Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-32342952-20180124211446

Copied and pasted from my Reddit page

I’ve looked at Weiss’s character a bit and I think I understand her. In fact, she may be just like me.

Her goal was to become the best Huntress with a reputation as a hero like her grandpa so that she could restore her family’s honor and help the people her father had hurt. However, while she really wanted to help people, her attitude was a combination of three things.

One: Pain. Besides watching people she loved being killed by the White Fang, Weiss has suffered. From the time she was ten, everyone that Weiss ever knew either pretended to be interested her just so they could gain access to her family’s wealth or ended up abusing her like her father did. The isolation that Jacques forced on Weiss kept her from making real friends and only met those who exploited her and then tossed her aside when they got what they wanted. At some point after Winter, her older sister and the only person who really loved her, left, Weiss came to a conclusion: if no one was coming to help her, she would have to do it herself and live only for herself. She put up a wall and and acted arrogant to drive away anyone willing to put up with her.

Two: Perfection and ambition. Because of her father’s controlling nature, Winter telling her to be better if she wants to leave and also the fact that she looked up so much to her grandfather, Weiss believed becoming a Huntress and redeeming her family meant being the best at everything. Her wanting to be a leader of Team RWBY showed how huge her ambition was. She was not afraid to use people to further her goal, as evidenced when she planned to partner up with Pyrrha so she could be noticed by the academy. Her perfectionist views on being a Huntress is a clear sign of low self-esteem, due to Winter’s training methods and disapproval from her father, her brother and her false friends.

Three: Fear and distrust. Weiss keeping her heart frozen and interacting as little as possible with anyone was because she believed that they would make fun of her or were only after the perks of her family name, just like those who pretended to be her friends. Then she meets Ruby, the energetic girl who nearly caused her to explode and who really wanted to be her friend, but Weiss, not int used to having a real friend, as well as Ruby being the cause of the accident that nearly killed them both, kept from interacting further. Because she distanced herself from Ruby, Weiss didn’t get to know her and thus saw Ruby as childish, impulsive and immature and not worth her time. In the end, Weiss admitted that she was difficult to get along with and told Ruby that she was doing okay as she was now, understanding deep down that Ruby was trying to impress her because she wanted to be her friend. But her reacting the way she did when Ruby was made leader was not only because she was angry that the goal she had been working so hard for was given to someone else instead but also because she was confused that even after all that dedication she was passed over and thus made her feel like Beacon saw her as not good enough, just like back home. Her anger then led her believe that Ruby was too immature for the role.

Professor Port’s advice on being the best person she could be was exactly what Weiss needed: she realized that Ruby was the only real friend that she had. If Weiss kept repaying the girl’s kindness by putting her down, Ruby would hate her and Weiss would have to grow up more alone. Then when the day came that she would finally become a great Huntress and save her family’s legacy, she would look round and see that everyone respects her, but nobody loves her or wants to know her. And then as she is finally overwhelmed by the soul-crushing sorrow from living inside the walls that she kept around her fragile heart, her last thought before she committed suicide would be:

“I am the loneliest person in the world.”

Telling Ruby that she wanted bunk beds as a kid was the first time she came out of her shell, and I wouldn’t be surprised that she went somewhere to cry because holding in that sadness for so long can break anyone.

Fast forward to Volume 4 and Winter helps her let go of her constant need to be perfect to restore their family’s honor and advises her to leave and carve out her own future. Volume 5 rolls around and she’s already told Yang about her family issues.

I may have been lucky enough to have parents and a brother who love me, but I’ve had Weiss’s experiences with low self-esteem and people pretending to love her enough to know that all she needed was people who really cared.

Anyone agree with me? 