Blake Belladonna

Blake Belladonna is a former student at Beacon Academy and one of the main protagonists of RWBY. Her weapon of choice is a Variant Ballistic Chain Scythe (VBCS) named Gambol Shroud.

She first appeared in the "Black" Trailer alongside Adam Taurus, partner and mentor in the White Fang, a Faunus terrorist group. After leaving the organization, Blake enrolled at Beacon Academy, where she becomes a member of Team RWBY alongside Ruby Rose, Weiss Schnee and Yang Xiao Long. She is the daughter of Ghira Belladonna, the current chieftain of Menagerie and his wife Kali.

Appearance
Blake is a fair-skinned young woman with long, wavy black hair and amber eyes. Her Faunus trait is a pair of black cat ears.

Original Outfit (Volumes 1–3)


She wears a black buttoned vest with coattails and a single silver button on the front. Underneath this is a white, sleeveless, high necked, crop undershirt and white shorts with a zipper on the front of each leg, emblazoned with the YKK logo of the real-life Japanese zipper manufacturer

She also wears black low-heeled boots and full stockings with a color gradation of black to purple at her ankles. Her emblem is visible on the outside of both thighs just below her shorts in white. On her left arm is a detached sleeve with a silver cuff around her bicep and black ribbons are wrapped around both forearms. A small, loose scarf is wrapped around her neck and a gray magnetic backpack is strapped to her back, hidden by her hair.

A ribbon is tied with a large bow on the top of her head, which acts as a cover for her Faunus heritage and disguises her cat ears. She wears purple eyeshadow in Catseye style.

Pajamas
Blake's pajamas is a black, long-sleeved, yukata-style shirt with white edging over a purple undershirt and a matching skirt. A black obi is wrapped around her waist and tied with a black and white string. During her time at Beacon Academy, she wears her bow while sleeping.

Alternate Outfit (Intruder)


During the events of "A Minor Hiccup" and "Painting the Town...", Blake wears an alternate outfit codenamed "Intruder".

This outfit consists of a white, v-neck, zip-up crop shirt with a black hem and three-quarter sleeves. Her emblem is printed in off-white on the left side of the shirt. She wears black pants that have a vertical gray stripe on the outer side of each leg and a black belt.

Attached to the rear of the belt is a black piece of fabric that covers her from hip to hip. Underneath this is a longer, translucent, purple piece of fabric. She also wears black high-heel boots with two straps and buckles and purple underoles, reaching to mid-calf. She retains the black ribbons on her forearms and her black bow.

Dance
During the Beacon Dance, Blake wears a short, purple, asymmetrical, halter neck dress that is split up the right side and has a black collar. Translucent black mesh covers her shoulders, decolletage and back, and decorative black swirls cover the left side of the dress and continue up the left strap. The outfit is completed with black pumps, and she wears a teal bow as opposed to her usual black one.

Uniform
Blake wears the same brown shoes, red tartan skirt, white blouse with maroon trim and thin red bow, a brown vest with gold buttons and a maroon blazer with gold trim as every other girl attending Beacon Academy, alongside knee-high black socks.

Post-Timeskip Outfit (Volumes 4-7)


After the timeskip following the Fall of Beacon, her design features a long white tailcoat with dark gray lining and a sleeveless black crop top. The crop top has rectangular and diamond-shaped cutouts around the neckline, which have purple outlines beginning in Volume 6. Additionally, she wears a white belt over black fitted pants. After the confrontation with Adam in "Heroes and Monsters", Blake has been left with an X-shaped scar on the bottom left section of her abdomen.

Across her torso is a diagonal strap that contains a smaller magnetic clip used to sheathe Gambol Shroud. She wears thigh-high black heeled boots with gold-colored edging around the top. The left boot has a belt wrapped twice around the thigh. Each boot bears her belladonna emblem in white on the outer side of the thigh, and a white pouch is attached to the back of her belt.

In "Of Runaways and Stowaways", Blake removes her bow and throws it into the ocean, while in "The Lady in the Shoe", Adam slashes her tailcoat off her.

Blake's ears from Volume 4 onward have a tendency to fold down or otherwise move in sync with her emotional state, much like the ears of an actual cat.

Atlas Outfit (Volume 7-Current)
After arriving in Atlas, Blake cuts her hair to be just above her shoulders and receives a new outfit. She wears a black, collared catsuit with a zipper on the chest and thigh-high black boots with zippers on the fronts and two kneecaps. Her long, white tailcoat has dark gray detailing on the chest, sleeves, sides and collar. It has a narrow gray belt around the collar and a wide white belt loosely secured around her waist through the coat's belt loops. The belt around her waist has a white pouch attached. The tails of the coat end in points,and the inside lining is vivid purple. The front zipper of the coat is upside down and extends to the very bottom of the coat, and there are additional zippers along the sleeves. Around each wrist, she wears a black belted wristband, and she appears to have something gray strapped to her back like a backpack.

Personality
Blake is described as being "mellow" by her voice actress, Arryn Zech. She displays a cool, reserved and serious personality most of the time but does not lack a humorous side, which is usually in the form of dry wit and sarcasm. Blake is a righteous person, respecting other people's lives regardless of whether they are Faunus or not. She strongly despises those who judge and discriminate based on racial prejudice. Blake is outspoken, going so far as to indirectly insult the Schnee Dust Company in front of its heiress and defend Faunus of any kind.

Blake is shown to be an introvert. Although she reads books to distance herself from the discussion at hand, as the series continues, she is shown to be more facetious and friendly. Blake appears most conversant when discussing the history and plight of her people.

As a Faunus, Blake has faced discrimination in the past and wears a bow when around Humans in order to be treated for her character and not her species. However, despite having no hate for Humans, she has seen how the real world works and wonders how she can undo so many years of hate and pain. After the Fall of Beacon, Blake discards her bow and does not cover her ears again, even around the presence of Humans, showing that she is no longer afraid to be seen as a Faunus.

Blake's past negatively influenced her personality, leading to moodiness, stubbornness, sleep deprivation and trust issues at times. She also has self-loathing issues, viewing herself as a criminal hiding in plain sight because of her past with the White Fang until her teammates convinced her that they still trusted and cared for her despite her being a Faunus and a former member of the White Fang, and viewing herself as a coward who runs from her problems, viewing her Semblance as a prospect of her tendency to avoid conflict and feeling unworthy of her parents' love after leaving them behind. However, she has a strong sense of righteousness as she strongly disagreed with the White Fang increasing level of violence and hatred towards Humans, especially Adam's, and leaving Adam and the organization after realizing how spiteful and uncaring for Human lives he was and finally decided to fight back against him after discovering that he was planning to overthrow Sienna Khan and gain total control over the White Fang.

Thanks to her parents' unconditional love and Sun Wukong's support of her, Blake began to grow out of her self-loathing issues and mistrust for others, with Sun persuading her to let her friends help her as much as she believes she is helping them. She uses this, in turn, to persuade Ilia Amitola to leave the White Fang and to confront Adam with others' help and to reunite with her teammates at Haven.

Her Faunus traits also seem to give her other aspects of a cat, such as climbing up to Ruby's bed to stay away from Ruby and Yang's pet dog, Zwei. Another time, she is distracted by and instinctively decides to follow a laser pointer light to a waiting Yang in "Burning the Candle". She also has a great love for tuna, as shown in "Round One" where she drools over a bowl of noodles topped with tuna.

Powers and Abilities
Blake shows above-average agility, speed, and endurance, as shown when fighting multiple enemies yet maintaining motion and energy without fatigue. She also exhibits a high level of skill when handling Gambol Shroud. She can slash away at opponents with startling speed and deflect incoming machine-gun fire using her blade.

Blake also possesses remarkable reflexes, as she is able to dodge a nearly point-blank strike from Adam by using her Semblance. She is also capable of jumping large distances, leaping from building to building and even on moving cars, as seen in "Painting the Town...".

As a Faunus, Blake possesses the ability of night vision, granting her the ability to see proficiently in the dark, as is shown after shooting out the power during the White Fang Faction Meeting, using the dark as a means for her and Sun to escape from Roman Torchwick and the White Fang.

Weapon


Gambol Shroud has three forms. When sheathed, the weapon is able to slice opponents in two with its cleaver-like cover. However, when unsheathed, Blake is able to use both the blade and sheath in tandem against her opponents.

She is also adept in using Gambol Shroud as a conduit for her Aura. Creating shock wave-like attacks of varying intensities in conjunction with her swings, these attacks have been shown to be extremely effective and versatile as Blake has used them against Grimm, missiles, AK-130's and Human opponents. Given that Adam demonstrates a red variant of this attack in the "Black" Trailer, it is possible she learned this technique from him.

She also appears to be able to freely and quickly change the way she grips her weapon. She can fold the blade into a gun-blade which is attached to an extending ribbon, similar to the Japanese kusarigama or sickle-and-chain. In the "Black" Trailer, it is shown that she is able to pull the gun portion's trigger by tugging on the weapon's ribbon. Her technique with this form of Gambol Shroud is similar to Ruby's with Crescent Rose: she uses the recoil from the gun attached to her blade to increase the speed of her attacks and can slice multiple enemies with Gambol Shroud from the ground or in the air through a whirling attack.

Additionally, she uses the momentum of the weapon on the ribbon as an anchor to maneuver herself in midair, and she can grapple other opponents or objects from medium range to bring them into melee distance. She is quite accurate as well, for she is able to kill an Ursa with one strike during her meeting with Yang in the Emerald Forest. Though she is very talented at using Gambol Shroud offensively, it requires a lot of concentration, lowering her defensive capability and making her more susceptible to attacks overall. Blake uses her ribbon again in "Painting the Town..." to spin Yang around, which is part of Ruby's plan to distract and defeat Roman.



Because the sword portion of Gambol Shroud folds into a sickle, the end of the blade is double-edged, and she can use this double edge when it is in its sword form. This is seen in "Black and White" when she attempts to interrogate Roman by placing the back of the blade to his throat while pointing her gun toward the White Fang members to keep them at bay.

Ultimately, her weapon was destroyed in combat against Adam in "The Lady in the Shoe"; the blade being cut horizontally in half by Wilt.

Semblance


Blake's most remarkable quality is her Semblance, Shadow, which allows her to create shadow-clones. Blake can use these clones to distract, shield or hide herself from the enemy for a brief amount of time, which is demonstrated during her fight with Atlesian Knight-130s and again during her fight against Roman.

Her first on-screen use of it is during the events of the "Black" Trailer when she utilized it against the Spider Droid. Blake's first recorded use of her "Shadow" ability in the series proper is during "Players and Pieces" when she fights the Nevermore. During the latter battle and others, she propels from her shadows, confirming there is some substance to her copies. In "Of Runaways and Stowaways", a clone exerts a force on her, allowing her to reach greater heights.

It is unknown exactly how long a shadow copy can appear for or how far away from Blake they can exist. Though Blake usually uses them in her immediate area, she reaches rather far away from one she uses to trick Reese Chloris in a Vytal Festival Tournament match.

Blake uses Dust to give her clones additional abilities. Fire Clones are explosive, Earth Clones are more concrete defenses than normal clones, and Ice Clones are effective in trapping enemies, giving Blake the advantage in fights.

Trivia

 * Blake alludes to both Belle and the Beast from Beauty and the Beast. For more information on this allusion, as well as other choices the creators made for this character, see Blake Belladonna/Behind the Scenes.
 * Blake means "black" in Old English. Bella donna means "fair lady" or "beautiful woman" in Italian, and it is also the name of a toxic plant commonly known as deadly nightshade. The plant commonly bears poisonous black berries, which lends to Blake's black color theme. It also commonly bears purple bell-shaped flowers, which lends to her Aura color.
 * The Rooster Teeth crew said Blake is one of the hardest characters to write for.
 * It was stated by Miles Luna and Kerry Shawcross that Blake prefers drinking tea over coffee. In "Destiny", when Weiss suggests the pair get coffee, Blake opts for tea instead. It was also mentioned in the Fan Service Podcast.
 * When asked about her bow by a fan during the Blake Week AMA, Arryn answered that Blake has a closet full of bows all neatly aligned on the walls.
 * Monty stated during a livestream that Blake's lack of a belly button in her original costume was a glitch with her character model. She does have one in her other costumes, though.
 * In the episode "Field Trip", Blake is shown to be uncomfortable around, or even scared of, dogs, most likely because she is a cat Faunus. This aspect is played up for comedy in episodes of RWBY Chibi.
 * During group fight scenes, the music often switches to dramatic piano scales when the focus shifts solely on Blake, as seen in episodes such as "Players and Pieces", "Best Day Ever", "Painting the Town..." and "Round One". This could be a leitmotif of sorts for Blake.
 * On the first night at Beacon, Blake tells Ruby her book is about a man with two souls. The first line of the right-hand page of the book reads, "He raised the glass to his lips." - a direct quote from Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.
 * Blake is a free playable DLC character in BlazBlue: Cross Tag Battle.
 * In the fourth episode of gen:LOCK, another animated series produced by Rooster Teeth, one of the main characters, Yasamin Madrani, can be seen dressed as Blake (Volume 4-7) in the Ether.
 * Blake, alongside Ruby, Nora Valkyrie and Jaune Arc, is one of the characters who owns an object sold in the Rooster Teeth store: her backpack.
 * It is possible that Blake's Shadow Semblance was inspired by C.T.'s hologram armor enhancement from Red vs. Blue which functioned and was used very similarly to Blake's Semblance.
 * On July 19th, 2019, a limited event collaboration between RWBY and SMITE was announced. Team RWBY is confirmed to appear as voiced skins with Blake as a skin for Amaterasu