User blog:ChishioKunrin/RWBY's quality, and how it can be improved

Occasionally, my mind ends up filled with tons of thoughts and ideas about RWBY, and I wish I could just sit Miles and Kerry down and talk to them face to face about all this because damn, I know they can do so much better. They just need to think about the right things and think about it in the right way! Those of us who've been watching the Red vs Blue seasons that Miles writes for know that Miles can write something awesome!

Writing
First of all, they have the advantage of having a fanbase that has people who are actually critical enough of RWBY to post critiques online about what has been done right and wrong in the writing. If they have any hope of improving the writing quality of RWBY, they should look at their past mistakes and how they could've done better, then apply that knowledge to the future writing of RWBY.

The Child-Friendliness
Second of all, if they really want to stick to the idea of RWBY being kid-friendly, they need to at least look at Disney. Disney movies have been able to show things that are a bit darker and more mature, characters actually being in real danger, mentions and threats of death, and even characters (usually villains, but hey) actually dying, and they're still considered children's movies. And for God's sake, don't be afraid to say "die." They said "killed" in Mulan!

Seriously, the subject of death is brought up multiple times in Mulan, and it's still considered a children's movie because, surprise, children can handle more than a lot of people think they can. When Mulan runs off wearing her father's armor, her mom says "She could be killed!" and her dad says "If I reveal her... she will be." They establish early on in the movie that she could get killed in the war, and if she's revealed as a woman, she definitely will be killed. When the soldiers arrive at the burned village, they see an entire field of corpses, albeit the corpses were mostly buried in snow. It's heavily implied that Shang's dad is dead, and he places a quick memorial for him. When Mulan is discovered as a woman, there's an entire scene about how the penalty is death, and the only reason she gets to live is because she saved Shang's life! There's a scene where it's pretty obvious that Shan-yu has his archer kill one of the Chinese soldiers he sends away to deliver a threatening message to the emperor! "How many men does it take to deliver a message?" "*Draws back arrow* Just one. *Screen goes black, sound of him firing the arrow*"

You can get away with stuff like this in RWBY, so 'DO. IT.'

We're not asking for them to turn this into Red vs Blue or have bloody massacres! We'll be fine with at least Disney-level violence because at least then, things actually feel tense and dangerous!

The Jokes
Somewhere along the way, I heard someone say that too many of the jokes in RWBY are simply references to things, and they were right. RWBY needs more of its jokes to be actual jokes, as in having a setup and a punchline. The "looks more like a puma" joke worked in Red vs Blue because it had an actual setup and a punchline. Talking about something looking more like a puma in RWBY is a nice reference to Red vs Blue, but it's not that good of a joke.

The Rest of the Dialogue
The dialogue has been good for the most part, but sometimes things get a little too exposition-y. A really good practice is to see if you can take a character's line and give it layers, multiple meanings. The layers can include And there are probably more layers that I can't think of at the moment.
 * The simple, literal meaning.
 * An info layer - Basically, telling us some world building, or a new fact, or how long ago something happened, etc. This layer has been inserted into dialogue a lot lately in RWBY, and it has been pretty nicely done.
 * An emotional layer - The emotions that a character has behind what they say, when they're not saying how they feel, can give the audience a look at who they are beneath the surface and add another feeling to the scene.
 * A foreshadowing layer - Whether the character knows something that's going to happen, the character is going to do something, or the character coincidentally mentions something that none of the characters know is going to be important later on or is actually going to happen.
 * A hidden past layer - Something from the character's past influenced them to say what they said in the way they said it, and once this something is revealed later on, it'll make much more sense.

Show, Don't Tell
RWBY has had such a big problem with "Show, Don't Tell," especially when it come to the Faunus. The only characters who have actually shown any sort of actual discrimination toward the Faunus are these three: No, Mercury and Emerald's interaction with and murder of Tukson doesn't count. Roman was supposed to kill Tukson, he got too busy and put it off, so they did the job and felt very proud that they pulled it off for Cinder-sama. Nothing against his species.
 * Cardin - Just like Jaune said, he's a jerk to everyone. The guy targeted Jaune and Pyrrha, and they're both human. ... As far as we know, anyway. Even if they're not fully Faunus, how would he know that?
 * Weiss - She gave a pretty good reason for being unable to trust Faunus and hating the White Fang. By the way, huge props for the argument between her and Blake actually not having one side be totally right and one be totally wrong. They both had their right and wrong points.
 * Roman - He's kind of a snarky ass to everyone.

It has become such a problem that some fans have actually started to speculate that the Faunus are exaggerating the discrimination they've faced or that they imagined it or something. This is what happens when you do too much telling and not enough showing.

So... a couple of ideas.

Utilize Background Characters
Show some background characters actually being discriminatory toward Faunus. So far, the most alive we've seen them be is their behavior at the end of No Brakes and the beginning of Breach. The rest of the time, they're mostly just zombies who don't seem to care who's around or what anyone's doing. Do something as little as have some background characters give Faunus dirty looks and even cross to the other side of the street if they see a Faunus walking toward them on the sidewalk. Maybe even have Blake and Sun walking around somewhere and show the contrast in reactions to Blake (who people think is human) and Sun (who is a Faunus).

Demonstrate What Has Been Said
One easy way to do it: Have a lot of Faunus live in the poor neighborhoods of Vale. This might sound kinda random and pointless, but let me explain.

It's harder for Faunus to get jobs, simply because they're Faunus. The places that do hire them pay the Faunus less than what they pay humans. A Faunus' only hope of decent pay is to take a dangerous job or become a huntsman/huntress. The Schnee Dust Company offers dangerous jobs with decent pay. After all, if an accident occurs in a mine or a factory, Mr. Schnee would rather a bunch of Faunus die, than a bunch of humans. He could also have the Faunus in the mines doing unethical hard labor. This would tie in to Blake having said that the Schnee Dust Company has "controversial labor forces" and Weiss saying that the company runs in a "moral gray area." This would also explain why the White Fang tends to hijack cargo from companies that use Faunus labor, as Blake said.

So, not only would that show Faunus being discirminated against and how the discrimination affects them, it would also explain things that have been said.

Dust
Can the show please, please, please start telling us what colors of Dust do what?! It's color coded for a reason!

We only know that green is wind because Haku told us and the green Dust crystal in World of Remnant: Dust was swirly shaped. We only know that red is fire, dark blue is ice, and yellow is lightning because those are the colors that Ruby sneezed on back in volume 1, resulting in a fiery explosion with ice and electricity.

But what about the other colors? White, purple, cyan, and... are there two different shades of orange, or just one? Because it looks an awful lot like there are two different shades of orange. Seriously, couldn't they have told us what all the colors do in World of Remnant: Dust? It was quite informational, especially for the fans who don't participate in obsessive in-depth speculation like many of us on the wikia. But a lot of the info could've been revealed in the show, similar to how Ironwood mentioned weaving Dust into clothing in a "Hey, by the way, you can do that, and it's an age-old technique" kind of way.

I'm sure they have figured out what each of the colors do, at least. Let me just throw some guesses out there: If I'm right about any of these, great, we figured some, or all, out. But we shouldn't have to meet up and discuss the evidence just to figure out what we think each color of Dust probably does! We need confirmation on this stuff! There are still people who aren't aware that red is fire, dark blue is ice, and yellow is lightning. There are still people arguing over whether dark blue or cyan is ice.
 * Bright orange, which Cinder uses, is lava. (Volume 1 Episode 1, her shot splattered to the ground when Glynda blocked it, as if it was liquid, not actual fire. Cinder used black glass swords; obsidian is black glass that's formed after volcanic eruptions.)
 * Cyan makes shields for some reason, like what Weiss and Neo did in volume 2.
 * Purple is darkness or something, like that one clone Blake made in No Brakes.
 * White is stone... for some reason.

Also, I'd like to know if Weiss makes the haste clock glyph by mixing yellow Dust with her Semblance or not. Based on Painting the Town, it sure seems that way, considering that the yellow streak she fired came from Myrtenaster.

World Building
The other complaint that fans had with World of Remnant was with Kingdoms. People kind of wanted a little more explanation on what the different kingdoms are like, not just some basic outline of basically what kingdoms are, the fact that they succeed because of natural barriers, a little note that they're run by councils, and then stuff we know already. There was more world building in that scene with Team RWBY playing Remnant: The Game.

I bet if Miles and Kerry sat down and really thought about it, they could come up with all kinds of interesting facts about the different kingdoms.

Hell, I've already made up some stuff just using Monty's colored terrain map and stuff that we've seen and heard in the episodes. Quite a while back, I overlayed that terrain map on the WoR: Kingdoms map to see generally where each kingdom is, though I doubt that each kingdom's city (or main city?) is exactly where the light is, considering Vale is on the west coast, not on that light. So, here's some stuff I came up with, as examples:

Location's Effect on Culture
Atlas is located in a snowy region. Their apparent fondness for the color white (1, 2) stems from the need to not stand out in the snow like a big "Come eat me" sign. Their cuisine has a lot of focus on warm foods and drinks, as well as anything they can make that could still plausibly be edible if exposed to freezing temperatures. Drinks have additives that help keep them from freezing solid when taken outside. The cold weather also explains Atlas' focus on machinery. Robots don't have to worry about frostbite while fighting the Grimm, and people don't have to worry about frostbite while piloting a mech.

Natural Barrier
Atlas is nestled against a snowy, icy mountain range.

Architecture
Architecture is focused on defending against both the Grimm and the cold. Common routes are sheltered from the cold weather to minimize exposure. Buildings have lots of insulation and very few windows, to keep in the heat. Roofs are commonly painted black to absorb heat and designed to resemble rocks so as not to draw too much attention from the Grimm.

Location's Effect on Culture
Due to being surrounded by so much water, their cuisine is quite focused on fish and shellfish, much more so than Vale's. Fishing is a common job and passtime, and most citizens enjoy swimming. Boats and ships are a Mistral specialty, as the best routes out of the kingdom are by water, due to the concentration of Grimm in the narrow strips of land to the north and south. This explains Yang's mention of a Mistral trade route while playing Remnant: The Game.

Natural Barrier
The best place for Mistral to be situated is actually approximately where its point of light is. In that position, they would only need to defend the north and south ends of their territory from Grimm on the ground.

Architecture
Their architecture has a lot of basis on withstanding floods and people being able to still travel while the kingdom is flooded, should such a disaster occur. Homes and other important buildings are raised up off the ground, and the foundations and walls are built to be as solid as possible. Buildings have roof access whether through doors or hatches.

Location's Effect on Culture
Vacuo's environment is very arid, due to its proximity to a desert, hence Sun describing it as "not a shirt and tie kind of place." Older Grimm come out at night, due to the open landscape making it difficult to be sneaky. Because night time is more dangerous than day time, Vacuo places importance on light and the Faunus' natural night vision. Due to the Faunus' usefulness, discrimination against them isn't quite as prominant in Vacuo as it is in the other three kingdoms, hence Sun's apparent lack of knowledge of the White Fang's history and their importance to most Faunus. At the center of Vacuo's main city is the citizens' water source and farmlands. Their cuisine revolves around water - fruits and vegetables that contain a lot of water are a staple of every meal, and soups and stews are common dinners during the cold nights.

Natural Barrier
Vacuo's natural barrier is a steep ridge of dry, rocky mountains and cliffs.

Architecture
Buildings have many, many windows that are often open during the day, to let air circulate through and make the heat a little more bearable indoors. Many homes also have specialized chimneys that can be opened, which aid in air flow to cool the house down. At night, windows and chimneys are closed, and thick curtains are drawn shut to block out the cold. Windows and doors are designed to minimize the amount of sand that gets in, especially during sandstorms.

Animation Limitations
It's possible that some limitations can be solved with a little creativity. For example, I have ideas that have some possibility of solving these two limitations RWBY has had:

Crying
Other than Ruby and Weiss' comedic waterfall tears, crying has been shown by having a character rub their eye.

Perhaps there's some way that the animators could use a texture to make it actually look like the character is crying, without the need of that gesture. For example, it turns out that, in the White Trailer, when Weiss starts bleeding, the streak of blood hasn't already reached her chin when we first see her bleeding. It is actually animated flowing down her cheek. It's just that it flows down so quickly, that you can hardly tell unless you slow the video down. If they can figure out how Monty did that, they could do that with a texture that looks like tears instead of blood, so the character gains a stream of tears on their face.

Eating
Oh, the dreaded disappearing cookies from volume 1.

It's quite possible this could easily be fixed by making multiple different models of a food that's meant to be eaten. Here are a couple of examples:

Taking a Bite
Let's use a slice of pizza as an example for this category. Create a model of a slice of pizza, texture it and all that jazz, and we'll call it Pizza Slice 1. Now, take Pizza Slice 1 and edit it so that the tip is missing, as if someone took a bite of it, adjust the texture as needed, and save it as an entirely new model named Pizza Slice 2. When animating a scene where a character eats a slice of pizza, first have the character hold Pizza Slice 1 and bite into the tip of it. Once they bite into it, switch Pizza Slice 1 out for Pizza Slice 2. As the character pulls Pizza Slice 2 away from their mouth, it looks as if they actually just took a bite.

Eating From a Bowl
Say our character is eating a bowl of chicken soup. Take the same basic concept from Taking a Bite and apply it to the spoon. We have a model of a spoon named Spoon, and when our character dips the spoon into the soup, Spoon is switched out for a model named Spoon Chicken Soup, which looks like it has chicken soup in it. The character puts Spoon Chicken Soup in their mouth, and when they pull it out, Spoon has been switched back into their hand.