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Yeah that got pretty dark quickly. The pacing is still off though, there's a lacking sense of urgency which I think might be partially animation constraints. Whenever they have more than three people in a scene everything becomes so stilted, maybe they'll go back and redo things but seeing half the cast stand helplessly in front of a robot really takes away from the dynamism of RWBY at its best.

I don't think Ruby is going to wrap strings around anything after what happened to Penny.

 

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Ruby activates neo's umbrella, SO SMART!

I couldn't believe it when Roman got eaten, they wrote ruby into a corner and had to kill best character in the stupidest way possible to get out of it.

 

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Forgive me Monty for I have sinned.

I take back what I said last episode about RWBY only being good for fanfic. This is ramping up. It still has a few issues but overall it was very good.

@HazeOfMisery - A number of people on 4chan.org/co/ guessed Velvet's semblance (weapon?). I think you're right about Cinder working for someone else. My personal theory is it's Weiss' father trying to turn the White Fang into a real military threat to further disenfranchise faunus but that's not supported by anything.

@KaiDASH - I didn't mind Torchwick's death. Sometimes people die in stupid ways in the heat of battle.

I think (hope) Yang's maiming is a stepping stone towards anyone can die.

My only real issue is that everyone felt nerfed during the mech battle.

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Also, Qrow's scyth. Unlike Ruby's it feels very utilitarian yet at the same time complex.

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I like it.

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Yang was thoroughly dis-armed by that encounter.

 

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My pet theory is that Cinders backer is someone from one of the overthrown royal families.

 

Really liked the episode, felt intense

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No way is Roman dead. He was swallowed whole, without being bitten in two or chewed on or anything. We've seen that they aren't above gritty imagery, so it's not that. Besides, he had a full Aura and moments earlier talked about how he was forced to work for Cinder.

Pretty sure he's alive, is going to shoot himself out of the Grimm and has thus successfully faked his death. Not that this was planned, or anything, but I can see him seizing this chance. Neo already has proven that she can't be found unless she wants to be found. So, guessing this duo is going to be AWOL for a while.

I do like that he was targeted by Grimm though. Theory I've read on tumblr was talking about how, since Grimm are drawn to negative emotions, and how Roman was pretty intense at that moment, with worry over Neo and bitterness towards his own situation, that this made Grimm target him especially.

Hoping to see a cool arm replacement for Yang.

Not a fan of how Adam is portrayed, though. Never got this obsessive love vibe from him, always assumed he was more of an older brother figure who, while disappointed that Blake got away from the cause, didn't exactly have a raging revenge boner.

Loved Velvet's weapon/Semblance.

Overall, really loved the episode.

 

What the hell happened to Aura? Cos that really should've covered a certain person. Overall, this episode was way, way better, but at the same time, there were some issues.

The Ruby vs Neo+Torchwick fight was great, even if I felt it ended in a sort of bullshit way. Torchwick had better not be fucking dead because he and Neo are the most epic team ever. Seriously!

At the same time, the fight with the rest of the cast was really, really poorly done. Whenever one person was fighting, the rest just took a break and didn't do shit. If that's Velvet's semblance/weapon why on earth didn't she represent her team in the tournament? xD

Aaand finally we get to see Ozpin join the fray. This is going to be awesome.

 

Honestly, i think thats Adams thing. One concentrated attack.

Actually, someone on 4chan had a pretty interesting idea about that. Adam has a red blade that cut through her Aura like it was nothing.
However, thinking back in time a little, the time Yang and Neo fought. When Raven appeared, she pulled out her sword and set it in the Red mode as well. Neo looked super scared about that. Could that be some kind of an Aura piercer?

I think Velvet didn't use it for two reason:
1)It takes a long time to recharge or reuse
2)It was supposed to be their Trump Card in the Tournament.

The Nora/Ren scene was super weird. They both had reflexes of sloths. It was kind of silly.

The Ruby vs Roman fight was really odd. We've seen before that Ruby is pretty shit without the Crescent Rose. But suddenly (because of plot armor), she can kick huge Griffins into ships. What the hell?

 

Pretty intense episode, but double WTF for Roman and Neo. The umbrella thing I can understand, but Roman's little trip to Grimm stomach? Nah, they built him up far too much for a death like that. Also, Ruby got a hell of a heroic power up.

Pity Cardin didn't see Velvet's TRACE ON!. Unfortunately, group battles still are awkard, unlike when RWBY fought against Roman in giant bot. Now that was a good one.

I'll avoid the disarmed jokes, but for a moment I actually thought Adam had killed Yang. As vain as she is there'll be some angst over the arm, or perhaps not, hard to tell with her personality.

I was hoping Ozpin, Jaune and Pyrrha would team up against Cinder but it makes sense that they'd just get in the way. Well, at least next episode promises a really good fight.

Overall, much better than the last one.

 

Relevant: Unlimited Blade Works


Source: dishwasher1910

I'm most impressed by the speed. Did this in a day at most.

 

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The Yang thing was played really "safe." They've established multiple times that cybernetics are a thing (especially with Ironwood), so once the shock wears off it'll probably just be shrugged off. Penny might be a little more complicated, of course.

 

Nemrut, that's the first thing I thought.

Unlimited Blade Velvet.

I'm so happy.

 

I favour Unlimited Velvet Works, but yeah, think many people were reminded of that.

It was a great sequence (and I guess it was also cost efficient, since they get to reuse previous animation for it, so we might see stuff like that more often) and I loved every second of it.

Makes me curious as to what the limitations and all are. So, her weapon, the camera, stores pictures of people and their weapons and her Semblance can recreate them as hard light constructs and give her the fighting abilities of those people the weapons belong to. Or her camera also creates the hard light constructs and her Semblance is the access to their fighting styles.

Maybe she can only use a fighting style for a few seconds and then the photo is used up? Dunno, seems cool though.

 

Lot of stuff to love in this episode.

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Unlimited Velvet Works, freaking solo-ing two robots that took the entire group of them to fight previously.

Ruby vs Neo and Torchwick brought back some of the fantastic Monty-esque fight choreography I've barely seen at all this season.

Yang losing her arm to Adam.

Stuff going Fubar with Pyrrah (but when, we could always see that coming).

Ironwood kicking ass.

Qrow's cool sword is actually a fucking epic scythe.

What I didn't like though was

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While it was spot on with a lot of the other scenes, the group fight against the two mechs was really poorly put together. It seems like something of a major running issue this season - inability to do fights that involve multiple characters. They seem to completely to maintain tension, involve awkward stops, starts and fight dialogue with scenes of one person fighting and everyone else standing around and watching. The music should have abruptly cut the moment Velvet got hit too - felt weird that it continued going.

Didn't like Adam either. As other people have said, he always seemed the older brother type than the obsessive lover. Plus I've always preferred characterisations where he comes across as somewhat understandable rather than just psycho hateful.

Perhaps it was due to Adam's character, but Blake and Adam's meeting felt pretty emotionally anticlimatic to me. It wasn't the emotional conflicting meeting I was hoping Blake would go through. Adam is too clearly a villain for the audience to feel that from her.

Really hope Torchwick is still around. Him and Neo are too good to lose.

Overall fantastic episode. Intense, with almost every scene pretty damn plot dense.

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Rooting for either Raven or Summer being "her". Happy Cinder isn't big bad - she wasn't nearly epic enough.

 

Is Neo loyal to Torchwick or is she loyal to his employer? I think it's been mentioned somewhere.

 

Any speculation on Ozpin's Semblance?

I've always thought it's something time based myself. Either way, looks like we may see it in the next episode.

 

I do think it's time based but doubt it's something like that. I could imagine it being like Kiritsugi Emiya from Fate, where he can speed himself up. Or he can temporarily freeze time for a short window and do some stuff then.

Kinda doubt it's Jaune being able to time loop.

Although, could be cool if some semblances are one use only or have very specific functions that are only useful in certain conditions. I mean, neither Ironwood, nor Roman used theirs at all so far.

 

In other words, the entire RWBY story is Jaune being stuck in a timeloop. He doesn't remember the future so the Vytal festival happens every time. Thus, he sends himself back in time constantly. Being Jaune is suffering.

 

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Watched the latest episode. 10/10. 10 fucking 10.

I called this so hard. Arkos is completely sunk. Pyrrha dead.

Looks like next season will be team Ruby/Jaune/Ren/Nora. My true OTP is coming true.

I knew Blake would run away as well. Thats all she does really. She always runs away from her problems.

The Pyrrha/Cinder fight was great. Honestly, if Cinder didn't have her bullshit Maiden powers, Pyrrha would have defeated her so hard. Its amazing how far ahead Pyrhha is compared to the rest of the teams.

Ozpin has disappeared. I don't think he was captured or anything. Does Ozpin also have a shielding Semblance?

 

Fuck everything.