It Is Interesting That When Yang Was Leaving In Volume 4 It Never Even Seemed To Be A Question Between

It is interesting that when Yang was leaving in volume 4 it never even seemed to be a question between them whether Tai was staying or not. I mean both of his daughters, his ex-wife and his brother-in-law were either in, or heading to anima. From what Oobleck and Port said during their visit the situation in Vale was... not exactly great, but under control. No one would've faulted Tai for going after his family, but he didn't.

And as enjoyable as theories about the relic of choice being hidden under the house and guarded by Tai are, I find it much more moving the idea that he stayed simply to make sure everything was still standing when they got back. That this man who has lost some of the most important people in his life is capable of tamping down on his own overprotectiveness and trust his family to look after each other when he's not there. To stay at home and try and actually improve the situation in Vale while everyone runs off on their big-picture save the world journey.

And it makes sense that its what he'd do, he's been doing the same thing for Qrow for years at this point. He's used to it, no matter how much the worry must eat at him.

Its definitely a trademark xiao long "this is definitely hurting me but its also the thing the people I care about need, so I'm gonna do it anyway" move.

both yang and especially ruby have this thing where they... not quite ignore but definitely shove their own problems aside for the moment to be there for others, even to the point of traveling across continents if so required. it's all about staying by others' side. 'until the end', a ruby song, says it best for ruby; i promise i'll be here until the end.

i can near guarantee they did not get this trait from summer or raven or qrow, all three who have either left and kept their distance; all either confirmed or heavily hinted as a way to protect their family.

no, this is a trait they got from taiyang, the depressed single father who worries about his daughters a lot. the one who stayed, no matter what, doing his best to be there for ruby and yang, even when his emotional state wasn't the greatest.

(and that's something ruby and yang definitely picked up on; those little changes, when his smile turns almost sad at something they said or did, when all the memories come flooding back, a reminder of a time that once was but can never be brought back)

like, tai stayed, so much so that even when everyone else left, he's still home, taking care of everything so that his kids have a home to return to.

to sum it up; the whole "there's no time to deal with our own problems there are others depending on us" is a certified xiao long trait and gods they need therapy.

I stayed up till 4:30 in the morning for a minute of footage that gave me no answers and only more questions.

And I honestly could not be happier about it.

I did have a similar joke reaction to this retcon, but then I thought of a funnier explanation.

He's lying.

He just doesn't want to admit he sent in 50 box tops of the stuff to get the hoody he is *currently wearing*

Ice Queendom sucks, I can't believe they ruined Monty's vision like this.

this is satire please don't execute me

Tumblr is really great on days where a bunch of stuff happens. Because it all just melts into this congealed mass of memes, and its completely impossible to tell what the fuck is going on.

Tumblr is the one website that will just tell me shit, and refuse to elaborate in any way that makes sense. Like some kind of unnecessarily cryptic wizard giving dire warnings of worldwide events.

Welp, guess this is the only thing I'm going to think about today.

Now I just have to stay up until... 4:30am.

Lets fuckin go.

LET'S GOOOOOO

Alright it's 5:30 in the morning so I'm gonna make one more post of my thoughts about the teaser then go to bed... and fail to fall asleep because I will still be thinking about it.

So the opening shot of Ruby in the fog room, we see her shake her head slightly suggesting she's talking, also she's seemingly by herself, so either the team doesn't reunite until a ways into the volume or Ruby is separated from the others. Might be some sort of personal trial thing? I've heard in another post that apparently the island reacts to their emotions so maybe this is just what happens when Ruby finally breaks down? it summons this... ominous fog.

The next scene is from the last teaser, and unless we are getting scenes of what's going on back in remnant it will likely be the opening scene of the volume. Not much to say here.

Then the crazy m.c. escher-esque bell tower and butterfly. The view outside the tower windows make it seem like the structure is horizontal, but differentsides don't match up, and the butterfly's movement says vertical. So clearly some trippy shit going on here. Can't quite make out what the pattern is inside the grid at the end of the structure is, but it kinda looks like a raised dias with a set of stairs leading up to it.

The next scene has Ruby holding one of penny's summoned swords. So if they made it down here then its possible her body did too, which... is unpleasant to think about given the general fuckery of this place. Crwby don't do us dirty with some kind of zombie penny please.

Then Ruby looking shocked in the forest with the mouse, I'm guessing this is fairly early on and she's just seen something that's made the otherworldliness of this place land for her.

Followed by a shot of the team on a cliffside overlooking some absoultely bonkers terrain. This could actually be a shot directly following from the last one and this view is what has Ruby shocked. We have the world tree, a hexagon of big glowing mushrooms, some smoking geyser/volcano rock formations, a floating island, some icy peaks and weird columns off in the distance, and oh yeah, fucking candyland apparently. If the terrain responds to their presence then Neo is definitely somewhere in the candy zone. We've also got a red area that reminds me of forever fall and a purpke area that kinda looks like a town covered in shadecloths that are partially hidden by the cliff and trees. So... a lot of ground to cover.

Then we've got a knight with armour seemingly reminiscent of Jaune's standing in flames. Is it jaune? Maybe, he doesn't appear anywhere else in the trailer. Definitely framed like a bad guy though. So either it's someone else or we're getting evil/corrupted jaune this volume.

Then this weird horned masked guy standing in what looks like a tree structure with glowing mushrooms around, some kind of village maybe? Also the figure has some kind of armour, shell, or exoskeleton over sinewy tissue. Not much to work with, but the stance, twitchy movement and the horns do remind me of the god of darkness a bit.

Neo looking feral in the rain and using her semblance on herself, though the scene cuts off before you can tell what illusion she's making. The terrain looks purple and rocky I don't think we've seen that so far in the trailer, so she might be in a very different area.

Someone with a bandage around one leg walking from the beach following another (likely Ruby's) set of footprints. A lot of people are saying Alyx and I'm inclined to agree mostly because they looked quite human, unlike a lot of the stuff we've seen so far, and I don't have any other good guesses except neo in disguise, abd why would she bother disguising herself if no one's there.

Then we get a montage of things asking what.The mouse talks, there's soneone with a crown, a chesire cat creature that said fuck you I'm gonna have my own artstyle, something with three eyes lurking in a pile of leaves, a lady in some kind of metal exosuit, and Ruby standing over someone (or something? We hear a what here too, but she closes a lid, so maybe whoecer spoke did so from a different place than Ruby's eyeline. That or she's locking someone in a trunk, which... normally I would say she wouldn't do, but hey she's under a lot of stress, who knows) off screen with death in her eyes. Too brief to be able to tell much about each of these. Though the exo-suit lady looks to have something to do with jaune/the knight from earlier just because they appear to be in the same place surrounded by fire. If not the person on the beach then this would be my next guess for Alyx, and it turns out she's maybe not gonna be as helpful as we hoped. No Idea why Ruby's so pissed off, but I guess that depends on who/what she's standing over.

Then we get shots of each of team Rwby and the trailer ends.

All in all, I have very few answers here. Team Rwby definitely seems to cover a lot of varied terrains, but whether they're doing so with intent or just searching remains to be seen. Jaune might be having a horrible time this volume as some kind of corrupted enemy, or that could be something completely different and they just decided not to show him in the teaser.

I have no idea, but writing all this down instead of having it rattling around my brain will hopefully help me sleep better.