Recap / RWBY V5 E14 "Haven's Fate"

RECAP:
Index | Character Short 1 | Character Short 2 | Character Short 3 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14

Volume 5, Episode 14:

Haven's Fate

"That's all that matters... that we're all here together. Right?"

Written by Miles Luna & Kerry Shawcross
Directed by Kerry Shawcross, Gray G. Haddock & Miles Luna

"You don't know the first thing about strength! You turn your back on people, you run away when things get too hard, you put others in harm's way instead of yourself!"

— Yang Xiao Long to Raven Branwen

As the battle for Haven reaches its conclusion on the surface, Yang confronts her mother at the relic vault.

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Tropes in this episode include:

• Advice Backfire: Back in "Known by Its Song", Raven advises Yang to question everything she's been told, so Yang decides to do just that by calling out Raven on her cowardice and her irrational perception of strength. By the end, Raven can only whisper a tearful apology before fleeing the Vault in shame.
  Yang: I'm starting to ask questions, like you said.
• All There in the Script: When the Seer Grimm drags Leo off-screen to kill him, it stabs him in the back and then through his head.
• Anti-Climax:
  • The volume appears to be setting up a fight between Blake and Adam during the finale. However, although Blake stands up to Adam, he bails instead of fighting her when he sees his forces being arrested.
  • By the time Yang reaches the vault, Cinder is gone and Vernal is dead. All that is left is an open Relic chamber and Raven. Instead of fighting over the Relic, Yang calls out Raven over her perception of strength, and demands she hand over the Relic. A distraught Raven agrees to let Yang peacefully claim the Relic as Raven hightails it out of there.
• Armor-Piercing Question:
  • Yang questions Raven about the previous Spring Maiden's fate as well as her motives. After Yang asks her "Did you kill [the Raven Taiyang told her as a child] too?", Raven's inherent cowardice comes out as she desperately attempts to justify her strength and irrational behaviour, only to be immediately rebuffed. From that point on, she emotionally disintegrates while Yang grows increasingly dominant.
  • Adam confidently tells Blake that he's made powerful new friends in Salem's group. Sun simply asks him where they are, pointing out that for all his talk about having allies, none of them are rushing to help him. When Adam looks around, seeing his men being rounded up and arrested, he realizes that Sun's right and ultimately escapes Haven.
• Calling the Old Woman Out: Yang calls out Raven for her cowardice: opting to murder the last Spring Maiden and take her powers because she wouldn't get stronger, and preferring to hide away from Salem and her forces rather than actually fight them. It reduces Raven to tears and leads to her fleeing the chamber out of regret and leaving the Relic to Yang.
• Cowardice Callout: Yang during her Calling the Old Woman Out speech to Raven tears down the latter's Social Darwinist delusions and exposes her for the Dirty Coward she is, calling her out on how she runs away when things get too hard and she's always letting others put themselves in danger for her whilst never returning the devotion. The fact that Raven reluctantly relents to allowing Yang, her own daughter, to take the Relic of Knowledge and in doing so put herself in Salem's crosshair so that Raven's own skin will be saved, puts the nail in the coffin and proves Yang's point.
• Determinator: As everyone else is on their last dregs, Nora notes that Hazel's Aura is recharging far faster than she's ever seen. Qrow theorizes that he's making it work through sheer willpower.
• Didn't Think This Through: Raven planned to steal the Relic to keep Salem away from her tribe. However, Yang points out to Raven that if Salem was willing to pursue her when she thought Raven was only harbouring the Spring Maiden, then Salem will put Raven on her hit-list upon learning that the latter not only is the Spring Maiden, but is also carrying one of the Relics she's after. Thus, Raven has no choice but to let her daughter take the Relic.
• Group Hug: When Blake joins with the rest of Team RWBY after the action dies down. Seeing that Yang accepts her return, Blake is brought in for a hug with the other three girls.
• Ironic Echo: In "Known by Its Song", Raven tells Yang to question everything Ozpin tells her about himself and the war with Salem if she's willing to find Ruby and Qrow. Taking her mother's advice to heart, Yang proceeds to repeatedly question Raven about everything she's told her.
• Mercy Kill: Raven tries to justify killing the previous Spring Maiden with this trope, saying that the latter didn't live up to Raven's standards and she would have been hunted for the rest of her life with those powers. Yang calls her out on this.
• Not Afraid of You Anymore: Blake makes it clear to Adam in no uncertain terms that she's no longer intimidated by him. Her standing up to him, coupled with Sun backing her up and his men getting arrested, leads Adam to bail.
• Oh, Crap!:
  • When the Queen Lancer that Weiss summons is destroyed, she reacts with shock and alarm. It was the only thing that had been able to impale and restrain Hazel as a result of his ability to feel no pain.
  • Lionheart panics when Ruby takes a potshot at him that breaks his aura, forcing him to run for it as he's now vulnerable. He also has a similar reaction when he realises Salem's about to kill him for outliving his usefulness.
• Please, I Will Do Anything!: Having his aura break and the tide of the battle turning on him, Leo pulls a Villain: Exit, Stage Left and tries fleeing for his life. However, when Salem catches him with her Seer Grimm, Leo promises to find her and do anything she says. Salem, on the other hand, decides he's no longer useful and kills him almost immediately.
• Rewarded as a Traitor Deserves: Leo has served as Salem's mole throughout the volume, passing her information from Ozpin's inner circle such as the location of the Spring Maiden, and forging transcripts to allow Cinder's team to enter the Vytal Tournament as a cover so they could bring down Beacon Academy. He also used his seat on the Mistral Council to give Salem the location of the kingdom's Huntsmen so that they could killed off. However, once the plan to destroy Haven and obtain the Relic of Knowledge fails, Salem decides that Leo's outlived his usefulness. When he tries fleeing for his life, Salem has her Seer Grimm kill him.
• Silent Treatment: During their conversation, Salem decides Leo's no longer useful and falls completely silent. Her refusal to respond to his bargaining causes Leo to have an Oh, Crap! moment; when he tries killing the Seer Grimm that's facilitating his communication with her, its tentacle bats his weapon from his wrist. Leo then attempts to flee, only to be killed offscreen. Salem can only call him a coward after he finally dies.
• Sound-Only Death: To kill Leo, Salem has the Seer Grimm drag him off-screen. The creators confirmed on the DVD Commentary that it stabs him in the back and then through his head, but the viewers only hear the sound of him being stabbed twice while he pleads for mercy with his dying breath.

• The Stinger: In the post-credits stinger, Taiyang waters his sunflowers outside his house in Patch. When he suddenly hears feathers rustling overhead, however, all Taiyang can do is sigh as he sees a black feather landing near him.
• Talking the Monster to Death: Yang makes Raven aware that she's not as strong as she thinks she is, saying that she's not only trying to bolt to save her own skin but taking the Relic will make her a target on Salem's hit list. Faced with the prospect of allowing Yang to take the Relic, a distraught Raven can only watch as her daughter enters the vault and they apologise to each other.
• Tears of Remorse: Yang criticizes Raven for attempting to flee for her life and murdering the Spring Maiden for being too weak to handle being hunted. After Yang makes it clear she's willing to stand up to Salem, even if it frightens her, Raven permits Yang to become Salem's next target by taking the Relic in her place. It reduces Raven to tears as she apologizes and flees out of regret.
• That Woman Is Dead: As part of her Calling the Old Woman Out speech, Yang briefly mentions that, according to Taiyang, Raven was a complicated person who fought for what she believed in. When Yang gives her Armor-Piercing Question about whether Raven killed that version of herself that her father described, it causes Raven to stop dead in her tracks and emotionally disintegrate.
• Villainous Breakdown: Emerald collapses to her knees in tears when Yang comes up with the Relic and Cinder's nowhere in sight. She clutches her head and screams as she conjures up a giant image of Salem that affects nine people simultaneously. The effort knocks her out, but Hazel is able to grab her and flee with Mercury.
• Villain: Exit, Stage Left:
  • Adam flees when his forces are arrested and Blake and Sun are about to double-team him. Sun tries to pursue, but Blake realizes that he's trying to lure them apart and pick them off. As a result, he loses the Fang's support.
  • When Yang returns with the Relic and Cinder is nowhere to be seen, Emerald has a Villainous Breakdown, and while the heroes are distracted by the giant Salem illusion she conjures up, Hazel grabs her and flees with Mercury. Adam, who is also fleeing, watches the team from the trees.
  • A subverted example occurs when Leo attempts to escape Haven Academy once he's defeated by Team RWBY. Salem, on the other hand, isn't in the mood to just let Leo flee; he's Killed Offscreen by her Seer Grimm.
• You Have GOT to Be Kidding Me!: Hazel, Emerald, Mercury, and Leo are fighting the heroes to a standstill, with Hazel obliterating Weiss's Queen Lancer, but when Leo is shot by Ruby and his Aura breaks, he has an "Oh, Crap!" moment and flees, leaving the other three to fight an uphill battle. Mercury isn't amused and invokes the trope.

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♫ We'll stand undivided
Our futures aligned
A new brotherhood
This time. ♫