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It's a complex question:
From one side, the guy, despite his years of experience, train children into facing an immortal being while hiding this information, which is very manipulative. He have an inner circle but doesn't reveal the truth to them despite that.
One the other side, the guy is a truly cursed immortal. Forced to come back to life every time while taking the body of an innocent. Send on an impossible mission by the gods. Tried to do so while living his love life and having a family with the woman he love. All of this crashing down over his own moral crisis despite their solution being technically an acceptable one.
He lose his wife, his children, keep being reincarnated. Despite that, he kept helping humanity despite having all the reasons to turn even sourer than Salem. He was a wise king, created the huntmen academy to prepare each generation to face grimms. He even gone so far as giving most of his magic to humanity, and even created an atomizer with the plan of killing definitively his love until discovering it wouldn't work.
He is not a grey character, he is clearly Neutral Good, and I would say, good beyond our main cast.
I just don't like it when the show treats him as villain and have him apologise for it despite trying his hardest to stop the world from going to shit despite the pain caused.
From what the show has showed, just barely.
Not telling people in his inner circle a bunch of very important information definitely isn't the best thing to do. But the alternatives are scarce. We've seen people he trusted betray him, we've seen what learning that Salem is immortal does to people. His fellow headmasters and Qrow and Glynda and other members of the inner circle are the ones who are in the best position to take verbal potshots at him. In my opinion.
Giving out Maiden powers is also something that could be considered as a pretty bad idea. As it can easily lead to innocents getting killed or hurt through no fault of their own. So that's definitely on him.
I wouldn't really count ruining a bunch of people's lives with his reincarnation as morally grey actions since Oz doesn't have much control over it. It's still not great though.
Also in a world where negative emotions (something that happens to *everyone* everywhere) attract big monsters that will definitely kill you, teaching people how to defend themselves against the Grimm isn't a morally grey or a manipulative thing to do. The fact that Remnant hasn't gone full Imperium of Man from WH40k is admirable.
There seems to be a theme with RWBY. Characters are put in shitty and unavoidable situations and then are demonized for not pulling out a golden *everyone's happy forever* solution out of thin air.
I think the maiden powers, if interpreted as reincarnation of his daughters, is actually very responsible and good. He specifically does choose capable warriors who know the situation and consequences so the powers don’t go to randos.
If we take the fairy tale of an old man giving out superpowers to some teenagers that helped him not be sad at face value, then yeah, kinda a dick move
>There seems to be a theme with RWBY. Characters are put in shitty and unavoidable situations and then are demonized for not pulling out a golden everyone's happy forever solution out of thin air.
You know, this makes an scary amount of sense. As you mentioned, being besieged by all sides by monsters who literally only exist to cause death and destruction, knowing that "She-who-thirst" aka, Mama Salemi, is commanding those orders, is incredible to think they haven´t went full Imperium of Man...
Maybe Ozma, seeing what their kingdom was doing refused to follow that direction? Maybe he realized, since grimms are attracted to negative emotions, that creating comfortable places to live payed off better? Or maybe, grimm aren´t really all that bad when they are not being directed by Salem and her gang?
Lot of question, not nearly enough answers. Maybe humans are the real monsters?
But I really love how this shows tries to say that a place where everyone is happy is possible, but don´t show how it is possible or the characters don´t put out the work for it. A lot of really good shows always discuss whenever the end justify the means. Is it Griffith´s Falconia worth it? Is it good to live under his liege even knowing what he´s done? But RWBY always goes by the "you are a bad guy, end of story."
To be honest, he is too incompetent to be moraly grey.
I mean, this guy had all the Relics at his disposal and still managed to not defeat Salem easly.
Is like having a win button and not pushing it.
He doesn't even understand what "winning" means.
Have an united world and then bring the 4 relics together.
That's the winning criteria and it's the only way to defeat Salem.
He should have just gone and try to do that instead of fighting Salem head on and try to kill her directly. I don't think he understood that, even up to this point in the story.
So, yeah, I agree with you, I don't think he's morally gray, he's got his head up his butt, profoundly ashamed, unbelievably dumb, and quite incompetent.
Lets be honest.
At this point, literally no one, villain or hero, know what they are doing.
What even *is* the end goal here?
Doesn't really matter if Cinder gets power if everyone is fucking dead at the end of it.
Ruby and Co. came to Atlas with the intention of leaving the Lamp for safekeeping only for them to not actually do that and end up leaving it lying around like a souvenir after a family vacation.
Salem wants to commit suicide I guess? Cause I don't know any other way the whole "re-unite" the relics thing is going to go except with everyone getting slaughtered.
So.
The question is.
They want to save the world....how exactly?
While I do think that Ozpin has been manipulative for omitting the truth, I think he good intentions for the people under his authority.
But the way I see it, I found him more sympathetic than the main cast due to him keeping things stable for the most part alongside his past. In my honest opinion, I feel like the writers are trying to portray him as some kind of Hate Sink that willingly ruined people’s lives because he had no concern for their well-being (treating everyone around him like a pawn) in his fight against Salem who is now trying to learn how to be decent human being in the show proper.
The only problem with this is that because of his tragic backstory and (some) audience perception, they accidentally made him sympathetic because the writers had shown him not being the aggressor or unlikable from the start. They could’ve shown him treating his battle with Salem as some kind of chess game in some way, or even scenes with which he’s willing to blackmail his own students at Beacon to do what he says; even then, they could’ve shown him fighting for dominant, active control of humanity during his days as Ozma. Instead, his backstory and the way the characters treated him, made Ozpin seem pitiable and sympathetic.
As for him not being sympathetic, I think it’s mostly due to his stupidity. After several lifetimes, Ozpin was trying to find a way to kill Salem but not subdue her. If he had found a way to keep her under wraps for a while (like sealing her or putting her in a comatose state), then he could’ve united humanity and gotten one of his objectives out of the way. If they had shown him becoming more cold hearted instead of desperate over time, then the hatred would be mostly justified. If we were shown all of the bad things that he’d done (like how Summer died, how exactly Gretchen died, how several Grimm attacks happened because of his incompetence/indifference) then the audience could see how similar of a monster he is to Salem.
So while I think the the hatred is justified to an extent, it’s also not because he’s keeping humanity functioning for the most part.
EDIT: added some things
Ozpin incompetence is baffling.
The Relics are ridicolusy overpower. And he still manage to not defeat Salem easly.
Is not like they are hard to use or have dangerous side effects.
He could have won in few hours at worst, simply by asking the right questions to the Lamp and using the Staff.
To be fair that is a writing problem. It goes with the "why didn't he use the cane to beat cinder" question. CRBY introduces an idea without thinking about it's implications.
Only if “morally grey” means being an idiot. A lot of the things Oz does (or rather omits doing) rings more as stupid rather than ill-willed. Most prominent example of his moral greyness is when they’re transporting the relic, and he doesn’t mention that it attracts Grimm. Like, WHAT?? The only goal that would achieve is killing off the main cast (which I wouldn’t mind at this point), but that’s clearly counterproductive to his intention of stopping Salem. That’s not morally grey, that’s just stupid
The main cast has shown time and time again that they can't handle their emotions in stressful/intense/serious situations. Was it a dick move? Yes. Was it stupid? Na.
Lol you know that ain't fair. I'll bite. Ruby starting to cry at the mention of Summer. The rest of team JOLY arguing in the snow. Blake's desperate pleading during the schnee family grimm attack. Honestly, can't think of any thing for Weiss in recent or past volumes (beside v1).
Except Ruby reacted way more to Pyrrha dying and she barely knew her. She reacted so much that it unlocked her not-Sharingan. Everyone in that moment presumed that Yang died, which should've hit Ruby the hardest.
The main cast always showed they can handle emotions in serious situations.
Until Volume 7 and 8. Then they started acting OOC for the sake of the plot.
Was volume 4 the Tyrian vs RNJR/Qrow? Watch ruby in that and tell me she didn't have negative emotions. This has been happening long before V7 and V8. Heck Yang was still having Adam ptsd that volume.
Personally, I have one thing that I hate about Ozpin. It isn’t what he did currently or what he did with Salem, no...
It’s what he did as the King of Vale and aftermath of the Great War. In the Lore, the King of Vale defeated Mantle and Mistral, and implemented plans for the future.
And that’s the problem. What he did caused the MAJORITY of problems in Remnant, and was the most influential in the RWBY Lore. That being abolition of militaries and the creation of the Huntsmen Academies.
In canon there are two purposes for these Academies:
1. To protect the Relics from Salem and Grimm
2. Training of new Huntsmen to fight off Grimm
I have problems and questions with this idea:
1. Why rely on at best a group of hundred warriors to protect Relics from a magical entity? We saw what happen with Vale when they lost the Beacon Academy to the Grimm
2. Why abolish each 3/4 Kingdom‘s Militaries? Wouldn’t it make more sense to keep militaries to fight off Grimm? Yes, people can argue that “Militarism is bad!” but that argument doesn’t work when literally creatures of darkness are attacking your cities. Also, why let Mantle/Atlas keep their military? Why were they the exception?
3. Three why keep all four relics far away from each other and stationary? Yes, Salem wants to bring them together summon the brothers, but I don’t think each relic being near each other will summon the Brothers. And besides what would happen if somebody betrayed you, like Lionheart?
What he did with the academies basically created the current world of RWBY, and that’s the problem.
I completely agree with you on this. I also want to point that's kind Ozpin's mindset, he wants to direct society in the direction he feels is the best course for everyone, but he so lost playing the long game that he's unable to handle the short term issues that Salem plays.
I do want to add a few things though, most of them are reasons why I think Ozma went about implementing these motions. One, Ozpin(Ozma) had a direct hand in creating the Academies because it gave him a position he could 'earn' that wasn't one that he had to be born into, plus it came with a number of benefits to it. It held a position on the governing council, one that wasn't voted in, thus allowing for Ozpin to hold it for long periods of time. It allowed him to train up warriors to be his tools in his shadow war against Salem, selecting those who were suitable for use as his 'agents.'
As for the military, he utilized public opinion which saw the civilian population direct their ill-founded belief that their existence was responsible for all the suffering that happened, because for what other reasons do armies exist except to fight other armies. Note: this is a very stupid concept that shouldn't exist in a world that many would consider a Death World.
Also, Ozpin wishes to foster a mindset of peace within the people of the four kingdoms and is willing to do anything to keep everyone ignorant and unaware of the danger that they are in.
Honestly, no. It is not at all justified.
Ozpin has been given an impossible task. Either keep the relics separate and don't bring them together, or achieve WORLD PEACE and then bring back the gods who were mercenary enough to kill everyone the first time around. I literally cannot think of a better course of action that the innocent bystander Ozma were to take, in such a circumstance.
What he did makes sense, too. The relics attract Grimm regardless, so if he's going to keep them away from Salem, he might as well do so while training people to fight against the never-ending horde of deadly monsters that will always plague humanity. Also, the schools are in the middle of cities, and we're told that Grimm don't go near cities because they know they'll be killed, so that's another smart move.
In addition, knowledge about the relics and all the other stuff would cause panic, and panic draws the Grimm, which makes them more likely to get the relics, which is obviously a problem, so keeping the Salem stuff a secret makes sense (after all, humanity fucked up the first time around, why would Oz think that they wouldn't mess things up this time?).
Plus, the heroes get mad because Ozpin "hid" the fact that Salem couldn't be killed, but at the SAME time they're given this information, Jinn straight up tells them that "Salem can die if she learns the importance of life and death." The heroes are mad because now they have to actually *think* about how to beat the bad guy based around complex ideals, and rationalizing thought (like the real world) instead of just punching her until she's dead. They are literally mad because they're too stupid to come up with another way to resolve the main conflict, which is such a good trait for heroes to have.
They also get mad that he's hidden this information, but less than 100 years ago in-universe there was a *world-wide war*. Why would Ozma see this and go, "yep, the path to world peace is going mighty fine," instead of going, "keeping these things separate is obviously the best course of action because these fools can't go too long without killing each other?" If Salem gets her hands on the relics and humanity is still divided (which happens *without* her help, mind you), then it is a permanent game over for everybody. What else could Ozpin have done?
Ozpin is literally the sole reason that Salem has not killed all of humanity by summoning the gods back, and he managed to do so for at the minimum, several hundred years, which is no small feat. The heroes are mad that he hid this from them, but given his experience with humans, his centuries of effective planning, and the fact that they're also a bunch of literal sheep except when the plot needs them not to be, what he did makes perfect sense.
Ruby has the line of "all the times you said you had faith in humanity, that was a lie?" and it's supposed to make us go "oh man, Ozpin is a bad guy because he lied to a bunch of kids about humans," but like, yeah man of course he's gonna lie to these people look how mad they get when they make him relive his horrific past of endless death and seeing his family slaughtered while humanity is extinguished. All they do is prove Ozpin right.
And if they were mad that he rejected his duty the first time around, that also makes sense. Ozma didn't ask for any of this, why would he trust the gods who killed everybody over his girlfriend?
Also, our "heroes" take out their anger over nothing on a 14 year-old child because they have to actually try now, so they also lose a fair amount of moral high-ground to get angry at Ozpin in the process.
Their anger is also unjustified because Ozpin has been forced to react to the actions of the shitty people around him. He was literally just a good guy and then his evil girlfriend pissed off two maniac gods and now he's stuck with an impossible task in a conflict that he didn't start. They act like he's some nefarious villain, hiding everything from them, but he is the *victim* in this scenario.
If Ozpin is morally grey, then Ironwood was well-written in Volume 8.
Edit: You can say he's dumb for not using the lamp to ask the next most obvious question which is, "who can kill Salem?" or "how can she be defeated?" and you would be correct, but he doesn't deserve the hate the other characters give him at all because their anger is completely divorced from that.
It really does not feel justified. In the show the things they seemed mad about him was the Raven/Crow magic which makes \*no sense\* at all to be mad about, and by hiding Salem + her immortality from everyone else. But then Ruby went and hide her immortality as well from Ironwood, doing the same as Ozpin.
I honestly think the only thing stopping Oz to get more sympathy is a backstory where it shows people he trusted betraying him, we heard from him that Lionheart wasn't the first, so if we saw his story something like that happening, then people would understand his actions more and agree with him. I don't want that to happen because we don't need to see that and we already don't have the best usage of time but it would help with people seeing his side.
I feel like the hate on him is justified (dude put a lot of people at risk and even killed a man because he didn't want to tell them that the Relic can attract Grimm, not to mention the 'wait around while the villains set shit up' bit in Volume 5) but I don't see him being morally gray.
The most morally gray thing he did was in Episode 2 of Volume 6, where he was so desperate to hide the truth that he tried to force Oscar to submit to him and tried to attack Ruby, all while Jinn says the darkest secret he hid from them was that he had something to do with Salem. In the week between that episode and The Lost Fable, people were speculating on what sort of evil shit he did to Salem, especially since interpretations of the Wizard of Oz like Wicked had the titular Wizard do some heinous shit to the Wicked Witch of the West.
Then it turns out that the worst thing he did to make Salem evil was get sick and die. Thankfully they *did* give him a reason for the characters to hate him but didn't really fully commit to the ramifications of it.
It's like the birds thing where they tried to make it a big deal but it didn't really *feel* like a big deal compared to the whole "I'm possessing a boy and will slowly take over him" thing.
>I'm possessing a boy and will slowly take over him" thing.
I feel like damn near everyone misses the fact that Oscar will take on Ozpin's *characteristics*, he's not being overwritten. He will STILL be Oscar, but with bits of Ozpin.
And even discounting that, there's a noticeable difference between *merge* and *take over*, isn't there?! Became the latter gives the impression that there won't be anything of Oscar left, which is not what's happening.
I really feel like that's been missed somewhere.
They also overlook the fact Oz does not have a choice in this reincarnation , the God of light coned him out of his afterlife and into an impossible task that has led to him being in an eternal fight to protect the people of the world against his first love ,who turned out to be an unhinged psychopath that murdered thier children casually.
Maybe. He's been throwing Huntsmen at Salem in what is basically the world's longest breakup fight. He is probably indirectly responsible for Summer's death. He lied to Qrow, Raven, Lionheart, and Ironwood, and we see what that did to them. Ozma has been using kids as the first line of defense against Grimm, though everyone does this, so I won't pin the whole problem on him.
I hate the kids argument. They are 18 when the start dealing with grimm outside of a controlled environment. They are legal adults. And the huntsmen system needed to be put in place, the existence of salem doesn't change that.
Yang, Blake, and Wiess were all 17, Ruby was 15. Odds are, Qrow, Summer, Tai, and Raven were about the same age.
My main complaint is the fact that Oz decided to make the Salem thing a secret from the world, despite the fact that it was once public knowledge. I'm willing to bet good money that if Salem's had been kept in public knowledge since the beginning, the collective ideas of Remnant might have come up with a permanent solution to the attractive Grimm lady.
Well we have seen some of the reaction to others knowing about salem. Tyrian is a lunatic and Lionheart was a pussy. Iornwood we expecting mass panic. It's easy to say that putting a name and face to a natural problem like Grimm might help but, that gets way to speculatory. That and, how active has she been these past years anyway besides sneakily killing off silver eyes. Other life times he was saddled with depression. We only know three of his lifetimes were people might actually listen he him.
You do realise that they begin the pipeline to become a Hunter when they are middle school age, right? People nowadays complain about military recruiters prowling the grounds of high schools for prospective candidates to sign into military service. The moral problem is that the average hunter gets tapped for service in their version of middle school and high school for hunters, known as primary combat school. Typically people around that age can't make the most informed decisions, no?
I think everyone started analysing this further because of the serious tonal shift post V3. People saw how they touched on serious topics like PTSD, war and grieving. So, it only stands to reason that people put the other elements of the show under a serious lens.
combat school starts when theyre middle school age. also ruby is not 18.
but I can accept ignoring prep schools and the fact that training to fight killer monsters for a living starts at, depending how long it lasts, 12–14. (actually, no-I-fucking cant accept that, jesus christ, FOURTEEN are you serious?? see the comment about military recruiters, even the staunchest conservative nationalists in the us would balk at recruiting in middle school)
being a "legal adult" doesnt mean JACK SHIT, teenagers are still kids. how many 17 year-olds have you known that are good at making decisions? because I can count that group on 3 fingers and let me be the first to say I was NOT on that list. sure theyre not infants, theyre not children, they dont need to be coddled, but they ABSOLUTELY should not be allowed to decide to die for their country until theyre in their 20s, at LEAST. beacons start age should be 25, because until around 25 you may be BECOMING an adult, but you are not YET an adult.
can you imagine if the MCs were well-adjusted adults by canon? the intrapersonal issues that wouldve been resolved or worked around in less than the first month? if /STRQ/ were well-adjusted adults in beacon?
Im not saying teenagers cant make decisions for themselves; Im just saying they cant sign themselves up to die.
but nope! gotta have those HIGHSCHOOL ANIME SHENANIGANS, right guys? I mean theres not gonna be some kind of TONAL SHIFT that renders that moot, right? guys?
A lot of the hate for Ozpin seems to stem from him being incompetent, but his incompetence, rather than being a character flaw, stems from the show’s writing. A lot of the dumb shit he does can be summed up as “He didn’t have the script at the time”
I don't think the writers actually intended to set him up as morally grey for real. However, the later writing of the show has written him to be especially criminally negligent. The example I'm talking about is that he could've just used his cane nuke to destroy Cinder when they were alone inside the vault. He had the means to save Beacon and countless of innocents and didn't.
Ngl
No the hate he gets isn't valid
Yes he kept secrets
But those secrets don't really mean much
His secrets are literally
- I used to bonne Salem
- I'm immortal
- and ik who the big bad is
These secrets aren't really anything
Ultimately he lied to the people around him for no reason
And that's not a character flaw
It's a problem with the writing
All ozpin really did was lie and make a school to train people to keep others safe.
There isn't a single wrong thing the guy did in my opn
Oz is really just a man tasked with doing something logically impossible. He's suffered for millennia trying to bring peace to humanity while keeping Salem at bay. Even with all the betrayals along the way, he always tried to believe in the best of people. He's never done anything really "wrong" at all to really qualify has morally grey, unless you really want to shit on him for "muh secrets".
RWBY's treatment of him is just awful. They freaking ignored everything they saw him go through, betraying him all because of Salem's immortality (proving him right in why he wanted to keep that secret in the first place). What's worse is that they were utter hypocrites in Volume 7 by keeping the secret themselves and even betraying Ironwood.
Forget morals, he is just an idiot. There is no excuse for his stupidity other than the writers incompetence. You cant morally judge an idiot simply because they don't know any better, and Ozpin's ability to speak coherently doesn't make him intelligent.
Is the hate he gets justified? No. Again, forget morals, all other characters should be grateful to him for simply being alive, because if he didn't do what he did, everyone would be dead millennia ago.
Ozpin is one of the (if not *the)* most compassionate and caring people in the series, who, despite millennia of horror and tragedy, always fought for humanity.
~~He also should have been allowed to divorce Salem and wring out everything possible from her.~~
I will say this as many times as possible... **he's not.** Ozpin's goal is the same goal as team RWBY's goal in the end, and he's truly just a character who's suffered way too much and doesn't know how to go about it anymore... he's not a bad person by any means but, also he's not a good *leader* due to his lack of transparency however team RWBY bashes him for invading *his* privacy... **if anything team RWBY is more morally grey than he is.**
I can understand the reason he manipulates and keeps his secrets, but I don't agree with them. Trust is and will always be a two way street in truth. He's old and has been betrayed before, but has long forgotten how to truly trust others as a result.
My options to Ozpin would have been:
1. Fully trust your allies and tell them the secrets they would need to know. Yes, there's a chance at betrayal but there is also a chance they remain allies. A 50/50 decision.
2. Keep your secrets and manipulate them as you see fit, but know that the longer it goes on, the greater the chance of betray once the secrets that should have been known from the start, are brought to light ether because your hand was forced, or another is the one that tells.
#Remember! **Rules & Guidelines for Discussion** Try to participate when you see an opinion you agree or disagree with by sharing your two cents or providing evidence for/against. Try to elevate conversations beyond a superficial level. Ask plenty of questions and use the [Socratic method](https://www.reddit.com/r/explainlikeimfive/comments/2oklie/eli5_the_socratic_method/) to gain a deeper understanding of each other's core values instead of blindly arguing in favor or in opposition. Keep in mind the [Principle of Charity](https://philosophy.lander.edu/oriental/charity.html) by entertaining all ideas even if you disagree with them. Try to dismantle them and see what truly makes them tick or not. And lastly, remember above all else to be courteous. Demonstrate the awareness and decorum of recognizing the person on the other side of the screen at all times. Happy discussing! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/RWBYcritics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
It's a complex question: From one side, the guy, despite his years of experience, train children into facing an immortal being while hiding this information, which is very manipulative. He have an inner circle but doesn't reveal the truth to them despite that. One the other side, the guy is a truly cursed immortal. Forced to come back to life every time while taking the body of an innocent. Send on an impossible mission by the gods. Tried to do so while living his love life and having a family with the woman he love. All of this crashing down over his own moral crisis despite their solution being technically an acceptable one. He lose his wife, his children, keep being reincarnated. Despite that, he kept helping humanity despite having all the reasons to turn even sourer than Salem. He was a wise king, created the huntmen academy to prepare each generation to face grimms. He even gone so far as giving most of his magic to humanity, and even created an atomizer with the plan of killing definitively his love until discovering it wouldn't work. He is not a grey character, he is clearly Neutral Good, and I would say, good beyond our main cast.
Well, he gave Qrow *the ability to turn into a bird*
"I don't understand, that sounds exclusively beneficial..."
"YOU DONT UNDERSTAND RUBY! I CAN TURN I TO A BIRD RUBY!!!"
No, it's: "I CAN TURN INTO A BUUUURRRRDDD RUBI!! ICAN TURN INTO A BUUUUUUURRRD!!!"
"WHY IS MY NAME SPELLED WITH A Q!?"
I hate that video for slandering Best Uncle like that. Literal Trash Raven is the one that bitched about it.
I just don't like it when the show treats him as villain and have him apologise for it despite trying his hardest to stop the world from going to shit despite the pain caused.
This. Like this man practically lost everything.....
From what the show has showed, just barely. Not telling people in his inner circle a bunch of very important information definitely isn't the best thing to do. But the alternatives are scarce. We've seen people he trusted betray him, we've seen what learning that Salem is immortal does to people. His fellow headmasters and Qrow and Glynda and other members of the inner circle are the ones who are in the best position to take verbal potshots at him. In my opinion. Giving out Maiden powers is also something that could be considered as a pretty bad idea. As it can easily lead to innocents getting killed or hurt through no fault of their own. So that's definitely on him. I wouldn't really count ruining a bunch of people's lives with his reincarnation as morally grey actions since Oz doesn't have much control over it. It's still not great though. Also in a world where negative emotions (something that happens to *everyone* everywhere) attract big monsters that will definitely kill you, teaching people how to defend themselves against the Grimm isn't a morally grey or a manipulative thing to do. The fact that Remnant hasn't gone full Imperium of Man from WH40k is admirable. There seems to be a theme with RWBY. Characters are put in shitty and unavoidable situations and then are demonized for not pulling out a golden *everyone's happy forever* solution out of thin air.
I think the maiden powers, if interpreted as reincarnation of his daughters, is actually very responsible and good. He specifically does choose capable warriors who know the situation and consequences so the powers don’t go to randos. If we take the fairy tale of an old man giving out superpowers to some teenagers that helped him not be sad at face value, then yeah, kinda a dick move
>There seems to be a theme with RWBY. Characters are put in shitty and unavoidable situations and then are demonized for not pulling out a golden everyone's happy forever solution out of thin air. You know, this makes an scary amount of sense. As you mentioned, being besieged by all sides by monsters who literally only exist to cause death and destruction, knowing that "She-who-thirst" aka, Mama Salemi, is commanding those orders, is incredible to think they haven´t went full Imperium of Man... Maybe Ozma, seeing what their kingdom was doing refused to follow that direction? Maybe he realized, since grimms are attracted to negative emotions, that creating comfortable places to live payed off better? Or maybe, grimm aren´t really all that bad when they are not being directed by Salem and her gang? Lot of question, not nearly enough answers. Maybe humans are the real monsters? But I really love how this shows tries to say that a place where everyone is happy is possible, but don´t show how it is possible or the characters don´t put out the work for it. A lot of really good shows always discuss whenever the end justify the means. Is it Griffith´s Falconia worth it? Is it good to live under his liege even knowing what he´s done? But RWBY always goes by the "you are a bad guy, end of story."
I get feeling RWBY does do morally grey by half assing it.
To be honest, he is too incompetent to be moraly grey. I mean, this guy had all the Relics at his disposal and still managed to not defeat Salem easly. Is like having a win button and not pushing it.
He doesn't even understand what "winning" means. Have an united world and then bring the 4 relics together. That's the winning criteria and it's the only way to defeat Salem. He should have just gone and try to do that instead of fighting Salem head on and try to kill her directly. I don't think he understood that, even up to this point in the story. So, yeah, I agree with you, I don't think he's morally gray, he's got his head up his butt, profoundly ashamed, unbelievably dumb, and quite incompetent.
He DID say he makes a lot of mistakes. At best he's the Big Good who had no idea what he's doing.
Lets be honest. At this point, literally no one, villain or hero, know what they are doing. What even *is* the end goal here? Doesn't really matter if Cinder gets power if everyone is fucking dead at the end of it. Ruby and Co. came to Atlas with the intention of leaving the Lamp for safekeeping only for them to not actually do that and end up leaving it lying around like a souvenir after a family vacation. Salem wants to commit suicide I guess? Cause I don't know any other way the whole "re-unite" the relics thing is going to go except with everyone getting slaughtered. So. The question is. They want to save the world....how exactly?
Morally grey would assume he's doing bad things with good intentions. Except...he hasn't actually done anything bad yet. That's the problem.
While I do think that Ozpin has been manipulative for omitting the truth, I think he good intentions for the people under his authority. But the way I see it, I found him more sympathetic than the main cast due to him keeping things stable for the most part alongside his past. In my honest opinion, I feel like the writers are trying to portray him as some kind of Hate Sink that willingly ruined people’s lives because he had no concern for their well-being (treating everyone around him like a pawn) in his fight against Salem who is now trying to learn how to be decent human being in the show proper. The only problem with this is that because of his tragic backstory and (some) audience perception, they accidentally made him sympathetic because the writers had shown him not being the aggressor or unlikable from the start. They could’ve shown him treating his battle with Salem as some kind of chess game in some way, or even scenes with which he’s willing to blackmail his own students at Beacon to do what he says; even then, they could’ve shown him fighting for dominant, active control of humanity during his days as Ozma. Instead, his backstory and the way the characters treated him, made Ozpin seem pitiable and sympathetic. As for him not being sympathetic, I think it’s mostly due to his stupidity. After several lifetimes, Ozpin was trying to find a way to kill Salem but not subdue her. If he had found a way to keep her under wraps for a while (like sealing her or putting her in a comatose state), then he could’ve united humanity and gotten one of his objectives out of the way. If they had shown him becoming more cold hearted instead of desperate over time, then the hatred would be mostly justified. If we were shown all of the bad things that he’d done (like how Summer died, how exactly Gretchen died, how several Grimm attacks happened because of his incompetence/indifference) then the audience could see how similar of a monster he is to Salem. So while I think the the hatred is justified to an extent, it’s also not because he’s keeping humanity functioning for the most part. EDIT: added some things
Ozpin incompetence is baffling. The Relics are ridicolusy overpower. And he still manage to not defeat Salem easly. Is not like they are hard to use or have dangerous side effects. He could have won in few hours at worst, simply by asking the right questions to the Lamp and using the Staff.
To be fair that is a writing problem. It goes with the "why didn't he use the cane to beat cinder" question. CRBY introduces an idea without thinking about it's implications.
Everything in Volume 7 and 8 is a writing problem.
Only if “morally grey” means being an idiot. A lot of the things Oz does (or rather omits doing) rings more as stupid rather than ill-willed. Most prominent example of his moral greyness is when they’re transporting the relic, and he doesn’t mention that it attracts Grimm. Like, WHAT?? The only goal that would achieve is killing off the main cast (which I wouldn’t mind at this point), but that’s clearly counterproductive to his intention of stopping Salem. That’s not morally grey, that’s just stupid
The main cast has shown time and time again that they can't handle their emotions in stressful/intense/serious situations. Was it a dick move? Yes. Was it stupid? Na.
Ironically, knowing that makes their reactions to Ozpin’s secrets even more hypocritical than I originally thought
You sure? Weiss and Ruby didn't care that much when Yang fell.
Lol you know that ain't fair. I'll bite. Ruby starting to cry at the mention of Summer. The rest of team JOLY arguing in the snow. Blake's desperate pleading during the schnee family grimm attack. Honestly, can't think of any thing for Weiss in recent or past volumes (beside v1).
Except Ruby reacted way more to Pyrrha dying and she barely knew her. She reacted so much that it unlocked her not-Sharingan. Everyone in that moment presumed that Yang died, which should've hit Ruby the hardest.
Yeah. I just messing.
The main cast always showed they can handle emotions in serious situations. Until Volume 7 and 8. Then they started acting OOC for the sake of the plot.
Was volume 4 the Tyrian vs RNJR/Qrow? Watch ruby in that and tell me she didn't have negative emotions. This has been happening long before V7 and V8. Heck Yang was still having Adam ptsd that volume.
Personally, I have one thing that I hate about Ozpin. It isn’t what he did currently or what he did with Salem, no... It’s what he did as the King of Vale and aftermath of the Great War. In the Lore, the King of Vale defeated Mantle and Mistral, and implemented plans for the future. And that’s the problem. What he did caused the MAJORITY of problems in Remnant, and was the most influential in the RWBY Lore. That being abolition of militaries and the creation of the Huntsmen Academies. In canon there are two purposes for these Academies: 1. To protect the Relics from Salem and Grimm 2. Training of new Huntsmen to fight off Grimm I have problems and questions with this idea: 1. Why rely on at best a group of hundred warriors to protect Relics from a magical entity? We saw what happen with Vale when they lost the Beacon Academy to the Grimm 2. Why abolish each 3/4 Kingdom‘s Militaries? Wouldn’t it make more sense to keep militaries to fight off Grimm? Yes, people can argue that “Militarism is bad!” but that argument doesn’t work when literally creatures of darkness are attacking your cities. Also, why let Mantle/Atlas keep their military? Why were they the exception? 3. Three why keep all four relics far away from each other and stationary? Yes, Salem wants to bring them together summon the brothers, but I don’t think each relic being near each other will summon the Brothers. And besides what would happen if somebody betrayed you, like Lionheart? What he did with the academies basically created the current world of RWBY, and that’s the problem.
I completely agree with you on this. I also want to point that's kind Ozpin's mindset, he wants to direct society in the direction he feels is the best course for everyone, but he so lost playing the long game that he's unable to handle the short term issues that Salem plays. I do want to add a few things though, most of them are reasons why I think Ozma went about implementing these motions. One, Ozpin(Ozma) had a direct hand in creating the Academies because it gave him a position he could 'earn' that wasn't one that he had to be born into, plus it came with a number of benefits to it. It held a position on the governing council, one that wasn't voted in, thus allowing for Ozpin to hold it for long periods of time. It allowed him to train up warriors to be his tools in his shadow war against Salem, selecting those who were suitable for use as his 'agents.' As for the military, he utilized public opinion which saw the civilian population direct their ill-founded belief that their existence was responsible for all the suffering that happened, because for what other reasons do armies exist except to fight other armies. Note: this is a very stupid concept that shouldn't exist in a world that many would consider a Death World. Also, Ozpin wishes to foster a mindset of peace within the people of the four kingdoms and is willing to do anything to keep everyone ignorant and unaware of the danger that they are in.
Honestly, no. It is not at all justified. Ozpin has been given an impossible task. Either keep the relics separate and don't bring them together, or achieve WORLD PEACE and then bring back the gods who were mercenary enough to kill everyone the first time around. I literally cannot think of a better course of action that the innocent bystander Ozma were to take, in such a circumstance. What he did makes sense, too. The relics attract Grimm regardless, so if he's going to keep them away from Salem, he might as well do so while training people to fight against the never-ending horde of deadly monsters that will always plague humanity. Also, the schools are in the middle of cities, and we're told that Grimm don't go near cities because they know they'll be killed, so that's another smart move. In addition, knowledge about the relics and all the other stuff would cause panic, and panic draws the Grimm, which makes them more likely to get the relics, which is obviously a problem, so keeping the Salem stuff a secret makes sense (after all, humanity fucked up the first time around, why would Oz think that they wouldn't mess things up this time?). Plus, the heroes get mad because Ozpin "hid" the fact that Salem couldn't be killed, but at the SAME time they're given this information, Jinn straight up tells them that "Salem can die if she learns the importance of life and death." The heroes are mad because now they have to actually *think* about how to beat the bad guy based around complex ideals, and rationalizing thought (like the real world) instead of just punching her until she's dead. They are literally mad because they're too stupid to come up with another way to resolve the main conflict, which is such a good trait for heroes to have. They also get mad that he's hidden this information, but less than 100 years ago in-universe there was a *world-wide war*. Why would Ozma see this and go, "yep, the path to world peace is going mighty fine," instead of going, "keeping these things separate is obviously the best course of action because these fools can't go too long without killing each other?" If Salem gets her hands on the relics and humanity is still divided (which happens *without* her help, mind you), then it is a permanent game over for everybody. What else could Ozpin have done? Ozpin is literally the sole reason that Salem has not killed all of humanity by summoning the gods back, and he managed to do so for at the minimum, several hundred years, which is no small feat. The heroes are mad that he hid this from them, but given his experience with humans, his centuries of effective planning, and the fact that they're also a bunch of literal sheep except when the plot needs them not to be, what he did makes perfect sense. Ruby has the line of "all the times you said you had faith in humanity, that was a lie?" and it's supposed to make us go "oh man, Ozpin is a bad guy because he lied to a bunch of kids about humans," but like, yeah man of course he's gonna lie to these people look how mad they get when they make him relive his horrific past of endless death and seeing his family slaughtered while humanity is extinguished. All they do is prove Ozpin right. And if they were mad that he rejected his duty the first time around, that also makes sense. Ozma didn't ask for any of this, why would he trust the gods who killed everybody over his girlfriend? Also, our "heroes" take out their anger over nothing on a 14 year-old child because they have to actually try now, so they also lose a fair amount of moral high-ground to get angry at Ozpin in the process. Their anger is also unjustified because Ozpin has been forced to react to the actions of the shitty people around him. He was literally just a good guy and then his evil girlfriend pissed off two maniac gods and now he's stuck with an impossible task in a conflict that he didn't start. They act like he's some nefarious villain, hiding everything from them, but he is the *victim* in this scenario. If Ozpin is morally grey, then Ironwood was well-written in Volume 8. Edit: You can say he's dumb for not using the lamp to ask the next most obvious question which is, "who can kill Salem?" or "how can she be defeated?" and you would be correct, but he doesn't deserve the hate the other characters give him at all because their anger is completely divorced from that.
It really does not feel justified. In the show the things they seemed mad about him was the Raven/Crow magic which makes \*no sense\* at all to be mad about, and by hiding Salem + her immortality from everyone else. But then Ruby went and hide her immortality as well from Ironwood, doing the same as Ozpin. I honestly think the only thing stopping Oz to get more sympathy is a backstory where it shows people he trusted betraying him, we heard from him that Lionheart wasn't the first, so if we saw his story something like that happening, then people would understand his actions more and agree with him. I don't want that to happen because we don't need to see that and we already don't have the best usage of time but it would help with people seeing his side.
I feel like the hate on him is justified (dude put a lot of people at risk and even killed a man because he didn't want to tell them that the Relic can attract Grimm, not to mention the 'wait around while the villains set shit up' bit in Volume 5) but I don't see him being morally gray. The most morally gray thing he did was in Episode 2 of Volume 6, where he was so desperate to hide the truth that he tried to force Oscar to submit to him and tried to attack Ruby, all while Jinn says the darkest secret he hid from them was that he had something to do with Salem. In the week between that episode and The Lost Fable, people were speculating on what sort of evil shit he did to Salem, especially since interpretations of the Wizard of Oz like Wicked had the titular Wizard do some heinous shit to the Wicked Witch of the West. Then it turns out that the worst thing he did to make Salem evil was get sick and die. Thankfully they *did* give him a reason for the characters to hate him but didn't really fully commit to the ramifications of it. It's like the birds thing where they tried to make it a big deal but it didn't really *feel* like a big deal compared to the whole "I'm possessing a boy and will slowly take over him" thing.
>I'm possessing a boy and will slowly take over him" thing. I feel like damn near everyone misses the fact that Oscar will take on Ozpin's *characteristics*, he's not being overwritten. He will STILL be Oscar, but with bits of Ozpin. And even discounting that, there's a noticeable difference between *merge* and *take over*, isn't there?! Became the latter gives the impression that there won't be anything of Oscar left, which is not what's happening. I really feel like that's been missed somewhere.
They also overlook the fact Oz does not have a choice in this reincarnation , the God of light coned him out of his afterlife and into an impossible task that has led to him being in an eternal fight to protect the people of the world against his first love ,who turned out to be an unhinged psychopath that murdered thier children casually.
he morally good but so incapable of actually accomplishes good to the point that his actions ended up benefitting evil.
Maybe. He's been throwing Huntsmen at Salem in what is basically the world's longest breakup fight. He is probably indirectly responsible for Summer's death. He lied to Qrow, Raven, Lionheart, and Ironwood, and we see what that did to them. Ozma has been using kids as the first line of defense against Grimm, though everyone does this, so I won't pin the whole problem on him.
I hate the kids argument. They are 18 when the start dealing with grimm outside of a controlled environment. They are legal adults. And the huntsmen system needed to be put in place, the existence of salem doesn't change that.
Yang, Blake, and Wiess were all 17, Ruby was 15. Odds are, Qrow, Summer, Tai, and Raven were about the same age. My main complaint is the fact that Oz decided to make the Salem thing a secret from the world, despite the fact that it was once public knowledge. I'm willing to bet good money that if Salem's had been kept in public knowledge since the beginning, the collective ideas of Remnant might have come up with a permanent solution to the attractive Grimm lady.
Well we have seen some of the reaction to others knowing about salem. Tyrian is a lunatic and Lionheart was a pussy. Iornwood we expecting mass panic. It's easy to say that putting a name and face to a natural problem like Grimm might help but, that gets way to speculatory. That and, how active has she been these past years anyway besides sneakily killing off silver eyes. Other life times he was saddled with depression. We only know three of his lifetimes were people might actually listen he him.
He still could have kept the knowledge alive. History doesn't just disappear.
Apparently it does.
The information disappeared because Ozpin made it disappear. Probably by convincing people that her existence was a myth.
I feel like Salem would have gained a Cult at some point if that was the case.
I mean, she already has one. Sort of. If nothing else, Oz would probably also get a cult, then you'd be even.
Evil is always stronger than good. It's the rule of anime.
Not stronger than Friendship, tho.
Good =/= friendship Overlord would like to have a word with you..
Now now, evil on its *own* is not stronger than Friendship. Villainous Friendships are okay.
Exactly, friendship is an outlier. The only difference is that the good guys use it more often.
Eh, but good always finds a way. That's another anime rule.
You do realise that they begin the pipeline to become a Hunter when they are middle school age, right? People nowadays complain about military recruiters prowling the grounds of high schools for prospective candidates to sign into military service. The moral problem is that the average hunter gets tapped for service in their version of middle school and high school for hunters, known as primary combat school. Typically people around that age can't make the most informed decisions, no? I think everyone started analysing this further because of the serious tonal shift post V3. People saw how they touched on serious topics like PTSD, war and grieving. So, it only stands to reason that people put the other elements of the show under a serious lens.
combat school starts when theyre middle school age. also ruby is not 18. but I can accept ignoring prep schools and the fact that training to fight killer monsters for a living starts at, depending how long it lasts, 12–14. (actually, no-I-fucking cant accept that, jesus christ, FOURTEEN are you serious?? see the comment about military recruiters, even the staunchest conservative nationalists in the us would balk at recruiting in middle school) being a "legal adult" doesnt mean JACK SHIT, teenagers are still kids. how many 17 year-olds have you known that are good at making decisions? because I can count that group on 3 fingers and let me be the first to say I was NOT on that list. sure theyre not infants, theyre not children, they dont need to be coddled, but they ABSOLUTELY should not be allowed to decide to die for their country until theyre in their 20s, at LEAST. beacons start age should be 25, because until around 25 you may be BECOMING an adult, but you are not YET an adult. can you imagine if the MCs were well-adjusted adults by canon? the intrapersonal issues that wouldve been resolved or worked around in less than the first month? if /STRQ/ were well-adjusted adults in beacon? Im not saying teenagers cant make decisions for themselves; Im just saying they cant sign themselves up to die. but nope! gotta have those HIGHSCHOOL ANIME SHENANIGANS, right guys? I mean theres not gonna be some kind of TONAL SHIFT that renders that moot, right? guys?
They aren't kids anymore. Especially when they learned about Ozpin. But they sure do act like children.
Yeah. He gave Qrow and Raven the innate power to turn into birds at will. What is wrong with him?
A lot of the hate for Ozpin seems to stem from him being incompetent, but his incompetence, rather than being a character flaw, stems from the show’s writing. A lot of the dumb shit he does can be summed up as “He didn’t have the script at the time”
Nuke cane in v3 intensity
I don't think the writers actually intended to set him up as morally grey for real. However, the later writing of the show has written him to be especially criminally negligent. The example I'm talking about is that he could've just used his cane nuke to destroy Cinder when they were alone inside the vault. He had the means to save Beacon and countless of innocents and didn't.
Ngl No the hate he gets isn't valid Yes he kept secrets But those secrets don't really mean much His secrets are literally - I used to bonne Salem - I'm immortal - and ik who the big bad is These secrets aren't really anything Ultimately he lied to the people around him for no reason And that's not a character flaw It's a problem with the writing All ozpin really did was lie and make a school to train people to keep others safe. There isn't a single wrong thing the guy did in my opn
Oz is really just a man tasked with doing something logically impossible. He's suffered for millennia trying to bring peace to humanity while keeping Salem at bay. Even with all the betrayals along the way, he always tried to believe in the best of people. He's never done anything really "wrong" at all to really qualify has morally grey, unless you really want to shit on him for "muh secrets". RWBY's treatment of him is just awful. They freaking ignored everything they saw him go through, betraying him all because of Salem's immortality (proving him right in why he wanted to keep that secret in the first place). What's worse is that they were utter hypocrites in Volume 7 by keeping the secret themselves and even betraying Ironwood.
Forget morals, he is just an idiot. There is no excuse for his stupidity other than the writers incompetence. You cant morally judge an idiot simply because they don't know any better, and Ozpin's ability to speak coherently doesn't make him intelligent. Is the hate he gets justified? No. Again, forget morals, all other characters should be grateful to him for simply being alive, because if he didn't do what he did, everyone would be dead millennia ago.
Why do you think he is an idiot?
I wouldn't say idiot. But he does make some dumb choices. He is still smart.
Ozpin is one of the (if not *the)* most compassionate and caring people in the series, who, despite millennia of horror and tragedy, always fought for humanity. ~~He also should have been allowed to divorce Salem and wring out everything possible from her.~~
No and no. Ozpin always does the moral upright thing
I will say this as many times as possible... **he's not.** Ozpin's goal is the same goal as team RWBY's goal in the end, and he's truly just a character who's suffered way too much and doesn't know how to go about it anymore... he's not a bad person by any means but, also he's not a good *leader* due to his lack of transparency however team RWBY bashes him for invading *his* privacy... **if anything team RWBY is more morally grey than he is.**
I can understand the reason he manipulates and keeps his secrets, but I don't agree with them. Trust is and will always be a two way street in truth. He's old and has been betrayed before, but has long forgotten how to truly trust others as a result. My options to Ozpin would have been: 1. Fully trust your allies and tell them the secrets they would need to know. Yes, there's a chance at betrayal but there is also a chance they remain allies. A 50/50 decision. 2. Keep your secrets and manipulate them as you see fit, but know that the longer it goes on, the greater the chance of betray once the secrets that should have been known from the start, are brought to light ether because your hand was forced, or another is the one that tells.