I can't even get into Ruby's stuff in this episode because she's just so many levels of Not Okay at this point that I can't even joke about it. She's just...WELL AND TRULY NOT OKAY.
And that she's having the whole crisis of "Oh pft, well if it was me in that story I'd have just done stuff Better" and then it's like "Oh no, sorry, the story is going to actively work against any efforts to do that "
Like who of us hasn't been there reading a book and going, "Oh man, I'd totally do this all differently and quicker and the Best" I love the idea of the story itself going, "LOL YOU THOUGHT?"
pastel ranma
Omigod, the more they set up how OBVIOUSLY RUBY ROSE IS HAVING A BAD TIME the more I am vibrating for the moment Jaune shows up because HOO BOY
yep this is deep speculation, but I think Jaune is that one knight we see in the preview and he's basically cast himself as a villain because of what happened with Penny.
YES. I think that might be what's happened too. Like he's been almost fully enchanted/absorbed by Ever After or whatever or basically something that it's like, "Uh Ruby...you...really need to get yourself some help because otherwise this happens and Boy Oh"
This was also my interpretation as well; Yang does know what it's like to be loved (Tai made mistakes but he still obviously gave her love for example) and knows how rare and precious that is to her and she'd rather just remain armless than lose that.
Like I get the fans who are/were saying, "OOO SHE COULDN'T BID THAT BECAUSES SHE DOESN"T KNOW WHAT BEING LOVED FEELS LIKE" but nah mate, she knows how valuable being able to feel love is; like hell is she giving that up just for an arm.
I'm like this close to making all 4 of these into emotes. What am I gonna do with 4 different "Weiss having a Normal One" emotes? HELL AS IF I KNOW BUT I THINK I NEED 'EM.
So obviously, while it's definitely based on Alice in Wonderland, The Girl Who Fell Through The World is without a doubt, distinctly different from the Alice in Wonderland book.
For starters, Alice and Alyx seem to be extremely different characters. Alice is generally portrayed as a sweet, unassuming girl if kind of naive and a little judgy in the ways that kids can be.
Alyx on the other hand appears to have been either a Huntress or some kind of warrior if this book was written pre-War, given that she full on had A DAGGER ON HER which is not the kind of thing "normal kids", even in RWBY-verse are going to have.
Yang also describes her as being a sort of mean character, lying and cheating to get her way alongside Blake casually dropping that Alyx apparently started a full-on war amongst the townspeople.
Now of interest to me is Weiss defending those actions with the statement that children's books morals are too simplistic" and "Alyx was just trying to survive" which, is Interesting on several levels.
Since we, the viewers, don't have the actual book in front of us to make our own interpretations of the text, we're going to have to 1) view Ever After through RWBY's interpretations of the text and 2) make our own judgement calls of those interpretations.
For example, Weiss defending Alyx's actions in the book could indeed be a legit critical analysis of those actions. HOWEVER, Yang might also be correct in that Alyx really wasn't a nice person, even if the actions she took were understandable in some contexts.
tl;dr they've set up a scenario where we're viewing a small sliver of the Ever After fandom literature analysis through RWBY and how they related to this book from their childhood.
Particularly because RWBY are currently acting like somebody showed them all the worst RWDE subreddits as they reflect on their actions in Atlas and the outcome.
Weiss has explicitly stated that she feels they caused more trouble than they solved. Blake is having a crisis of morality as she tries to figure out the Most Right thing to do in any given situation likely so that she won't accidentally do the Most Wrong thing like Adam would which is an Impossibility but I'll get back to that.
Ruby is full on depressed and distraught because, from her point of view, they failed on all points: Atlas and Mantle are gone and Penny is dead so literally nothing they did "worked". It was a full on "Failure" for any of their goals, with failure in air quotes like that because we know that's not the actual case.
Basically, what I think might ultimately be going on here is RWBY getting to come to terms with their choices and actions set against the actions and choices of a literal storybook protagonist. Alyx lived her story, a story they're currently taking part in, and they'll have a chance to reflect on the actions she took in her story vs the actions they've
taken in theirs. Did they do everything Wrong? Did they do everything Right? Did they do somethings Wrong but the reasons they did them were understandable/in order to survive? Was any Harm they caused outweighed by the Good they did. IS RIGHT/WRONG AND GOOD/HARM TOO SIMPLISTIC WHEN WE'RE TALKING ABOUT A WAR GEE I DON'T KNOW.
In any case, I am like 99% certain they're going to run into Alyx herself. And I think it's going to be an older Alyx, not the Alyx they remembered from the book. An Alyx who has already lived that story and has grown into whatever person she decided to grow into (or not grow into).
There's a very faint reflection of an older woman's silhouette in the mirror behind Alyx in the illustration pan down during the OP and I think that's gonna be a big reveal. After she fell through the World, who did Alyx become?
fandomliterature analysis through RWBY and how they related to this book from their childhood.likely so that she won't accidentally do the Most Wrong thing like Adam wouldwhich is an Impossibility but I'll get back to that.