Hey, everyone.
So, due to the Blake Character Short, I'm sure some people are on a Blake high. I'm not. But, I'm not really a Blake person. There are things I like about Blake, and then there are things I really don't like about Blake. Speaking of which, I was looking at the view counts on my blog, especially the ones for my RWBY posts, and Blake doesn't seem very popular.
Looking at my Top 10 Reasons series, Ruby seemed the most popular with 109 views, Weiss was second with 62, Blake was third with 55, and Yang came in last with 36. I thought those results were quite interesting because I thought both Weiss and Yang were more popular than that, but I never expected Ruby to be so much higher and Blake to be so low. Then, while looking at the RWBY: The Novelization posts, the "Red" Trailer was the most popular with 98 views, the "Yellow" Trailer was second with 87 views, the "White" Trailer was third with 85, and the "Black" Trailer was last with 50.
Now, while we may conjecture that older posts are bound to have higher views because they've been up longer, however, I don't usually see posts get very many views after they've been released. And, Yang's "Yellow" Trailer met and beat Blake's "Black" Trailer within a week. So, why is that Blake doesn't seem to be all that popular? This requires some investigation.
Alright, so, some people may think it odd that I thought Blake was that popular. Why did I think that? Let's take a look at a few factors.
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| The resting bitch face doesn't help. |
1. She's A Cat
Cats are popular in anime. Hell, they're popular in Japan. Probably because of the lack of space and time, so cats are preferred to dogs. But, I look at anime and video games, and I see a lot of cat furries. For whatever reason, they're one of the most popular anime character tropes. In the anime Omamori Himari, one the main characters, Himari, is a cat demon. And then in Outlaw Star, there's a whole alien race of cat-people called the Ctarl-Ctarl, and catgirl Aisha Clan-Clan is one of the main characters. Another thing about these catgirls is that they're usually over sexualized which usually nets them a big audience despite the ears, tail, and possible fur and rough tongue.
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| (Left) Himari from Omamori Himari (Right) Aisha Clan-Clan from Outlaw Star |
Looking at Blake, while not sexualized but still sexy, I would've thought some of this ideology would've boosted her numbers. And, cats are popular in the States. I mean, we're almost a decade removed from Icanhazcheeseburger.com, and yet, cat memes can still be found on the Internet. So, why hasn't Blake seen a popularity boost? Is it possible that she isn't catty enough, or that RWBY doesn't have as much of a sexual appeal as Omamori Himari and Outlaw Star? It's possible. I once was a member of a RWBY FB group where they showed a cosplayer dressed as Ruby and her skirt was much too short and her tights showed the full shapeliness of her rump. Many in the group were horrified by the slutty and "trying too hard" depiction of Ruby. So, perhaps it takes more than just a pair of ears to make a catgirl a catgirl, and RWBY just isn't sexy enough.
2. Arryn Zech
This may seem strange to some, but the fact that Arryn voices Blake should boost her popularity. Why? Well, Arryn actually has a decent popularity herself. Many think she's the cutest thing ever and the cutest of the VA's. I remember seeing an interview she did somewhere in LA, and the comments were chock a block full of people fawning all over her. I wanted to puke because I didn't see what the big fuss was. So, shouldn't Arryn boost Blake's popularity?
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| Don't look directly into her eyes. It's easier not to like her that way. |
Well, maybe, but there's no rule stating that just because a VA is well liked, the character will also be. For example, I quite like Serana from Skyrim, Rise Kujikawa from Persona 4, and Lucina from FE: Awakening, but Laura Bailey... enh. She's talented, but so what. She's not Rise. And, Tara Strong is pretty, and I can't imagine anyone else doing Rikku's (FFX, X-2) voice, but Tara Strong isn't Rikku or even Lollipop Chainsaw's Juliet Starling. So, why should Arryn's popularity be Blake's? Shouldn't Blake earn her own?
3. Black Sun/Eclipse
There are some people out there who really like Black Sun. Hell, some people really like Sun. That, or they really like his abs. So, one might expect to see some people like Blake by proxy. I mean, I started liking Pyrrha more due to her involvement with Arkos. (That and she was brutally murdered before her time.) So, why wouldn't people like Blake if they like Sun?
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| Can you hear the fangirls screaming in the distance? |
Well, do you remember my argument for the VA's? Yeah, that just as easily applies here, so I guess that's an argument shot to hell. And, there's no rule stating you have to like the person your friend is dating, despite what that one episode of Scrubs said. It may be funny, but that doesn't make it right.
4. Bumbleby
Ah, the dreaded Bumbleby. I may dislike Illia, I may think Adam is a douche, I may have lost respect for Torchwick, Neo, and Mercury, and I may abhor Cinder, but when it comes to my true RWBY nemesis, there is none greater than f*cking Bumbleby.
I'm not going to go into it, but looking at how popular Bumbleby is, again I would've thought Blake was popular due to this ship. You look up RWBY ships, and the first one to pop up is Bumbleby. It's not unusual for me to see at least a few Bumbleby pins on Pinterest when I search for RWBY stuff. Hell, I sometimes see something pop up in my general feed. Add to that, Blake and Yang were shipped ever before they were officially made partners. People really like the Bumbleby. So, I would've thought that meant Blake was popular, but it doesn't seem like she is.
This of course raises questions about Bumbleby, firstly, why is it so popular? Is it because of Yang? Is it because black and yellow complement each other? Or is it because non-canon shippers are just dreamers with too much wishful thinking? What is it about Bumbleby that appeals so much to people? If it isn't the characters themselves, what the hell is it? Because if you remove the characters from themselves, remove the characterization from the character, then the ship is utterly pointless because the purpose of seeing two characters in a relationship is to see the characters interact with each other in an intimate way, which they can't do if they aren't themselves. From a writer's perspective, it's fundamentally wrong! It's a mortal writing sin.
Anyway, it would seem that Bumbleby itself is popular, but Blake or Yang by themselves are not. Take one of them out, and it's no longer the same thing. It's like if you removed the Brad Pitt from Brangelina leaving Angelina Jolie and no one giving a f*ck anymore. Weird, weird, weird.
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| Sorry, Angelina. Without Brad, no one cares. |
So, now that I've gone over the reasons why I thought Blake would be popular, let's look at what I feel are her two biggest shortcomings.
1. She's the Hardest to Get to Know
When it comes to adding characterization, it's best done by finding out what a character thinks, how, and why. Now, while you can do that in a TV show, i.e. Scrubs, it's better to have characterization shown through character action and dialogue. And Blake being Blake, she doesn't speak or do much resulting in her not being known very well. And you can't really like someone, for who they are, unless you know them.
Looking at Blake, it takes really emotional encounters to characterize her. Like when she was arguing with Weiss, when Yang was trying to get her to slow down, when she reconciled with her father, and when she was talking to Sun after he got hurt. And unfortunately, this pattern is getting old. It's great for her character, but the other three haven't needed such confrontations to build their characters. So, not only is Blake difficult to get to know, when we do get to know her, it's always in these emotionally tense scenes, and that may not reflect well upon her.
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| Why do we always have to meet Blake's character under these conditions? |
2. Her Story is Stuck in Second Gear
Blake has slowest character development. Looking at the fall of Beacon and then all of Volume 4, Blake reverted back to the days when she ran from her problems rather than standing and facing them. Volumes 3 and 4 were big deals to our girls. It made them see where they were weak and in what way they'd need to get stronger. Yang learned that she can't solve all her problems head on and with brute force, Weiss learned how to be truly independent from her father in order to rebuild her family name, and Ruby learned that the life she chose is actually really dangerous and it won't be all fairytales and happy endings. But, what did Blake learn? Hmm...
You could argue Blake learned that running from her problems doesn't solve anything. She ran from Adam and he came back with a vengeance. She ran from the battle at hand to seek respite at home, but learned that the White Fang's violent influence is farther reaching than she suspected. She may have also learned that you can't run from a boy who genuinely likes you and is willing to do some shady things to keep up with you.
Sure, Blake decided to go after the White Fang and take it back by the end of Vol. 4, and she reconciled with her parents, but her story sort of stagnated. She started her Vol. 4 arc by running away. It wasn't until Illia injured Sun that she realized she couldn't run from the White Fang anymore. By this time, Yang had already made peace with her arm being gone and had started training again, Ruby was facing the fear of losing another loved one and possibly losing the rest of JNPR, and Weiss was mastering her summoning and preparing to leave.
Blake develops more slowly than the other three, and she falls back on her old habits more often than the others. I mean, Blake's been running away since her trailer. And, this is something that even hardcore Blake fans like my associate Blake Belladonna from RWBY Wonderland is sick of. This is the real problem with Blake--she's still moping over her past and is still afraid to face it. True, her past has real horrors in it, and that should set her up for an epic redemption arc, but after viewing her character short, I'm not imbued with a lot of confidence. Maybe Kerry and Miles just don't know how to write a story like Blake's. Maybe Monty had a much more direct influence on the show's writing than we all thought. Or maybe even Monty didn't know what to do with Blake. But, it is entirely possible that Blake's story just takes longer to go through because it is so much more serious. But, it's still very difficult not to see how slowly her story's pacing is when compared to the others. Maybe she's too serious a character for a project like RWBY.
So, where does this leave the question of Blake's popularity? Well, this post helps illustrate why she isn't as popular as some people thought and it illustrates the weakest parts of her story. But, to some extent, it does put her story into a perspective that will buy her some time to get her sh*t together. But, it better happen real quick.
Anyway, that's it for now. In the next post, I'm going to go over my personal theory as to why I don't think Sun will be Blake's Pyrrha.
Keep writing, my friends.
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