Nora Valkyrie & Lie Ren

The problem with the Ren and Nora focus is that in a Volume about getting over the end of Volume 3, their plot had fuck and all to do with that and focused on something that happened a decade before hand and led to a rather lackluster climax and this is a large part of what Ruby is shifted to the background for. Hell it even goes back to Volume 1 where after team RWBY is officially formed the next 2 episodes and parts of the last 2 imply that there will be an arc about RWBY working on building their connections and overcoming personal issues with each other as team building, only to have 2/3 of the last 6 episodes be a Jaune arc that feels like it goes on way too long and most of what is brought up in it ends up irrelevant. Then the last two seems to give a decent amount of the focus on two new characters and as such feels like the character conflict between Weiss and Blake is rushed to the end while also starting the Blake's White Fang arc which has fuck all to do with 3/4 of team RWBY which probably killed a lot of investment and didn't do wonders for the Fanus racism stuff when Sun being astounded by it. And give Ren something to do, too. If you're desperate for ideas, try something like making him insecure/sensitive about having a sucky Semblance. ANYTHING would be more interesting than him just standing there. Ren and Nora were not important to RWBY's story. Their back story added nothing to the plot and completely derailed us from the other characters that we should have been focusing on. Jaune and Ruby should have been the ones to get that screen time, not Ren and Nora. Or better yet, they could have just written it better and had a little more personal interaction between them than barely any at all in the last three episodes. Samantha Ireland: "Nora is getting a backstory in Volume 7!" Cell: "Okay, but why though?" Don't get me wrong, I've been wanting them to make Nora more than just a satellite love interest for Ren for the longest time, but they had that opportunity back in Volume 4 and they blew it. It's this weird thing you see bad writers do in their shows like in the case of RWBY or Netflix's She-Ra, where the writers just don't know how to develop more than one character at a time so only one character gets any actual focus (usually when it makes no sense for them to be focused on at the time) and the rest of the cast become glorified extras until it's their turn. Also, why now? They're in freaking Atlas, are you meaning to tell me that Nora somehow made it to Ren's hometown in Mistral from Atlas? How? And if the fan theory turns out to be true that the Nuckelavee followed Nora, does that mean that it tracked her from Atlas? Again, how?! Mistral is across a freaking ocean from Atlas, I don't exactly see either of them swimming or being able to take a boat there. It really doesn't make sense to give Nora backstory at this point after it's been so long. I think it'll be pretty ham-fisted and poorly done like Ren's backstory, if they even do it at all. It just seems like the current showrunners have no idea what a storyboard is. I mean six volumes in and now they allegedly decide to show Nora's backstory? I'm not an expert but it's not hard for a show to follow some sort of structure. Trying to rack my brain over how Nora was an orphan in a town full of rich people that thought it was a good idea to live away from the cities with no guards to protect them and Grimm prowl around a lot more frequently so I can go into the season with low expectations. So possibility 1 is that Nora just tagged along in a caravan when the townsfolk were leaving the city because she was an orphan prior to that. Anything else that involved an uncle and aunt throwing her out on the streets while in the town would be extremely stupid considering they are attracting Grimm in a defenseless town. Possibility 2 is that Nora is dumb lucky like Yang to survive in the woods but not get jumped by Grimm and stumbled upon the town. But then again since they're in Argus now there has to be a comparison... So how the fuck did Nora get to Kuro Yuri!? Oh God her backstory is going to drag on isn't it!? As much as i like Nora, i think there are people who need more of a backstory than her, like Cinder. We still have no idea what she is doing in the ENTIRE show besides power and a backstory would at least explain why is Cinder doing what she is doing in RWBY.

Physical Description

Special abilities

Why I don't like Nora's semblance. This is something that has bugged me for quite some time, pretty much ever since Volume 3 Episode 2, the episode where we first saw Nora's semblance. This is one of the most unlikely to ever be used semblances a huntsman could have. Nora's semblance relies entirely on her opponents or allies having some kind of electricity type weapon or ability that she can absorb. This is ridiculous even from a storytelling perspective as they have to make there be optimal conditions for Nora to use her powers. Case and point, the fight between JNPR and BRNZ. In this fight, not only did one of her opponents just so conveniently have a cattle prod as his main weapon, which is ridiculous considering he's a huntsman and is training to kill monsters that are far larger than anything a cattle prod is going to do anything against (maybe it has different voltage settings I don't know we never see). Yeah nice monster slaying weapon...... But the even bigger problem with this fight is the storm that is conjured at the top of the mountain in the latter half. This storm appears to have no real purpose, just like the sun in the SSSN/NDGO fight later in the episode. If they showed that the storm was some kind of hazard that would cause lighting strikes or strong winds to complicate and challenge the resourcefulness and instincts of the of the combatants then that would be different. But it's not, it's literally there just so Nora can become overpowered and destroy the competition. This has even worse implications than just the ones for the fight itself, but I'll save that rant for another post. This brings up a question I'm surprised no one has brought up, or maybe they have and I haven't seen it. Why doesn't Nora carry any electric type dust around with her? She doesn't have any, which doesn't make any sense. Her pre-timeskip outfit has a large harness that was implied to carry her grenade launcher, but her Volume 4 outfit loses the harness, but she carries it in the same place, so why have the harness? Why not give her a pouch or two to imply she might carry some equipment with her, I mean why not? Having it so that Nora doesn't carry dust with her at all times quite frankly makes her look like an idiot, which is not a trait I like to associate with characters I'm supposed to take seriously. Nora is bubbly and hyper active, but she is not stupid. She is clearly a capable and skilled huntress and the idea that she of all people would not think to carry the dust type that would basically give her a way to activate her semblance whenever and wherever she wanted is ridiculous to me. Nora shouldn't need her teammates to help her activate what is supposed to be special about her. She doesn't have talent that is just waiting to be unleashed, you could argue she's one of the most skilled fighters in the entire show. So you can't argue that her personality is in line with her semblance and mimics it well. If a semblance is supposed to be a physical manifestation of a person's soul, than why does Nora not have the ability to actively take in electricity? This would make it not only more versatile (if only slightly given hunters fight creatures in the wild with no electricity nearby 99% of the time), but it falls far more in line with the the kind of person Nora is. Nora takes the Frontline, the tank that pushes the attack and takes the big hits. You might argue this makes her overpowered, but it doesn't. Not only would she need a decent charge of electricity to even get her semblance to activate in the first place; but we have seen in this volume that they are going to be going up against opponents who can completely handle their abilities with relative ease. Or did Tyrian not prove this? Look how easily he's blocking her! Nora's semblance brings up one other flaw with its idea, how did Nora even discover she had this power? You know how everyone else in the series has some easy to understand power where the circumstances of how they discovered their abilities could have happened on a daily basis? Not in Nora's case, the circumstances in which would allow Nora to discover her semblance are so few and convenient it's ridiculous. Take the main four for example, Ruby might have been running one day, suddenly she goes extremely fast. Weiss is training, discovers her glyphs while in practice. Blake gets scared during a protest gone bad, leaves behind a clone. Yang gets angry one day, punches a hole in the wall. See what I mean? The circumstances literally every other character in the show would have gone through to unlock their abilities are things that could have happened at any time in their lives. Chances of getting struck by lightning or stepping on a faulty telephone wire? Miniscule at best, virtually impossible at worst. If her power had been what I had suggested, which is for to have the ability to actively drain electricity from machines and other sources by grabbing onto them. Like I said before, she would clearly still have to carry around electric dust since machines won't always be around for her to take electricity from, but it would make her much more versatile and drastically increase the odds of her discovering her power, since it could have been something as simple as touching a television or playing a video game, or using any other mechanical appliance that needs electricity to function. It seems obvious to me that Nora's semblance was not given the consideration it deserved because the team wanted her power to be electricity based due to her character alluding to Thor, the Norse god of thunder. It was also a severe lack of foresight on the creators part, as Ren and Nora barely got any screen time in the first or second volumes, so their semblances were not really a concern as they wouldn't be seen for a long time. But when the time came to show off Nora's power, they either didn't look back on what they did, or they went with the first idea that came to mind without thinking about the implications of the power and how they made it virtually worthless to her. The fact that they didn't think about this for Volume 4 either is what really baffles me. Just to expand a little more on the disconnect between her semblance and her personality and why I feel like it outright contradicts it, we all know Nora is not passive. Nora is the most aggressive of team JNPR and RNJR as she should be. How does a semblance like this, which once again is supposed to be a physical manifestation of a person's soul, mold itself in a way that requires other people to bring out it's full potential when that is just not Nora. To put it simply, it feels like Nora was being designed around her concept instead of the concept being designed around Nora. The character comes first, who they are comes first, make the concepts you create work around them not the other way around because the character is what we care about. This stuff with her semblance just annoys me as it shows the creators not taking every individual element into account when considering things about their characters. Every element is important, no matter how small it is in the grandiose of the story. I hope everyone at least found some interest in this post, I might be doing more posts based in more analysis for now, since I don't have as much time to do fan art. Please leave a comment if you have anything to add or any counterpoints to make. I want to know if I might have missed anything. Thanks for reading!

Mental characteristics

Personal history

Nora gets a backstory but nothing for Ruby. Why do RT hate my girl? It really doesn't make sense to give Nora backstory at this point after it's been so long. I think it'll be pretty ham-fisted and poorly done like Ren's backstory, if they even do it at all. My ideas for a backstory for Nora would be really simple. She's one of many children in a huge viking family of huntsmen and huntresses that's based on members of Thor's family from Norse mythology. They're rich since they're really good at their job and the way she knows Ren is because his family was also rich and they've known each other since they were kids cause their families live near each other and attend the same high class events. Ren's parents forbade him from becoming a huntsman because they want him to take over their business and Nora sticks by him even not going to a combat school so that she can stay in normal school with him. Then she manages to convince him to pursue his dream of becoming a Huntsman so they both run off together and go to Beacon. Ren and Nora are pretty much mostly sidekick buddies to Jaune, yeah - they had their sidequest arc, now they just hover in the background, with occasional lines to remind us that they exist. Thus leading to the awkwardness that they're around, have been around and hanging out with the main cast for, what, weeks, months? And yet have no actual on-screen relationships - what do Weiss and Nora think of each other? No idea, I don't think they've actually talked. I'd say it's more Jaune who developed at the school then his team. Nora and Ren don't develop at all (Closest thing Ren has to that is his arc in V4) and Pyrrha doesn't really get much development until her final volume. They also don't really have much team development, either. Pyrrha gets instantly fond of Jaune for some reason (Who wouldn't love a loser who cheated his way into Beacon and constantly hits on a girl who's clearly uninterested in him), Nora has one or two small moments with Jaune and Pyrrha each, and Ren has one scene with Jaune (Where Jaune acts like they're super close while Ren seems as confused as the audience). At least RWBY had some (minor and short-lived) friction between them early on. The closest thing JNPR had to that was that stupid scene in the Vytal Festival where they get hung up on team names. Outside of that, they get along easily with each other. Why not have Jaune getting annoyed with Nora for being Nora, Ren getting frustrated with the group all being really noisy at once and showing some emoshuns, the rest of his team learning about Jaune faking his way into Beacon (Remember when that was a thing? The show didn't after the bullying arc.), Jaune learning Pyrrha helped him with her semblance and him confronting her about it, just some sort of interesting conflict beyond "X is crushing on Y, but they don't wanna tell Y because they're worried it'll ruin their friendship", something I've seen in a dozen stories before and after RWBY. I personally think Terra and Saph were forced and were not needed. They have the same problem as Ren and Nora as they're seen as a couple and not individuals and their only trait they have is that they are gay. This also doesnt help when this couple was just to prove that they could do bumblebee and that Barbra wouldn't shut up about it at panels. But that's just my opinion, agree or disagree I'm okay with either. Also we really don't need any relationship at all in the series and that includes straight couples like Ren and Nora. Unless it's the parents of someone then fine that's fair but as of now let's just have everyone be friends as why does this matter to the plot of destroying the root of all evil?

Mental Trauma

Ren and Nora maintain a night watch rotation between the two of them, a holdover from their lives as orphans in the Grimm-ruled wilderness. They have trouble sleeping without knowing someone's on guard, and will sometimes even silently patrol the student dorms. It has given Jaune and Pyrrha reason for concern. Trying to convince their teammates of the school's safety has been unsuccessful, as the one and only time the watch was abandoned, Nora suffered a night terror and wet her bed. Team CRDL dares not tease her about it for obvious reasons involving potential leg fractures. Still, Jaune and Pyrrha were not discouraged, and even offered to take some watches, but to no avail. As soon as one of them inevitably falls asleep, Ren and Nora will automatically wake up to maintain the vigilant watch. Thankfully, no sleep deprivation has been evident, as the two orphan friends have trained themselves to fall asleep just about anywhere. Professor Port's class and the library are particular favorites for naptime.

Personality Characteristics

Savvies & Ineptitudes

Nora is a lot more clever than you would first realize and often surprises her team with great insight before lapsing back into her Nora-ness again.

Likes & Dislikes

Nora's weakness is spicy food. Ren has an entire book full of self-written haikus that his team sometimes find on occasions, even if they don’t know who writes them( Ren convinces someone else to write them for him so Nora won’t notice his hand-writing). His writings also contain a lot of snark in them and usually involves the daily antics of his team. When his team mates find out, they’re surprised that it’s “kind of stereotypical of him to write haikus”. Turns out he doesn’t like writing haikus, he just likes fucking with his teammates.

Social

Contacts & Relations

If RW (Ruby and Weiss) were paired with NR (Nora and Ren) what would be their acronym? NWRR (Noir). Yes, with Nora as leader.

Hobbies & Pets

Nora is actually a bookworm, and when not in the field she spends hours engrossed in novels by Teal Degrimm Tyron, a famous Grimm researcher. Ren spends an nearly hour in the bathroom washing his hair. Ren's favorite genre of music is screamo. He wants to start a band. Vale's new top band: Lucifer's Junipers. Nora would obviously be drums. She'd start out on drums, and then get shifted to vocals after Ren and Jaune realised they couldn't afford to replace the drums every week. "For the last time, Nora, no, you can not use Magnhild instead of your drumsticks." Jaune and Ren are actually god-tier at video games and have been trying to beat the other since their first semester. Ren is better at MOBAs and strategy games, but Jaune is better at shooters and fighting games. Ren helps Yang with martial arts( Coolman229's idea).