The Lady in the Shoe
"We've fought giant monsters before. This is just a tiny old lady... with one very big robot."
Written by Miles Luna & Kerry Shawcross
Directed by Kerry Shawcross & Connor Pickens
Directed by Kerry Shawcross & Connor Pickens
"You little spider-roaches thought you could creep your way to Atlas?! Well, let's see how your resolve holds out against the might of the Atlesian Military!"
— Special Operative Caroline Cordovin
The heroes must face Cordovin and her mecha as Yang races against time to locate Blake and Adam.
Tropes in this episode include:
- Arm Cannon: The mecha's right arm is a large cannon, which can fire a range of Dust ammunition to achieve a variety of effects. Cordovin attempts to take out the entire group with a blast of Ice Dust from the cannon and then later tries to attack Team JNPR with Gravity Dust. She is also able to destroy Weiss's ice-summoning of a Queen Lancer with a blast from the cannon.
- Attack Reflector: Blake explains that Adam's semblance is like Yang's: they can both absorb the energy thrown at them and send it back at their opponents at will. However, Adam does it by absorbing the energy with his sword while Yang has to tank the damage done directly to her body before she can transform it. Yang lampshades how cheap it is that he can dish out damage without first having to feel it.
- Beehive Barrier: When Cordovin activates her robot's Hard Light shield, it takes on a repeating hexagon pattern, just like the honeycomb hives of bees.
- Bullet Catch: When Maria fires a missile from the stolen airship to try and stop Cordovin from attacking the others, Cordovin manages to use the mecha's left hand to catch the rocket without detonating it. She then throws it right back at Maria, hitting the ship.
- Call-Back:
- When Yang intervenes in the battle between Adam and Blake, it's during similar circumstances to her intervention during the Battle of Beacon. Adam is again standing over Blake having stabbed her in the abdomen, this time unsuccessfully as Blake has fooled him with a clone. Yang again charges Adam, but this time tactically: she launches her motorbike into his body, allowing her to establish a battle position. Adam acknowledges the similarities of the situation by observing that he and Yang have unfinished business.
- While staying at the abandoned farm, Yang hallucinates Adam and Blake tells her that she'll protect Yang from Adam. Yang is very upset by this declaration. Against the real Adam here, Blake tells him that Yang's not protecting her and she's not protecting Yang — she and Yang are protecting each other. This time, Yang is pleased with the declaration.
- Car Fu: Yang enters the fight between Blake and Adam by diving Bumblebee off of the cliffs surrounding them and slamming it into Adam.
- Colossus Climb: The team is fighting a mountain-sized robotic behemoth. Once Cordovin activates the robot's shields, the only way to fight it is up-close-and-personal. Team JNPR has to wait for one of the giant hands to come into reach, allowing them to jump onto it from the cliff they're on and then begin the climb up the arm to get to the main body of the unit. Weiss creates a tabular icebergs for her and Ruby to race across the surface of the sea and work their way up the body from the bottom.
- Crippling Overspecialization: Jaune deduces that the mecha is designed to fight large marine Grimm that attack from deeper waters, which explains the robot's size. It's not very good at manoeuvring into position for aiming its weapons, meaning that it's designed to fight very large targets. Jaune's conclusion is that it cannot handle fast-moving, human-sized targets, so he splits the team and keeps them all moving.
- Deflector Shields: Cordovin can activate shields to protect the mecha from ranged attacks. The shields are made from hard-light Dust and form a hexagonal pattern when activated. It does not prevent people from climbing onto the mecha, however.
- Dramatic Unmask: Adam has been masked from his very first appearance, meaning that his eyes have never been seen. His face without the mask has been teased a few times but never revealed. Once he has defeated Blake, he removes his black blindfold, revealing his face to be scarred over the left eye. His healthy right eye is bright blue, but his scarred left eye has red sclera and a grey and black iris. A massive branding mark has been burned onto his face saying SDC, revealing that the Schnee Dust Company is responsible for his injuries.
- Dynamic Entry: Yang races to Blake's rescue on her motorbike. Blake's cat ears pick up the approaching engine, allowing her to use her clone Semblance one last time to distract Adam and move out of the way just in time for Yang to appear — not on the same level as her, but from the cliff above. Her bike goes flying through the air to slam into Adam knocking him back from Blake.
- Eye Scream: Adam takes off his blindfold to reveal what he's been hiding behind the mask he normally wears. His left eye has a red sclera and grey-black iris. Over the left side of his eye, a massive brand has been burned into his face simply stating 'SDC'.
- Genre Savvy: As Oscar uses his vantage point in the airship to try and identify the location of the mecha's shield generator, Ruby suggests over comms that it might be on the back because in the video games she always plays, the giant bosses always have shield generators on their backs. Weiss interrupts the conversation to complain that Ruby's being stupid because this isn't a video game. However, Ren identifies the location of the shield generator is exactly where Ruby guessed it would be.
- Hard Light: The mecha has the ability to create shields to protect it from ranged attacks. Cordovin describes the technology as hard-light Dust, something Atlas excels in producing.
- Humongous Mecha: Cordovin's mecha is a gigantic robot that even towers over cliffs. When it stands in the sea, it's so tall that the water only laps at its ankles. Its right arm has a missile silo in the upper arm and the lower arm ends in a giant cannon that can process a variety of different Dust types to attack with different effects, such as blasting ice, gravity Dust, or wind.
- Improbable Aiming Skills:
- When Cordovin fires a missile at the airship Maria and Weiss have hijacked, Ruby is able to destroy it by firing a single Dust bullet from her sniper-scythe.
- When Maria fires a missile at Cordovin, the mecha's previously clunky arm is able to catch the missile in mid-flight and without detonating it. It's then able to throw it back at Maria with enough precision and accuracy to hit a fast-moving airship.
- Mark of Shame: Adam's face has an SDC brand burned into his face, right over his left eye. Ever since he was introduced, he has never been seen without his mask on his face, hiding the scarring. He only shows it when fighting Blake to make a point about how he feels that, despite all the hurt and scars he's received in his life, no-one has ever hurt him the way Blake has done.
- Psychological Projection: A lot of the insults Adam hurls at Blake have been character flaws he has presented. He accuses her of cowardice, but he abandoned his own men at Haven Academy to be arrested while he escaped; the White Fang turned on him for doing that. He calls her selfish but he is the one determined to stalk her across the continent just to drag him back to his side regardless of what she wants. Blake simply calls him delusional.
- The Reveal: Adam has a history of attacking SDC facilities and cargo and taking enjoyment in killing SDC personnel, but his face is never seen unmasked. When he finally reveals his face, it's to emphasise the permanent scarring he's suffered as a result of an SDC brand having been burned across his left eye. The left eye itself is also shown to be unnatural, with a red sclera and strange greyish iris.
- Stepping Stones in the Sky: Ruby uses her speed Semblance to dodge a rain of missiles by leaping onto the top of them and using them like stepping stones to get closer to the mecha that's firing them at her.
- Super-Senses: As Adam stands over the defeated Blake ranting, he can't hear the approach of Yang's motorbike. However, Blake's feline ears detect both the noise and direction of the oncoming vehicle, meaning that Yang's bike smashes into the body of the oblivious Adam while Blake manoeuvres safely out of the way.
- Wrecked Weapon: During his fight with Blake, Adam overpowers her and cuts her sword in half in the process.
"We're protecting each other."
