User blog:Zolnir/Volume 2 Episode 4: Short Review, and Future Predictions

Great episode. The end.

Review

What? An actual analysis? Oh, right, that's the reason I even write a blog instead of going ham at the comment's section instead! Okay, let's see...

First, Night Club scene. It is currently the most awkward scene I've ever seen in RWBY ''ever. The 'sup guys, ready for another round of bashing?' scene is actually lousier ''than the Trailer, and well, generally, just super awkward and wrong the entire time. It feels like someone at some point suddenly realized, 'er, hey, why are we doing this again?' and then just whatever the hell through the thing.

Junior's either a great liar (since at the Opening he's clearly on Cinder's side) or a poor, pitiful man who gets roped into the situation like a rat facing a snake. Miltia and Melanie in perfect sync - I thought Miltia was the meek one, too. But either she's really good at mimicking her elder sister (Melania, btw, has the airs of an ojou-sama even more than Weiss) or well, it's a freaking night club. Wear that kind of clothes and you get hit on so often you just don't give two shits about it anymore.

Speaking of which, oh shit! I forgot about Penny! Who is that guy again who argued against me in the 'Penny vs Everyone' thread that essentially ends with, 'since she's a robot (lousy interpretation btw, and although I know you don't care it's still inaccurate, Maki) she doesn't have an Aura thus she gets thrashed - q.e.d'? Well whatever. Q.E.D indeed, but definitely not the one you desired for sure. One point for me, this time.

Point: Penny has a soul. Anyone who's not blind or deaf or inhuman or whatever can see that. Thus, Penny has an Aura. And apparently, the combination of a tough steel body and Aura makes for one helluva soldier. You don't need the Vytal Festival to prove yourself, Penny, I think you can even solo most of the Teams with minimal support.

So, let's just jump straight to Yang right now because she finally has some reveals on her Semblance. She has been called a Berserker since ages ago, but she finally shows her core strength today. Basically, the more damage she takes the more powerful she gets.

I'm not going to fanboy over her strengths; instead I'll just bring light to some of the more troublesome aspects of her Semblance:

1) How much control does she has over her Semblance? Can she take too much damage, and in response her Semblance turns incredibly powerful and potent to counter the threat, and Yang's only way of turning it off is to use up the energy? That can make for the troubled childhood we've all been talking about - a fire that almost no one, not even herself, can control at the time.

2) We understand her cheerful demeanor now. We know that Yang can activate her Semblance with bursts of great emotion, other than just damage. Now let us imagine her as a child. Say she gets angry, and suddenly fire explodes all over the place. Definitely not the best childhood one can hope for. It's easy to see now why she tries so hard to stay cheerful, because a negative mood is only going to cause her lose it even though she has better control now.

3) Does her Semblance affect her mood? Her response to Weiss' pun is sharp and curt; not something I believe her normal self will do.

A final note about this review: '''Roman/Cinder doesn't just have one Paladin in their hands, they have more than that as clearly stated by Roman himself. So get it into your dim heads already, for those of you who think this is the last we'll see of the Paladins.'''

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Prediction

So 3 of my predictions prior to this Episode are:

1) Penny has a soul and Aura,

2) The gathering Blake and Wukong attends will mention of a date and time and plans to nab the Paladin. We will see Roman rob in action (I stand by the opinion that it's a damn shame we didn't get to see the antagonists in action) and Blake and Wukong plus reinforcements will try to stop them.

3) I... don't remember the last one unfortunately. Shit. But it was wrong anyway, so forgetting it is fine.

The tally is 1 right and 2 wrongs... A bit disappointing, but I keep forgetting how fast RWBY drives the pace. Even BenRG's near perfect prediction didn't predict the end of the first Paladin fight so quickly.

A few predictions about the future, now that we finally have a clearer picture:

1) We now understand how they're really going to put all the new Teams shown thus far (SSSN, CFVY) into focus. The Vytal can be one, but I've always been wondering how they're going to fit all the fights. On the other hand, Cinder's forces stole more than just one Paladin, as well as whatever they can get along the way. So one Paladin for every team, they say! Such truth and much action, we agree!

2) Penny's crisis. It's practically confirmed (in the Afterbuzz interview) that she is going to get at least some story this Volume, with Ruby having to rescue her from this yet-revealed crisis. The simplest deduction will be that Ironwood decides to put her to the test, and as usual, things go awry.

3) Pyrrha is the other person who's probably going to grab some spotlight. It'll be interesting to see how she'll fit in such a tight schedule (like really, when you factor in the Vytal Tournament - which actually probably won't get a spotlight, all things considered - Cinder's movements, Penny, CFVY, SSSN etc, there's just so... many!), but I believe it won't be long for now. Or maybe hers is the long game, where it'll pop up from time to time until finally getting resolved near the end of the Volume.

And that's it for today. Since I have no pictures I doubt people will read through them word by word, but eh, one can try. Oh, and Neo/Nea/whatever, woman - Semblance is likely something related to glass, mirage, illusion, ice, and even timestop.