Cinder 101

Of all the characters in RWBY, the one who receives the most misguided, blind hatred is definitely Cinder Fall. Nearly every discussion of this character, her role as an antagonist, or her personality produces a horde of angry, passionate people who either despise Cinder for doing her job as a villain, or, more commonly, deride her for being “bland” or “not having any motivation”. Even worse is the amount of people who think her character boils down to her “just wanting power”, despite how laughable this view is in the face of her actions in the show.

The RWBY fandom, for everything good that’s come out of it, seems almost completely averse to doing any form of deeper analysis of the show. So many people cannot do any inferencing or analysis beyond surface level, and if someone dares to look into the show beyond that, they’re told to “not take it seriously” or informed that RWBY is “just” a “dumb action show, IE, fans denigrating their own favorite anime in order to prevent anyone from taking a deeper look at it. Because of this, I have heard people argue that "RWBY didn't have a plot until V3" despite the fact that all of V3's plot was the payoff to the setup that occurred in V1 and V2.

What I intend to do here is to explain for those who are somehow unaware, or misled by popular statements about Cinder, her motives as a character. In it, I will be relying entirely on canonical information put forward in RWBY and its associated side material. And on that topic, a note about Jeff Williams’ image songs.

According to both Jeff himself, as well as Miles, who has brought this topic up at panels and on directors’ commentaries multiple times, the image songs for various characters are based on canon info. Now yes, there are exceptions. Not Fall In Love with You was written decades before RWBY and re-used for the episode due to lack of any other song to go there, as mentioned by Jeff at RTX 2016.  All Our Days was written for Casey Lee Williams and isn’t about any particular RWBY character. Cold was written as a tribute to Monty, not a song about Pyrrha as popularly believed. But aside from these exceptions, RWBY’s soundtrack is canonical. In an article entitled “RWBY Composer Jeff Williams on His Creative Process”, Jeff discussed how he bases the songs off of secret, behind the scenes info about characters’ inner thoughts, beliefs, pasts, and futures. He wrote Boop years before Renora became a thing on-screen in Vol 4, he wrote I May Fall about the events of V3 back in 2013, etc. Miles talked about how he wrote Bad Luck Charm back in V3 after Miles told him about Qrow's curse, but he wasn't allowed to put the song on the soundtrack. The songs are canonical information, deal with it.

Now that’s out of the way, we can get into the meat of things.

What is Cinder’s goal? What is her motive? In short, it is to overthrow Ozpin’s secret cabal which rules Remnant from the shadows and censors human history, and to destroy the Hunter Academies. She views these academies as brainwashing camps misleading the people of Remnant into becoming sacrifices for a plan they don’t understand. If this sounds familiar to you, that’s because her boss Salem has the same exact views and goals. (As an aside, this is yet another reason why Salem is unnecessary—she offers nothing that Cinder doesn’t offer already as a character.) Let’s get the elephant in the room out of the way. Cinder does not “just want power”. If she “just wanted power”, why would she put so much effort into making Ozpin look bad and humilating him publicly? Why would she destroy Beacon and work with a group looking to destroy the Hunter Academies? Why would she put so much effort into framing Ironwood for her attack and telling everyone that he was a tyrannical dictator? That claim simply does not line up with her actions whatsoever. Obtaining the Fall Maiden’s power was merely one step in her plan to defeat Ozpin, and it allowed her to kill Ozpin’s current host body. It is a means to an end, nothing more.

Now onto the facts. Let’s take a look at some things Cinder has said on-screen and things others have said about her. I’ll do this prior to my analysis of the soundtrack, as while her theme songs are much more explicit, they may not be as accessible to the audience.

Back as early as Vol 2, Cinder explicitly said that “It's not about overpowering the enemy. It's about taking away what power they have. And we will, in time.” This refers to seizing the reins of power from Ozpin’s cabal rather than simply becoming more powerful herself, something which is plainly obvious in the context of her character.

In V3E7, when Cinder attempted to recruit Adam for her plan, we were never shown what she said to him initially. But we did hear Adam refer to her plans as “a human cause”. She then said herself that she was “Working on a revolution of her own”. Earlier in that episode, Cinder told Emerald that she would “question everything she knew”. This is Cinder opening her eyes to the truth about Remnant and the Hunter Academy system.

Now to the most direct material. Cinder’s speech after Penny’s death. While many dismiss this as simply her trying to cause a panic so the Grimm would invade, given that the beliefs she states in this speech are nigh identical to both her statements in her image songs, as well as the things she’s said and others have said about her. Of particular concern are:

“This is what happens when you hand over your trust, your safety, your children, to men who claim to be our guardians, but are in reality nothing more than men. Our academies' headmasters wield more power than most armies, and one was audacious enough to control both.”

“Or perhaps this was his message to the tyrannical dictator that has occupied an unsuspecting kingdom with armed forces.”

“We, the citizens, are left in the dark. So, I ask you, when the first shots are fired, who do you think you can trust?”

While Cinder is definitely lying about Yang and Pyrrha’s responsibility for their actions, and about her involvement in the Breach, this is because those actions were deliberately performed in order to make Ozpin look bad. Cinder isn’t going to win the populace over with abstract discussion of political philosophy. Merely framing her opponent for murder and terrorism like she did is a sure-fire way to turn the populace against their overlords.

With that out of the way, let’s move onto the songs.

Sacrifice is the place I direct those who deny Cinder’s motivations to first, and for good reason. It’s her main image song, and is the most explicit about her in particular. The amount of confusion about this song is near legendary. Many people believe it’s about Raven, or is from Cinder’s perspective but directed at Salem for some reason. This isn’t helped by the fact that various youtube music uploaders have used misleading images, such as fanart of Pyrrha, to adorn it. Sacrifice directly samples a leitmotif heard on the series’ score and referred to by the composer Alex Abraham as “Cinder’s theme”. This leitmotif plays whenever she’s on screen. It’s the part heard in the beginning, except with a drumline over it in the full song. The song is also very clearly directed at Ozpin given all of the lyrical parallels with Divide that I’ll get into later.

I will also note that the song’s first two stanzas suggest Cinder was someone who was a former hunter working for Ozpin whose eyes were opened to the truth, and realized that he was not the benevolent man he seemed.

Here’s the lines of note:

“All your faith in ancient ways,
Leaves you trapped inside a maze.
Take the lives of those you need,
Sow the death then reap the seed.
Reap the seed."

“Show them gods and deities,
Blind and keep the people on their knees.
Pierce the sky, escape your fate.
The more you try the more you'll just breed hate and lies.
Truth will rise,
Revealed by mirrored eyes.

What if all the plans you made,
Were not worth the price they paid?
Even with the lives you stole,
Still no closer to your...
Goal.”

Given whose perspective this song is from, it’s most likely that the “mirrored eyes” are not actually Ruby’s eyes, but rather the flaming-winged eyes of the Maidens. Cinder will expose the truth to the masses as she ascends to become the Fall Maiden. Also, I’ll note the reference to “gods and deities” used to “blind and keep the people on their knees”. Ozpin is the one promoting a religion in order to back up his claim to rule Remnant, not Salem. The idea this song is directed at anyone else is simply idiotic.

Now onto When it Falls. If title doesn’t make it clear enough, this song’s bridge is a direct reference to Cinder’s speech, but it’s got some additional stuff in it. Of particular interest:
“You placed your faith in fools
And now you'll smother in lament

They play the part of allies
Claiming peace their only goal
But once the fight for power starts
They'll eat each other whole

Their iron gloves point fingers
They'll wage a war of blame
And mankind will wilt in pain”

This song is basically Cinder gloating about her victory over Ozpin’s cabal and how all of the casualties that are a side effect of her revolution are their fault, for lying to the people and setting up a system that had to be destroyed.

Finally we have Divide. While this song is Salem’s theme, her and Cinder have nigh-identical beliefs. In addition, there are obvious parallels with Sacrifice:

”Sacrifice them
For your needs”

“I’m not your sacrifice”

Then the rest:

“It was you who ended their lives
Made them to dig their own graves
With your dark, sick, cruel design
Convinced them their world could be saved

Have you no shame?
Signing them up for your war
Train them to fight what they can't beat
Your sins are what they'll pay for”

This is the most explicit reference to the brainwashing nature of the Hunter Academies and the use of the hunters as meat-shields to uphold Ozpin’s order, a cause they don’t even understand. As we saw in V4, Ozpin has an ulterior motive for controlling Remnant. He’s trying to cling onto macguffins which grant him the ability to reshape the world in his image. These are things the hunters serving him aren’t even aware of, and neither are the civilian governments which Ozpin pretends to be subservient to, but in truth has more power than they ever will. We see this directly with Pyrrha being pressured into becoming the Fall Maiden, sacrificed just as Cinder said. We also see how Ruby is given a messiah complex that almost gets Qrow killed and puts her and her friends in danger.

Finally, we’ll discuss one final song. It really puts the head-in-the-sand nature of the fandom in perspective when Ruby Rose herself, the aformentioned girl with the messiah complex, is more willing to question Ozpin and look deeper at the show than the fanbase is.

From Time to Say Goodbye:

“Were we born to fight and die?
Sacrificed for one huge lie?
Are we heroes keeping peace?
Or are we weapons?
Pointed at the enemy
So someone else can claim a victory?”

I’m sure I don’t have to explain what “Sacrificed for one huge lie” is alluding to. It should be clear at this point. Cinder is a revolutionary anti-villain, one who believes the ends justify the means in ending the secret tyranny which grips Remnant. Whether you agree with her or Ozpin more is a matter of opinion, but what Cinder believes is a matter of fact. This is not a struggle of good versus evil. Blake said it best, there is no such thing as “pure evil”. This is law and order versus chaos and freedom, simple as that. Whether you choose to sacrifice your freedom for the sake of safety, or to fight against those who would take it is up to you.

Hopefully this cleared up a lot. I’m just trying to make the obvious more visible to those who somehow haven’t seen it. Denialism and hatred for Cinder run rampant in the fanbase, and going into the future, I want as little misinformation going around as possible. Thanks for your time, I’ll see you later.