Board Thread:Speculation House/@comment-14138255-20140801004849/@comment-14909251-20140802010455

Here are my thoughts broadly on Weiss from this episode:

1. She clearly was not into the card game. This was probably her being dragged into it and relenting. In no way is it new or a sign of some "progress" people think she needs to make as we have seen Weiss object to other projects of the team only to go along with it. We even saw it in the Emerald Forest where she was somehow persuaded by Ruby to ride a giant murderous raven. I doubt she was into the food fight either, despite having been hit with a pie. She probably fake died as a way of bowing out with minimal confrontation.

2. Weiss is very easily floored by the confident direct approach from a guy. I imagine Sun could make her knees quiver with a similar effort and it may even be more successful since it would throw her off balance for him to take an interest in her. It did not work with Jaune because, let's face it, he was a dork about it. That is partly because Jaune is not really that kind of guy. He did so well with Ruby by being a nice guy. Were Jaune to be himself with Weiss a little more it would work out better for him. That said, her subdued reaction to his efforts probably signals that he is pretty close to breaking her with his determination alone.

3. For various reasons I expect any ship with Neptune will be short-lived. Neptune is clearly a ladies man who would have no trouble getting a girl, but that also means he is liable to hit on other girls and that would be annoying to most girls. His personality exudes vanity and that is not likely to be something Weiss goes along with for long either. Despite all the talk of her being arrogant, she's really just a know-it-all and that is mostly because she is incredibly smart. Someone who is in love with himself is not going to be of interest to Weiss for long.

4. The chair routine was silly, but it also served a purpose. Yang and Ruby are meddlers, who love to meddle with other people's affairs. Weiss wants to help people, but she is also leery of getting involved. Doing some bizarre ostentatious display is how Weiss eases the emotional burden of actually probing into someone's personal feelings. You can sort of hear the awkwardness in her question to Blake to tell you this is Weiss putting herself out of her element.

5. She mentioned Blake "fighting for freedom" in reference to her time in the White Fang. While the context might make it seem sarcastic, the other things were not sarcastic so I think this probably indicates sympathy to the Faunus generally. As I understand things, it has only been like two weeks since Black and White. I take that as confirmation that her previous attitude was not as hard-edged as it was perceived. Weiss never condemned the Faunus in general, but stated that she found it difficult to trust them. Her history with the White Fang made that inevitable, but it did not somehow mean that she was not sympathetic to their overall plight. People can have issues trusting other races, but still support them having civil rights and equality.

Overall, I see no real "change" in her character as this is all pretty much what I expect from her.