Steven Universe

[JustAName]

Niiiiiiiiiiiiiice

[Merrymaker_Mortalis]

It's back.

[Jamfalcon]

Well, I finally got around to starting the show a little while back. And now I'm all caught up.

Sooooo... yeah. That's a pretty great show. I like that it works on so many layers and has appeal for such a wide audience, and that different groups (ages in particular) are going to get very different things out of it, but I think almost everyone will get something.

I only wish it'd been around when I was younger. Eight-year-old Jam would've wanted to be Onion. Though to be honest, so does present-day Jam. I think it's also a sign that I'm into it when I got way too excited about the Lil Butler reference in the last episode.

[Merrymaker_Mortalis]

I'm curious how children will see the mature themes in the show. The corruption is very dark!

[JustAName]

I do love how they keep addressing these themes in easy to approach and understand ways, too. Alone At Sea, in particular.

[Merrymaker_Mortalis]

That episode was about an abusive relationship and astonishing how well the analogy worked at explaining it without it being not child-friendly.

[JustAName]

I'm not rewatching Mr. Greg and crying a lot, you are.

They just had that grief for so long. I'm so happy.

[Merrymaker_Mortalis]

The show does a good job of presenting you with what looks like a whimsical filler episode which suddenly has some significant plot developments.

[JustAName]

(Take a moment to think of just...)

[theknightofiron]

(...Flexibility love and trust)

a fantastic message built into the most recent episode.

this is my first time posting in this thread but i freaking love this show.

[Merrymaker_Mortalis]

I think the message is great, and I am happy people are feeling support from the song.

But I do feel sad that I don't feel like I have a Steven for my Connie, or a Ruby for my Sapphire.
The closest person is hundreds of miles away and I won't be Abel to see him anytime soon.

[azninsect]

I've only just jumped into the Universe. I'm...really enjoying it.
I'll need to binge all of it. All...of...it

[NebulosDisconcertion]

Done now!
Here's a bunch of tangential thought wandering:
Wikipedia referred to Sapphire and Ruby as non-binary, which I didn't think was correct maybe? They both seem definitively feminine? So I read the cited article, which says they're literally not binary because gems only have one gender. Okay! That's also the conclusion I came to, except I wasn't sure there weren't males gems who just coincidentally hadn't come up yet. Which sounded maybe like a stretch of coincidence, and then I thought about how long an alien race in some other sci-fi could go with only males appearing, and that's quite a while.
Anyway, between being confused by wikipedia taking things out of context and seeking out the context, I thought 'rubies don't appear to have breasts, is that what it was talking about? That doesn't really make sense.' Several gems don't have breasts, at least Bismuth* and rubies pretty definitively don't, but it's a cartoon and the character designs are not done with sex appeal in mind. It's kind of hard to tell. Rose certainly does, and in fact she's by far the most human looking of any of the Gems. But her skin is a human colour because she's rose quartz and is pink, she could just as easily be blue quartz.
Also just now I realized the gem hole in Rose's dress is the same shape as Lion's mane. 'What's the deal with Lion anyway' is probably the question I'm most looking forward to having addressed.

*Just did an image search. Wow, bismuth crystals really look like that. Those are really nifty. Kind of want one now.
Also I was deeply suspicious of her the whole time. I'm not sure if I should feel slightly smug or if that was intentional.

Thematically-off-message Because-I-felt-like-it off the top of my head battle ranking not including fusions other than Garnet because that would complicate things:
Garnet
Jasper
Lapis**
Pearl
Amethyst
Steven***
Peridot

**With access to a small domestic swimming pool. With the ocean she'd be higher, and with no water a lot lower.
***disregarding his totally OP powers of friendship and understanding. Also; Tank. Healer. How good is that? So good!

[MetricFurlong]

Also I was deeply suspicious of her the whole time. I'm not sure if I should feel slightly smug or if that was intentional.

I wouldn't consider it worth getting smug about pretty obvious foreshadowing, but then again apparently I tend to overestimate general audiences' ability to pick-up on that.
Honestly, in terms of implicit stuff, the episode Bismuth also has a fair amount of implications about Rose Quartz. Maybe nothing quite as potentially significant as what Monster Reunion seems to be hinting at once you know about the Pink Diamond situation, but combined with what else we've seen about her, I think there's definitely room for some interesting stuff about her. Assuming the series can ever be bothered to get off its arse and just commit to telling a story of course, which I'm afraid is something I don't have a lot of hope for at this point.


In regards to the non-binary thing: while it's technically correct, I wouldn't put a lot of weight on it, personally. As it is, it strikes me as being the sort of thing that's mainly only going to be of interest to the "no, see it totally doesn't count as gay because reasons" crowd (see also: the asari from the Mass Effect videogames).