RWBY: Ice Queendom

Episodes 1-3

Honestly, Ice QUEENDOM was a long time coming. When RWBY first debuted, it was a phenomenon that resonated with nerds across the Internet far and wide. Off the back of Rooster Teeth's previous online successes and animation genius Monty Oum, RWBY went on to be one of the most popular web animations of the past decade. If anything, the only surprising aspect of RWBY crossing the bridge into the anime medium is the fact that it took this long to happen, especially considering how popular the series supposedly is in Japan.

I followed the webseries at the height of its popularity and got as far as the end of season five before I started to fall off of it. That said, I still harbored a huge respect for what the franchise originally represented to a lot of people, and I requested Ice QUEENDOM to review because I was curious to see what this anime experiment was going to look like.

As it turns out, Ice QUEENDOM is an alternate retelling of the original story. These three episodes hit a lot of the same story beats as the original web series, developing things with the foresight of plot points that would get introduced later while also introducing elements that, to the best of my knowledge, were hinted at yet never formally introduced in the original story. In my opinion, the first two seasons of the original RWBY really aren't that well-written; while the story does start to hit its stride by the third season, there are some plot points and character backstories that clearly felt shoehorned in when they could have been introduced more organically had they been planned ahead of time.

I bring this all up because the first two episodes of Ice QUEENDOM do exactly that: they set up the starting points for all of our characters a bit better, and provide a more solid foundation for establishing their character journeys. Ruby is introduced over the grave of her mother who she still feels a strong attachment to. We can immediately get a sense of how close and dependent Ruby is with her sister, and how that plays into her lack of world experience. There's even an implication that Ruby is probably imprinting on the oldest and most prominent woman in her life out of a fear of loneliness. Weiss gets introduced alongside her emotionally distant and borderline manipulative family, and the deft framing and subtle direction serve to highlight the burden she is carrying. Blake's segment is cut down significantly compared to her introduction in the original series, but the facial animation and directing help to convey a strong sense of longing as she tries to leave a dangerous life behind her in pursuit of a more righteous one. And Yang acts very much like a forward yet mindful older sister. Everyone's arcs are clearly laid out and built upon which organically leads into the dynamic that the four of them would end up sharing once episode two comes along. The point is that these are all individuals with their own baggages, and they need to try to come together in spite of that and eventually form a cohesive team.

Some fans might be a little bit caught off guard by the amount of focus Weiss receives in these initial episodes of Ice QUEENDOM, to the point where her issues almost seem to overshadow the others. However, RWBY arguably never had a singular main character to begin with, and it feels like the production crew realized that Weiss' baggage had the potential to grind against everybody the most. So I think it was a smart move to focus on her as the impetus for the problems that all of these characters need to resolve both as individuals and as a team. I also like the fact that Weiss' dynamic with Ruby is made a bit more hostile compared to the original; it serves to highlight Ruby's immaturity as the youngest of the group without sugarcoating the pressure that Weiss seems to be dealing with, which can be a difficult balance to pull off.

However, Ice QUEENDOM does begin to lose some steam after the second episode. I'm not a fan of how episode 3 introduces way too many plot points while simultaneously omitting stuff that would have made them land with a lot more impact. The biggest example of this revolved around Jaune and his team. While I think their introduction is also a lot stronger here compared to the original – and I like how Jaune's abilities as a leader as well as his insecurities are better highlighted – aside from his relationship with Pyrrha, you don't really get a sense of how strong their bond is as a team. I feel like the show wanted to create a parallel for team RWBY by introducing a team that gels well together despite their own insecurities, especially with Jaune's team entering his dreams and confronting monsters that feed off aura and trap you in a dreamscape of your insecurities. However, the payoff for this entire sequence is built on those strong bonds that they all supposedly share but that we haven't seen a lot up until this point. I'm not sure if the show thinks that was already implied or if it's relying a little bit too much on fans filling in the blanks, but it was jarring. Honestly, I think the material in episode 3 could have easily been split into two episodes.

Episode three also flashes between a lot of different scenes and events across season one of the original RWBY, introducing characters and fast forwarding to conversations that weren't supposed to happen for a while. There are times where it works, like fast tracking to the confrontation between Weiss and Blake that their first conversation is already leading towards. But other times the introduction of characters and even some of the editing can be confusing, as if the show suddenly wanted to frame things through implication rather than through organic storytelling.

And that is genuinely a shame, because I do think Ice QUEENDOM has the potential to tell a more contained and enriching story compared to the original. But seeing the seams already start to show once it starts trying to find a balance between anime original material and elements from the original webseries is worrying. I hope the issues in episode 3 don't become a pattern throughout the rest of the show because I don't want that strong start as well as some amazing animation and voice acting to go to waste. I would like the show to add on to RWBY's legacy rather than repeat the same mistakes that I feel like the webseries sometimes makes.

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RWBY: Ice Queendom is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.