User blog:Zolnir/RWBY Episode 3 Short Speculations

This blog post would attempt to make a slightly more in-depth analysis on the strange behavior of Professor Ozpin, when he spoke on stage.

Currently, there are various theories out there that tried to describe his behavior, and they basically could be summarized into these two groups:

1) Something is wrong with Professor Ozpin.

2) Professor Ozpin simply displays a different self in public as Headmaster of Beacon Academy.

Since I've already addressed Number 2 already, this time I'll attempt to translate his actions by the Number 1 method. Below are my speculations, and while they're slightly different they both share the same belief: At the time, Professor Ozpin was not present on stage. He, or it, was something else.

There are proof to this theory. First, as you would've already noticed, his speech behavior was completely different than before. The Ozpin on stage sounded dispassionate, eerie, and as Ruby said, it's as if he wasn't even there. This was in complete contrast with the Ozpin Ruby knew.

The second proof would be his movements. Notice that when Ozpin walked away from stage it looked rather mechanical, slow and acted as if he was an old man or something. This did not make sense because we clearly saw Ozpin holding a plate of cookie and a cup of coffee in both hands when he first met Ruby, and at that time he had moved with ease and without problems. This suggests that the Ozpin on stage may very well be someone, or even something else.

The final proof is rather simple, and I believe many of you should've noticed it already: The Ozpin on stage had a walking cane. We obviously knew from Episode 1 that he didn't need it at all, and yet this Episode 3 Ozpin not only uses it, but also seemed to be relying heavily on it to walk properly. All the signs suggested that the two Ozpins are different people, that the real Professor Ozpin had business somewhere else and hence could not attend the ceremony.

As to the nature of this 'other' Professor Ozpin, below are two very simple guesses:

1) He was another teacher in disguise. If this is true, he's likely to be quite old judging from his cynical tone and aged movements.

2) One could also interpret his movements and speech as being mechanical. It's possible that this Professor Ozpin was actually a kind of Dust-animated Puppet used primarily to imitate a human being. I could speculate a number of strong reasons why Ozpin and Glynda would choose to do this, but currently I cannot form a basis for any of them.

Aaaaaaaaaaand that's it.