Winter Schnee


 * For the original Winter Maiden, also called Winter, see Maidens.

Winter Schnee is the elder sister of Weiss and Whitley Schnee and a Specialist in the Atlesian Military's Special Operatives unit. She is first mentioned in "A Minor Hiccup".

On August 7th, 2015 during the RTX 2015 RWBY Panel, it was announced that Elizabeth Maxwell would voice Winter. Concept art for her character design and outfit were also revealed. She first appeared in the series itself in the episode, "It's Brawl in the Family".

Despite being the eldest child, Winter's right to inherit the Schnee Dust Company was abdicated upon her decision to join the Atlesian Military.

Appearance
Winter is a tall and fair-skinned young woman with white hair that is tied up in a bun at the rear left corner of her head, causing her bangs to fall towards the right side of her face and leaving a small curled lock of hair that reaches below her left ear and slate blue eyes.

Her attire is navy blue, white and gray-colored, and consists of a white coat with a red brooch that exposes upper arms, pants that have garters incorporated into them and black gloves.

Personality
At first glance, Winter appears to be a cold, dignified, and distant person who prefers to keep her emotions subdued and speaking in a very high-class, eloquent, almost robotic fashion. However, when interacting with Weiss, she smiles and shows that she cares about her younger sister's life and well-being, based on how she inquires if Weiss has been eating properly, gained any new hobbies, and made any new friends, in "It's Brawl in the Family". Winter is very intuitive towards her younger sister's emotions. With that said, she is not afraid to raise her hand at her younger sister whenever she is annoyed. Overall, she truly loves Weiss and wants her to succeed in life.

Winter can be very harsh as well, as shown in "Lessons Learned." When she attempts to teach Weiss how to Summon old foes with her Semblance, only for her sister to fail. Winter fiercely rebukes her younger sibling's excuses, citing her lack of resolve will not help her in the tournament, or as a huntress.

Although she strives to keep her emotions in check, she can be rather hot-headed at times. Once she becomes angry, she drops her dignified ladylike demeanor and loses all restraint, this is shown when she attempted to attack Qrow Branwen when provoked. She is fiercely loyal to her superior, James Ironwood, and becomes infuriated whenever his judgment is questioned; but she is equally faithful to his authority, and respectfully defers to him.

Weapon
Winter shows great skill with her weapon, displaying above-average speed, agility and reflexes in combat. She is able to both start moving and stop in an instant, as shown when she aborted her final attack on Qrow at the last second upon hearing Ironwood's voice. Her skills with her weapon are impressive, and although she was unable to land any serious blows on Qrow, she was able to parry and match all of his attacks for the duration of their fight. However, Qrow wasn't trying to hurt her and was mainly toying with Winter.

Semblance
Winter has the Schnee family Semblance of Glyphs. Her glyphs have many of the same effects that her sister's do, most notably including the ability to exert forces on herself and objects, which Winter uses to increase her speed to superhuman levels and boost jumps.

Like Weiss and other members of the Schnee family, she can also Summon versions of her past enemies to fight for her. Unlike Weiss at first, she displays great mastery of this aspect of her Semblance. Her Summons are known to include dozens of small Nevermores as well as full-size Beowolves. Her Summons take on a white-blue coloration and emit a soft glow.

Trivia

 * For information on choices the creators made for this character, see Winter Schnee/Behind the Scenes.
 * Winter shares her last name with the rest of her family, which is German for "Snow", following the color naming convention on Remnant.
 * Like Weiss, Winter's first name begins with a "W" and she is also referred to as "Ice Queen."
 * Winter is one of the four calendar seasons, usually characterized by cold weather, often accompanied by snow, further tying her entire name with her color motif.
 * It could be interpreted that Weiss having siblings was first alluded to in "The Badge and The Burden, Pt.2", when Weiss told Ruby Rose that she always wanted bunk beds as a kid.
 * Winter is shown to be ambidextrous or having some skill in wielding two weapons at once, as shown by her unique sword and dagger combination against Qrow in "It's Brawl in the Family."
 * Qrow refers to Winter as a "Specialist" in "It's Brawl in the Family". During the "Huntsmen" episode of RWBY: World of Remnant, Winter is shown to be a member of the Atlesian Military's Special Operatives unit, enlisting the follow-up of her graduation from Atlas Academy.