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I'm going to enjoy watching you break.
—Neopolitan, speaking through her illusions

Neopolitan,[5] born Trivia Vanille[6] and now better known as Neo, is a major-supporting antagonist in RWBY. She was the partner of Roman Torchwick, with the two sharing a close and possible romantic bond. Her weapon of choice is called Hush, a parasol with a concealed blade. She first appeared in "Painting the Town...". After the Fall of Beacon, she hunts down Cinder Fall in revenge for Roman's death, but subsequently joins forces with her, shifting her target to Ruby Rose.

In "The Final Word", she is betrayed by Cinder in the Central Location and knocked into the void, finding herself in the Ever After. She is the secondary antagonist of Volume 9.

In "Tea Amidst Terrible Trouble", she gets possessed by the Curious Cat (becoming NeoCat) after driving Ruby to ascend, who intended on using her body to leave the Ever After.

After killing the Curious Cat in "Of Solitude and Self", she chose to stay in the Ever After instead of returning to Remnant, undergoing ascension.

Neo is also featured as one of the main characters in the novel, RWBY: Roman Holiday.

Appearance[]

Neo, themed after Neapolitan ice cream, has the appropriate trio of colors in her hair and on her outfit. While sometimes altered via illusion for disguise, her hair color is typically half pink and half brown, with white streaks on the pink side. As of Volume 6, Neo's hair is also styled differently. It is noticeably thicker with a slight wave to it along with shorter bangs and missing her white streaks. The white streaks appeared as an emotional reaction to her parents' deaths in Roman Holiday.[7]

Neo's natural eye color changes between brown, pale pink, and white, and they can alternate coloration in differing combinations, with this ability apparently being entirely under her control. Neo appears to have a condition known as heterochromia iridum, where the eyes of a subject have two different colors. In her case, it is complete heterochromia, where one iris in its entirety is a different color from the other. During her childhood, her left eye was pink, and her right eye was brown.[8] In Volume 3, she is seen wearing green eyeshadow, starting with her paramedic disguise.

Despite being in her twenties by the start of RWBY, Neo is also rather diminutive in stature, compared to the rest of the main cast, including Ruby Rose, as shown in the height chart presented by Monty Oum. This is demonstrated in "No Brakes", when she stands off against Yang Xiao Long, as Neo is only able to reach her chin despite wearing high heels.

Original (Volumes 2-6)[]

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Neo wears a white cropped wide, broad tailed jacket with a pink interior, collar, a single pink button and large pink cuffs. She wears skintight brown leather pants with a dark belt that has a gray buckle and an additional narrow belt under it. Under her jacket is a brown over bust corset, curved in the middle and at the bottom, exposing her hips. She also wears a multitude of black beaded necklaces, which hang haphazardly around her neck. Neo also wears black and white spat styled under the knee boots alongside black gloves.

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In "The Coming Storm", Neo undergoes a slight outfit change: she now wears Roman's hat, seemingly in remembrance of him, and her clothing is shown to have been torn up over the time since her last appearance, especially on her jacket's left shoulder that revealed a broad shoulder strap of her corset, her coattail and leggings. During her fight with Cinder in this episode, she hides the damage and Roman's hat with an illusion until they move the fight into an alley.

Post-Timeskip (Volume 6–Current)[]

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In "Our Way", Neo sports a new outfit while still wearing Roman's hat. It consists of a chocolate brown jacket that starts just below her shoulders and above her chest and has a pink interior, two brown belt shoulder straps and twin gray button seams. She wears a gray scarf similar to Roman's, and a white three gray button-up vest style top that is strapless and cropped exposing her midriff. She also wears a pair of chocolate brown detached sleeves with puffy tops and pink trim alongside a pair of white funnel cuffed gloves with gray button detailing. She also wears skintight white belted leather pants and black and white spat styled ankle boots with cutout detail just above the ankle. The back of Neo's jacket is shown to have a small, coned ice cream key chain that is usually covered by her hair.

Notably, Neo's eyes no longer switch colors between each other in her natural state, while she keeps her green eye shadow.

NeoCat[]

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Neo after getting body snatched by the Cat.

After becoming possessed by the Curious Cat, Neo's body briefly underwent a transformation. Her eyes became those of the Cat's in their normal form, with a light blue sclera and white pupils and her teeth also became much more jagged and sharp. Later, her arms were replaced with large light blue claws.

She later changed back to her original form after the Curious Cat had left her body.

Disguises[]

While participating in the Vytal Festival Tournament, Neo has a completely different appearance. Her hair is black with lighter streaks where her white streaks would normally be, and her default eye color is green, though she can change it to pink, brown or white at any time. Her hair is done up in a twin tail hairstyle with white bows and her bangs are still in the same usual style from her original appearance.

She wears an outfit with a black and white color scheme. Her attire consists of a sleeveless black blouse with white frills on the chest and collar and a black ribbon bow hanging from the front of the collar. The blouse exposes her midriff, and she wears medium-length black armbands on both of her wrists. Along with the blouse, she wears a knee-length skirt fastened with a white belt. She wears black shoes with a triple tomoe emblem, a mitsudomoe, on the soles, with white legwarmers. Later, in RWBY: Amity Arena, it was revealed that she wore large, thick white socks over her shoes.

In "Beginning of the End", she disguises herself in a paramedic uniform, with a cap on top of her short hair, and her eye color changes to magenta. In "PvP", she assumes her regular appearance but dons the uniform of an Atlas Military officer. In "Our Way", Neo is briefly seen in a Mistral Police uniform. In "Cordially Invited" and "As Above, So Below", Neo disguises herself in a Schnee waitress uniform with black shoulder-length hair clipped with two barrettes and green eyes.

In "Out in the Open", it is shown that Neo can disguise herself as already existing characters i.e., Ruby Rose. In "With Friends Like These", Neo is shown to be capable of taking on forms of different genders as she takes on the appearance of Oscar, however she has never been seen impersonating anyone with extreme size or build differences.

In "Witch", Neo showcased the ability to camouflage herself as inanimate objects, as she turned herself into a wall of Monstra to steal the Relic of Knowledge.

Trivia Vanille[]

Prior to going by Neopolitan, Trivia Vanille originally had only brown hair, but maintained the pink and brown heterochromia in her eyes. In public, her parents made her wear colored contact lens that made both eyes appear brown. At the time, she wore her hair in pigtails, and her clothes consisted of a brown dress with dark brown cuffs and a white collar with a black ribbon attached to the collar with matching ribbons in her pigtails.[8] At the age of twelve, she also had an "adventuring outfit" consisting of a white tank top, brown blazer and matching pants alongside white sneakers with pink hearts.

Image Gallery[]

Outfits[]

Disguises[]

Personality[]

Neo is a mute who cannot speak[8] and as such communicates purely through body language, miming, or text messages. She has been mute since birth.

Neo is stated to be cruel, vicious, and sadistic, as seen in her smile as she prepares to stab Yang in "No Brakes", as well as in "Round One" when she proceeded to brutally stomp on her opponents face with a cruel smile despite him being physically unable to continue their match. [9] However, she does seem to exhibit fear and hesitance when she knows she is outmatched, fleeing if her opponent proves to be as such. This can be seen when Raven Branwen appears and engages her on the White Fang cargo train. She is rather perceptive and is able to recognize superior abilities to her own, despite her confidence. Neo is also seen to have a vengeful side by her attempt to kill Cinder Fall in "The Coming Storm" for her part in Roman Torchwick's death, only stopping when she reveals her Maiden powers.

Neo is highly determined when she sets her mind to a task, often dealing with any problems presented to her efficiently and competently. During her battle against Team JNPR, Neo took notice of Lie Ren's protectiveness of Nora Valkyrie and took advantage of that by transforming into her using her Semblance to make him hesitate. She also used Emerald Sustrai and Hazel Rainarts's escape as a cover to steal the Relic of Knowledge and skip away in the dust cloud created from Monstra's explosion.

Additionally, she is extremely ruthless, easily turning to murder as a means of achieving her goals and often doing so with a playful demeanor. In "Worthy", she alongside Cinder and Arthur Watts massacred the people stationed at the Atlas Command Center.[10]

Neo possesses a desire to be validated whenever she accomplishes a task, as well as to be treated as an equal by a partner or superior. She was happy with working with Roman, as he often acknowledged her for completing a job. However, while working for Cinder, she was irritated by her lack of recognition or respect towards her. She was further angered when Cinder took the Relic of Knowledge from her without a word of gratitude and failed to give her credit for successfully stealing the Relic, as well as taking credit for her accomplishments to redeem herself before Salem. These actions eventually resulted in her going against Cinder's orders for her own wishes.

Neo was extremely loyal to Roman and very close with him. She willingly carried out his demands and he was the only one she did not show contempt towards. Likewise, Roman never got upset with Neo like he did with others, and they were very proficient in wordlessly coordinating attacks. Neo was shown to be devastated after his death, and wears Roman's hat in memory of him. She is solely driven by a need to exact revenge for what happened to him and has gone to near suicidal lengths to do so, including facing Cinder alone. Neo had a previously lonely life until she met Roman, and after his death her life returned to said state. This is illustrated by her disheveled appearance in "The Coming Storm".

Later, Neo takes fights slightly more seriously becoming even more sadistic, cruel, and merciless then before. Previously, during her V2 fight with Yang, Neo toyed with her before knocking the girl unconscious and afterwards unsheathing Hush. Similarly, in her V3 fight against Ruby, Neo opted not to use her sword to fight, and later used it to threaten Ruby, which ultimately turned out to be her undoing when she used Hush to send her flying. Comparatively, in current fights, while she continues to mock her opponents, Neo uses her blade more frequently and is shown dispatching foes much more quickly and not dragging out finishing moves any longer than necessary. It's implied that this notable change in behavior may be a result either of her perceived feelings of guilt for having failed Roman when he needed her the most, frustration at all of the constant delays towards avenging him, growing fed-up with all of the ridiculous situations she's found herself in or even a combination of all three.

In RWBY: Roman Holiday, it is shown that Neo was abused by her father and mother for not being the perfect child, due to her inability to speak, heterochromia, and unruly behavior. She had an imaginary friend named "Neopolitan", who she subconsciously used as a scapegoat to take the blame for her own rebellious desires that she had externalized. This was due to her parents simultaneously punishing her for her wants while not taking them seriously, as well as her loneliness and desire to be free—"Neopolitan" was everything Trivia had wanted to be.

Eventually, Trivia realizes that "Neopolitan" was an externalization of her own desires—that she and "Neopolitan" were one and the same. All the violently lashing out at those who wronged her, rule-breaking and illegal activities, taunting, freedom and danger "Neopolitan" had pursued was just what Trivia had wanted, but felt she wasn't allowed to after a series of events—including her introducing herself as Neopolitan rather than Trivia to Roman, which she felt was "right" and gave her "a fresh start", with the metaphorical final straw being her mother physically shattering the illusion of "Neopolitan" conjured by Overactive Imagination in front of Trivia. When Trivia takes on her new identity and name as Neopolitan, she viciously and fervently enforces her own wants and whims in contradiction to how long she'd been forced to repress them. Similarly, she takes great pride in herself and cares little of how other people perceive or feel about her, in contrast to how her parents had insisted their image mattered more than anything else, including Neo's desires.

At the end of Roman Holiday, during the fight at the Vanille Estate involving Neo, Roman Torchwick, Senior Xiong, and Lil' Miss Malachite, Neo makes a split-second decision to trick Lil' Miss into triggering a Dust explosion on the third floor in order to escape the fight, though the explosion ends up unintentionally killing her father and she suspects also her mother. This is Neo's first experience with the death of someone known to her, uncertain of how to react and feeling that it didn't affect her, although she gains her iconic white stripes in her hair at this time, indicating she is impacted by their deaths no matter what she thinks. Her inability to legitimately process her parents' deaths is indicative of her larger inability to handle grief, as further shown by her single-minded revenge driven handling of Roman's death.

In “Tea Amidst Terrible Trouble”, after she finally gets her revenge on Ruby by driving her to ascend in the Ever After, she becomes a broken and emotionless person herself as she realized she only wanted revenge, not to conquer the Ever After, and now that she achieved it, she had nothing. She became so broken that the Curious Cat was able to take over her body to fulfill their own agenda.

In “Of Solitude and Self”, Neo was released from the Curious Cat’s control and upon being exposed to the smoke of the Great Tree’s leaves, Neo was shown to have gone through significant emotional growth, as she eventually realized that revenge wouldn’t make her happy, nor fill the emptiness in her heart and would only consume her entirely, leaving her with nothing. The entire experience in the Ever After caused Neo to finally let go of the past, by letting go of Roman and accept his death, as instead of trying to continue attacking Ruby or her friends, she decided to go through Ascension in order to find herself and become something new.

Powers and Abilities[]

In "No Brakes", Neo proves herself to be a highly skilled combatant, able to defeat Yang in a one-on-one fight, seemingly playing with her opponent as she was able to defeat her without taking anything more than a glancing hit. Her fighting style is highly evasive, dodging, deflecting or maneuvering around her opponent's strikes until she has exhausted them, or is ready for a counterattack. Neo also displays incredible reflexes and speed, dodging several of Yang's attacks with ease, even when holding her umbrella in one hand.

This is further shown in "Heroes and Monsters" where she is easily able to keep up with and defeat Ruby almost single-handedly, and in her fight with Cinder in "The Coming Storm", with Neo taking two hits and delivering four back to Cinder in a mostly even fight, only backing down when Cinder resorted to the use of her Maiden Powers. Cinder also commented Neo had 'grown stronger'. An example of that was shown in "The Enemy of Trust" with despite being completely outnumbered by both Oscar and Team JNR, she easily evaded, parried and dodged their attacks and overpowered and outmaneuvered them with quick and powerful strikes while doing so in a joking manner, hinting that Neo herself was not taking them seriously and was toying with them during the majority of their battle.

Neo has also displayed herself to be very acrobatic and exceptionally skilled in hand-to-hand combat relying on her agility to dodge and misdirect enemy movements and attacks, before retaliating with her own kick-based attacks resembling Bartitsu with the way she blocks with her parasol, and Capoeira with her acrobatic kicks. She learned this as a student at Lady Browning’s Preparatory Academy for Girls, where they had a secret program for training chosen students to be assassins with a wide variety of classes in fencing, self-defense, and escape artistry. Neo excelled in all these classes and even trained under a rogue Huntress, her skills reaching the point that she could stand up against the Malachite sisters when they tried to stop her from escaping the academy.

However, Neo has also been shown to immediately back out of a fight she knows she can't win. She instantly retreated upon seeing Raven in "No Brakes" and stopped attacking Cinder in "The Coming Storm" when she activated her Maiden powers, despite instigating the fight in the first place. It also appears that she has more difficulty against opponents equipped with a melee weapon, as opposed to barehanded fighters; she easily bested Yang in "No Brakes" but had a more even contest against Ruby in "Heroes and Monsters" until Roman arrived to reinforce her. During her fight with Cinder in "The Coming Storm", Neo initially held the initiative, but Cinder gradually gained the advantage once she equipped herself with dual swords. During her duel with Maria Calavera, Neo was consistently outmatched until Maria became distracted. When she faced Ruby again in "Worthy" and "The Final Word", she held the initiative, but fell for Ruby's attempt to goad her, lashing out in anger that enabled Ruby to get the better of her.

While using her weapon in sword form, Neo has displayed a sword style similar to Victorian Age fencing, as seen during her battle against Team JNPR and Oscar, where Neo held one of her hands behind her back as she made several swift sword stabs, jabs and swipes at her opponents. Notably, during her first few appearances, Neo never used Hush's blade to fight, only to down fallen opponents like Yang. Later, she is seen using it once, for a split second against Cinder and afterwards begins employing it regularly in fights.

By Volume 8, Neo's combat skills become powerful enough that she could easily fight multiple skilled opponents simultaneously. In "Worthy", she was able to fight against both Ruby Rose and Blake Belladonna and largely keep them on the defensive.

Weapon[]

Main article: Hush

Neo's weapon of choice is Hush,[5] a parasol containing a long, thin blade hidden within the length of the parasol's tube, which can also project the blade's tip from the top end of it. The canopy of the parasol is made of an extremely dense, durable fabric that can repel minor Dust explosions, allowing Neo to use it as a shield or a glider. Unlike many of the weapons shown in RWBY, Hush does not appear to contain a concealed firearm or projectile weapon, therefore it can only be used for close quarters fighting.

Semblance[]

Main article: Overactive Imagination
Neo illusions

Yang shatters the illusion wall.

Neo's Semblance, Overactive Imagination, allows her to create "physical illusions that can be seen by everyone", as opposed to Emerald's Hallucinations, which usually only affect the person(s) she targets.[11] These illusions are highly convincing and shatter like glass when she dispels them, or someone breaks them. Her most apparent use of them is creating illusions around her body, either to disguise herself or for her opponent to target while she escapes or moves unseen to another point of attack. They also seem to be somewhat resilient to damage. While fighting Cinder, the illusion concealing Neo’s outfit was not dispelled even after taking or landing some hits. This was revised however in Volume 7, as her disguise was dispelled upon receiving a punch from Oscar. Additionally, in later volumes, she has learned to use her Semblance for psychological manipulation, exploiting the appearance of close friends and families in her enemies to torment and overpower them.

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Neo disguising an entire Mistral Airship as an Atlas Manta

In "Our Way", Neo displayed her new mastery over her Semblance, where she managed to completely disguise an entire Mistral Airship to physically resemble an Atlas one, implying that she could maintain the facade long enough to fool the Atlas Military and cross the continental border checkpoint into Atlas.

Neo also uses her Semblance when communicating with others in lieu of her muteness, as seen in "Out in the Open" where she transformed into Ruby when arguing what to prioritize with Cinder.

Initially, unlike Emerald's hallucinations, Neo's illusions did not affect a person's hearing, as she was not able to mimic sound or voices; thus, if she was disguised and someone tried to talk to her, her muteness might give her away. Before her time in the Ever After, her illusions also seemed to be limited in their range; they typically only covered Neo herself, and either a short distance around her or something she was touching, such as the Mistral airship that she disguised as an Atlesian Airship in "Our Way". However, as seen in her battles against Yang, Ruby and Cinder, she can maintain an illusion after moving away- until something makes contact with it, after which the illusion will shatter.

As shown in "Witch", Neo herself has showcased the ability to create a camouflage illusion across her entire body in order to hide in plain sight. She altered her physical appearance, completely blending in with the dark crimson colors of Monstra's walls. Doing so, Neo was able to observe Oscar, Emerald, and Hazel accessing the Relic of Knowledge.

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Neo Clones

In “Rude, Red, and Royal”, Neo’s Semblance evolved further, where she now has the ability to make multiple copies of herself. These clones are semi-autonomous, able to either copy movements of Neo or perform commands given by her. She can also control them at will and the clones themselves retain the ability physically attack others, such as the Jabberwalker.

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Jabberwalker Clones

In “The Parfait Predicament”, it is shown that she can create clones of other beings as well, such as the Jabberwalker, and can even have them mimic the speech and voice of the original.

As seen in “The Perils of Paper Houses“, her Semblance can seemingly replicate another being to the point of copying their unique abilities. This is implied when the Jabberwalker clones attempted to devour Ruby, suggesting that the clones also possess the original’s ability to permanently kill a Afteran by eating them. Though this is currently unconfirmed.

In "Tea Amidst Terrible Trouble", Neo created clones of Penny Polendina, Pyrrha Nikos, Ozpin, Leonardo Lionheart, Clover Ebi, James Ironwood, Oscar Pine and Roman Torchwick. Her clones were able to perfectly replicate their voice, facial expressions and even to a degree, their personalities and fighting styles. She could also construct complex constructs such as appliances and even entire buildings, having replicated a copy of the Vanille Manor, complete with functioning lights and furniture and portraits of her memories. She could even create functioning weapons using her Semblance, as shown where she recreated Miló and Akoúo̱, Floating Array, The Long Memory, Stalwart, Melodic Cudgel, Due Process, had Milo and Akouo, Due Process, Melodic Cudgel and Stalwart fire rounds, and Milo and Akouo change forms.

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Neo speaking through her clones

Furthermore, as implied in "The Perils of Paper Houses", Neo possess a connection to her constructs and could project her psyche through them, first shown where she remotely transformed one of her Jabberwalker clones into herself to send Ruby a message of her targeting her. Later, she projected her thoughts and feelings through her clones of Ruby’s friends and acquaintances, signified when their eyes turned into her heterochromia of pink and brown.

Neo's power is shown at its strongest when she has her final confrontation with Ruby in "Tea Amidst Terrible Trouble": she creates a massive mansion for Ruby to walk in, hosting a tea party of sorts with fallen comrades of Ruby. Her projections have enough autonomy to speak, fight and even bleed. They speak in Neo's stead, acting as a way for her to verbally communicate what she hates about Ruby and how she has personally failed them, all which quickly break Ruby's spirit.

Other Skills[]

Neo herself proves to be a competent getaway driver and a highly skilled infiltrator, as shown in "Beginning of the End", where she, disguised as a paramedic, drives Cinder, Mercury Black and Emerald Sustrai away to an unknown location in an Air Bus after they initiate their plan to frame Yang.

This has been proven to be one of Neo's greatest talents, as she showed that combined with her Semblance, she could easily infiltrate military compounds no matter how well guarded or secure they are. One of the best examples is when she is shown walking through an airship full of Atlesian soldiers she presumably killed to free Roman and later Neo again shows her skills in infiltration and hijacking, when she manages to easily acquire a Mistral airship after presumably infiltrating a Mistral air base to steal it without being detected or noticed by the Kingdom's military or officials. Later she showcased that she could even easily infiltrate the highly secured Atlas Academy and later escape from it with no one noticing her at all and managed to again hijack and steal an Atlesian Manta.

Neo has displayed a high level of cunning and skill in acting when using her Semblance, as seen when she observes and notices the close relationship between Lie Ren and Nora Valkyrie and is able to use it to emotionally manipulate Ren into giving her an opening to attack and escape. After her Semblance evolved, Neo’s ability to psychologically manipulate others using her Semblance has also increased, as shown where she was able to make her clones of Penny, Pyrrha, Ironwood, Ozpin and Oscar act, behave and sound like the originals to the point that they were able to effectively illicit emotional anguish from Ruby. Neo also showcased the ability to make her clones of Yang, Blake, Weiss, Jaune, Nora and Ren behave similarly realistic.

With the aid of her Semblance, Neo is shown to have expertise in pickpocketing, as she is easily able to steal the Relic of Knowledge off of Oscar without him knowing until it is too late.

Weaknesses[]

Although Neo is an exceptionally skilled melee fighter, she has a habit of dropping her guard when she decisively gains the upper hand, either out of smugness or anger; this sometimes allows opponents to make a successful counterattack. Examples include her gloating after defeating Yang in "No Brakes" and Ruby in "Heroes and Monsters"; in both cases, this gave her opponents (Raven and Ruby) time to turn the tables on her. In "The Final Word", after Neo disarms Ruby, Ruby provokes her anger over Torchwick's death, causing Neo to impulsively attack and fall straight into Ruby's trap. In "Tea Amidst Terrible Trouble", when Neo has Ruby at her mercy, she leaves herself open to a surprise attack from the Curious Cat, temporarily disrupting her attack on Ruby.

Trivia[]

Allusion[]

  • Neopolitan alludes to Hecate, the Goddess of Witchcraft and Necromancy from Greek Mythology. She could also allude to the Mad Hatter from Lewis Carol's "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland". For more information on choices the creators made for this character, see Neopolitan/Behind the Scenes.

Color Naming Rule[]

  • Neapolitan is a flavor of ice cream that combines strawberry (pink), chocolate (brown) and vanilla (white) flavors. Neo's eyes are capable of switching between these three colors, and her hair and outfit also follow this color scheme.
  • Neo- (νεο-) is also a Greek prefix, meaning "new". In English, neo- is also used as a prefix to denote something that is contemporary, recent, modern or new. The word "Neopolitan" itself derives from the Greek Neápolis (Νεάπολις), meaning "new city". Neo also means 'young' and 'immature' in Greek, usually in medical terms.
  • Neo's full name has been written in two different ways.
    • It was originally spelled Neopolitan by Monty in an image album that he uploaded to Facebook, which featured images of her model from different angles.[12] This spelling is used in all media directly created by Rooster Teeth, including merchandise and RWBY Chibi.
    • The staff of the mobile game, Amity Arena, later revealed that the reference files they received from Rooster Teeth labeled her as Neo_Politan, leading them to question Rooster Teeth on the matter. They incorrectly spelled her name Neo Politan, with Politan being her last name,[13] a spelling also used in BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle.
    • The debate was resolved by The World of RWBY: The Official Companion, which settled on the single word spelling of her name.
    • This also makes her one of two villains to have no last name given, the other being Salem. However, in Neo's case, this is because Neopolitan is not her original name, as suggested by the lyrics of One Thing and later confirmed in "RWBY: Roman Holiday".
  • Her birth name is Trivia Vanille. "Vanille" is a French name meaning "vanilla" bringing a creamy white color to mind.
    • "Trivia" means "where the three roads meet", which could relate to the three flavors of Neopolitan's namesake: chocolate, vanilla and strawberry.
      • Trivia is also the name of the Roman Goddess of sorcery, witchcraft and crossroads, with her Grecian counterpart being named Hecate.
      • Trivia also contains the prefix tri, which speaks of groups of three.

Story[]

  • Neo can change the color of her eyes at will, usually alternating between pink and brown. They can also turn white (completing the ice cream theme) although rarely; one turns white as she removes the sword from her umbrella, and both turn white when Raven appears. Later, she also changes her eyes to green as part of her tournament disguise and magenta as part of her paramedic disguise.

Character & Design[]

  • From the 8th to the 11th of July 2014, Monty hinted at Neo's Neapolitan ice cream theme by tweeting pictures of Neapolitan ice cream, long before the character's first appearance in the show, a few days after her appearance in the Volume 2 Trailer.[14][15][16]
    • It is possible that this may have been in response to some fans noticing Neo in the Volume 2 Trailer (published July 4th, 2014) and discussing her, as these tweets began shortly after she was noticed.
  • Though Gray G. Haddock has confirmed that Neo was created for a "casting opportunity",[17] she has not spoken once onscreen. She does make some nonverbal sounds in the episodes "Round One" and "Heroes and Monsters".
    • In The World of RWBY: The Official Companion, it is revealed that the casting opportunity was going to be Sarah Silverman, though Neo was opted to have been made mute instead.
  • Although Neo is currently the only character known to have complete heterochromia, Blake was originally going to have it as well, as evidenced by early concept art in which she had a yellow eye and a blue eye.[18]
  • It has been confirmed that Neo does not allude to the Cheshire Cat.[19]
    • Another character introduced in Volume 9 named the Curious Cat alludes to it instead.
      • Ironically Neo eventually ends up becoming possessed by the Curious Cat turning into the NeoCat.
  • During the first update to RWBY: Amity Arena, where Neo and a handful of other new cards were added to the game, the last part of her description talks about how she may or may not be capable of speaking. This bit has since then been removed for unknown reasons.
  • Neo's parasol contains a blade connected to the handle. This type of cane sword was originally called a "dolon" and was first used by the ancient Romans. It is yet unclear whether this design choice was a deliberate allusion to her partnership with Roman Torchwick.
  • The animation for Neo's Semblance has improved over the course of the show, with three different versions. The first version appeared as a line of light moving over Neo's body while spitting out small fragments, then became a more complicated line made up of pink fragments in Volume six. In Volume 7, it changed drastically, appearing as an amorphous pink shape and losing its crystalline properties.
  • According to The Official Companion, Overactive Imagination was created because Monty needed Roman and Neo to exit during "Painting the Town..." but having them escape was hard to animate, and it was decided having them shatter instead would be easier.[20]
  • As per E.C. Myers, originally, Neo's birth name was going to be Kat, in reference to Kit Kat chocolate bars. After doing research on the name Catherine—the full name Kat is based on—which originates from Hecate, the name of the Greek Goddess of Three Way Roads, Myers instead decided to make Neo's birth name Trivia—Hecate's Roman God equivalent—as he felt it sounded better and was more thematic.[21]

Media[]

  • On August 4th, 2019, Neo, along with Yumi from Senran Kagura and Akatsuki and Blitztank from Akatsuki En-Eins, were revealed as Season 2 DLC for Cross Tag Battle. She is voiced by Casey Lee Williams.[22]

Miscellaneous[]

  • Whenever Neo appears to be fighting or initiating combat, there seems to be a waterphone-esque instrument that plays in correspondence to her movements.

References[]

Characters
BRIR
RWBY/Justice League
Super Heroes and Huntsmen
Other
Minor Characters
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