User blog:Zathronas/Speculative author: Volume 2 and episode 12, general thoughts

Hello and welcome to the 14th blog of speculative author.

Once again, I will not make any speculation in this blog as my crusade to analyze and speculate the pants off RWBY will begin next week (Nov 4th) So instead, I think I'll give you my impression of episode 12 and volume 2 in General.

Episode 12

Overall, I liked it. We get the whole cast and then some for a farewell tour. The fight was interesting as usual but again, very unequal. We get a few additional questions to ponder until volume 3 and get some question answered about characters we've barely seen before. From what I read here on the Wiki, I believe those who felt underwhelmed by the episode expected too much from it. A cataclysmic destruction of Vale was not in the cards because frankly, it's way too soon in the story. Our protagonist are too young an inexperienced, as are we with the world of Remnant. Once we get comfortable with the way thing are in this world, then it will be the time to shake things up.

Unfortunately, there are some big problems with the episode nonetheless. As is often the case since the gang fought the Nevermore in volume 1. The Grimm seemed a pushover, I agree that there was a lot of fighters there to render a whoop-ass but some of those fighter seemed ridiculously strong. Coco and Glynda especially. When you have a woman so powerful, that she doesn't even glance at the Grimm while destroying them as if they were more of a nuisance like a fly instead of the greatest threat to mankind.

Few plots have been resolved but I'll get more into that while talking about volume 2. As for if it holds up as a volume finale... Yes and No. I felt there is too much distinction between fights scene and plot progression, but again it was the same for most of volume 2. So let get directly into it.

Volume 2

So does volume 2 hold up? Is it better than volume 1? On several aspect, yes but not all of them so let`s do them by category.

Characters

By the end of volume 1, I felt they introduced too many characters too fast to be able to do them justice in the next volume.

I was right.

But they did give it a hell of a try. Yang, Weiss, Pyrrha, Penny, Jaune, Cinder, Roman and Oobleck got the real development in this volume. I'm not saying they were the only one's, just that the rest was minimal or inconsequential by the end of the volume. I could even say that some of our main heroes had no development whatsoever. Especially Nora and Ren. The romance story and the Ball plot seemed forced and grind the story to a halt right in the middle of the volume just so we could establish some romance with some of the characters. The only thing it did right was Jaune's progression.

We also got a new wave of characters that will once again remove time to develop already established characters. Some seem important to the plot like Raven, Mercury and Emerald (yes, we saw them in volume 1 but they were really introduced in volume 2). Others serve no purpose at the moment even if they are cool. I'm looking at you Neopolitan. And before you all froth at the mouth, Yes she's a great character but tell me that Mercury or Emerald couldn't have done her role in volume 2. I'm just saying that maybe she could have been introduced later. We'll have to see.

Story

Hit and miss. As I said in my volume 2 recap, This was Cinder's volume and her schemes was the main plot. The biggest problem with the story comes from it's pacing and that results from the many fights in the volume. I'm not saying the fight weren't good, most of them were great! But except from a few notable exceptions, there seem to be a separation between the fight scenes and the plot scenes instead of integrating them together, Volume 1 had the same problem. The two exception are the CCT fight and most notably, the underground train.

Think about the Paladin fight. Yeah, it was cool and we learned Yang's semblance, saw RWBY's teamwork and glimpsed at Neopolitan for the first time but what did it serve in the plot? As an example on how it could have served the plot, we could have seen Ironwood and some Knights come and wonder how the White Fang got their hands on a Paladin or a various of other plot points could have been slipped in the fight thus progressing the story.

Most of the fights are there to showcase Monty's ability to make great fights scenes and that's okay but I wish he could further the plot at the same time. At an average of 15 minutes per episode, time is precious in RWBY.

World of Remnant

RWBY introduced us to World of Remnant in this volume. It was Monty and the writer's way to give exposition they cannot put in the show. Monty stated that he received the idea from Attack on Titan. I like the show because it gives us much needed answers but I do feel it's a copout. Instead of establishing the world they made properly, in the story, we get infomercial explaining it. Again, that's symptomatic of poor pacing in the actual show.

Graphic

Much better than Volume 1, there are still some issues. Although nothing jarred me out of the episodes. The sequence of Cinder running on the rooftop could have been done better but that's really minor. My biggest problem is with the age of the characters. It's pretty much impossible to assess the age of most adult characters in the show just by looking at them. I know that Monty has figured out how to age character in the last few months so I'm hoping for an improvement on that account in volume 3.

Music

The music for volume 2 was a couple of notches below volume 1 but that was to be expected as Volume 1 soundtracks was the best music out there, be it movie, TV or other webcast. It was so good that I put it on par with John Williams score for Star Wars. It's THAT good so it was inevitable that they couldn't maintain the same standard for volume 2.

That being said, the music was still very good and I have to give it to Jeff and Casey Lee Williams. If it weren't for them, the series would be half as enjoyable as it is. Magnificent work!

Final Thoughts

I know it seems I've been dumping on the show but this is far from the truth. RWBY is a great show with interesting plots and characters. I think you all know how much I like it or I wouldn't be doing this blog. But it isn't perfect either and it can be better. I feel that everyone involved on the show are growing while creating it and I expect RWBY to become even better in the coming years.

Still, it's a great show and I would like to thank everyone involved with it. Keep up the good work and I'll keep watching and analyzing.

Next week, We start the Hiatus program with 2 analysis and 2 speculation. Ruby Rose and Weiss Schnee.