Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-101.160.173.208-20130420133315/@comment-4010415-20160217043243

ChishioKunrin wrote: We were told by the RWBY crew a long time ago that:


 * Ruby = Little Red Riding Hood


 * Weiss = Snow White


 * Blake = Belle from Beauty and the Beast


 * Yang = Goldilocks

So, those are confirmed. Long confirmed. Miles even said in the volume 1 directors commentary that they tried to surround Blake with as many Belle things as they could early on in volume 1 - books and a candelabra. It has been said by people on the crew that Monty had a habit of calling the RWBY characters the names of the characters they allude to, rather than their actual in-show names, and he called Yang "Goldilocks" a lot.

Also, I'm pretty sure they do not have the characters based on more than one character. However, they can have the character's appearance based on someone else. For example, Neptune is based on Neptune/Poseidon, the king of the sea, but his appearance (as in, the way he looks) is based on TOP, a K-Pop star.

Here, I'll just make a list of the characters whose allusions we know:


 * Ruby = Little Red Riding Hood (We were told by the crew; she has a red hooded cape, she fought wolves (Beowolves) in the Red Trailer)


 * Weiss = Snow White (We were told by the crew; her name is literally German for White Snow, Monty said the pendant on her necklace is an apple, the song Mirror Mirror in the White Trailer makes reference to Snow White a lot, ads for the Schnee Dust Company on the backs of magazines say "The finest of them all," etc and so forth.)


 * Blake = Belle, from Beauty and the Beast (We were told by the crew; Belladonna - Bell(e)adonna, like I said Miles said they tried to surround her with Belle things early in volume 1, she loves books, she hung out with a man who became "a monster" (Adam. She said he became a monster. Figuratively, but still).)


 * Yang = Goldilocks (We were told by the crew; she has long messy golden hair; in the Yellow Trailer, she walked into a nightclub owned by Junior (Hei Xiong, his real name, means Black Bear in Chinese. He's pretty much the baby bear), beat up a DJ who was wearing a bear mask, and fought Junior; the first Grimm she ever fought in the show were Ursai, which are bear-type Grimm.)

JNPR ~ Like it was said earlier in this thread, their theme is people who cross-dressed in their tale.


 * Jaune = Joan of Arc (Jaune Arc - Joan of Arc, pretty easy.)


 * Nora = Thor (Her symbol is a hammer with lightning through it, she wields a hammer, her name is pretty Nordic; Thor dressed as a woman to steal back Mjolnir.)


 * Pyrrha = Achilles (Her nickname is "The Invincible Girl" and Achilles was an invincible warrior (except on his heel, but whatever); Achilles dressed as a red-haired woman named Pyrrha.)


 * Ren = Mulan (His name is Chinese, his symbol is a lotus, blablablah.)


 * Cardin = Henry Beaufort, the Cardinal of Winchester, the guy who was set in charge of burning Joan of Arc (Cardin(al of) Winchester; he bullied Jaune; his scroll ID is 1374 Beaufort)


 * Velvet = The stuffed rabbit from The Velveteen Rabbit (She's a rabbit Faunus; her name is Velvet Scarlatina - In the story The Velveteen Rabbit, the kid who owned the stuffed rabbit came down with scarlet fever, which is also called scarlatina.)


 * Ozpin = The wizard of Oz (Pretty obvious. The initials of Oz's full name spells OZPINHEAD)


 * Glynda = Glinda the Good Witch from Wizard of Oz (Also obvious. Glynda Goodwitch - Glinda the Good Witch. She works with Ozpin; her Semblance is telekinesis, which is pretty witch-like.)


 * Professor Port = Peter, from Peter and the Wolf (His name is Peter Port, and he told the students a tale of the time he caught a Beowolf and saved his village and such.)


 * Dr. Oobleck = Bartholomew, from the Dr. Seuss book Bartholomew and the Oobleck (His name is Bartholomew Oobleck. What else do you need?)


 * Sun = Sun Wukong, from the ancient Chinese novel Journey to the West (His name is literally Sun Wukong. Also, he's a monkey Faunus who fights with a staff, and his Semblance is clones. The original Sun Wukong was the monkey king, who fought with a staff and could create clones from his hair. Also, the original Sun had the ability to see through disguises, and RWBY Sun saw through Blake's disguise.)


 * Sage = Aesop (Monty said so.)


 * Neptune = Neptune/Poseidon of Roman/Greek myth, king of the sea (His name is literally Neptune. Vasilias, his last name, is a variant of the Greek word Basileus, meaning "leader, prince, king, or emperor" and like I said Neptune is the king of the sea. His weapon turns into a trident, and his symbol, which is on the tongues of his shoes, is a trident. The original Neptune's weapon is a trident.)


 * Cinder = Cinderella (Cinderella; she wears glass shoes with her usual outfit (you can hear them clinking in episode 1); she fights with glass swords (Ruby called them glass. They're obsidian, which is black volcanic glass); she uses some kind of fiery Dust (most likely lava, which explains how she used that orange Dust in her clothes to make obsidian swords); Miles and Kerry made a joke toward her voice actress in a video once, calling her Cinder Ella (Spanish word pronounced eya), and to point out the fact that they were saying the Spanish word, she said "You two are so Spanish.")


 * Roman Torchwick = Romeo Lampwick/Candlewick, from Pinocchio (His name is strikingly similar; while his appearance is influenced by the guy from Clockwork Orange, his appearance is also similar to Lampwick's appearance in Disney's Pinocchio movie.)


 * Mercury = Mercury/Hermes of Roman/Greek myth (His name is literally Mercury; his symbol is a shoe with a wing on it, and Mercury/Hermes wore shoes with wings on them.)


 * Junior (Hei Xiong) = The baby bear from Goldilocks (His real name, Hei Xiong, is Chinese for Black Bear, and his nickname is Junior.)


 * Adam = Most likely the beast, from Beauty and the Beast


 * Ironwood = Most likely the Tin Man from The Wizard of Oz

And now we know that
 * Penny = Pinocchio (Her name sounds similar; she's a living robot, similar to how Pinocchio was a living puppet; she said to Ruby "I'm not a real girl," similar to how Pinocchio said he wanted to be "a real boy.")


 * Scarlet = Peter Pan from the sequel novel Peter Pan in Scarlet, where Peter Pan becomes the new Captain Hook. The crew said that Scarlet's last name being David is a reference to the Peter Pan author's brother being named David.

But yeah, the characters allude to classic stories, not just fairy tales. And I'm gonna lock up this thread, since the discussion has long been concluded.