RWBY's third season marks a massive shift in the show's tone. The first two seasons were fairly light-hearted and fun, with excellent action. Season 3, on the other hand, gets really dark, and the series is all the better for it.
The third season of RWBY seemingly starts off as a tournament arc, as the students of Beacon fighting their way through a big tournament. However, halfway through the season, things take a more sinister turn. Cinder and her team starts messing with the tournament, Pyrrha learns about the secrets that the faculty has been keeping, and by Episode 9, Penny is dead and the high school is attacked by Grimm. This season feels like a culmination of everything RWBY has been building up to, all of the characters and villains make big appearances in this crazy final battle, and the sheer amount of shocking twists and heart wrenching emotional moments form some of RWBY's most compelling episodes. Season 3 does have a bit of a slow start that mostly follow the lines of a standard anime tournament arc, but once things start to spiral out of control, this season is leagues better than the first two in pretty much every way. Season 3 proves that RWBY can definitely pull off dramatic beats incredibly well, especially in regards to Jaune and Pyrrha's storyline this season. Pyrrha gets a lot of focus as the school wants her to be the next Fall Maiden while also dealing with her feelings for Jaune. It's pretty obviously setting up Pyrrha's death at the end of the season, but it's done so effectively. Team RWBY gets some great stuff too, particularly Blake who has to deal with Adam's return.
In terms of presentation, Season 3 is a big and noticeable improvement on the first two. The lighting is better, the characters are more expressive, and the animation is far less janky. Monty Oum passed away during this season's production, so he only worked on parts of the action. As a result, some of the setpieces aren't as polished as the ones from Seasons 1 & 2, but I think the team does a good job of maintaining Oum's sense of energy and deliver some great fights for what is obviously a very fight-heavy season. Speaking of which, I think Season 3 might have a bit too many action scenes this time around. Almost every episode has a fight in it, and since a lot of the action are tournament fights, it can feel a bit repetitive. It's the worst in the first half, with episodes like New Challengers that are pretty much entirely devoted to progressing the tournament. Don't get me wrong, these fights are cool, but did we really need to see Sun and Neptune's team fight for an entire second half of an episode?
Season 3 has a lot of highlights, especially in its second half:
Fall: This episode was the turning point for the season, and is easily one of RWBY's most iconic episodes despite being a bit of an exposition dump. This is the first time we learn about the maidens and relics, which is a massive game-changer for the series. We also get Yang's awesome fight with Mercury and the subsequent shocking cliffhanger ending.
Destiny: There aren't any fights during this episode, but I think it stands out as one of RWBY's best character-driven episodes. Yang deals with the fallout of the false accusations, and the scene where she asks her team if they believe her is excellent. Even better, Pyrrha dealing with her destiny is incredibly compelling, especially when she accidentally takes her frustrations out on Jaune.
PvP: This is the episode in which everything completely falls apart. Pyrrha's fight with Penny and Ruby's desperate chase to stop the fight is incredibly thrilling, until Penny's shocking and heartbreaking accidental death and the climactic reveal that Cinder had been manipulating the tournament the whole time.
Heroes And Monsters: Easily my favorite episode of RWBY (at least so far), this episode has everything. Velvet finally reveals her secret weapon and it's absolutely badass, the fight between Ruby and Roman is a climactic and satisfying end to his character, and the devastating ending where Yang loses her arm and Cinder becomes the Fall Maiden is a perfect set-up for the season finale.
End Of The Beginning: Ending this amazing season on an amazing note, this finale changes everything. Pyrrha's final battle with Cinder and subsequent death is easily the highlight of the episode, but we also have the devastating splitting up of Team RWBY, Ozpin's fight with Cinder that's so fast we can't even see most of it, Ruby using her silver eyes for the first time, and the insane reveal that the goddamn narrator was a bad guy the whole time! And thus ends one of the gutsiest and most mind-blowing seasons Rooster Teeth has ever put out.
Overall, RWBY's third season takes a more dramatic turn but it absolutely pays off. Despite a somewhat slow start, the second half of this season is shocking, intense, climactic, and easily contains some of the most compelling moments in the show.
5/5 Stars
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