Go Oft Awry: The Goals, Expectations, and Plans of Volume 8
The best-laid schemes of mice and men go oft awry -- Robert Burns
The first two chapters of Volume 8 were full of characters stating what they're going to do or what they expect to happen far more so than any other two consecutive episodes in RWBY have before. This is exciting from two different angles. It's exciting for the viewer who's just watching the series, and even more exciting from a writer's perspective. Y'all up for some scriptwriting theory?
There's a rule in scriptwriting that when it comes to the plot you NEVER repeat yourself. In practice this means that whenever a plan is spelled out in advance, it's not going to happen.
The classic example is the bride dreaming of walking down the aisle at her wedding. Anytime you see that, you know her wedding is going to be interrupted.
There are two exceptions to this rule. One is when the plan is being spelled out as a voiceover to scenes of the plan going down. Then it's okay, because the audience is still only experiencing it ONCE, not twice. We saw a bit of this technique used for the first time in RWBY in "Divide". The other exception is for an information-gathering plan when the new information distracts the audience, which we saw back in Volume 2 "Painting the Town".
What does this have to do with RWBY Volume 8? A lot, because we're hearing nothing but goals, expectations, and plans.
First, let's define the terms. A "goal" is what you're planning to do, not how you plan to do it. An infamous example from RWBY occurs in "The Argus Limited" when the Grimm attack the train.
Blake: What's the plan, Ruby?
Ruby: Don't let anyone else die!
Ruby, sweetie, I love you, but that's a goal, not a plan.
Confusion over goals and plans has only intensified since Volume 7 came out. Ironwood's GOAL of turning Amity into a communication satellite is brilliant, but his PLAN to do so by depriving Mantle's defenses was a disaster, and would have been a disaster even if what he thought was true about Salem really was the truth.
In stories, goals may be reachable -- but any expectation or plan that's spelled out in detail to the audience isn't going to happen exactly the way it's supposed to.
An "expectation" is what the character thinks is going to happen. In a story, if an expectation is stated out loud in detail, it's not going to happen exactly that way. A great example from RWBY is the introduction of Team FNKI.
Yang: You're from Atlas. What could we expect?
Weiss: Well, seeing as their Kingdom, academy and armed forces are all merged as one, I think we can expect strict, militant fighters with advanced technology and carefully rehearsed strategies.
At that very moment, a rainbow zooms past the two surprised Huntresses-in-training.
Weiss: ... Or whatever they are.
A "plan" is a detailed proposal for how to meet a goal. It's optimal for characters to have plans, but spelling a plan out in advance in detail to the audience is the kiss of doom. At that point you know they may reach their goal SOMEHOW, but it won't be by following that plan.
RWBY is full of concealed plans that work and revealed plans that fail. The best examples are probably the attacks on Beacon and Haven. Cinder's plan to attack Beacon was concealed from the audience and went off almost perfectly. Cinder's, Raven's, and Adam's separate plans for the Haven attack are all spelled out in detail to the audience, and all fail to go exactly as planned.
In "Divide" we start with the villains. Cinder has a goal to strip Penny of the Maiden power, but is thwarted by Salem. Salem already has a plan in motion and doesn't want Cinder's last-minute changes messing it up like happened at Haven. What's more worrying, Salem doesn't share her plan with the audience, so a large chunk of it just might work.
In Mantle, the Happy Huntresses have a goal to get everyone into the crater. We don't hear their plan spelled out in detail, although what we do hear in the background is a fairly standard evacuation model that's evolving to deal with changing circumstances, as such plans do. From a storytelling perspective, that's vague enough to the audience that it should mostly work. (The "mostly" comes not from any audience signalling that the writers are doing, but from the shear size of their endeavor.)
Ruby and Pietro have a goal to launch Amity via the military base command terminal. Not many details were spelled out in advance on camera, and much use was made of voiceover with action scenes, so we know at least part of the plan to get into the base will work.
Penny voices a naive goal to give Salem what she wants so she will go away, which is quickly shot down. The audience and most of the characters realize this would be a disaster, but does Penny?
Yang's team has a plan to help with the evacuation by doing what the emergency workers tell them to do. This is both a good plan for anyone assisting in an emergency, and from a storytelling perspective flexible enough to succeed.
Ironwood -- hoo boy. At this point it looks like he has a goal but nobody knows what it is, beyond "shoot anyone who says the F word." He's not jinxing any plans by sharing them. He's pretty free with his expectation that Mantle is doomed, but he doesn't go into enough detail to jinx that one.
Salem begins giving orders, but doesn't jinx it by telling us the whole plan.
Jacques spells out his expectation that Whitley will get Jacques' lawyers to free him. That means it won't happen exactly like that. (Personally I think Whitley is cooperating fully with the General and having the lawyers draw up divorce papers for Willow that remove Jacques from any custody considerations. It's the sort of thing that Whitley watched Jacques do.)
Ironwood has a plan for Watts, but we don't find out what it is.
Qrow states his goal to kill Ironwood, but doesn't spell out a plan.
Joanna steals a reporter's mic and announces the plan to retreat to the crater to the public. As this scene is intercut with scenes of people following that plan, it has a good chance of succeeding.
Ozpin spells out his expectation in detail for how the merge with Oscar will happen. That's been said often enough now that we know it won't happen exactly like that. He also states a goal to bring people together, but is candid about not knowing how. This is a goal in need of a plan, hopefully a plan that will be spelled out over scenes of it successfully happening.
May states an expectation that "between our secret weapon and my Semblance, you all couldn't be in safer hands." While this may be technically true, it also falls under the category of Famous Last Words. If we didn't know something was going to go wrong before, we do now.
Weiss states in detail a plan to get into the base which promptly goes sideways, as does Weiss herself. Hopefully that's all the jinxing that plan gets.
Fiona's evacuation plan is being adapted and carried out in real time, which saves it from narrative jinxing. Whether it will work against Salem is another matter. Getting everyone to the crater definitely qualifies as "the best bad plan we've got".
And we see one of Salem's unrevealed plans start to unfold with brutal, terrifying efficiency.
Finally, there's Ruby's nightmarish visions from the opening. Since these haven't been stated aloud, they also haven't been jinxed. There's no telling right now if these nightmares are prophetic visions or just bad dreams.
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