Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-174.93.53.97-20130826071537/@comment-226878-20130911003009

Sadly, if you toss around the word magic to explain everything, it actually detracts heavily from the awesome-factor of any work of fiction. If magic can do anything then why is there a plot involving evil creatures, maleficent organizations, and high-tech weaponry. It should just be happy world of rainbows and sunshine with no troubles on the golden horizon. You can't ignore certain unrealistic properties just because it looks cool.

It's like I argued once in the case of making a novel out of Mario Bros.: You don't need to explain anything because there has never been an attempt made to explain anything.

Once you explain even a single factor as to how a world works, then you suddenly have to explain everything. We know two things about the world of RWBY: Grim have existed nearly as long as men. Dust makes everything work. Aura allows people to use dust. These facts aren't magical phrases that make everything coherent, they simply are the keys to a puzzle-box of deeper questions. How does dust make things work? What is its function? What are its limitations? How does Aura interact with Dust? Where exactly did man first encounter the substance and how did they learn how it could be used? How/why do the colors of Dust correspond to elemental spells? Is Dust lethal to humans or only to the Grim?