the door for RWBY to be carried on by the SHAFT CRWBY team in the event that RT isn’t able to for some reason. With all the rumours about RT being sold off or worse, closed down, I’m concerned for the future of RWBY.

I can’t help but feel like V9 might possibly be the final chapter---not just for the whole Salem storyline that we’ve been following since V1 but also the 3D animated series done by RT as a whole.

That’s just how I’ve been feeling. While I’m not jumping off the walls for Ice Queendom, I will say that its art style and animation looks very promising from the trailer footage. While I quite love the style of the RWBY main 3D animated series, I wouldn’t mind if RWBY was continued in the 2D anime style done by SHAFT as an alternative to RT following the end of V9; y’know what I mean.

But putting art and animation aside, I’m actually way more invested in seeing what Ice Queendom does for the overall story of RWBY. Again, you can’t just dangle resurrected fan-favourite characters and cute outfits in front of me to psyche me up anymore. That stuff might’ve worked on me back in my earlier years of being a fan of RWBY. But after watching its main story do…not so well over the seasons, I just want the Ice Queendom writing team to deliver better on the STORY OF RWBY. Even if what they’re telling is an alternate one. I don’t just want this anime series to be a one to one copy of RWBY V1 for the parts of it that are adapted from those scenes/plot points in the show.

All I’m hoping for now is that the writing for Ice Queendom is not just good but solid and for the love of God, please let it be consistent with what fans already know from the World of RWBY.

Basically what I’m trying to say here is that RWBY’s story and writing is already hella messy as it is. As a long-time fan of the series that, somehow, STILL cares about the writing in spite of its flaws and problems, I neither need nor want Ice Queendom to add onto that.

I can’t take yet another RWBY project being harped on by its own fandom community for the same problem that’s been plaguing it since the beginning---its storytelling. For me, the writing of RWBY is what’s been keeping it back from being a genuinely phenomenal show and still continues to do so, based on my observations over the years.

Either improve upon the overall story of RWBY or don’t do anything with it at all! It doesn’t matter how many cool-looking action packed, razzle-dazzle-y spin-off projects they do. If the general writing of the series is still a mess, NO ONE is going to care in the long run. 

Not the prospective new fans or even the long-time ones still relentlessly holding onto the hope for RWBY to be better. And I honestly don’t want that to happen for RWBY. 

I know that’s a lot of pressure to place on Ice Queendom but here we are. So here’s to Ice Queendom delivering better on the story of RWBY as its second animated adaptation. Fingers crossed on that one.

Please let your story NOT suck Ice Queendom. 

That’s all I have to say on that.

~LittleMissSquiggles (2022)