RWBY V6 C12

## Plot

First of all, I'd like to think that not only does the title of the episode refer to the idiom of the same name, but also Ruby because of her color scheme, Adam because of the saying about bulls, blood, and the Creatures of Grimm. You'll see why later. The airship is still flying around and avoiding blasts from Cordovin's mech. The military personnel in Argus are watching the battle, and don't notice a red dot on their radar heading straight for them. Oscar is still concerned about Ruby, who is still on the cliffside. Luckily, she's able to climb back up with her scythe. Jaune and Nora are back on their feet, and Oscar finally tells them about the weakness he noticed earlier. The cylinder on the cannon arm rotates and locks in a giant dust cartridge every time Cordo changes attack styles. Her missile launcher pops out though. With the shields down, one well placed shot can detonate the missiles while they're still in the launcher, which could destroy the entire cannon. Ruby gets in the airship to try and make the shot. Caroline notices a call from the base, but before she can answer it, Maria taunts her into bringing out her missile launcher. However, she notices Ruby, realizes what they're trying to do, and puts it away again at the last second. She fires a blast of electricity at them, which affects Maria's eyes. Oscar is forced to take control, and they crash land in the forest. Luckily, they're all still alive and the ship is in one piece. Ruby starts walking towards the mech, but Qrow tells her to stop. She says he needs to trust her. Like in volume 4 though, I don't think it's about trust, but about her safety. She tells Caroline that they're going to Atlas no matter what, and points out that they're supposed to be on the same side. She gives her one last chance to hear them out, but Cordo refuses, and prepares to fire at her from point blank range. In a move that shocks everyone though, including Cordovin, Ruby goes inside the cannon while it's preparing to fire. She shoots the raw dust, which combusts, and gets out with her Semblance. The arm cannon is weighed down by all of the ice and earth dust. Ruby's Aura is depleted, and she's unconscious. Weiss uses some gravity glyphs to slow her fall, which exhausts her, and Qrow catches Ruby, who wakes up. Maria's eyes are back, and the airship still works. Back at the fight most of the stupid audience really cares about, Adam points out that Blake didn't think she could beat him two on one at Haven. She says she doesn't have a choice now. She has people that actually care about her, and she promised she'd never leave them again, so she's not dying now. Adam tells Yang that she promised him that she'd never leave his side. Yang asks him if she made that promise to him, or the person he was pretending or used to be. He assumes he just wasn't good enough for her, but she says it's so much more than that. They resume their fight, with Blake and Yang using teamwork to their advantage. However, Blake's Aura is depleted, and she almost falls off a cliff. Yang freezes up for a moment when Adam asks her if she thinks she's faster than she was at Beacon. They continue to fight, with Adam using his Semblance more and more, and getting angrier and angrier. Because of this though, he fails to notice Blake climbing up the cliff, which Yang sees. Her eyes turn red, and she uses her Semblance for the first time since Beacon. It's our first time seeing it in the Maya engine, and I think it looks amazing. She takes Adam's sword and punches him, which depletes his Aura. She says she may not be faster, but she's smarter. Her Aura is depleted as well, and she tosses his sword over the cliff. When he tries to reach for it, Blake uppercuts him. They race for the broken hilt of Gambol Shroud. Blake gets to it first, and Yang grabs the other half. They simultaneously stab Adam through the chest and back. He stumbles to the edge of the cliff and falls into the water, hitting some rocks and losing his shotgun sheath as he does so. Blake collapses and starts crying. This was my favorite part of the episode, because for some reason I love seeing my favorite characters angst. I think that she's either crying in relief because it's finally over and Adam is dead, horror at having taken a life, or a mix of sadness and horror at having specifically taken Adam's life, since regardless of what became of him, the two used to be close. Or because of Adam's comment earlier about her breaking her promise to him, and worry that Yang thinks the same thing, but I don't like that interpretation because it seems shallow. They hug each other, and she says she's not going to break her promise, and Yang assures her that she knows she won't. Cordovin says that the kids will never get to Atlas, and tells the other forces at the Argus base to converge on her position. However, they reveal that Argus is in danger from a Leviathan Grimm that started approaching during their battle. As well as a whole fleet of Sphinx and Manticore Grimm. And Ruby just disabled their best chance at killing them all. Oops.

## Review

Okay, I'm a young, white, middle class woman living in the year 2020, so… yeah, the writers and other crew members of the show don't really know how to write or portray oppressors or the original aggressors, or organizations like Black Lives Matter or the Black Panther Party at all. At the time, there were only four writers, and two of them were people of color, but that doesn't automatically make them experts on this stuff either. And the two writers before this were two white guys who have obviously never experienced oppression or racism or colorism firsthand due to their skin color. And I'm guilty of that too. From his first appearance in the Black trailer, I only ever saw Adam as an abuser and a terrorist, and the White Fang in general as terrorists, not as a character or organization that the writers didn't know how to write sympathetically that people of color would identify with, and then have negative ideas about themselves reinforced when he died. Or Professor Leonardo Lionheart, or High Leader Sienna Khan, or Fennec Albain, or Corsac Albain being arrested, etc. Or that POC characters in general don't have voice actors matching their characters, or are rare and stereotyped, etc. I think it's sort of like my complicated feelings about Varian and Cass as antagonists on Tangled: The Series. I felt bad for Varian because he has a sympathetic motivation for doing what he did. Cass, on the other hand, has a sympathetic backstory, but not a sympathetic motivation. I'm not even entirely sure what her motivation is. You don't want to be in Rapunzel's shadow anymore and want to find your own destiny? Okay, then why are you listening to a creepy ghost child about what your new destiny is and what you should do? As in, go to Corona, where Rapunzel is, and take the sundrop from her… why? Why does Cass even want ultimate power? *Does* she even want ultimate power? It's obvious that Varian's big character flaws in late season 1 were his inability to trust Rapunzel after she couldn't help him right away, or at all, and admittedly she and the rest of Corona does share some of the blame for that; and his inability to realize that he is ultimately to blame for what happened to his dad, which is something he recognizes by the time we see him again during season 3. I think Cass's biggest character flaw is her waiting. She's not demonstrating patience, she's being… passive, or inactive, I guess? Which isn't the kind of thing you'd expect to see from a character like Cass, especially since she's a main character, but whatever. At the end of season 2 and for most of season 3, she's tired of waiting and actually takes action towards realizing her destiny, but it's not what she really wants. She doesn't know what she wants, so she's just wandering aimlessly and blindly trusting what's shown and said to her by a creepy ghost girl in a house that she knows is suspicious. Probably because Zhan Tiri was the first person to show an interest in her and "helping" her instead of Rapunzel. Don't get me wrong, I still love Cass, I just find both her face turn and her heel face turn to be incredibly forced and rushed. Slightly off topic, I also have complicated feelings about the main cast of the Netflix show *The New Legends of Monkey*, which is loosely based on the 1980s show *Monkey Magic*, which was also about Sun Wukong from the classic Chinese novel *Journey to the West*. Anyways, only one member of the main cast, Chai Hansen, who plays the Monkey King, is half-Asian, specifically Thai, not even Chinese or Japanese, where the original story is very popular. The actors of Tripitaka and Pigsy are of Tongan heritage, which is a Polynesian country in Oceania. The show is filmed in New Zealand, and from what I can tell, casts mostly New Zealand actors. They even have *Rachel House* in a recurring role. The same Rachel House that's been in *Moana*, *Soul*, Sherwood, *Thor: Ragnarok*, and, I just found out, voiced Mama Binturong. I'm pretty sure her voice has become iconic and instantly recognizable, at least for me. I didn't recognize her in The Lion Guard, but that's probably just because it was weird to hear her as a villain for once. Anyways, I don't know what New Zealand's population is like, ethnicity wise. According to CIA World Factbook, the country's population was almost 2/3rds European as of 2018, and only 4.9 percent identified as Chinese. I guess the best way to describe the show is that it might have Monkey's name in it, but I personally think that it's Tripitaka's journey. I've seen a number of people compare it to *Xena: Warrior Princess* and *Hercules: The Legendary Journeys*, and if you liked those shows, you'll probably like this one. Yes, it's campy and kind of dumb and goofy and the VFX is usually pretty bad and some of the fight choreography is also nonsensical (or filmed in a nonsensical way), but it's just so fun! I personally think that season 2 is much better than season 1. It seems like they were given a slightly bigger budget, I liked all of the practical effects, we actually get to see the gorgeous New Zealand landscape, etc. Pigsy and especially Sandy actually have focus episodes and get to do stuff and are relevant. They even sing, and they're not half bad! I also really like *Monkie Kid*, even if I have to wait forever for the English dub. Ninjago also has the same problem. It's made in Canada and only has one Asian voice actor. They have a greater mix of ethnic groups, but again, most are from European countries. As of 2021, only approximately 4.7 percent of their population identified as Chinese, and as of 2016, only 0.35 percent identified as Japanese. Anyway, the point is, sometimes it's not always possible to have a cast that represents the characters race wise, due to things like budget, location, availability, etc. In which case, you're usually left with two options: Either race lift the character, or have an actor of a different race play them, which might count as putting ability over appearance, at least in some cases. For example, a mostly all white school would never be able to put on a production of a musical like *Hairspray* because the race of characters factors into the plot. I know from personal experience that my own very white, very Christian public high school had trouble putting on *Thoroughly Modern Millie* due to the mostly female cast required. They even had to genderbend one of the characters from male to female because only two students in the whole school were fluent in Chinese (my school only offered Spanish and German). And yes, that musical has received controversy for its racial stereotyping of the aforementioned Chinese characters, although they are both redeemed by the end.