Thursday, September 19, 2013

RWBY: Ep 10: The Badge and the Burden part 2

Two apologies, missed a week due to nefarious schemes of distracting me over the weekend and I seem to be unable to get stills tonight.  Sigh.

To sum up however, mostly in episode 9 we see the girls get uniforms (although Ruby still has her hood) and an actual class get into motion where Weiss seems to be on slow uptick to exploding.

This episode picks up after Weiss has volunteered to help Prof Port demonstrate potential Huntress skills against a Grimm.  It looks a great deal like a wild boar with 4 eyes and a serious attitude problem but unlike the last few we have seen it is almost completely armored.

Monty and crew do a good job of here of showing that while Weiss has some skill, her agitated state shows in lack luster precision and often twitches and head bobs as Ruby attempts to cheer her on.  Yang and Blake make the obligatory actual cheerleader joke but this episode actually addresses a nice character point.

Weiss snaps at Ruby as the battle goes against her because of her distractions, while Port heartily cheers the whole thing on, even when it is going badly!  Finally Weiss gets her stride and uses her Dust skills to smash the Grimm in the belly with her rapier.

Time is up and while even Jaune thinks something is up with Weiss and Ruby, it is a surprising twist that is used this time around.  Weiss, as expected with her character thus far, feels Ruby has been given her role as leader unfairly.

She of course expects someone with the work and studying behind them to have been leader, meaning Weiss herself of course.  Ruby does gets crestfallen but both girls appeal the situation to higher authorities.

Weiss finds Port on a balcony and compliments the class and experience she had.  The teacher notices she is a little off kilter and asks her to unload.  When she declares she should have been team lead instead of Ruby, Port almost promptly says "Absolutely not!"

This surprised me as I could see them going with a teacher's pet route, but instead things take a rather deeper turn.

At the same time Ruby is timidly confronting Ozbin if he has made a mistake in putting her in charge.  The head of Beacon does not deny at all that is a fallible man and with a long history of mistakes behind him, but does not count making Ruby a leader one as yet.

I have to give credit to Miles and Kerry with Monty no doubt as well here.  Ozbin makes a very eloquent explanation of what a leader can become and what is expected of one in Ruby's situation.  It actually is something I would love to see quoted more often in reality as well to be honest.

Meanwhile, Weiss is shocked at the flat denial from Port who explains that Ozbin has never lead him wrong and he trusts the headmaster implicitly.  He also offers the clear opinion that Weiss, while good in combat, is far too used to getting her own way no matter what.  He counters her expectations with the idea that rather than lament what is reality, to become the best she can with what is reality.

What started as a team difficulty seems to have become 2 challenges to half our MC title characters.  Ruby has to learn to become a leader that others will follow because of what she can offer a team, and Weiss needs to learn to accept the challenges of a life where she will most definitely not always get her way.

I give full compliments that the flow of character dynamic was well done this time around, episode 9 felt a bit rushed and more showy to me than anything else, but as a build up to this episode it does a nice contrast.

I promise next time I will track down photos guys.  Been a rough week of personal time on my end.

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