How is it that each episode of RWBY this season seems to get more and more intense? The latest episode just has so much going on, yet it doesn’t feel rushed. It’s absolutely fantastic and just leaves you asking, “HOW IS THERE ONLY ONE EPISODE LEFT IN THE GOSH DANG SEASON!?” If you haven’t watched the episode yet, be warned that spoilers are prolific ahead.
I’ve decided that I’m going to break this episode up by character groupings instead of chronological order. We’ll start with the plane group first. This consists of Clover, Qrow, Robyn, and Tyrion. Qrow gets the call from Ruby that Ironwood’s declaring martial law and Clover and Robyn both get notices saying that RWBY, JNR, Oscar, and Qrow are to be detained on sight. Clearly this raises tensions considerably in the plane. To make matters worse, Tyrion’s there and he gets all excited that it looks like everyone’s going to turn on each other.
Eventually, Robyn is unconscious and we’re left in a three-way fight between Clover, Qrow, and Tyrion. It’s really fascinating to watch, and then Tyrion and Qrow end up creating a truce to take down Clover. It’s nuts! I guess the old adage, the enemy of my enemy is my friend, really came through in this episode as they work together. Qrow has Clover down and out and they’re exchanging words about how what each of them is doing is the right thing, but then we have the most beautiful piece of art as Tyrion uses Qrow’s sword to stab Clover from behind. This of course creates problems as it is Qrow’s weapon with Clover’s blood on it. Qrow also has a lot of emotional baggage here since Clover was his friend and I think he really helped Qrow this season. Tyrion ran off and I’m assuming that Qrow will either turn into a bird and fly off (I bet Atlas is too high up though for that to work) or willingly surrender if for no other reason than to get to Ironwood.
Next, we’ll talk about what Team JNR is up to. They’re not in the episode very much, but Neo finds them pretending to be Oscar with Djinn’s lamp. Oscar then comes running and lands a very solid punch on her making me feel very proud. Team JNR then recognizes Neo and we know things are going to go down next episode.
Third, we’ve got Penny and Winter. These two have gone to transfer the power of the Winter Maiden over to Winter, but when Ruby’s message gets to them, there’s some very interesting discussion. Penny talks about things not feeling right and Winter talks about how sometimes you have to wrestle with your feelings to know you’re doing the right thing and that’s why she’ll follow Ironwood. They get to the area where the Winter Maiden is and are getting things ready and Cinder shows up! Penny’s ready to exact revenge on her and it’s definitely going to be an interesting showdown between the three of them. This also raises some very interesting questions about who will obtain the Winter Maiden powers. While I think Weiss will ultimately receive the powers (I think of Team RWBY is going to become the next set of Maidens), it could be interesting to have Penny receive the powers first. Maybe it would turn her into a real girl?
Finally, we have Team RWBY. They get to have a fun (for us, not them) fight against the Ace Ops minus Clover (for obvious reasons). The fight is incredible and it shows how much the girls have grown. Yang doesn’t even activate her semblance until the very end and it’s not through an uncontrolled rage. The biggest thing to note with the fight is that not everyone is on board with Ironwood’s plan. They’re willing to do it because of orders, but some just want to be friends about things and calmly arrest them, while others are ready to just go all out from the start. After the fight, Maria and Pietro arrive to help them out. I’m not sure how they’ll be able to help, but I’m glad that Maria’s back!
I’m not sure how they’re going to contain everything into one more episode. They’ve got Winter and Penny vs Cinder, ORNJ vs Neo, whatever is going on with Qrow, and RWBY and Maria and Pietro trying to talk sense into Ironwood. There’s a lot to sift through and I don’t know how one episode can handle it all. Who do you think will get the Winter Maiden powers? How will Maria and Pietro help RWBY stop Ironwood? What is going to happen to Qrow? Feel free to share your theories below.