Hey everyone, this is Hailey from Cartoon Universe!
This is going to be my first RWBY video after Volume 7 started, and this is actually going
to be a video released while the season is still airing.
We are in at the tail end of a two-week break, so I jumped on the opportunity to discuss
the show when I will have enough time to make a video before an episode comes out!
And for those of you who are wondering about my thoughts on the new volume, I am really
enjoying it!
I love the new characters, am glad Penny is back, and am super happy that we not only
got to meet Willow officially, but also got some hints at some STRQ backstory.
It’s been a good time, and I am really excited to see where the rest of the volume takes
us.
Lots of crying, apparently.
But today I want to discuss a character I have only briefly mentioned prior in a video.
And that is the insane scorpion faunus, Tyrian Callows.
He didn’t interest me too much at first, despite the fact that he is a freaking scorpion
faunus that is an amazing fighter, since I am not the biggest fan of characters that
are this crazy seemingly without reason.
Not to mention his unwavering devotion to Salem and slightly grotesque mannerisms.
But then, I got to thinking about his backstory, and that got me a lot more interested in him.
And with the release of the World of RWBY book and a lot more scenes with him in Volume
7, there is now quite a bit to talk about!
So in today’s video, let’s talk more about Tyrian’s past, semblance, and his ultimate
fate!
If you enjoy the video and want to stick around to see me make more RWBY content, make sure
to subscribe!
To begin, let’s talk about his semblance, since, as I have mentioned before, a semblance
can sometimes tell you more about a person’s past.
Initially, people were uncertain if his ability to poison people with his stinger was his
semblance.
But the World of RWBY book clarified that it is more of a special ability of his since
he is a scorpion faunus.
Then my friends came up with the idea that perhaps his semblance had something to do
with metal or weapon detection.
In his fight with Qrow, we see how he almost effortlessly dodges pass all the swings and
shots made with Harbinger.
Not only that, but he is able to deflect all of Ruby’s bullets with his tail while he
wasn’t even looking in her direction!
It was only when Qrow decided to use his hands and actually punch Tyrian that he was able
to get some real hits in.
It doesn’t seem to be exactly that, however there could still be a reason as for what
this happened other than Tyrian not anticipating that attack.
I’ll get to that later, but for now, let’s talk about what we saw of his semblance.
For those of you that didn’t catch it, it looks like episode 6 of Volume 7 finally gave
us an answer to his semblance.
In the episode, he goes on his little murder spree in an attempt to frame Penny, killing
many thirsty moms and others in the process.
But in order to get Penny in the right position, to make it look like she was attacking Robyn,
he wanted to get Fiona out of the way.
He creeps up on her and his eyes and right-hand start to glow purple.
With his right hand he slashes her, making her aura melt away from the spot of contact.
Then with his other arm he cuts her with his weapon, and with no aura to shield her, she
takes the hit and gets a huge wound on her stomach.
Not that there was really any doubting that being his semblance, but Forrest’s voice
actor confirmed it anyways.
But what are the specifics of it exactly?
Well from the looks of it, upon contact he can make the aura on an entire person’s
body retract, allowing it to be damaged from any small hit.
I love Pheonix Night’s possibility for it, as he said it was like aura poisoning, which
would actually make perfect sense for a scorpion faunus.
It even looks like he is channeling his aura into his hand, making himself vulnerable for
attacks himself.
An eye, for an eye, if you will.
But even if that’s not exactly the case, this is still an extremely powerful semblance.
Without auras people can easily get hurt or even die from cold weather when the heating
goes away… oh.
Now of course I cannot forget the connection this gives him to Jaune Arc, who I mean of
course I love to talk about as much as possible.
But I want to save that for last!
So before that, I have some thoughts on Tyrian’s backstory!
In the episode Worst Case Scenario, we learn a bit about where he was before he was with
Salem.
We learn that he has been apprehended in the past for murder, assault, and kidnapping,
and was only caught with the cooperation of both officers and a Hunstman by the name of
F. Pickerel.
While being transported on an airship from Mistral to Atlas, a swarm of Grimm attacked
and killed everyone on board, except for Tyrian, who was considered missing ever since.
From the way he calls the Grimm beautiful, I think we can presume that it was Salem that
sent these Grimm for him, and this was the first time they had actually been in contact.
Perhaps she saw the chaos he was causing on his own through her seer grimm, and thought
he would be a good asset.
She saved him from what seemed to be life in prison, or whatever Atlas had in store
for dangerous Faunus.
I should also note that Tyrian’s allusion is the parable of the Scorpion and the Frog,
which has its moral being that some people are irredeemable.
So Tyrian is clearly the Scorpion, and it looks like we finally got our frog with Pickerel,
which is a type of frog.
In the story, the scorpion kills the frog even after the frog allows it to ride on its
back across a river, which parallels the show since it was likely Tyrian that ended up killing
Pickerel.
If his semblance does in fact leave him vulnerable when he attacks, this also goes along well
with his allusion, since in the tale both the scorpion and the frog drown once the frog
dies.
Sure, it is good to finally get some backstory on him, but this doesn’t quite satisfy me.
Who was he before he was a serial killer?
Surely there is more to his story that this.
And I have kind of come up with something!
This might sound a bit messed up, but that’s usually how my backstory headcanons are.
And for Tyrian, I’m sure the crazier the better.
So anyways, this backstory came to me while listening to Tyrian’s leitmotif video.
This basically highlights all the musical moments in the RWBY soundtrack that are associated
with a character.
Starting around the 1:30 mark, I began to get very circus-y vibes.
I don’t know much about instruments or anything like that, but from the fast tempo to the
organ whistles we hear, it definitely sounds familiar.
Not to mention how much his leitmotif can sound like a music box, where calmer moments
wind up to become louder and faster.
It really has that circus feeling, but creepier and chilling, at least to me!
Everything in RWBY is very intentional when it comes to music, so I formed some ideas
around this.
What if Tyrian was more or less born into a life in the circus, where he was constantly
put on display and forced to perform tricks?
This would explain his acrobatic abilities.
But the faunus trainer that worked at the circus was cruel and clearly treated the faunus
he held captive horribly.
The scars Tyrian has could be from being whipped for years, which is commonly seen with animals
in the stereotypical scenes of a circus performance.
Life in captivity and being treated like an animal in this manner would drive anyone insane.
We even have evidence that Faunus have long been treated terribly to the point where they
were put in cages for all the view.
Anyways, perhaps Tyrian heard rumors of someone that could control Grimm, and wanted the most
powerful people are her henchmen, and he wanted to get her attention.
Something must have happened where the ringmaster slipped up or Tyrian just straight up destroyed
the circus and escaped, but eventually this lead him to become a serial killer, not only
seeing revenge on humanity which had severely wronged him for no reason other than being
seen as a freak, but also to get the attention of his goddess.
His semblance makes it super easy to kill people, making it perfect for him.
Eventually all this killing does attract the attention he was seeking, and now he is truly
a force to be reckoned with.
But we do know that Tyrian does not seem to have a grudge with just humans in particular,
but just living beings as a whole.
So perhaps he was simply an outcast from wherever he was born.
There is the theory that he was born in Vacuo, which is a very unforgiving land, especially
when one has no tribe to call their own.
Perhaps that was the case with Tyrian, and it drove him insane.
This is all just of course my speculation, and we may never get more insight into his
backstory.
If you have a different Tyrian origin story in mind, tell me in the comments section!
Now finally let’s talk about where the show may be going with Tyrian.
Now it’s pretty clear that he has a huge role to play in the season.
He is doing a lot of the heavy lifting in all of Watt’s schemes and has one of the
highest kill counts on the show so far.
With all this focus on him, it makes sense that there will be another Tyrian battle coming
up in this volume.
And what do you know, one of the things we have yet to really see from the volume 7 intro
is Tyrian vs. Qrow and Robyn.
This is definitely a battle that makes sense, because Qrow vs. Tyrian is a fan favorite
fight.
Looks like Tyrian might want to finish what he started last time.
But I don’t see this being the end for Tyrian.
There is one thing that I am begging for the show to resolve.
Mostly since I love Jaune and I am still wondering what the heck Tyrian meant by this line.
“Now you do interest me” Tell me your secrets, scorpion man.
Now initially I figured he was interested in noodle boy because he is pretty clearly
an Arc.
The emblem being on his shield makes it a dead giveaway, but Tyrian checked him out
a bit more just to be sure.
The Arc family has a very long and important history, which we don’t know too much about,
but I speculated on it a lot in my first RWBY theory video.
But with the reveal of his semblance, there is another possibility which has come about.
Perhaps he was interested in Jaune due to not only the amount of aura he possesses,
but also due to his semblance Aura Amp.
This semblance is very useful, as it allows him to give his own aura to others to heal
injuries.
But he can also strengthen his own defensive aura, and even in some ways heal himself very
quickly after a hit.
So it is pretty clear that Tyrian and Jaune have very contrasting semblances, to the point
where one can almost negate the other.
I can see it being possible that Tyrian knew Jaune had a ton of aura and fancied him to
be someone interesting to battle.
The ability to detect auras is something we have even before.
For example, Fox is able to do it, as showcased in the novel After the Fall.
I talked more about his abilities in a previous video, which you should also check out.
This actually brings me back to what I was talking about before with Qrow being able
to only hit Tyrian when he used his fists.
Huntsmen are able to channel aura into any type of weapon and object.
And if Tyrian is able to sense aura to such a high degree, perhaps this gives him a huge
advantage over anyone using a weapon.
Then again wouldn’t Qrow’s fists also have aura?
I don’t really know, but for all we know Tyrian being so good at dodging weapons is
just part of his senses that he naturally has as a scorpion faunus.
So this is another piece of evidence that these two are destined to once again clash,
even if it is not in V7.
We also have people pointing out the colors of their auras, which resemble those of the
Gods of Light and Darkness.
Which is crazy but all I can say is that I’m worried for my boy.
But being able to fight Tyrian, either with the rest of his team or by himself, would
really show how much Jaune has grown as a character.
Tyrian and Jaune are very much opposites, although in a different way than Jaune and
Cinder are.
And being able to fight such an important villain and not getting horribly defeated
would show how much he has actually improved.
And now that Jaune has officially unlocked his semblance, if someone nearby gets hurt
by Tyrian’s poison, Jaune can easily step in and help heal them.
Jaune has always been one to be willing to sacrifice himself to save others, and perhaps
Tyrian would want to put his abilities to the test to see how many people he can actually
save when he is needed.
Kinda like what Cinder did to Weiss, but on a much larger scale.
Or you know, the whole eye for eye thing, and the JNPR death theory could become another
25% true.
Finally revealing Tyrian’s semblance is actually getting me more excited about what
the writers have in store for Jaune.
Combining all of his training with the possibility of him learning how to extend his aura and
his even more upgraded weapon, and he is turning out to be someone Pyrrha would be extremely
proud of, more so than she was already.
Volume 7 hasn’t exactly been a big season for Jaune so far, except for the hair cut
and the moms that were after him because of that, but I am still loving the little ways
that he is growing.
So I managed to turn this into a Jaune video, which honestly isn’t that surprising knowing
me, but as I said before I am a lot more interested in Tyrian now.
With all that said, what do you think the writers have in store for him?
Not like there was any question about it, but he is a character that is very much incapable
of redemption.
Who do you think will be the one to take him down?
Will Volume 7 see the end of Tyrian, or will he be causing chaos for a lot longer?
Let me know!
If this is your first time watching a video of mine and you want to see more, make sure
to subscribe!
I might try and get another RWBY theory video out before the volume ends, but I am not sure
that will be totally possible.
And if you want to help support the channel, we have a Patreon!
Any support really helps and is greatly appreciated.
We also have a new host on the channel, Post Storm, who is making RWBY videos.
His first video, about Oscar’s semblance, may be out before or after this video gets
uploaded.
At the time of recording this I am not 100% sure.
Thank you all for watching and have an animated day!