User blog:Tatmtn/Huntsmen and Huntresses

Well another WoR has come and gone, and although I'm super upset that we didn't get some more RWBY goodness, we got some world-building goodness! This is my favorite WoR so far in that I actually enjoyed it and thought it had useful, concrete information that answered questions while still keeping me interested. While hearing about the Grimm was certainly the highlight, I was quite intrigued by what we learned about Huntsmen and Huntresses. Hopefully, my thoughts can spur some discussion!

First of all, it seems to me that Huntsmen and Huntresses have a double-sided relationship with the Grimm. On one hand, they kill the Grimm. That's their job, and they need to do it to survive. On the other hand, the profession obtains a lot of its allure from that. Through the use of 'bombastic story-telling,' to quote the narrarator, I think that Huntsmen and Huntresses have created a romanticised version of what they do, kind of like the real-life military. They gain a very flattering reputation, and Ruby gives us an idea of what that reputation is like in volume 1. Weiss even talks about the romanticized expectations that team RWBY had of their new career and says that in the end, it's just a job. A violent, dangerous job, to boot.

Secondly, I really like how RWBY is portraying the H&Hs (I'll call them that from now on). They aren't special units or super-soldiers. They're just soldiers. They're fighting, killing, surviving, and doing it all over again. This WoR seems very topical in that, at the same time they're telling us about Huntsmen and Huntresses, the show is stripping away the fantasy behind their reputation and showing us the cold, hard reality. This WoR also seemed to put them in a negative light as well, as tellers of tall tales who treat the Grimm like trophies to be collected instead of enemies to be fought. I doubt that Port actually thinks like this, and I doubt that the majority of H&Hs think like this, but his attitude in volume 1 supports this portrayal. His appearance was also used as the Hunstman in the video, bragging and collecting fake trophies. I wonder if this portrayal will be expanded on in later episodes of RWBY?

Finally, I wonder who the first H&Hs were. We know how they came to be; they had to fight back against the Grimm. But who were they? Were they poor civilians, sick of their governments not taking the Grimm seriously? Or were they established by the first organized governments, who saw their threat for what it was? Or were they the nomads mentioned in the previous WoR, who taught their ways to others and caused the profession to spread?

Also, this is my first blog, so hopefully I did alright.