#RWBY WRITING CHALLENGE!!!

[howlingday]

So how about a little challenge, choose one of the following 3 songs as the theme of the writing or background music for it: 1.-NEFFEX - Careless 2.-NEFFEX- Rumors 3.-REDASH : OUR HOMETOWN [GODDESS OF VICTORY: NIKKE OST] ps: this is only if you want.

I do want, and you know what? I accept your challenge, and in reply, I say, GIVE ME ALL THREE.

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Another Sleepless Night

Lucyna Kushinada, better known by her friends as Lucy, stared out her apartment window. Her friends... Assuming anyone else survived that night. Everything was already fucked from the start, with her getting kidnapped and held hostage while the crew charged headfirst into the shitstorm of Arasaka gunfire.

She remembered reading the news report about the "violent gangers who tried to storm Arasaka tower" and manged to be "summarily punished as to be expected." She'd read every news outlet she could on her way to the moon. Hoping, praying that someone found something that the others didn't and somebody survived.

But no, that's not what she found. They all said the same thing with different words. Rebecca is dead. David is dead. Days later, they found Kiwi dead outside a Buck-a-Slice in Arroyo. Much as she was a backstabbing and cold-hearted bitch, a part of her missed her.

But not as much as she missed David. On the moon, she swore she saw him jumping around on the moon, just like he did before. Her throat felt dry, so she left to grab a drink. Something hard enough to make her regret. But she couldn't forget.

Never. Because every day, she regretted not ripping off her helmet and dancing with him on the moon.

(NEFFEX - Careless)

===============================

Jaune Wants to F Pyrrha

People said a lot of things about Pyrrha Nikos. Some said she tall, beautiful, and perfect in every way. Some said she was Remnant's light of hope against the dark tides of the Grimm. That none could ever defeat the aptly named Invincible Girl.

And yet there was surprisingly little said about her in any negative way. Pyrrha never made any statements of her being perfect, but public response was she was being modest. The first negative thing anyone ever said about her was during her first few weeks of Beacon Academy, when her teammate, Nora Valkyrie, said she "apologized way, way, waaay too much" and "was too nice for her own good". Since then, she had been small attempts to remedy these issues, but this seemed to only fuel the already roaring flames of the perfectionist ideal people made of her. It seemed no matter what she did, she would always be perfect.

Until one day, she met a young man about her age. Her team leader, Jaune Arc, who was almost her exact opposite in every way. Nobody said a nice thing about him since his arrival, save for the few friends he'd made, and even then, they had much to say about him.

Jaune was weak, scraggly, and was inept at combat when he began attending. She could personally attest to his lacking qualities when he not only didn't have his aura unlocked, but he didn't know what aura was! But she knew better than to judge a book by it's cover and decided on the day of her initiation that he would be her partner.

Was it selfish to pick and choose who she wanted to team up with? Maybe, but it worked out in the end. Where Jaune lacked in combat strength, he made up for it in his tactical mindset, leading their team to victory. One could say he was the brains of the outfit, though his low test scores would argue that point.

Over time, though, his lacking skill became more and more evident, so he asked Pyrrha to train him. This leads us to now, on the rooftop above their dorm, where they hold their near nightly sparring matches. They had finished a mock match, sitting next to each other, hands so tantalizingly close and yet so painfully distant. He looked to her and she looked to him.

Jaune gazed into Pyrrha's eyes, and she into his. The blue sky overhead met green hills below, and she couldn't help but admire the way he looked at her. She could see... No, she could feel love and adoration glowing from him. Her heart pounded as he spoke to her.

"Pyrrha, I... I wanna ask you something." Pyrrha swallowed a lump in her throat. "And... And if you don't want to, I'd understand and respect your decision."

It was at this moment she realized where they were. They were alone, isolated from their friends, on the rooftop of the school with a night sky filled with gleaming stars and a moon nearly whole. This was a night she'd always dreamed of.

"Anything, Jaune." She answered.

"I... I wanna fight you!"

"...Come again?" She didn't hear that wrong, did she?

"I want to fight you." Jaune said, with more confidence this time.

"I... I sorr-" She stopped herself. "I mean, excuse me, but I don't understand what you mean. Didn't we finish sparring?"

"Yeah, we did, but," he looked up, to the stars that glittered high, "but I meant I want to fight you for real one day. I want to get so good, you don't have to hold back against me when we do spar."

She wouldn't argue with his statement, considering nothing he said could be seen as a lie. She was leagues above him with her years of athletic and competitive training, so of course she would have to hold back when the two sparred. A kindness she didn't often share with others, or ever in the case of the resident bully, Cardin Winchester.

"Do... Do you really mean that?" Pyrrha asked. "Do you really want to fight me?"

"Pyrrha, if I could fight you on your level, and not totally suck, I think I'd be the happiest guy who ever lived."

Giving a puff instead of a laugh, she couldn't stop smiling at him. She leaned against him, her pinkie touching his. Then, his hand slid over hers, and she felt her heart nearly explode with joy. She gave a soft sigh.

"One day... I want to fight you, too."

(NEFFEX - Rumors)

**********************************************

The Napping Bounty Hunter

Zora Salazar was a lot of things.

First off, she hates epithets and whatever criminals she hunts down using them gets an extra crack in the jaw. Two of 'em if they're really going on and on about how their supposed "magic superpower" automatically means they win.

Second, she herself is Inscribed, and her epithet was, is, and will be broken. Helped make her bounty hunting easier, sure, but she rarely used when she was tracking. Not unless someone gives her a reason, like ticking her off in a way similar to the previous paragraph. Still, her epithet was definitely the strongest she'd seen yet.

Third, she's a bit of a romantic. Not exactly like the loved-dovey, kissy face, "I'd die for you" kinda romantic. More of a "two men enter, one man leaves, and they're both best friends, and they're giving it their all and also there's a sunset shining behind them" sort of romantic. She loved the thrill of the fight, the sweat that beads down from giving your all, and chase and satisfaction of reaching the top.

Fourth, she really loves-

"HEY!" A voice belowed.

Zora tapped her hat up from her comfy lie down against the tree. And she JUST got comfy.

The bellowing came from a familiar face, but not one she could name. Some guy from a gang she busted a few days ago. She would've brought him in, but he was already running out the back door when she zeroed in on his boss.

"You n' me got a score to settle!"

"No, we don't." Zora put her hat back on her face. Great, now she has to get comfy again.

"Yes, we do!"

"Nuh-uh."

"WHAT YOU MEAN NUH-UH?!"

"I mean. Nuh. Uh." She grumbled loudly. "Means whatever beef you got with me goes to a different butcher. Do I look like a butcher?"

"She looks like a cowboy." A small voice said behind annoying big guy.

"Nah, I'd say she's more of a desperado." Another voice said.

"You only know that word because you watched one western movie!"

"And it was a good one!"

Maybe a movie would would help her sleep. If she was real quiet, she could sneak inside and take a nap in a comfier seat than this tree. I mean, the tree was comfy if you got in the right spot, but-

"HEY! QUIT STARIN' AT THE SKY!" He huffed. "You're being so rude! We drove all the way out here in my brand new car just so we could make you pay for putting our boss in jail!"

"Listen," Zora said after letting out a deep breath, "I'm willin to let this go for interruptin my nap. So get back in your car while you still can."

"Oh, I don't think so!" Suddenly, Zora felt a hand grab her by her poncho. Of course this loudmouth had an epithet. All loudmouths do. "I'm gonna-"

"Let go."

"Wha?"

Zora glared at him with cold, baneful eyes. "LET GO, OR ELSE."

"Or else what?" He sneered. Oh, she was so hoping he'd say that.

With a grin and an iron grip, she squeezed his hand. Slowly, it started to bulge before shrinking, smaller and smaller until all that was left was emaciated, bony hand. With a groan, he let go, wheezing as he stared at his wizened fingers.

"Wh... Wha dih you do to muh bodeh..." Losing his teeth didn't make him easier to understand, but Zora was well versed in gum linguistics.

"Or else." She said, turning away. "Enjoy the walk home, old man."

"Uh, but we drove."

"I know." Faster than anyone else could react, she whipped out her gun and fired a bullet into the engine of the car. Rust creeps as paint peels, the car slowly sinking to the ground as it's tires deflated. The glass of the car slipped free, shattering as it fell inside. "But you're walkin' now."

(REDASH - Our Hometown)

_________________________________________

[bridgyrose]

15 minute writing challenge - Yang introduces Ruby to the club scene at 21.

(Alright, here's the challenge)

Ruby sighed as she looked around the club, watching everyone dance and drink while the music pounded in the air around her. She tapped her foot against the stool she sat on, watching the time on her scroll as she tried to count down the minutes to when she could leave, sipping on her fourth soda. She still wasnt sure how Yang convinced her to come around, nor did she remember why she even agreed, but everything made her feel overwhelmed. 

“Come on Rubes, you need to relax and get up and dance!” Yang said as she brought over a couple drinks, sitting one down in front of Ruby. “You’ll never meet anyone if you sit here.” 

“How can you enjoy this?” Ruby asked, pushing the drink away from her. “Its too loud to think, and I still have a meeting with Ozpin in the morning. I should be leaving-” 

“And you only turn twenty-one once. We’re here for you to relax, remember? You’ve been so stressed out lately and this will be the perfect chance for you to cut loose.” 

Ruby sighed as Yang walked off, staring at the drink that was left in front of her. Sure, Yang was right, turning twenty-one was a once in a lifetime thing, but drinking in a crowded club with music that made her ears pound wasnt exactly her idea of relaxing. Truthfully, she would’ve much rather been spending time with Weiss in the library or with Blake getting tea… even game night with Jaune and his team would’ve been better than this. Still, if she was going to be here, it might not be a bad plan to try to enjoy the night. 

A woman with green hair sat down next to Ruby, taking a sip from her own drink as she stared out into the crowd. “Not much of a clubber, are you?” 

“That obvious?” Ruby asked. 

“You’ve been sitting here for the last hour, you havent touched the drink your friend brought, and you’ve had enough soda and water to tell someone that you’re either the DD, or that you dont drink.” 

“Sister. She’s my sister, not my friend.” 

“Doesnt make a difference to me.” 

Ruby pushed her drink towards the woman and sighed. “And you? Sounds like you’ve been more interested in watching me than enjoying yourself if you know what I’ve been through since I’ve walked in.” 

The woman shrugged and put her empty glass down. “Figured you’d prefer a friend that didnt want to dance. Or get you drunk.” 

“That’s fair.” 

“Emerald.” 

Ruby looked at her curiously. “Emerald?” 

Emerald smiled a bit. “My name is Emerald. What’s yours?” 

“Ruby.” 

“Want to ditch this place? I know a cafe down the road that has a bit better of an atmosphere than here.” 

Ruby hesitated as she looked out towards Yang, her foot tapping a bit faster as she almost seemed torn on leaving. While she didnt want to be here, she couldnt exactly just ditch Yang. But if she had a way out… She sighed and texted Yang from her scroll, letting her know where she’d be. “Sure, why not? Anywhere is better than here.”

[rwby-mulitshipper]

JanuRWBY Writing Challenge

Hosted by @becausewritingshouldbefun

Prompts and ships for each chapter!

1. Baby, it's cold outside (Sunflakes)

2. Glitter (Nuts and Volts)

3. Invite (Monochrome)

4. Beginning (Partners in Cream)

5. Resolutions (Renorarc)

[crazywolf828]

Rating: Explicit

Archive Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply

Categories: F/M

Fandom: RWBY

Relationships: Blake Belladonna/Sun Wukong

Characters: Blake Belladonna, Sun Wukong (RWBY)

Additional Tags: Kinktober, smut, Strap-Ons, Anal Sex, Pegging, Prep, Gentle Sex

Summary:

"Give me a week," She says softly, just shy of his lips, "I want to do some research first."

That makes Sun cackle, pulling back with a full belly laugh, "Of course you'd turn this into homework."

Blake rolls her eyes, but there's a smile on her face, "I just want to know what I'm doing, I don't want to hurt you."

That serves to quiet his laughs, a genuine smile crossing his lips, "I love you, you know that?"

"I love you too." It's filled with so much conviction, so many emotions, it warms his heart.

[kitkatopinions]

Just saw the extended animatic that was originally meant to end V9 and is now gonna get repurposed into the (possible) V10.

Let me just say, I still feel the same about the things I saw in the first animatic. I can now firmly say that Qrow has been replaced with a doppleganger same as Blake (I wonder if it's like a partial possession thing in this case where sometimes it's Qrow and sometimes it's the faker.) I hate the dumb Winter scenes about how disappointed she is that poor people aren't nice enough to her billionaire blue blooded mother in her silly little sunhat. I have no idea what the hell Raven is doing there. The 'Remember Her Message' thing is stupid because of how poorly done Ruby's message to the world actually was and what little impact Team RWBYJNOR has actually had on the world at large. And I still want to see Whitley without Willow for three point five seconds. And I'm still wondering why the presence of an army in Atlas was a sign of pure evil and was immediately seen as a horrifying threat but seeing an army in Vacuo is meant to be a sign of peace and hope.

But also, now I have more to say.

Like first of all, I'm even more confused on how Remnant managed to pull off any sort of army now that we know what remained in Vale after the Fall of Beacon got decimated. Where are they getting their army? From Mistral, where we know Leo had all the Hunters killed? Are we meant to assume that the people that showed up from Mistral are the cops Blake called on the White Fang? Or, maybe from Argus, even though we're meant to hate Cordovin and the Atlas military that was there? Second of all, this makes me even more annoyed at Winter for being like 'if my poor martyr sister could see how badly we're doing, she'd be disappointed,' Winter get realistic goals challenge 2024. Third of all, Team SSSN and CFVY made appearances and if I ever have to see Coco "based on a nazi" Adel ever again, it'll be too soon, but I still insist that it should've been just Sun, Neptune, and Velvet because none of their other teammates got enough focus in the actual show to be real characters. They could've been casually name dropped off-handedly and it would've been fine. Speaking of teams making reappearances, Neon is there, which means she didn't die in the Fall of Atlas and likely her teammates didn't either, but they had better have a full explanation in V10 for how soldiers on the field got back to the city and threw the portals, and it's weird that we saw Neon but not Flynt. Also can I just point out that "the people who were colonized by Atlas are being aggressive to innocent Atlas orphans and need to be told off" is a writing choice the writers didn't have to do, and considering all the whole history with RWBY and bigotry, I don't know why they did that. Neon and Nora had a moment though, and I was like... Ship material? Also, Tyrian and Mercury are working with the Crown, but... To be honest, if they don't scrap that in V10 (if V10 ever comes,) I'm gonna question their decision making even more, because they just did a new location with a new villain and it proved that this late in the game it's hard to set up or properly execute new threats, and if V10 ever comes out, it's a high probability that we're not ever getting a V11. So if you ask me, if they don't cut out the Crown, they're either gonna badly execute these new bads because they expect their fans to do homework to understand the main show, or they're gonna spend way too much focus on establishing them and the Mains will get sidelined again. Merc looks like a mess, though, and this would make me think a redemption arc is a-coming except that they're pressed for time like I said, so I'm not counting on it. The fact that I have to see Peter Port of all characters is also making me want to say a lot of bad words. Like I cannot emphasize enough how much I hated seeing him and his stupid face and how much I wish he'd never existed. What is this choice to not have the serious potential mentor character who had been part of Oz's inner circle come in and instead having the comic relief teacher who blathered about testosterone and flirted with an underage student be the one to break what should be devastating news that should by all rights get a lot of focus? And where the heck is Tai in all of this? Rip to Oobleck, but out of everyone from the Vale seasons, I would not have picked either of these men to bring back, I'd have brought in Tai and Glynda. It's just a bad choice. And still no sign of Maria and Pietro, so like... What the heck?

All in all, I thought before that I couldn't have less hope for the future of RWBY, but whoa buddy this extended animatic proved me wrong.

[sunnysunsins]

Since recently everything here has been taken over by dipshits who lack media literacy, i will come back here to say - RWBY is a good show. It is good. It has good story and good writing and good characters. Does it have stumbles and limitations? Of course, like everything else ever created. Is it the real reason yall are dedicating your lives to religiously following and picking apart every detail to find something, anything, to hate on and make it your whole personality? Nah.

Yall are just pissy your hc wasn't canon. And i'm only half-joking.

Yall are just stuck in the expectation of "cute girls in school fighting monsters and baddies", which it hasn't been for almost a decade. Let Beacon fucking die already, it was the most boring part of the story anyway. If you like it so much, watch.. idk, high guardian spice. Or maybe my hero academia, it has godawful writing too with your favorite Adam-like and Ironwood-like archetypes you adore so much.

And if you didn't click off already in hissy rage, and want to challenge me on the writing point:

Yall are complaining about pacing, characterization lacking, skipped development, insert some other reason, how "show went to shit after volume 3". Well, newsflash, look back at volume 1. REALLY look at it, without your nostalgia boner.

How, in what actually can fit into 3.5 full-length episodes, it skips a whole semester with only a few moments shown in like 3-8 minutes. Notice how Ruby and Pyrrha interacted like 2 times in 3 volumes total. Ruby and Penny? Yeah, they barely interacted too. Ren hasn't talked to rwby girls at all aside from ensemble scenes.

Too many characters in later volumes? Honey, 1-3 had SO many pointless grunts and you ate them up. The whole Vytal festival was filled with them.

Can you tell me the plot of volume 2 from the top of your head? Yeah, me neither. If i think maybe i can remember there was a mecha fight, a dance and a train, but beyond that what was the point of that entire volume again?

Your favorite, pedestalled, volume 3, most of which is fighty-fighty filler and the only stuff you actually remember when jizzing your pants about it is last 3 episodes.

Most character interactions and development happened after Beacon arc. Most actual plot and bigger story happened after it too. Yall are stuck circlejerking to *filler*, setup, which only purpose was to show the status quo to later destroy it and start to show the real picture.

Do you know why v4 and 5 feel so empty and missing something? Sure, juggling multiple plots gave it's pacing issues too, but it felt empty because there were no side characters to fill out the world and make it feel alive. V5 cast was so tiny it felt like nobody interacted at all. Because there were none of those "extras" yall hate on so much. The extras make the world feel real. Which is why Atlas feels alive when Mistral wasn't.

The most complaints about later volumes are chucked down to lack of media literacy and nuanced reading of situations and characters. Translated for your easier understanding: the writing was too nuanced for your "cute girls go fighty fighty brrr" brain to comprehend. Sometimes things require you to put the situation into character perspectives. Sometimes their decisions are made under stress + personality + influence of events and interactions. But i guess yall don't want to think, yall just want to watch "girl go brrr killy killy monster"

I can continue writing down all these other points, but i'm hungry and should get up so i won't. Bottom text: RWBY is a good show with good story and good writing and good characters. It has struggles and fumbles like every other piece of media. But for some reason, because it's indie, it's held to a much higher standard and everyone feels entitled to pick apart every detail of it to make themselves feel justified for feeling sad over their dead headcanons, even though they'd never do the same picking for big production popular series with much *much* worse writing than even the worst of RWBY's fumbles.

If you made it this far and are a member of rwde, congratulations, you still have a reasonable bone or few. Most others i guess clicked off at first point and blocked me after sending me some kinda death threat, idk, i haven't posted this yet after all.

So yeah, feel free to leave your takes and death threats below, i'll happily discuss further later

[unofficialadamtaurus]

Fans who love the character Adam could’ve been 🤝 fans who love the character Blake could’ve been

I literally started watching RWBY explicitly because someone told me I was exactly like Blake (this was when volume 2 was wrapping up) and I connected to her so much. I have complicated feelings about Adam (ie I saw him as Blake’s abusive ex from the get go even before it was confirmed due to coincidental similarities to a real life situation and projection but retrospectively love his character and want so much more from it) and I feel great kinship with Adam fans like you because of how mishandled these two characters were

I will maintain until the day I die that Adam’s weak writing also weakened Blake’s. Like sure, who’s gonna argue against a “kill the stalker abuser ex” story (ignoring the racism with Herculean effort)…but it could’ve been so much more. Breaking cycles of abuse while recognizing the humanity in the monsters that cycle creates, not boiling down solving racism to just “kill the crazies and nicely ask your oppressors to stop,” giving Blake a moral and physical challenge to overcome that would likewise flesh out her backstory, the list goes on.

Instead he dies a pathetic hate sink’s death and she becomes arm candy. Stellar stuff, no notes 🫠

[itsclydebitches]

It astounds me that CRWBY can have the whole volume's 'character arc' resting on the idea that Ruby doesn't need to be perfect and that her friends aren't expecting her to be, only for her heroic entrance in the climax to be followed by her team mates basically going "If she wasn't perfect, we wouldn't follow her.". They've already failed to effectively establish a character arc and somehow STILL manage to undermine it.

Unfortunately, that's RWBY's go-to writing style: put forth a straightforward character arc, but then fail to consider how everything surrounding it may undermine that journey. RT seems to continually believe that The Message of the show is separate from everything else we see on screen, rather than realizing they're two sides of the same coin; a fictional series of evidence supporting a fictionalized argument. You can't have a character proclaim, "I've learned to be charitable!" and then show numerous scenes where they're being unnecessarily stingy. That's a head and a tails that simply don't fit.

Cat: You’re broken! You break everything you touch! I call Humans… weak! Confused! Incomplete! Weiss: No, you’re wrong. Yang: She’s never been any of those things. Blake: That’s why we follow her.

Unlike my above example though, RWBY is usually a bit more complicated. Here, the Cat tosses out accurate and inaccurate accusations, making it that much easier for viewers to simply ignore the ways in which this moment doesn't support Ruby's arc because look, some of what he's saying is nonsense. Personally, I disagree with "broken" and "incomplete"—especially with those two descriptors leveled partly at Yang—but confused? Frequently. Weak? Yes, that's a part of life; a challenge to overcome. Breaking everything they touch? Not everything, but a large part of Volume 9's reflection was supposedly them acknowledging how massively they messed up in Atlas. So... yeah. Things have been broken, on a literal and metaphorical level. Why would the heroes deny that in the final hour?

The purpose of Ruby's arc was meant to be accepting her flaws to the point where she can work to move past them. There's a fine line between acknowledging that people are imperfect while likewise acknowledging our responsibility to continually improve. It's not an excuse or a pessimistic declaration, yet Volume 9 started by denying the impact that their failure has had on others—Who cares that an entire Kingdom is gone? We tried our best and that's all that will ever matter!—and ends with the girls denying that those flaws exist at all. "You're wrong... She’s never been any of those things." Ruby has never been weak? Or confused? She's never fucked up? Huh, I thought this arc was explicitly showing how weak and confused and a failure she's been, to the point where those emotions drove her to a magical suicide. Worse than simply erasing Ruby's (already near non-existent) growth though, this moment—as you say, anon—suddenly paints Ruby as perfect when the whole POINT was for her to realize she didn't have to be. Her team turns her into an archetype on a pedestal, rather than a living, breathing, flawed person who needs support. Ruby is never confused. She's never weak. She's never lacked anything within her sense of identity. She's never made horrific mistakes. She is the PERFECT leader and that is why we follow her. Insert the implication here that a flawed Ruby would be abandoned by her team, AKA the very fear she expressed earlier that day:

Ruby from a few hours ago: "Why do I have to be the leader, anyway? Why do I always have to be the one to pick people up? What about me? ... Gotta find someone who isn't going to just screw everything up! Gotta stay positive, right? Smiles all around!"

RWBY is so frustrating because we have these scenes where multiple narrative problems are combining. I hate that they have Ruby complaining about being leader when she continually demanded that responsibility, to the point of actual Kingdom-wide destruction, and I hate that she's simultaneously right to be upset with how her team has been treating her. RWBY fails on both fronts by giving us a hero who is incapable of acknowledging her own screwups without making a whole production of it (Ruby's breakdown, though understandable, puts her in the position of a victim in need of comfort, rather than the responsible party who needs to own up to those mistakes) and it gives us a hero who expresses a need to be treated like a human being... only for her team to turn around and deny a large chunk of what makes her human.

None of which even gets into the iffy human/faunus dichotomy and how these definitions of humanity apply to Blake...

I love you just the way you are, says Summer, talking to a literal toddler who has not caused irreparable damage in a war. What about me? screams Ruby, someone who has made it all about her since she ignored Qrow's advice and ran after Cinder. We never expected her to be perfect, says Yang, and she's kinda right because the story has consistently shown Ruby demanding this responsibility, not having it placed on her shoulders. We follow Ruby because she's perfect, says the team, obliterating this Volume's arc that was already contradicting the rest of the series. This show is a MESS, says Clyde, banging her head against the metaphorical wall.

[invested-in-your-future]

I saw your post about if RWBY was written someone decently:

“We would have absolutely gotten a fallout from Jaune just...forging his entry into the academy and then harassing a girl for two volumes.”

I know I am going to get some hate but honestly I wanted Jaune to learn from his actions. I never did like how even at his worst he gets rewarded for his bad behavior:

-he came to a school without aura and no one scolded him for being reckless

-he is sleeping and being lazy with his training (this was your dream why aren’t you taking this seriously?)

-the worse one to me personally (Pyrrha offering training he desperately needs he refuses out of pride…despite knowing he is doing awful)

I hated the bully arc because it was only there to make jaune look good. (Doesn’t help the writers admitting that it was self insert moment.)

Jaune should have faced consequences for being this irresponsible.

Honestly, it's just a mess.

First of all, I have to preface this by saying that there's nothing necessarily wrong with writing Jaune as lazy or not taking his position seriously - as long as writing acknowledges that and uses it to develop him.

Making Jaune as misguided into believing being a Huntsman would make him respected and adored while struggling to put in actual work necessary could be interesting.

The behavior that is in show would fit perfectly the idea of someone who just thought he'd enter into this prestigious academy and get treated like a hero or "The protagonist" - of course someone like that would instantly attempt to hit on the most popular and famous girl at school and of course someone like that would find it difficult to get into his brain that she isn't interested.

Writing Jaune as this person enamored with toxic stereotypes of masculinity and the idea that others owe something to him for his position is interesting. As is the idea of someone like that slowly getting over the toxicity inherent in his behavior and growing into someone more genuine, someone not bound by awful complexes and generic macho fantasies.

Showing how Jaune has to learn to be comfortable with himself and how the whole "knight in shining armor" stereotype of masculinity is not necessary - that would be a riveting character arc.

It would justify all the clashes with Cardin because both represent the polar opposite issues with toxic masculinity overall.

It would even make him a fitting member of JNPR by making his characterization part of the team's theme of challenging gender stereotypes and roles!

The issue is that the writers don't see any of those as an issue - in the minds of Miles and Kerry and the like - Jaune is just this guy "way in over his head" who is just "trying his best".

And what's worse, the writers take the absolute worst possible message from the critique that surrounds Jaune - they somehow believe that the key to making Jaune more likable and to sell him better to the audiences is to make him more "manly", "stronger", "responsible" - all the while walking straight(heh) into the worst toxic stereotypes that people were complaining about in the first place.

They don't attempt to challenge the toxicity and the annoying character traits because they don't see them. Instead they attempt to make him likable and "cool".

So Jaune gets to step over a trail of women who died for his characterization while lamenting how "he never asked for this" and getting a banana haircut that's "more manly". And to prove the likes of Weiss of how achshually he's totally nice and cool guy and she was oh so wrong for daring to not be interested.

I wrote before that the show has Jaune deal with completely different issues than his character actually has, essentially in parts stuffing Ruby's character arc bits onto his character rather than the main protagonist.

It's not only infuriating because of how much the result of his characterization poisons the already shaky show and steals the protagonists' screen time and development, but also downright sad to see the potential of a compelling story arc robbed.

[dragynkeep]

Oh boy! Time to be RWDE again!

Volume 1:

Why is Glynda set up with every possible anime trope of being Ruby’s mentor, yet she gets shafted?

Who thought two minutes and forty seconds is an episode? No, that’s a clip. A short.

Speaking of episode length (or lack thereof), what is up with this pacing…

So…team RWBY aren’t going to ever speak to each other? Why not assign them to different teams?

Borrowing from Young Justice, Weiss could lead the team until Ruby is mature enough to handle the role. Why yes, I do think Weiss has the head to be a leader, or at the very least, try to be a leader and fail, teaching her how to be a better team player. Character Arcs 101.

You had Weiss having a internal dialogue (great! Do that!) and then drop it to never use it on her or any other character. That’s a staple of anime, geniuses.

-we’re not copying Soul Eater down to the school layout, we swear- Uh huh. Sure.

Why is Ruby giving Jaune advice she doesn’t know herself??? How did she learn/know that???

Also PS- While Emerald’s redemption is something RT did, it could have been pulled earlier in Volume 2 or Volume 5, but that requires actual good writing and planning.

So many points, so little time with this show fr.

1:

RWBY just hates women. Like I'm not even joking, this show hates women despite being a female-led show. Glynda was given the oppotunity to be this figure for not just Ruby, but the team as a whole, but every chance she gets is given to the male teachers for no reason.

Professor Port was the one to lecture Weiss about being a good teammate and to not allow her ego to blind her to her own shortcomings, even if that scene is dogshit in retrospect. Professor Oobleck was the one to challenge Team RWBY's ideals around being Huntresses, to the point where we got depth into his character on why he wanted to be a Huntsman.

Even when Yang had lost her arm and needed guidance, Port and Oobleck were there with Tai for that arc. Glynda never gets a chance to even talk properly with our main team, or even flesh herself out as a character to the point that the most we got is from the AA game.

2.

The reason why V1 was like 20 episodes long. The episodes were like five minutes long and would've done better just shoving the parts together. It also meant that the pacing was really slow because we'd be waiting a week for a continuation only to have another five minute long episode.

3.

Interteam relationship outside the partnerships have always been an issue tbh. It's just more egrigious now because it's been like ten years and Ruby/Blake are barely friends, let alone close enough that Blake would admire Ruby like she said she does. Classic told =/= shown.

4.

I think the whole leadership issues with Weiss and Ruby were concluded far too quickly, they could barely be counted as arcs. Weiss has justified issues with Ruby not taking Beacon or her role as their leader seriously, but rather than that being built up more and having the two actually grow together, they just get lectured at and immediately change.

5.

Unpopular opinion but I hate the inner monologue used in anime and I'm glad RWBY doesn't go into it all that much outside of that one time with Weiss. The issue rises because they don't ever let the watchers in on what these characters are thinking or feeling, and even contradict themselves over the volumes.

6.

The advice Ruby gave to Jaune is honestly bad advice? A leader isn't someone who puts the team before themselves, that just opens up for the burnout and idiolising the leader, which is exactly what happened to Ruby in the later volumes. But they didn't show that the advice she gave them was not meant to be something taken seriously.

If they even remember what Ruby told him when they can't even keep track what happen in the volume before.

7.

The whole thing with Emerald's redemption is that she really wasn't given much to flesh out. She started the show straight up ignoring Cinder's orders to go out of her way to be more evil and violent, murdering a minority who ran from an organisation she has no part of. Only for the show to try and paint her later as a lost soul who doesn't realise how bad Cinder is for her.

Nevermind the actual redemption doesn't have her face consequences for the fact that she murdered countless people without much care and only ever pulled sad faces rather than, you know, having actual character to push her redemption.

[ragecndybars]

AO3 tag game :3

thanks so much for the tag @mvshortcut !!!!! much appreciated, this was a blast to fill out :D

How many works do you have on AO3?

86! Damn, that's more than I remember 🙀 I have been writing pretty fervently since I was pretty young, though, and I transferred all my old fics from fanfiction dot net to AO3, so it's a long stretch of time. All my old wattpad fics are still rotting somewhere though lmaooo I can't even access them anymore bc I forgot my password and I can't reset it bc I used a school email 😔

What's your total AO3 word count?

443,734! When I get to half a million I'm gonna have to throw myself a party. With boba and everything

How many fandoms have you written for, and what are they?

Oof, okay, here we go. A lot of the fandoms I have tagged on AO3 don't really "count" because they're just aggregate tags for the same fandom, so even though AO3 says the number is 48, I'm gonna count the TRUE number as 17. (It got cut down so much because of how many video game series have different games with different fandom tags on AO3, lmao)

Here's the breakdown of the list:

Persona (Mostly Persona 3)

Fire Emblem (Mostly Shadow Dragon and Blazing Sword)

Legend of Zelda

Pokemon

Professor Layton

RWBY

Kid Icarus: Uprising

Earthbound/MOTHER

Red vs. Blue

Voltron Legendary Defender

Naruto

Final Fantasy XV

Harvest Moon

The Mysterious Benedict Society

The Avengers

Animal Crossing

Care Bears (despite having never actually consumed any Care Bears media to my knowledge)

The worst part is that this stupid list would be much, much, MUCH longer if I finished even a quarter of my WIPs 😭 Hell, even just my "Video Games" subfolder in my "Fanfiction" subfolder has more than 17 subfolders in it...

Y'all don't understand how many random fics my ADHD spares you from ever seeing I have no focus

Top five fics by kudos:

Ash and Emotion (Zelda) - Not surprising, I knew this was my most popular fic. It was for a ZeLink zine full of beautiful work :)

Resemblance (Naruto) - bro I always forget people really liked this one. Literally an unedited drabble I did in an hour for a "pride month drabble challenge" which I immediately abandoned. Trans rights I guess

Always Wanna Play (But You Never Wanna Lose) (Persona 3) - This one isn't surprising either, and I'm very proud of this fic so I'm quite chuffed to see it get so much attention... thanks everyone :')

The Beat of Your Heart (Zelda) - Now this one surprised me a lot. This was just a little piece for ZeLink week... Another unedited one, I literally was writing it on the toilet in church so I could get it out in time 😭

Comfort (Zelda) - Another ZeLink week piece, but I knew this one was popular. Also unedited, lmao. I was writing it on the day of my AP Calc finals and I rushed through the exam so I could have more time to work on the fic 😭 I made some Choices that year

Do you respond to comments?

I try to! But I get very anxious about it and tend to work myself into a tizzy, so I often put it off for later and then forget, haha. Then I'll go and respond to all my comments from the last few months and feel even weirder about it... T_T

What's the fic with the angstiest ending you've ever written?

Oof. That's... a hard one, haha. I've written a couple of fics without happy endings, though I typically don't. At least three fics which end on a canonical character death, for instance. But I'd say the ending which made me the most emo writing was Butter, a Mother 3 fic. It ends with Lucas, who's like 9, recently lost his mother, then lost his twin brother (and thinks it's his fault), and is now being neglected by his father, crawling into bed and crying. So yeah, pretty bleak, lmao... but at least he doesn't die I guess?

Do you write crossovers?

I do, but I haven't posted many yet. I'm not always huge on writing them, but I do think about them a lot. I was working on this one Persona 3 x Fire Emblem Awakening crossover but I lost steam on it, and now there's a really lovely crossover on AO3 with a similar premise that I was SO delighted to come across!!! Hope y'all don't mind me taking a break from linking my own work to shill for this one, hehe

Have you ever gotten hate on a fic?

Unfortunately, yes, about six times, I'd say. Even more unfortunately, most of those times happened earlier on in my fanfic writing career, and I was pretty sensitive to hate back then, so I deleted many of the relevant fics, and some of them I don't even have access to myself anymore.

Not gonna talk about the ones that are still upsetting, but I will talk about the funny examples: on a (since deleted) RWBY fic, I said in the author's note that I "wrote them as platonic, but the fic can be read as WhiteRose", and then I got a glowing comment gushing about how good the story was which ended with "but then you had to ruin it by shitting all over WhiteRose, how about you [long suicide bait]". Third most baffling comment I've ever received.

The two most baffling were on different fics, but both were making the same weird accusation??? One was on a ZeLink fic (actually, on Comfort, my fifth most kudos'ed fic of all time now), and y'know I think I'm just gonna show you the comment in question:

The other one was on a long-since deleted fic which focused on both a romantic ship, as well as a fatherly relationship between one member of the ship and the other member's father. I guess having a fatherly relationship with your father-in-law makes your boyfriend actually your brother (and therefore you can't date him anymore). IDK man people are crazy. (tbf the commenter in question thought I was setting it up so that he'd get adopted by his boyfriend's parents, which would give them more of a case, but like... that didn't happen in the fic and wasn't going to. they just guessed at a future plot development and got angry about their guess)

Do you write smut?

I do, but I've never posted any. I've posted one fic that was very suggestive, I'd even call it "NSFW" in a sense, but never anything explicit. Maybe I will in the future? We'll see if I can ever finish anything smutty, lmao.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yep, I had Ultimatum, my longest chapter-fic (and by far my most popular fic in the ff.n days) stolen and posted on another site by somebody. I reported it but never checked back up to see if it got taken down.

I also feel that I've had my work plagiarized pretty damn blatantly in another fandom (I was browsing a certain AU tag and read one which contained all the exact events and sometimes word-for-word dialogue from a fic of mine, just very very slightly rewritten) but the poster had no other works and their writing was definitely extremely juvenile, so... I figured they were a dumb kid and just decided not to raise a fuss. Checked back later and they deleted it, hopefully because they realized they shouldn't do that, so I figure there's no need to start shit over it. Honestly, if that person used that experience as a jumping-off point to write their own fics, then I'm glad it happened, imitation being the highest form of flattery and all.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

No, though I had someone reach out to me on fanfiction dot net a long time ago and ask permission to translate An Unheard Goodbye, which was super exciting! I agreed, but I don't believe they ever got around to it, or if they did, they never posted it. Still very flattering, and I think about that a lot, hehe.

What’s your all-time favorite ship?

HOW COULD I POSSIBLY ANSWER THIS. UM. UM UH. UHHH UM UH I. UM.

I'm.... gonna say Zelda/Link? I haven't written it in FOREVER but it was such a huge part of me coming into my own as a fanfic author, so I have to give it credit for that.

What’s a WIP that you want to finish, but don’t think you ever will?

.......all of them 😭 god I have so many of these damn things. But for the prime example, I'd point to Ultimatum, an old Pokemon fic that I started in middle school. I got all the way to the climax and I feel bad leaving my readers hanging, but... at this point, if I did continue it, I would honestly have to rewrite the whole fic first just to be in line with my current understanding of the characters.

What are your writing strengths?

Y'know, I think I get character voices down extremely well in a way which elevates my dialogue and narration. That's probably the thing I'm most proud of in my own writing, at least.

What are your writing weaknesses?

BREVITY. Or the utter, glaring lack of it. I have also been known to muddy up my writing with an overabundance of A) adverbs, B) unneeded clauses tacked onto perfectly good sentences, and C) em-dashes 😭

What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fics?

I think it's dope as fuck, but I currently can't really accomplish it because I'm monolingual (NOT FOR LONG IF I HAVE ANYTHING TO SAY ABOUT IT, I'M COMING FOR YOU, JAPANESE FLUENCY!!!!). I will also say that I don't like when authors will write characters having a story-important conversation in another language, then put the translations in the end notes or something, requiring you to either read the chapter confused or else keep scrolling back down and back up.... I think even that's totally fine to do if what's being said isn't plot-relevant, though.

What was the first fandom you ever wrote for?

Naruto. I hadn't read or watched Naruto btw, I had only read other Naruto fanfics. I have spoken on this topic many times, but it remains hilarious to me. Also, so many of my old Naruto fics are lost to the Wattpad times, but I will take this opportunity to once again share a quote which I recently managed to unearth from my long-lost unsung magnum opus:

Never ever will I intentionally attain the level of comedy gold that I managed while writing completely dead serious Naruto fanfiction on Wattpad in 2012.

What’s your favorite fic you’ve written so far?

See above. How could I ever top that fic.

In all seriousness, this question always makes me sweat, but I think I'm gonna say Oil, a slightly older fic from my EliHec days which I absolutely obsessed over for months before finally managing to finish. And, unlike most of the fics that I obsess over, I think the obsession actually made it come out better rather than worse, haha.

thanks again for the tag!!!! as for me, I'll tag uhh, hm, @wizard-finix @dreamedge @misty-wisp @flyfish1999 and any other AO3 writers who see this!!! (idk how many of you use AO3 and most of the MBS authors I know have probably already been tagged hehe but anybody who wants to should absolutely feel free!!!!!!!)

[howlingday]

A bit random, but what do you think a normal day for Stung Knight was like when Beacon was up and running?

Jaune's Day:

Jaune wakes up early, about as early as Ren. He gets ready for his classes, and once he's ready, he tries to wake up Nora and Pyrrha for breakfast. Pyrrha wakes up easily, while Nora requires a full team effort. They head to breakfast, where he sits across on the far end of the table. RWBY arrives, and he kisses Blake and Yang good morning on the cheek. Morning classes are the same as usual, though Yang will usually crack a joke more often to make him smile before class starts. At lunch, Blake will make an effort to sit next to Jaune if possible, often taking Pyrrha's seat, while Pyrrha sits next to Weiss. In this time, the teams will gab and share about future plans. Jaune will occasionally lean over to read whatever Blake is reading.

In the afternoon classes, Jaune will start to doze off, but Yang is thankfully close to him to pinch him awake. After classes, the group will hang out in the library, where Blake and Jaune will read, and Yang reads comic books or plays board games.

When dinner comes along, Jaune and Yang will try to sandwich Blake. Ruby, Weiss, and Pyrrha fill in the vacant seats, with Ruby across from Yang, Weiss across Blake, and Pyrrha across Jaune. The teams will retreat to one or the other's dorms. Jaune and Blake will hold a book club with Weiss, Pyrrha, and Ren, while Yang, Nora, and Ruby play video games. Before leaving for the night, Jaune kisses Blake and Yang good-night. Inside his dorm, he gets ready for bed, then falls asleep, imagining what it would be like to share a bed with them. Would he sleep in the middle, or on the side? Who could say?

Blake and Yang's Day:

Blake wakes up later than everyone else, while Yang wakes up around the same time as Ruby, which is after Weiss. In getting ready, Yang will come up behind Blake and hug and kiss her on the cheek, giving cute compliments about how beautiful Blake is, only stopping when she blushes, or when Weiss yells at them to stop making them late for breakfast. Speaking of, Blake sits next to Yang and will usually sit as close as possible without interrupting. They both kiss Jaune on the cheek before sitting down. Blake focuses on her classes, usually writing down more notes than Yang or Jaune, the former of the two will sometimes make flirty eyes at the latter. At lunch, Blake grabs food as quickly as possible to sit next to Jaune, again as close without disturbing him.

During afternoon classes, Yang will keep and eye on Jaune, who is known to be sleepy, while Blake keeps an eye on the professors, who are known to be testy with sleepy students. After classes, the teams go to the library, where Blake will help Jaune with his studies, or reread a book she recommended for the book club. When she's bored, she looks over to Yang and watches her. When Yang wins, she sometimes has to control her victory cries. When she loses, she has to acoid breaking a table with her strength, as she often smashes her fist down onto the table in frustration.

At dinner, Blake, Yang, and Jaune sit down together and sandwich Blake between them. While eating, Jaune and Yang will inch closer to Blake, a reversal of before. Yang will sometimes get into eating contests with Ruby, much to the disgust of Weiss. Afterwards, they retreat to the dorms, where Blake leads her book club. Yang, as usual, will challenge Ruby and Nora to a "Battle to End All Battles" match, in which she often loses to the combined might of the two. If need be, Jaune can step away to help his girlfriend even the odds, though it's usually to share the misery. At the end of the day, Blake and Yang kiss Jaune good-night. After preparing for bed, they then kiss each other good-night. Yang sleeps easy knowing that she has two people who love her. Blake dreams comfortably that her life is a stark, albeit safe contrast to her upbringing.

[bestworstcase]

Given your thoughts on fandom and RWBY, what do you think really constitutes as good writing? It often seems like people just hurl around the phrase and "bad writing" without much, if any kind of consistency beyond basically asserting that their specific likes or dislikes are absolute truths.

bad writing is writing that fails to effectively communicate the ideas it is intended to express; good writing is writing that communicates well. neither correlate to whether a story is or isn’t enjoyable necessarily, although good stories that are badly written tend to have a much greater reconstructive appeal (meaning the fun is mainly in the act of making fanworks).

good/bad writing isn’t a wholly objective label because obviously whether any given example does or does not communicate its ideas in an effective way will depend on factors like genre and the audience; i think on some level this is why hatedom types so often either feign confusion or else deliberately make wild misinterpretations of out-of-context fragments from things they haven’t actually watched or read, because “well i didn’t get it so it wasn’t clear enough” backstops the ‘bad writing’ claim even if the misinterpretation is challenged. (<- although the primary engine of that phenomenon is just. hatedom fanon. lol)

[chaoticevilspacewitch]

Yet More Objectively Correct RWBY Ships: Everyone But RWBY

Arkos: controversial take, but this one only tugs people's heartstrings because half the ship is dead. Without Pyrrha's tragic death early in the series, Arkos would be very cringe.

Renora: I thought this was pretty bland but inevitable until I challenged myself to write it and make it interesting. Injecting drama and conflict into their relationship right out of the gate adds so much to this.

Rainbow Quartz: Be Gay, Do Crime! Ilia & Emerald are the premier non-RWBY ship, two girls who aren't really bad at heart but whose lives put them on a bad path, and who've had their affections spurned by more prominent characters, struggle to find redemption and love together. I love the idea of them on a special ops team together.

Hellebore: my other S-tier non-RWBY ship. Winter and May, two damaged women struggling to move on from their abusive families, carving their paths in opposite directions while still finding their way into each other's arms (and, who wouldn't want Winter Schnee?)

CinWin: A close second for Winter ships. Fire and ice. Temperature Play says it all. Cinder and Winter, both hurt, polar opposites who compliment each other perfectly.

SpiceCream: Villainnesses with heart, Neo's playfullness is a delightful compliment to Cinder's glower and angst. They're enemies with benefits, as demonstrated in Melting Glace, one of my favorite fics.

Crosshares: Duh. Although, I will say that the chibi dynamic of bashful, timid Velvet and cocky, confident Coco doesn't do a ton for me. I think there's some cynicism and bite to Velvet that deserves more exploration.

KnightLight: we are stealing Jessica Cruz from DC, plain and simple. She and Jaune compliment each other perfectly and are adorable beyond belief.

[herwrittenuniverse]

Happy 1 Year AO3 Anniversary to me!

Yes, I'm that weirdo that remembers the one year anniversary of joining AO3. 23, however, is my favorite number, and it was also the beginning of the school year - I think that's why it's so distinct!

Last year, I was looking to do more things that I love, so I said "fuck it" and decided to post a chapter to a fic I hadn't updated in years and years on a different fanfiction website. A longtime reader/ fanfic author @butterflydreaming-writes-fic contacted me and basically said, "Girl, you gotta get on AO3. It's where it's at!" And one year later, here we are!

Here are some totals for you...

Of course, I know some other authors have higher stats then me, and that's okay. I'm proud that in just a year, I've accumulated over 1000 kudos, over 200 bookmarks, and over 21,000 hits. It's very gratifying.

I have 23 stories in total, but not all of them of new. Some are old ones that I reposted from a different website. Out of those 23, 9 are Cardcaptor Sakura, 2 are Final Fantasy VII, and a whopping 12 are of The Dragon Prince (with more to come on the way! I'm in the groove now.)

My most popular story based on hits is Lunation, my interpretation of the reconciliation between Rayla and Callum. I worked the hardest on this fic and am happy to see it still remains at my most popular piece. (Although, some of the shorter, sillier ones from S5 are quickly approaching its numbers, and I admit I will be kind of sad if it's no longer at the top! 😂) On the other end, my least popular is Red Lite, Green Lite, which is a silly little fic about Vincent Valentine going about Midgar trying to get a cigarette. It's quite funny.

The first not-reposted original story was Promises, Promises - a take on Callum's fatal promise to Rayla. ("You have to kill me.") I've never written such an action-packed piece and I am pretty proud of it. Even when rereading it, I still feel the urgent tone that carries itself throughout the story.

My most underrated fic is definitely To Those Who Crossed Over, a weirdly experimental story about how Touya from CCS - a naturally gifted clairvoyant - comes face-to-face with another medium, causing some interesting in-depth insight about Yue. While it's not the norm, it definitely is an interesting read.

In the next year, I would love to post some other fandoms (like RWBY, for example) and perhaps continue/expand on the CCS fic To Love Another. It's a story about Touya coming to terms with who Yukito/Yue are as a person. It is definitely the most quietly popular fic, with no comments but 96 kudos and 18 bookmarks.

Also, I want to simply continue to write. I put a lot of pressure on myself when it comes to fanfiction. Character and canon accuracy are important to me, but I am slowly realizing that fanfiction can be whatever you want it to be. And that's the beauty of it.

Remember, fanfiction writers do it for nothing except the love of our fandom. We take time out of our days to pour our hearts into stories for you to read. I'm so grateful to AO3, as the website allows us a safe space to do that. (I always donate when the time comes, and if you read or write on AO3, you should too!)

In the past year, I rebranded and created my online personal as HerWrittenUniverse because I felt like I was entering another era of fandom. In addition, fanfiction has personally opened up so many door for me. It's giving me a healthy way to express my love for a fandom, challenged me to increase my writing skills, and opened up doors to friendships that I never though possible. So thank you to Cris for kicking my butt and getting me on AO3, thank you to my fellow fandom friends for supporting me (and everyone else!), and thank you to the readers. Fanfiction writers create for themselves - but the support is always nice, too!

Cheers to another year on AO3!

[kitkatopinions]

The RWBY writers: *Writes five seasons of Blake being stubborn, feisty, active, and passionate, standing up for herself, calling out Weiss when she's anti-faunus, speaking her mind, doing what she wants and only changing her mind if she's been given a good argument, being willing to call out others, trying to take a more realistic approach, has broken away from a toxic and controlling person she's stood up to repeatedly since then, yells "he's mine" while attacking someone she thinks is actively hurting her people, has opened up about her feelings repeatedly, doesn't back down from a challenge, acts openly exasperated when her friends or acquaintances are being stupid, is mature enough to recognize that even when her friend is reminding her of Adam that it doesn't mean that she is Adam and calmly explains her initial hesitance and explains what reassurance she needs before deciding to believe her friend anyway, saw her horrible ex trying to kill people and jumped into a fight with him while proclaiming she wouldn't run away, and then when her friend got hurt gave him this look

And only ran away when it was Yang's life on the line after tricking him and saving Yang despite having been suffering from a stab wound, etcetera, etcetera.

The RWBY writers: *Writes Weiss to say she'd been used to Blake being 'the quiet one' at the end of V5, implying that the writers want us to think that Blake's behavior in the early seasons had been muted and that now that she'd had a growth arc in V4 and V5 (badly done or not) that she would be more feisty, more outspoken, more self-assured, more passionate, and even more action driven than ever. Which would make sense considering that we saw her take Sun's words to heart concerning the personal growth she needed to do, and seemed to start moving in the direction of shedding her self-hate and blaming herself and start learning to accept love and care instead of pushing people away. And the writers also seemed to want us to believe that she was becoming more of a leader and V5 seemed to mark her finally fully moving on from what had happened with Adam.*

Also the RWBY writers: *Proceeds to write Blake to randomly turn into a meek wallflower who doesn't usually stand up for herself, needs frequent help in fights, gets insecure when she thinks people are unjustly mad at her, plays peacekeeper with her friends while trying to manage their angry moods with soft tones like a mother attempting to corral toddlers in the middle of temper tantrums, doesn't fight or argue when people make anti-faunus cracks at her or call her cat ignorantly or otherwise, flinches and grimaces when Yang gets angry, hides behind Yang when she feels threatened, doesn't really talk things through, is no longer active and is content to wait for her friends to tell her what they should do, the closest she's gotten to active has been in V9 where she was telling her friends about a story they all already knew, hasn't called out or even casually argued with her friends on anything iirc since V6, doesn't care to attend rallies against Jacques Schnee, is characterized like a sweet, caring, shy girl who needs reassurance when her romantic interest goes on a different mission than her, has no problem at all with Yang going red-eyed at the mere suggestion that they should ever take missions apart, acts like she thinks she's going to be hit all the time and wouldn't be able to do anything if she was hit.*

Some RWBY fans: "I am just so happy that Blake is healthy now and gets to be her true self now."

Like, Blake prior to the end of V5 was not "the quiet one" who was so so so super not confident and wasn't her true self. Her relationship with Yang didn't "fix" her and make her confident. The writers haven't actually shown her to be better and healthier and stronger and more sure of herself than before. If anything, they've given us the exact opposite.

How the hell am I meant to think Blake has gotten better when the writers specifically now write her to act this way ever since the beginning of V6? How am I meant to take their 'you used to be the quiet one' seriously when it isn't true? When the opposite is true and she becomes the quiet one in V6? It really just feels like they and a lot of their fans literally forgot who Blake was and replaced her with a whole new person and I'm sitting here like

How is she now "Not the quiet one" and before she was "the quiet one" when she was five times more outspoken and acted more confident and passionate and feisty before? I do not get it, I do not understand how I'm supposed to think she's more healthy now. I do not know how I'm supposed to think that she's done all her growing and is now much better when she actively seems worse off than she did in V freaking 1.