#it’s also like

[cloudcastor]

The Dream…The Nightmare

[bestworstcase]

This is probably outside of your purview, but do you think the fights in RWBY have gotten worse, or just different from what came before?

i think there has been a shift away from tightly-choreographed showcase fights toward a more naturalistic approach prioritizing setting and character over rhythm and composition. whether or not this is aesthetically preferable is a matter of taste, but it is absolutely to the benefit of the narrative as a whole.

there’s this beat during the group fight vs tyrian in volume four where tyrian kicks ruby and her aura ripples out from the point of impact in such a way to create the illusion of deeper motion: it looks like her ribs buckling as that force moves through her body, it feels like we’re seeing this formidable new adversary break her fucking ribs after throwing JNR around like ragdolls. it isn’t shot with any particular artistry or stylistic finesse; the shot is instead lined up to emphasize the violence.

that serves a more important narrative purpose than aesthetics: it makes it believable that ruby just cowers in dread after taking this hit, it viscerally drives home how dangerous tyrian is, building tension, setting the stakes for the upcoming fight with qrow, and thus it also underscores the contrast between tyrian’s wild brutality and qrow’s discipline when they fight and qrow tips the scales not because he’s stronger but because he doesn’t let tyrian rattle him… it’s doing quite a lot of work for a mere handful of frames.

compare, say, the nevermore fight, which is beautifully shot and choreographed but doesn’t have a lot to say: ruby can plan elaborate tactics on the fly and communicate them to her team well enough to execute the whole thing flawlessly, and… that’s kind of it. RLR2 does all the narrative heavy lifting. and that’s fine, to be clear, because this is a point where the story is still setting up the board and introducing us to these characters.

but the nature of rwby as a story is that the fight scenes cannot stay that way. and this isn’t even a “monty/not monty” thing, you can see the experimentation with using fights as a medium to develop character and theme starting early in volume two: ruby calling out team attacks and narrating yang’s semblance during the mech fight, splitting up the team on the train so wby can each duel an opponent who represents their personal struggle*, doing the battle in breach as a sequence of character moments, etc.

(*weiss feels disgusted by what the SDC has become and wants to reclaim the schnee name -> she faces a white fang officer who loathes her for being a schnee; blake is torn up about not knowing how to solve all these big social problems and reeling with the emotional fallout of leaving adam’s white fang -> torchwick tries to push those buttons; yang feels rootless and hollow and worried her current outlook is unsustainable -> she has to fight somebody she literally cannot touch and her increasingly frustrated attempts to punch through get turned against her the instant she overextends.)

in early volume two it all feels a bit clunky and uncoordinated in part because the mech fight is still so stylized. the fights on the train and the battle in vale are less so; you still get those tightly-choreographed sequences, but balanced out with moments that are more raw and real—the fake-out “slow-motion killshot” that turns out to be just weiss’s time dilation catching up, followed by the lieutenant grabbing her face and yanking her out of the air, is a particularly effective example with the grapple being shot with the same intention as tyrian kicking ruby in the chest—and also just more grounded in who the characters are (weiss gets in trouble trying to be fancy, yang’s frustrated determination is both a strength and a weakness, blake takes torchwick down with brutal efficiency because she’s used to fighting people but she also lets him say his piece before knocking him out because that matters to her).

so like—waves hands—volume two sets the course that is followed in the latter volumes where the fights become increasingly less about style and more about substance. the style is very much still there, it’s just not The Main Event anymore. it’s garnish on fight scenes you can write robust character analysis about.

[yellowraincoat]

The funniest thing reading the hollow boy for the first time as a 19 year old was that Lucy was so very concerned about Lockwood picking Holly over her, and yeah maybe Lockwood had the tiniest of crushes on Holly for a minute there. Maybe.

But at the end of the day, Lucy, I guarantee you, the hottest 18 year old girl you’ve ever seen does not want ur 16 year old boyfriend. She’s got better options available to her, I promise u.

[bruisedboys]

papyrus ⇢ if you put your ‘on repeat’ playlist on shuffle, what’s the first song that comes up? what do you like about it / associate it with? 🫶

-🦦

all my ghosts by lizzy mcalpine! I love everything about this song, the lyrics especially, and it sort of has this giddy dreamy feeling to it that I adore!! I associate it with being in love and all the little mundane things about love <3

send me some get to know me asks!

[anx1oustig3r]

my gf cried ONCE MORE over attack on titan

except this time i came close too the only thing that stopped me was the power of foresight

[diamondseaside]

I really want to believe no cheating was involved... 😔 I mean like that is such an awful way to end a relationship and such a serious one too. Like could we go back to think he didnt propose to her or something? The other night someone was saying that must have been it. I know I'm being silly but like for me cheating is such a...I don't even know but it says a lot about someone's character to me. And if that article came from his team why would they even risk to poke the bear and not get a response, if dirty laundry could be aired which make him look bad. Like it doesn't make sense to me...and most of all I don't want to believe everyone ends being a disappointment in the end 😐

your point about his team poking the bear and risking his dirty laundry coming out.. exactly!! why would provoke her like that if he did in fact cheat?? i feel like i’m pulling at strings to convince myself he didn’t bc i so badly don’t want that to be the case, especially since we know it’s one of taylor’s biggest fears in a relationship. it’s just to painful to think about and i don’t feel comfy saying anything definitely happened until she flat out says it

[aloeverawrites]

I saw a sign on the mall the other day. The bottom half of it had been torn off. And then I looked closer.

No it hadn’t, it had just been printed to look that way. A specially made imperfection.

A company trying to be like us, saying that they slapdash signs and use torn spare bits of paper without actually doing so.

You see it everywhere, an artificial show of genuine feeling.

Things can be imperfect in a perfect way. They can be spontaneous with a carefully planned precision.

Corporations trying to say they’re real like us without getting their hands dirty by reaching out.

An illusion of togetherness bridging the gap they created with their greed. Joking about the cost of living they created as though they’re our friends and not our problems.

I’m not sure where I’m going with this I just wish they’d stop selling humanity to us.

[sacredjake]

it’s the way i have so many fucking pictures to post, but no motivation to go through everything

[derryonair]

I am utterly convinced that if you watch Donbrothers- Out of order, like via a random number generator, it’ll make just as sense as the actual show.

[spitblaze]

[guy who doesnt watch shows voice] yeah ive been meaning to watch that show

[enemywasp]

I'm sorry I keep posting my tiktok comments but please. What does this mean. What do people THINK shipping is for anymore???

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Knowledge Revenge.

[fruitydiaz]

yeah “i can teach you” is kind and gentle and warm and comforting. it’s also hot. right

[vamprisms]

i feel like a lot of the 'i hate kids' crowd would be more tolerant if they understood that due to a kid's limited experience of the world that 4 hour flight might just be the longest they've ever had to sit still for or that trapped finger might literally be the most pain they've ever felt in their short life or they might not have ever seen a person with pink hair ever so of course they want to touch it or nobody's told them yet that they can't run around the museum and they only just learned cheetahs are the fastest animals so of course they want to put that to the test. how were they supposed to know etc etc.

[liquidstar]

i always think abt my cousin in greece who's like obsessed with american culture, bc ill say that im going to a barbecue and she'll be like "wow.... a real life american barbecue... will there be red cups?" you bet your ass there'll be red cups. take my hand. have a hot dog. all your dreams can come true here at the real life american barbecue

[emberwritesinsight]

The discussion around Ariel TheLittleMermaid baffles me bc if my dad literally destroyed a bunch of stuff I collected in front of me in a terrifyingly violent display of anger and I had a witch offer me an out if I could score the boy I thought was hot, my name would be on that dotted line before you can say "poor unfortunate soul". What do you mean she's stupid, her dad ravaged her Special Interest Cave like a toddler throwing a temper tantrum, I would also run the fuck away