User blog:Gundam Legilis/Heroes and Monsters In Depth

''fatmanfalling style satire. Not a personal attack.''

Welcome, to the review of the penultimate episode of Volume 3!

Before we start, I will give credit where credit is due for seriously raising the stakes.

SERIOUSLY, WHERE HAVE THEY BEEN ALL MY LIFE!?

First off, we start off with Ruby ... slicing a Griffon into pieces on an airship.

WAT.

I thought it was established that the Griffons were strong and dangerous enough to have two experienced Huntsmen, Beacon faculty, no less, to evacuate the entire horde of students that took down a Humongous Nevermore. I thought they were dangerous enough to shrug off Coco's minigun bullets, the same ones that shredded Giant Nevermores, and Death Stalkers.

But here they are, with one of them being quickly taken down with a few slashes.

What's the whole point, really, of evacuating them if they can be easily taken care of with a little time and effort?

Also, it's glad to see Neo use Snapchat to communicate something for the first time, and reveal her ways of disguising herself.

Next up, we have Ren and Nora moments. Though it would help if Ren was better framed to not stand around like an idiot.

Now that Velvet's weapon/Semblance is revealed, it's basically every weapon. Just goes to show how much Monty loved all his weapons. But what's with all this nonsense about not fitting in the box, or a camera being that complex to build, if they can just copy everybody else's weapons, especially in the digital age? Hell, if a weapon is this simple, there really should be little reason at all not to show it off in Bleach.

And how is it, that 3D printed replicas of weapons and a rope can take down Paladins, but not the real deal, made with steel? Even when Shirou Emiya and Gilgamesh replicated weapons, at least they were made with metal, not whatever that is. And they certainly never went against heavily armored mechs. Also, it would be more effective if she used replicas of Yatsuhashi's sword, or Neptune's trident, assuming Neptune and Nora are smart enough to go for close range, rather than pelt the thing with useless bullets. Coco, Nadir, and Reese, sure, but them?

But it is nice to see Paladins being tough to take down. Even frozen legs, or a hailstorm of bullets aren't enough to take them down. Hell, it takes the deactivation of the virus and the strongest moves to take them down. Good job at not portraying them like chumps. And the flow of the choreography when Velvet goes CQC on the Paladins.

Back on the ship, we see an smooth and impressive fight between Neo, Roman and Ruby, as the two use teamwork to put her on the ropes. Hell, I was intrigued when Roman exploited the explosive nature of his bullets to ricochet his cane and hit ruby, and hurling another projectile, lacrosse-style to intercept Ruby at top speed.

Also loving Roman's speech, alright, and the fact that Ruby takes out Neo with her parasol. And Roman's little rant hits pretty close to home, so that's an added bonus - if he would watch his surrounding environments and not be Hannibal Chowed by a Griffon. And how some of the missing Huntsmen in the show are justified by dying on the field.

That being said, how is it possible Ruby can effectively kick a Nevermore while using only Crescent Rose for gripping the side of the edge, or stomp an Alpha Griffon through the hull of an airship and cause it to come crashing down? Doesn't it contradict the hard-set rules that Ruby sucks when not using her weapon? These things are large, hard to beat Grimm, yet Ruby takes them both down with ease and with no weapons.

It's like they meant, "oh Ruby sucks without her weapon, except when she kicks stuff." For crying out loud, Ruby sucks at martial arts, period. This includes kicking!

Anyways, I doubt Roman and Neo are dead. We have yet to see Roman's Semblance, we barely scratched the surface of his backstory, and we have yet to see Neo's voice actress.

I knew Ironwood would be back. Look! He even has robo nips and robo abs (though it is somewhat reasonable). What's next, a robo-wang to go full Austin Powers on us? He kinda looks like I Robot's Detective Spooner though (replaced entire arm and lung from an accident with cybernetics).

As much as Qrow's scythe looks awesome, why would the flat end of the sword become the scythe edge, let alone possess a pop out inner edge, that would be hard to fit in? Shouldn't it be the other way around?

Now we get to Ozpin and the Maiden transfer. While I can forgive Jaune and Ozpin for momentarily being distracted by Pyrrha's scream, I cannot forgive the fact that they failed to hear Cinder coming down from the elevator. They're in a large, empty vault, a thing to keep things safe, and everyone can basically hear the sound of a person coming from an elevator. So what's their excuse for not listening to the elevator noise?

And I don't know whether or not it's symbolism, or if the lights are literally powered by the Maiden's life force.

We now get to Blake and Adam's fight. What I don't like is how one-dimensional and cheap Adam seems. Not to mention that it breaks the fact that their relationship was a mentor-student one, not a pseudo-romantic one that reeks of statutory laws (despite Adam's mythology being a harsh one by today's standards).

And as much as I liked the potential for character development for Yang, punishing her for charging in and subverting a possible attempt from Yang to land a beatdown, not to mention actually having the balls to raise the stakes and go out on a limb trying to cut one off (with an otherwise-useless melee weapon due to Aura, no less,), just how is it possible that a sword can bypass Aura and stab Blake in the gut, and then cut off Yang's arm, leaving a stump flowing yellow embers of what used to be her Aura (there was no Aura deactivation SFX)? And after absorbing two measly, deflectable pistol bullets, no less!?

I'm all for weapons landing some major damage, but this goes against established rules about Aura! I ... just how!?

And then we have Blake carrying Yang, one of the more fragile members carrying someone more heavy than her (granted she did lose her arm, but still), despite being wounded and using a substitution ninjutsu to trick Adam into thinking he decapitated her.

But hey, Adam's still badass for using a Batman Gambit to bait Yang into losing her arm - not to mention stopping an Unstoppable Rage powerhouse by intercepting her charge with a sword strike.

5 bucks says that Cinder becomes too arrogant and ignores the possibility that the kids (particularly Pyrrha and Jaune) will screw up her plans all because of Maiden powers, Aizen-style. Or dispatching Mercury and Emerald to deal with the two.

Can't wait for what happens next, especially for Cinder vs. Ozpin.

Thoughts?

-Gundam Legilis he Maiden transfer.