How do Gems know exactly which Gem they are? Peridot is FACET - 25FL - CUT - 5XG.

We can assume that the latter is based on the placement of their exit holes, since Amethyst is 8XM and was able to locate the hole based on that. It works kinda like a grid system, like row X, column M, and then all of the Amethyst were numbered ‘8′ so maybe thats just the place in the Kindergarten after they run out of letters they move on with the next letter. So, we’ve just made Peridot 4ZZ, so next would be Peridot 5AA? Thats how I’d assume it works anyway.

I have NO idea how the Facet works, but I can assume its to do with the location of the Kindergarten itself, since Amethyst’s kindergarten is in FACET 5, and Jasper’s is in FACET 9.

But how do they know what planet they were made on? Is that the numbers and letters that come after the first number of their facet? Surely with the amount they colonise, some gems would end up having both their facet and cut/cabochon repeated?

Maybe Peridot is from a planet labelled “5FL”??

I would just like to point out that Connie’s new sword is Pearl’s colors and that is ridiculously precious and badass. Represent the gem who taught you, sweetie.

okay, so i dont take part in steven universe discourse (or ANY discourse, for that matter) but just look at this frame from “now were only falling apart”. dont see the problem? look closer

STEVENS FEET ARE OFF THE EDGE OF THE FLOOR HE IS STANDING ON. LOGICALLY SPEAKING, HE SHOULD BE FALLING AT THIS POINT

its not really a big deal, but just think about it. this was drawn in a storyboard, then animated, and edited, and this issue was never noticed? when people talk about the artistic incompetence in steven universe, theyre talking about THIS.

now, i dont really care about this at all. its just unprofessional, is all, and thats why i think its fucking hilarious. the argument that steven universe is artistically unprofessional is validated by frames like these, which is why theres such a large group of people who heavily criticize the show (not to mention other examples of general incompetence, like the lack of model sheets, and the freehand storyboard writing, both of which i dont have an opinion on and are justifiably controversial). thats not to say steven universe isnt a good show. some people say it sucks and have very good reasons to dislike it, while others enjoy it for similarly good reasons. but when you get down to the facts, the fact that steven is hanging off of the floor for this whole shot is so humorously unprofessional that you cant help but not take the show as seriously as it wants you to.

anyway im probably gonna get bombarded with hate for this but fuck it ive been impossibly neutral this whole time im allowed to express how i cant take this frame seriously.

Steven Universe: HARMONY is a five-issue miniseries focusing on Sadie Miller’s personal life and the Gems’ problems associated with a Gem artifact called the Harmony Core. It’s written by S.M. Vidaurri and illustrated by Mollie Rose, with colors by Meg Casey and letters by Mike Fiorentino. The paper issue I bought has the main cover by Marguerite Sauvage!

Plot:

Having figured out that they can activate the controls of the Harmony Core by harmonizing with it–at least one person on the outside, at least one person on the inside–Pearl and Steven connect through the song they established.

Peridot explains that the Core must have been developed to suppress organic populations, but as she mechanically describes how they have to be partially operated from the inside and therefore any number of Harmony Cores could be holding trapped Gems that would have been abandoned by cruel Homeworld commanders after invasions were complete, Amethyst grows angry and sullen. She doesn’t like that other Gems may be left and forgotten, and Steven of course agrees with her. Peridot and Pearl are more practical, saying they need to be safe themselves first and it would be very challenging to boost this signal to space, but Steven wants to try.

They set up a plan to awaken the sleeping humans by sending out a new signal, and Pearl is ready to send Peridot and Amethyst back out of the core as well using the controls she can now access, but she intends to be the one to stay behind and operate it. Peridot and Amethyst elect to stay with her for support instead.

The plan is successful in awakening the humans who had been affected, like Connie, Greg, and Sour Cream, but there are still affected humans associated with the third Harmony Core in the Arctic of Earth. Garnet runs with Steven’s debriefing and goes in search of the third Core, assuring Steven that she’s trusting him with handling Pearl’s messages, not leaving him behind. When Garnet gets to the Arctic, she easily locates the third Core, but it’s implanted on a pretty dangerous guardian and she unexpectedly has to fight it while avoiding letting the Core touch her. It gives her a run for her money.

Meanwhile, Steven, Connie, and the band are trying to figure out a way to get a signal to space so they can reach other trapped Gems and free them. They set on the idea of using an amplifier to summon the Cores to Earth so they can destroy them. Garnet finishes up her battle with the guardian, assisted by Lion showing up to help her, and she accompanies her battle with a melody about being together as one.

When Garnet and Lion return with the captured Harmony Core, Steven and his dad and the others are setting up loads of amps and speakers on the beach. Steven congratulates Garnet on her capture and she says it was easy. Steven delivers the plan to Pearl, and Peridot says it can work since unlike radio waves, the Harmony Core works like Warp Pad technology. Pearl notes that someone will have to stay behind in case the Cores activate and hurt anyone else while they’re executing this mission, and before anyone can stop her, she sends everyone else out, staying behind herself.

Steven is upset, but Garnet is trusting him, so he goes forward with the mission, pressing the Harmony Cores together and starting up his own song. All the townspeople who have gathered begin to harmonize, while from inside, Pearl redirects the signal. Steven’s song is able to reach other Cores out in space, but an unforeseen consequence activates: one of the cores sets off a security protocol, and a huge guardian appears on Earth, with various Harmony Cores all over it. The townspeople helplessly watch as it arrives.

Notable:

1. There are a few typos or mistakes, like the wrong “it’s,” and the word “suppress” is written as “surprress,” and I think when Peridot said “recourses” she must have meant “resources.”

2. Buck Dewey is HILARIOUS in this issue. He just keeps throwing out all his Buckisms, like calmly suggesting they could “get really into minimalism” if they still want to record a demo like they planned, or “free associating” to come up with a solution and then just tossing out random words.

3. Garnet and Lion fighting in the Arctic is super cute. They don’t have much interaction in the show so seeing them being cute together is amazing.

4. One of Amethyst’s attempts to help harmonize included making a fart noise. It didn’t work.

5. Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon. She asked Steven “what did they say?” and when Lion unexpectedly shows up in the Arctic to help her, her reaction is “Lion?!”

6. Garnet got to participate in the musical aspect of this issue, but she didn’t get to do it with the band like the other Gems. Still cool, though Garnet rocking with the Cool Kids is something I still really wanna see.

7. Pearl assuring Amethyst that SHE won’t get left behind is so typical Pearl. She’s aware that Amethyst has abandonment issues and acts quickly to protect Amethyst, even though she’s sacrificing herself.

8. Man, that Arctic Temple is really cool looking.

Point #1:

No, it is not “a headcanon” that Garnet never asks questions. The creators of the show have more than once discussed their intention to have Garnet written as a character who does not ask questions–in explicit terms, no wiggle room. Two examples:

One, from a Toon Zone article in 2015 from San Diego Comic Con.

Conversation with Rebecca and Ian:

Rebecca Sugar: Garnet never asks questions. Ever. She’s sure of everything she says, so if you’re putting this in, she’ll never ask a question.

Ian Jones-Quartey: If you see Garnet ask a question in something, it’s not canon.

Two, from the podcast: Volume 2 Episode 10.

Rebecca Sugar discussed there that one “rule” for Garnet is that she does not ask questions (in her present state, that is; she certainly asked many questions in “The Answer,” before she was sure of anything). Ian and Rebecca knew about the character trope of someone who’s there to ask questions and push the narrative along, and they wanted her to be the opposite. The lack of question-asking also represents a pact with Rose.

Usually, if Garnet wants to ask something without technically asking a question, she reframes it as a “tell me” imperative statement. It’s a technicality she uses to get around asking questions. I made a GIFset of that here.

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173203636572/questions-without-question-marks-youve-heard

So please, do not say Garnet not asking questions is some made-up fan thing. It is not a headcanon at all. That’s an oversimplification and misrepresentation of the situation.

Point #2:

HOWEVER.

You are correct that Garnet HAS asked some questions in the show proper, though the point you made about Sapphire is irrelevant; Sapphire questioning their certainty in forming Garnet does not mean Garnet started asking questions again, but even with that acknowledged, Connie fights with Rose’s sword in the Harmony series so if we wanted to fit it into the timeline, it’d have to happen before “Reunited.”

The times Garnet has asked questions in the show are rare, but they exist. I’m aware of them and even made a GIFset detailing some of them here:

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173473415732/a-few-questions-garnet-supposedly-is

What these are are minor writing mistakes no one caught before airing. They are not proof that this isn’t a canon aspect of Garnet, any more than animation mistakes prove that sometimes characters canonically lose their pants for several frames or change their skin color temporarily.

Rebecca Sugar is also aware that this has happened, and even explicitly discusses being personally responsible for one of them (and regretting it), also on the podcast episode mentioned above. (She says she wrote the line “can’t you see that my relationship is stable?” in the famous “Stronger Than You” song, and she specifically states that even though it’s a rhetorical question, it should not have been allowed.)

Yes, I’m saying the show itself has busted its own canon at times. It happens because it is an imperfect show written by imperfect people. So what I’m saying above in my review, about Garnet’s questions violating canon, also takes into account that the show itself does this every once in a while too. It’s a mistake those times too.

I understand how people can get confused about this but believe the heck out of me, I know what I’m talking about.

That seems to clearly explain that isn’t physically incapable of asking questions, but rather that she chooses not to.

“minor writing mistakes”

are you implying pool hopping isn’t canon? that episode was literally dedicated to garnet doubting herself.

I don’t know why you’re expanding a verbal idiosyncrasy (”Garnet doesn’t ask questions”) into some bizarre suggestion that Garnet also never questions anything, doesn’t have doubts, etc. Garnet does do those things, in many episodes besides “Pool Hopping.” This is meant to be a speech pattern she has, and of course it is supposed to represent the confidence that is usually behind it, but anyone who understands Garnet knows that sometimes her confidence is a show for others. She canonically gets scared, is unsure, gets confused about what to do, makes poor choices. She is an imperfect character who often thinks she has to make herself seem perfect to be a good leader.

You also mentioned her “pact with rose”, which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don’t like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose. People who bring up “garnet can’t ask questions” often mean it in a literal, unable to physically ask questions sense.

I’m not “moving goal posts”, the goal post is; does garnet ask questions. She does. Not often, but she does. The writers don’t want her to, but she does anyways and even has episodes that revolves entirely around that, so it is not simply minor mistakes.

I’m not denying established statements, I’m logically interpreting that they didn’t mean it as “garnet has and will never ask any question whatsoever”, but rather that they seem to not want her to ask questions because they don’t wish to fall into a trope, and also because if Steven and other gems actually asked more questions a lot of the mysteries would be ruined.

Also, just like how “garnet doesn’t ask questions” is a big part of garnets character, a big part of pearls character is that she is often an opposite to amethyst, she doesn’t like eating food or drinking liquids, she prefers to be neat, she considers thing logically and carefully, she doesn’t like to be impulsive, and more.

Does this mean when her character develops over time and we see her do the opposite of what she normally would in last one out of beach city that it’s somehow not canon because it breaks the rule of how she’s usually written? Of course not.

If you claim that something happening in the cartoon means it is canon that it happens, then I guess you’re also saying Bismuth sometimes makes her pants vanish and Amethyst sometimes switches back into her old outfit and Marty’s face sometimes canonically appears in Greg’s hair. Those things weren’t supposed to happen, but they did, and they were published, and the writers can’t really fix them now. So what I said is that the comic made the same mistake.

“You also mentioned her “pact with rose”, which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don’t like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose.“

Really? So I just dreamed the podcast where Rebecca Sugar discussed “a pact with Rose”?

You didn’t listen to it, or you don’t remember it, and now you’re trying to call me out on things you have no business pretending to have knowledge of. Stop saying things are “headcanons” when you don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’d like to listen to the podcast I linked above, Volume 2, Episode 10, the phrase “a pact with Rose” is part of A SENTENCE REBECCA SUGAR SPOKE. I didn’t make it up. Things the creators say about their characters are not “headcanons.” It’s really annoying that you’re being dismissive about things you haven’t checked out.

When you say “”””people”””” bring up “Garnet can’t ask questions” as if it’s a physical impossibility–comparable to Pearl’s previous inability to speak about Pink Diamond, I guess–you’re reaching again because YOU ARE ARGUING WITH PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT ME. I didn’t say, and am not saying, that Garnet’s speech pattern is a physical impossibility, and you keep talking to me like you know that’s my position. Why in the world would you say “well other people say X” as if it’s an argument I must be making? In fact, I’ve argued with those people too–people who theorized that Garnet might have been commanded by Rose to not ask questions in a similar way that Pearl was unable to reveal Pink’s secrets. I argued with them because I DON’T BELIEVE THAT. Do not bring up other people’s arguments, which I haven’t made, as if they represent my position.

Your statement suggestion you aren’t moving goal posts:

“The goal post is; does garnet ask questions.”

NO. THAT IS NOT THE GOAL POST.

The statement I made–stop changing what you think I’m saying–is “Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon.” (If you scroll up, that’s literally cut and pasted from my comic review. It is what I said. Not “does garnet ask questions.”)

I’m saying it’s canon that she isn’t supposed to ask questions. When she does, that breaks the intended canon. And, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I’m saying the cartoon has broken its own canon several times, and small errors do not establish overall rules. The creators Rebecca and Ian are still saying in very recently released podcasts that they don’t intend Garnet to ask questions. I’m sure they also intended Bismuth to keep her pants on. They are telling you, without any ambiguity, that they have this writing rule about Garnet and they are also SPECIFICALLY TELLING YOU IN THAT PODCAST that they know they have accidentally broken it before.

Now, I do understand the logic of “if a character is observed to have done something, we should be able to assume they do it,” sure. But when the people who write these characters are accessible and are able to tell you “we actually didn’t mean to do that, and this is still a rule we use to write this character,” then I’m telling you “they use this rule to write this character, and here is one of the examples where they forgot to stick to the rule.”

We’re supposed to assume Vidalia wears a wedding ring even though it pretty much just appeared for the scene where they were discussing her marriage. We’re supposed to assume Blue Diamond’s sadness wave doesn’t affect humans even though there was one glitchy scene where the animators accidentally included Connie in those who were affected. We’re supposed to assume Ruby’s Gem is on Garnet’s left hand even though I know of a few scenes where it was on the wrong hand or her Gems were completely absent. The rule of drawing Garnet is that her Gems are on her hands and certain facet patterns are on certain hands. But we’ve repeatedly seen her Gems disappear (Ruby’s, too!), and the fact that it did happen in the cartoon does not mean “sometimes, Garnet doesn’t have Gems.”

But it happened, right? Garnet’s Gems disappeared for a scene. Therefore, by your logic, it’s canon that sometimes she just doesn’t have Gems.

Well, or someone like me says “the people in charge had a quick oversight and nobody caught it before they ran the cartoon.”

Which seems more likely? Small mistakes that happen in any artistic work by imperfect people? Or tortured logic explaining why creator-established rules don’t apply if you can find anyplace onscreen where someone messed up?

Again, the rules established by the canon of the show–as REPEATEDLY described by the creators and as REPEATEDLY indicated on their model sheets–do not necessarily prevent slip-ups.

(Note: I could find at least a dozen more screencaps of Garnet or Ruby featuring animation errors on their Gems. That’s far more times than Garnet’s accidentally had a question in her script. You can’t say one counts and the other doesn’t when there are explicit statements from the Crewniverse to the contrary.)

Steven Universe is a show written by people and Garnet is not a real person. Her words and actions are written for her. The people who write these have a rulebook and they’re revealed parts of it to us. It’s fine to notice when the rules get broken–nearly every movie has an “errors” section on IMDB–but it is not incorrect (or “A HEADCANON!!!”) in the least for me to point out what I know the rule to be and include an example of it being broken in the comic.

You are mischaracterizing the “Pool Hopping” episode as well. You’re claiming that the show has episodes “revolving entirely around” what we’re talking about, and again, again, again, I am telling you that Garnet doubting herself and questioning is not the same thing as the speech pattern saying she doesn’t ask questions. That’s what I mean by moving the goalposts. It’s ludicrous to say that episodes where Garnet experiences confusion and uncertainty are proof that she asks questions. Her questioning herself is certainly canon. I don’t appreciate that you keep coming back acting like I’ve argued against this.

As for whether the comic ties into the upcoming movie, I don’t have inside information on this, but no, the heart-shaped Harmony Core is not “heavily implied to be important to the movie coming out” just because it is heart-shaped. The comics are not written by the same team and are not stated to be tie-ins with the actual show timeline–it would not be logical for something important like Gems getting trapped in an old Homeworld artifact to have happened between “Sadie Killer” and “Reunited” and never be mentioned on the show. There is no indication that the movie crew is involved with the comics at this time. The heart shape is making a lot of people jump to conclusions (shall we say…headcanons?), but there are a limited number of common shapes gemstones are cut into, so personally I’m taking it as a coincidence. I have no statements from Crewniverse members to this effect, though, unlike the other points discussed above.

“the goalpost isn’t does garnet ask questions but that her asking questions breaks canon”

if her asking questions breaks canon…then that means that we are implying that garnet cannot or does not ask questions ..aka asking if garnet asks questions. yes, the phrasing is different, but the two statements are inherently connected.

Lastly, please stop bringing up animation errors. Dialogue and and episode plots are written and rewritten multiple times, and span for often multiple minutes of multiple episodes. It is not the same as an error that occurs for a few frames where one singular artist forgot to draw something.

BTW, as I stated in the previous arguments, when Rebecca and Ian say they don’t want garnet to ask questions, that doesn’t mean it’s impossible to the point that if she asks questions in a future episode, it can only be “non-canon”, because people change their mind and often have their characters do things that they normally wouldn’t do, especially in special circumstances. As I mentioned with pearl in last one out of beach city, despite hating food and drinks, and never being impulsive or breaking rules, pearl does multiple of those things because it’s relevant to the plot of that one specific instance. it’s possible for a character to break their own rule depending on special circumstances, and it doesn’t make it non-canon.

So, if you’re saying garnet DOESNT ask questions, but is PHYSICALLY ABLE to ask questions, it’s very possible that in the comic, or more important the show, her asking a question isn’t inherently noncanon, because sometimes characters change or do things they normally wouldn’t do based on the circumstances. That’s the reason I brought up the argument some people use of her being physically unable to ask questions.

Lastly, I would really prefer if you didnt imply that I’m annoying and don’t check things out simply because I didn’t remember one line from one of many podcasts, and say that I’m moving goal posts simply because I rephrased a statement that is still a necessary link to the other statement. It may have been accidental but some of your messages are coming off as rather rude.

You did it again.

Garnet. Did. Not. Have. An. Episode. About. Not. Speaking. Questions.

Asking questions is what the creators said she does not do. 

That is not the same thing as never having a question about anything. It means she doesn’t phrase her questions as questions. It’s a speech idiosyncrasy.

I don’t know why I can say four different times that being unsure, questioning oneself, wondering, admitting confusion, is not the same thing as speaking a question … and you ignore me.

I’ll just assume you either can’t understand me or you refuse to, and I won’t address this argument again.

“Also, please point out the exact time that Rebecca sugar said “garnet doesn’t ask questions because of a pact with rose”.”

I. Did. That. In. The. Previous. Response. To. You.

I. Said. Rebecca. Sugar. Spoke. This. Exact. Phrase. In. The. Podcast. Volume. 2. Episode. 10.

If you won’t go listen to it for proof, I just don’t know what you expect me to do. She said that phrase and I told you where and you won’t accept it. I mean, I’m sitting here putting the food on the spoon and putting it in your mouth and you respond to that action with “well how come you aren’t serving up the food? Might as well repeat over and over that there isn’t any food.”

A partial transcript of the podcast episode I’ve quoted to you repeatedly:

   McKenzie: There’s a joke about it in “Know Your Fusion” that really stuck out to me. Where she’s like, “Maybe we should ask them what’s going on?” “I can’t.” She’s like, paralyzed.

   Rebecca: She can’t ask questions.

   Ian: She just doesn’t want to.

   McKenzie: Right, so it’s not that she physically cannot. It’s just that, yeah, it’s just not–

   Ian: It’s just not, yeah, it’s not in her nature to do.

   Rebecca: It’s also a pact that she made with Rose, which we will go into very soon.

Feel free to claim that what we saw doesn’t qualify as a pact, but that’s how the person who created these characters described it. I don’t know what else to tell you.

Joe Johnston has also explicitly addressed the question of whether Garnet was ordered not to ask questions in a similar capacity to the way Pearl was ordered not to speak of the Pink Diamond incident. It was apparently a pretty common theory once we found out that Pearl was compelled, not just asked, to keep silent on that subject. It makes sense that people wondered, but Joe Johnston denied that it’s the case. And I’ll quote it to you because you keep saying “NOBODY EVER SAID THAT!” even to things I’m telling you they literally said, so here you go:

   Question: did Pink have a power over gems that binds their free will? i ask because of how Pearl obviously cannot physically speak of the past

   Joe: This is more a function of how Pearls work. Since they are specially made for their owners, they are duty bound or I guess “programed” to follow the orders of their masters.

This is on his blog joethejohnston if you want to read it.

And since I’m not arguing that Garnet never questions herself–why why why why why why why why holy crap do you keep addressing this as if I’m claiming otherwise–then it doesn’t matter what Garnet questions about herself in “Pool Hopping” or “Reunited.” (Though, as I mentioned, which you ignored, stuff that happened in the “Reunited” arc would have had to happen after this comic if it were canon.)

Your comment saying mistakes in writing dialogue are different from mistakes drawing frames is poorly reasoned. No, you can’t assume that the dialogue is more carefully pored over than the images. You don’t get to designate one aspect of the cartoon as more reliably canon than another. I agree that animation errors are easily dismissed as animation errors. You need to accept that the people writing the dialogue are in similar situations; the scripts aren’t finalized until after storyboarding, and they even talk about the no-questions rule on the podcast you keep refusing to investigate with regards to how hard it makes it to write for Garnet. Hilary Florido and Joe Johnston have a whole conversation about how one of the most challenging aspects of writing Garnet is dealing with her no-questions rule. There has to be a no-questions rule for them to have that conversation. I cited that same no-questions rule when I said the comic broke canon. End of story. The people who make the show are all talking about this, stating it’s a rule, stating that they try to keep to it, admitting that once in a while they slip. I don’t know why you keep acting like slip-ups in writing dialogue aren’t the mistakes they are.

The. No. Questions. Rule. For. Garnet. Is. Discussed. Among. The. Creators. As. A. Fact.

When I said the comic broke it, that’s all I said. It just shouldn’t be controversial, especially as raised by someone who tries to argue without looking at the supplementary materials I used to find out a rule like this exists in the first place.

Of course if things changed so Garnet started asking questions, or it was somehow really significant and indicative of character growth, I’m sure there could be canon ways Garnet could ask a question–you know, like she did multiple times in “The Answer” before the rule was established. But the example in the comic–Garnet just saying “What did they say?”–is no significant moment at all. It’s such a false equivalence for you to compare that to Pearl talking out loud about her intention to try “drinkin’ tonight” and clearly struggling with herself to put that can to her lips. Like, that’s such a bad comparison. If Garnet wants to know what someone said, she’d normally say “Tell me what they said”–like when Steven had future visions and she said “tell me what you saw” instead of “what did you see?”

I am not arguing that she doesn’t physically have the capacity to ask questions and I am not arguing that it’s impossible for the show (or other materials) to lead the story into a place in the future where Garnet asks questions. But considering the emphasis they’re putting on this, bringing it up so consistently in the behind-the-scenes materials, it is considered extremely important to Garnet’s character that the writers don’t put questions in her mouth. If they started doing so, it would absolutely be a focused-upon turning point, not a one-off incidental question the writers just didn’t realize they were phrasing with a question mark. Rebecca Sugar emphasizing in the podcast that even rhetorical questions shouldn’t have been allowed, calling it her bad, acknowledging that it was a mistake she’s responsible for, talking about how Hilary gives her crap about it–this all made it really clear they didn’t mean to do it. It is a mistake, and therefore along the same lines as animation errors, not intended to communicate anything about the reality of the characters.

And as for you accusing me of expecting too much because you “didn’t remember one line from one of many podcasts”…

don’t misrepresent the problem.

What you absolutely did do is tell me the statements I quoted from the creators were either headcanons or things nobody ever said.

Even when I told you where I heard them. I quoted chapter and verse, I said who said the quotes, I gave you context, I told you the volume and episode in case you wanted to listen for yourself instead of taking my word for it. You didn’t check and then on top of that you told me AGAIN the rule isn’t a rule even though they said it is, there’s no pact even though they called it a pact, etc. I’m not going to claim the Crewniverse said things if they didn’t say them. You, on the other hand, are looking at my unembellished quotes and telling me they aren’t real or don’t count. There’s no point.

As for the tone argument nonsense where you’re protesting my rudeness, I’m not actively out to be nasty to you, and I’m generally pretty excited to discuss SU with people even if they disagree or have different interpretations, so disagreeing with me certainly isn’t the problem. The problem is you came onto my happy little post with a “critical” username trying to correct me, saying there is no rule about Garnet’s speech patterns when I know there is, and framing a known statement by the creators as a headcanon. It’s like you’re saying “by the way, this blogger who has read and reviewed and documented a huge chunk of the supplementary material in this franchise? She’s got a silly headcanon and it’s my responsibility to tell my followers it’s only a fan theory.” You don’t get much more “canon rulebook” than straight from the creator’s mouth, and though characters can change fundamental aspects of themselves, THAT HASN’T HAPPENED with this character. And if she does change so she asks questions when it isn’t a mistake, it’ll be way more obvious to fans than a one-off incidental question. Comics don’t lead canon anyway, so that is not the place they will do it if they decide to.

I know you provided WHERE the quote came from, I asked WHEN, as in a time stamp. As in the very exact moment a quote takes place. I did this because, something you didn't take into account, not everyone is immediately available to watch a podcast because people can be busy. I have listened to multiple of the podcasts before.

The critical url? If you actually looked at my blog, the very thing in my bio (and you dismiss me for "not doing enough research") you would see while I am critical of some steven universe choices, most of the content on my blog is actually anti su critical.

I've said multiple times now that the phrase "asking questions" does not have to literally mean "she doesn't ask questions out loud, but she can ask questions in her head or imply a question by turning it into a statement". When most people say a phrase like "can't ask questions", they don't make a loophole where that person technically can ask questions. If they truly mean tha wet it's simply garnet cannot directly ask a question, but is able to ask questions indirectly through statements, or can question herself as long as she doesn't say it out loud, that's fine, but I would need that confirmed because that's so specific that it simply doesn't make sense to me. Before you say "but I just showed you where the creator confirmed it!" I'm saying that if it's specifically about speech and not the actual concept of questioning, then they would do well to say it's actually about speech and not the concept of questioning it's self.

The ONLY thing I said was headcanon was a) garnets inability to ask questions (as in, PHYSICAL ABILITY), and b) garnet being FORCED by rose/pink to not ask questions. I mentioned multiple times that I DONT think garnet is forced to not ask questions by rose or that she is physically incapable of asking questions. Then you give me...quotes that literally state that garnet isn't physically unable to ask questions and she isn't forced by rose/pink to not ask questions.

In that quote, Ian, as I said before, said "She (Garnet) just doesn't want to (ask questions)." As I have mentioned before, a character can usually not WANT to do something, and then do it anyways. That's why I mentioned pearl not WANTING to consume food or liquid, or be unsafe, but then turn around and do those exact things in last one out of beach city. If garnet just doesn't WANT to ask questions, then she could at any time ask questions even if she doesn't WANT to, or she could want to do something because of the special circumstances.

It only makes sense to me that the dialogue will be more carefully examined than the animation. The dialogue is directly related to the plot/story, and tells you a lot about a character. Just look at all the little clues we later found out were hinting at pink diamond! What someone says in the script (obviously not counting improvisation) is much more likely to be noticed then a few frames of messed up animation. Many people can watch the show again and again and not notice if someone's gem is missing, especially since people tend to look at the focus of the shot, such as someone's facial expressions. The crew has even said their selves that they don't care for model sheets because it's not important to the overall show! But you know what things have been important? Corruption, which is first seen early season one. Pink diamond, which was planned as far back as in 2013. Characters who have secrets, which includes all of the crystal gems, where if they say something contradictory to what's actually true, people will notice, because people are more likely to remember a line of dialogue then bismuth not wearing pants.

Lastly

one taught me love

one taught me patience 

Steven Universe: HARMONY is a five-issue miniseries focusing on Sadie Miller’s personal life and the Gems’ problems associated with a Gem artifact called the Harmony Core. It’s written by S.M. Vidaurri and illustrated by Mollie Rose, with colors by Meg Casey and letters by Mike Fiorentino. The paper issue I bought has the main cover by Marguerite Sauvage!

Plot:

Having figured out that they can activate the controls of the Harmony Core by harmonizing with it–at least one person on the outside, at least one person on the inside–Pearl and Steven connect through the song they established.

Peridot explains that the Core must have been developed to suppress organic populations, but as she mechanically describes how they have to be partially operated from the inside and therefore any number of Harmony Cores could be holding trapped Gems that would have been abandoned by cruel Homeworld commanders after invasions were complete, Amethyst grows angry and sullen. She doesn’t like that other Gems may be left and forgotten, and Steven of course agrees with her. Peridot and Pearl are more practical, saying they need to be safe themselves first and it would be very challenging to boost this signal to space, but Steven wants to try.

They set up a plan to awaken the sleeping humans by sending out a new signal, and Pearl is ready to send Peridot and Amethyst back out of the core as well using the controls she can now access, but she intends to be the one to stay behind and operate it. Peridot and Amethyst elect to stay with her for support instead.

The plan is successful in awakening the humans who had been affected, like Connie, Greg, and Sour Cream, but there are still affected humans associated with the third Harmony Core in the Arctic of Earth. Garnet runs with Steven’s debriefing and goes in search of the third Core, assuring Steven that she’s trusting him with handling Pearl’s messages, not leaving him behind. When Garnet gets to the Arctic, she easily locates the third Core, but it’s implanted on a pretty dangerous guardian and she unexpectedly has to fight it while avoiding letting the Core touch her. It gives her a run for her money.

Meanwhile, Steven, Connie, and the band are trying to figure out a way to get a signal to space so they can reach other trapped Gems and free them. They set on the idea of using an amplifier to summon the Cores to Earth so they can destroy them. Garnet finishes up her battle with the guardian, assisted by Lion showing up to help her, and she accompanies her battle with a melody about being together as one.

When Garnet and Lion return with the captured Harmony Core, Steven and his dad and the others are setting up loads of amps and speakers on the beach. Steven congratulates Garnet on her capture and she says it was easy. Steven delivers the plan to Pearl, and Peridot says it can work since unlike radio waves, the Harmony Core works like Warp Pad technology. Pearl notes that someone will have to stay behind in case the Cores activate and hurt anyone else while they’re executing this mission, and before anyone can stop her, she sends everyone else out, staying behind herself.

Steven is upset, but Garnet is trusting him, so he goes forward with the mission, pressing the Harmony Cores together and starting up his own song. All the townspeople who have gathered begin to harmonize, while from inside, Pearl redirects the signal. Steven’s song is able to reach other Cores out in space, but an unforeseen consequence activates: one of the cores sets off a security protocol, and a huge guardian appears on Earth, with various Harmony Cores all over it. The townspeople helplessly watch as it arrives.

Notable:

1. There are a few typos or mistakes, like the wrong “it’s,” and the word “suppress” is written as “surprress,” and I think when Peridot said “recourses” she must have meant “resources.”

2. Buck Dewey is HILARIOUS in this issue. He just keeps throwing out all his Buckisms, like calmly suggesting they could “get really into minimalism” if they still want to record a demo like they planned, or “free associating” to come up with a solution and then just tossing out random words.

3. Garnet and Lion fighting in the Arctic is super cute. They don’t have much interaction in the show so seeing them being cute together is amazing.

4. One of Amethyst’s attempts to help harmonize included making a fart noise. It didn’t work.

5. Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon. She asked Steven “what did they say?” and when Lion unexpectedly shows up in the Arctic to help her, her reaction is “Lion?!”

6. Garnet got to participate in the musical aspect of this issue, but she didn’t get to do it with the band like the other Gems. Still cool, though Garnet rocking with the Cool Kids is something I still really wanna see.

7. Pearl assuring Amethyst that SHE won’t get left behind is so typical Pearl. She’s aware that Amethyst has abandonment issues and acts quickly to protect Amethyst, even though she’s sacrificing herself.

8. Man, that Arctic Temple is really cool looking.

Point #1:

No, it is not “a headcanon” that Garnet never asks questions. The creators of the show have more than once discussed their intention to have Garnet written as a character who does not ask questions–in explicit terms, no wiggle room. Two examples:

One, from a Toon Zone article in 2015 from San Diego Comic Con.

Conversation with Rebecca and Ian:

Rebecca Sugar: Garnet never asks questions. Ever. She’s sure of everything she says, so if you’re putting this in, she’ll never ask a question.

Ian Jones-Quartey: If you see Garnet ask a question in something, it’s not canon.

Two, from the podcast: Volume 2 Episode 10.

Rebecca Sugar discussed there that one “rule” for Garnet is that she does not ask questions (in her present state, that is; she certainly asked many questions in “The Answer,” before she was sure of anything). Ian and Rebecca knew about the character trope of someone who’s there to ask questions and push the narrative along, and they wanted her to be the opposite. The lack of question-asking also represents a pact with Rose.

Usually, if Garnet wants to ask something without technically asking a question, she reframes it as a “tell me” imperative statement. It’s a technicality she uses to get around asking questions. I made a GIFset of that here.

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173203636572/questions-without-question-marks-youve-heard

So please, do not say Garnet not asking questions is some made-up fan thing. It is not a headcanon at all. That’s an oversimplification and misrepresentation of the situation.

Point #2:

HOWEVER.

You are correct that Garnet HAS asked some questions in the show proper, though the point you made about Sapphire is irrelevant; Sapphire questioning their certainty in forming Garnet does not mean Garnet started asking questions again, but even with that acknowledged, Connie fights with Rose’s sword in the Harmony series so if we wanted to fit it into the timeline, it’d have to happen before “Reunited.”

The times Garnet has asked questions in the show are rare, but they exist. I’m aware of them and even made a GIFset detailing some of them here:

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173473415732/a-few-questions-garnet-supposedly-is

What these are are minor writing mistakes no one caught before airing. They are not proof that this isn’t a canon aspect of Garnet, any more than animation mistakes prove that sometimes characters canonically lose their pants for several frames or change their skin color temporarily.

Rebecca Sugar is also aware that this has happened, and even explicitly discusses being personally responsible for one of them (and regretting it), also on the podcast episode mentioned above. (She says she wrote the line “can’t you see that my relationship is stable?” in the famous “Stronger Than You” song, and she specifically states that even though it’s a rhetorical question, it should not have been allowed.)

Yes, I’m saying the show itself has busted its own canon at times. It happens because it is an imperfect show written by imperfect people. So what I’m saying above in my review, about Garnet’s questions violating canon, also takes into account that the show itself does this every once in a while too. It’s a mistake those times too.

I understand how people can get confused about this but believe the heck out of me, I know what I’m talking about.

That seems to clearly explain that isn’t physically incapable of asking questions, but rather that she chooses not to.

“minor writing mistakes”

are you implying pool hopping isn’t canon? that episode was literally dedicated to garnet doubting herself.

I don’t know why you’re expanding a verbal idiosyncrasy (”Garnet doesn’t ask questions”) into some bizarre suggestion that Garnet also never questions anything, doesn’t have doubts, etc. Garnet does do those things, in many episodes besides “Pool Hopping.” This is meant to be a speech pattern she has, and of course it is supposed to represent the confidence that is usually behind it, but anyone who understands Garnet knows that sometimes her confidence is a show for others. She canonically gets scared, is unsure, gets confused about what to do, makes poor choices. She is an imperfect character who often thinks she has to make herself seem perfect to be a good leader.

You also mentioned her “pact with rose”, which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don’t like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose. People who bring up “garnet can’t ask questions” often mean it in a literal, unable to physically ask questions sense.

I’m not “moving goal posts”, the goal post is; does garnet ask questions. She does. Not often, but she does. The writers don’t want her to, but she does anyways and even has episodes that revolves entirely around that, so it is not simply minor mistakes.

I’m not denying established statements, I’m logically interpreting that they didn’t mean it as “garnet has and will never ask any question whatsoever”, but rather that they seem to not want her to ask questions because they don’t wish to fall into a trope, and also because if Steven and other gems actually asked more questions a lot of the mysteries would be ruined.

Also, just like how “garnet doesn’t ask questions” is a big part of garnets character, a big part of pearls character is that she is often an opposite to amethyst, she doesn’t like eating food or drinking liquids, she prefers to be neat, she considers thing logically and carefully, she doesn’t like to be impulsive, and more.

Does this mean when her character develops over time and we see her do the opposite of what she normally would in last one out of beach city that it’s somehow not canon because it breaks the rule of how she’s usually written? Of course not.

If you claim that something happening in the cartoon means it is canon that it happens, then I guess you’re also saying Bismuth sometimes makes her pants vanish and Amethyst sometimes switches back into her old outfit and Marty’s face sometimes canonically appears in Greg’s hair. Those things weren’t supposed to happen, but they did, and they were published, and the writers can’t really fix them now. So what I said is that the comic made the same mistake.

“You also mentioned her “pact with rose”, which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don’t like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose.“

Really? So I just dreamed the podcast where Rebecca Sugar discussed “a pact with Rose”?

You didn’t listen to it, or you don’t remember it, and now you’re trying to call me out on things you have no business pretending to have knowledge of. Stop saying things are “headcanons” when you don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’d like to listen to the podcast I linked above, Volume 2, Episode 10, the phrase “a pact with Rose” is part of A SENTENCE REBECCA SUGAR SPOKE. I didn’t make it up. Things the creators say about their characters are not “headcanons.” It’s really annoying that you’re being dismissive about things you haven’t checked out.

When you say “”””people”””” bring up “Garnet can’t ask questions” as if it’s a physical impossibility–comparable to Pearl’s previous inability to speak about Pink Diamond, I guess–you’re reaching again because YOU ARE ARGUING WITH PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT ME. I didn’t say, and am not saying, that Garnet’s speech pattern is a physical impossibility, and you keep talking to me like you know that’s my position. Why in the world would you say “well other people say X” as if it’s an argument I must be making? In fact, I’ve argued with those people too–people who theorized that Garnet might have been commanded by Rose to not ask questions in a similar way that Pearl was unable to reveal Pink’s secrets. I argued with them because I DON’T BELIEVE THAT. Do not bring up other people’s arguments, which I haven’t made, as if they represent my position.

Your statement suggestion you aren’t moving goal posts:

“The goal post is; does garnet ask questions.”

NO. THAT IS NOT THE GOAL POST.

The statement I made–stop changing what you think I’m saying–is “Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon.” (If you scroll up, that’s literally cut and pasted from my comic review. It is what I said. Not “does garnet ask questions.”)

I’m saying it’s canon that she isn’t supposed to ask questions. When she does, that breaks the intended canon. And, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I’m saying the cartoon has broken its own canon several times, and small errors do not establish overall rules. The creators Rebecca and Ian are still saying in very recently released podcasts that they don’t intend Garnet to ask questions. I’m sure they also intended Bismuth to keep her pants on. They are telling you, without any ambiguity, that they have this writing rule about Garnet and they are also SPECIFICALLY TELLING YOU IN THAT PODCAST that they know they have accidentally broken it before.

Now, I do understand the logic of “if a character is observed to have done something, we should be able to assume they do it,” sure. But when the people who write these characters are accessible and are able to tell you “we actually didn’t mean to do that, and this is still a rule we use to write this character,” then I’m telling you “they use this rule to write this character, and here is one of the examples where they forgot to stick to the rule.”

We’re supposed to assume Vidalia wears a wedding ring even though it pretty much just appeared for the scene where they were discussing her marriage. We’re supposed to assume Blue Diamond’s sadness wave doesn’t affect humans even though there was one glitchy scene where the animators accidentally included Connie in those who were affected. We’re supposed to assume Ruby’s Gem is on Garnet’s left hand even though I know of a few scenes where it was on the wrong hand or her Gems were completely absent. The rule of drawing Garnet is that her Gems are on her hands and certain facet patterns are on certain hands. But we’ve repeatedly seen her Gems disappear (Ruby’s, too!), and the fact that it did happen in the cartoon does not mean “sometimes, Garnet doesn’t have Gems.”

But it happened, right? Garnet’s Gems disappeared for a scene. Therefore, by your logic, it’s canon that sometimes she just doesn’t have Gems.

Well, or someone like me says “the people in charge had a quick oversight and nobody caught it before they ran the cartoon.”

Which seems more likely? Small mistakes that happen in any artistic work by imperfect people? Or tortured logic explaining why creator-established rules don’t apply if you can find anyplace onscreen where someone messed up?

Again, the rules established by the canon of the show–as REPEATEDLY described by the creators and as REPEATEDLY indicated on their model sheets–do not necessarily prevent slip-ups.

(Note: I could find at least a dozen more screencaps of Garnet or Ruby featuring animation errors on their Gems. That’s far more times than Garnet’s accidentally had a question in her script. You can’t say one counts and the other doesn’t when there are explicit statements from the Crewniverse to the contrary.)

Steven Universe is a show written by people and Garnet is not a real person. Her words and actions are written for her. The people who write these have a rulebook and they’re revealed parts of it to us. It’s fine to notice when the rules get broken–nearly every movie has an “errors” section on IMDB–but it is not incorrect (or “A HEADCANON!!!”) in the least for me to point out what I know the rule to be and include an example of it being broken in the comic.

You are mischaracterizing the “Pool Hopping” episode as well. You’re claiming that the show has episodes “revolving entirely around” what we’re talking about, and again, again, again, I am telling you that Garnet doubting herself and questioning is not the same thing as the speech pattern saying she doesn’t ask questions. That’s what I mean by moving the goalposts. It’s ludicrous to say that episodes where Garnet experiences confusion and uncertainty are proof that she asks questions. Her questioning herself is certainly canon. I don’t appreciate that you keep coming back acting like I’ve argued against this.

As for whether the comic ties into the upcoming movie, I don’t have inside information on this, but no, the heart-shaped Harmony Core is not “heavily implied to be important to the movie coming out” just because it is heart-shaped. The comics are not written by the same team and are not stated to be tie-ins with the actual show timeline–it would not be logical for something important like Gems getting trapped in an old Homeworld artifact to have happened between “Sadie Killer” and “Reunited” and never be mentioned on the show. There is no indication that the movie crew is involved with the comics at this time. The heart shape is making a lot of people jump to conclusions (shall we say…headcanons?), but there are a limited number of common shapes gemstones are cut into, so personally I’m taking it as a coincidence. I have no statements from Crewniverse members to this effect, though, unlike the other points discussed above.

“the goalpost isn’t does garnet ask questions but that her asking questions breaks canon”

if her asking questions breaks canon…then that means that we are implying that garnet cannot or does not ask questions ..aka asking if garnet asks questions. yes, the phrasing is different, but the two statements are inherently connected.

Lastly, please stop bringing up animation errors. Dialogue and and episode plots are written and rewritten multiple times, and span for often multiple minutes of multiple episodes. It is not the same as an error that occurs for a few frames where one singular artist forgot to draw something.

BTW, as I stated in the previous arguments, when Rebecca and Ian say they don’t want garnet to ask questions, that doesn’t mean it’s impossible to the point that if she asks questions in a future episode, it can only be “non-canon”, because people change their mind and often have their characters do things that they normally wouldn’t do, especially in special circumstances. As I mentioned with pearl in last one out of beach city, despite hating food and drinks, and never being impulsive or breaking rules, pearl does multiple of those things because it’s relevant to the plot of that one specific instance. it’s possible for a character to break their own rule depending on special circumstances, and it doesn’t make it non-canon.

So, if you’re saying garnet DOESNT ask questions, but is PHYSICALLY ABLE to ask questions, it’s very possible that in the comic, or more important the show, her asking a question isn’t inherently noncanon, because sometimes characters change or do things they normally wouldn’t do based on the circumstances. That’s the reason I brought up the argument some people use of her being physically unable to ask questions.

Lastly, I would really prefer if you didnt imply that I’m annoying and don’t check things out simply because I didn’t remember one line from one of many podcasts, and say that I’m moving goal posts simply because I rephrased a statement that is still a necessary link to the other statement. It may have been accidental but some of your messages are coming off as rather rude.

Steven Universe: HARMONY is a five-issue miniseries focusing on Sadie Miller’s personal life and the Gems’ problems associated with a Gem artifact called the Harmony Core. It’s written by S.M. Vidaurri and illustrated by Mollie Rose, with colors by Meg Casey and letters by Mike Fiorentino. The paper issue I bought has the main cover by Marguerite Sauvage!

Plot:

Having figured out that they can activate the controls of the Harmony Core by harmonizing with it–at least one person on the outside, at least one person on the inside–Pearl and Steven connect through the song they established.

Peridot explains that the Core must have been developed to suppress organic populations, but as she mechanically describes how they have to be partially operated from the inside and therefore any number of Harmony Cores could be holding trapped Gems that would have been abandoned by cruel Homeworld commanders after invasions were complete, Amethyst grows angry and sullen. She doesn’t like that other Gems may be left and forgotten, and Steven of course agrees with her. Peridot and Pearl are more practical, saying they need to be safe themselves first and it would be very challenging to boost this signal to space, but Steven wants to try.

They set up a plan to awaken the sleeping humans by sending out a new signal, and Pearl is ready to send Peridot and Amethyst back out of the core as well using the controls she can now access, but she intends to be the one to stay behind and operate it. Peridot and Amethyst elect to stay with her for support instead.

The plan is successful in awakening the humans who had been affected, like Connie, Greg, and Sour Cream, but there are still affected humans associated with the third Harmony Core in the Arctic of Earth. Garnet runs with Steven’s debriefing and goes in search of the third Core, assuring Steven that she’s trusting him with handling Pearl’s messages, not leaving him behind. When Garnet gets to the Arctic, she easily locates the third Core, but it’s implanted on a pretty dangerous guardian and she unexpectedly has to fight it while avoiding letting the Core touch her. It gives her a run for her money.

Meanwhile, Steven, Connie, and the band are trying to figure out a way to get a signal to space so they can reach other trapped Gems and free them. They set on the idea of using an amplifier to summon the Cores to Earth so they can destroy them. Garnet finishes up her battle with the guardian, assisted by Lion showing up to help her, and she accompanies her battle with a melody about being together as one.

When Garnet and Lion return with the captured Harmony Core, Steven and his dad and the others are setting up loads of amps and speakers on the beach. Steven congratulates Garnet on her capture and she says it was easy. Steven delivers the plan to Pearl, and Peridot says it can work since unlike radio waves, the Harmony Core works like Warp Pad technology. Pearl notes that someone will have to stay behind in case the Cores activate and hurt anyone else while they’re executing this mission, and before anyone can stop her, she sends everyone else out, staying behind herself.

Steven is upset, but Garnet is trusting him, so he goes forward with the mission, pressing the Harmony Cores together and starting up his own song. All the townspeople who have gathered begin to harmonize, while from inside, Pearl redirects the signal. Steven’s song is able to reach other Cores out in space, but an unforeseen consequence activates: one of the cores sets off a security protocol, and a huge guardian appears on Earth, with various Harmony Cores all over it. The townspeople helplessly watch as it arrives.

Notable:

1. There are a few typos or mistakes, like the wrong “it’s,” and the word “suppress” is written as “surprress,” and I think when Peridot said “recourses” she must have meant “resources.”

2. Buck Dewey is HILARIOUS in this issue. He just keeps throwing out all his Buckisms, like calmly suggesting they could “get really into minimalism” if they still want to record a demo like they planned, or “free associating” to come up with a solution and then just tossing out random words.

3. Garnet and Lion fighting in the Arctic is super cute. They don’t have much interaction in the show so seeing them being cute together is amazing.

4. One of Amethyst’s attempts to help harmonize included making a fart noise. It didn’t work.

5. Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon. She asked Steven “what did they say?” and when Lion unexpectedly shows up in the Arctic to help her, her reaction is “Lion?!”

6. Garnet got to participate in the musical aspect of this issue, but she didn’t get to do it with the band like the other Gems. Still cool, though Garnet rocking with the Cool Kids is something I still really wanna see.

7. Pearl assuring Amethyst that SHE won’t get left behind is so typical Pearl. She’s aware that Amethyst has abandonment issues and acts quickly to protect Amethyst, even though she’s sacrificing herself.

8. Man, that Arctic Temple is really cool looking.

Point #1:

No, it is not “a headcanon” that Garnet never asks questions. The creators of the show have more than once discussed their intention to have Garnet written as a character who does not ask questions–in explicit terms, no wiggle room. Two examples:

One, from a Toon Zone article in 2015 from San Diego Comic Con.

Conversation with Rebecca and Ian:

Rebecca Sugar: Garnet never asks questions. Ever. She’s sure of everything she says, so if you’re putting this in, she’ll never ask a question.

Ian Jones-Quartey: If you see Garnet ask a question in something, it’s not canon.

Two, from the podcast: Volume 2 Episode 10.

Rebecca Sugar discussed there that one “rule” for Garnet is that she does not ask questions (in her present state, that is; she certainly asked many questions in “The Answer,” before she was sure of anything). Ian and Rebecca knew about the character trope of someone who’s there to ask questions and push the narrative along, and they wanted her to be the opposite. The lack of question-asking also represents a pact with Rose.

Usually, if Garnet wants to ask something without technically asking a question, she reframes it as a “tell me” imperative statement. It’s a technicality she uses to get around asking questions. I made a GIFset of that here.

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173203636572/questions-without-question-marks-youve-heard

So please, do not say Garnet not asking questions is some made-up fan thing. It is not a headcanon at all. That’s an oversimplification and misrepresentation of the situation.

Point #2:

HOWEVER.

You are correct that Garnet HAS asked some questions in the show proper, though the point you made about Sapphire is irrelevant; Sapphire questioning their certainty in forming Garnet does not mean Garnet started asking questions again, but even with that acknowledged, Connie fights with Rose’s sword in the Harmony series so if we wanted to fit it into the timeline, it’d have to happen before “Reunited.”

The times Garnet has asked questions in the show are rare, but they exist. I’m aware of them and even made a GIFset detailing some of them here:

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173473415732/a-few-questions-garnet-supposedly-is

What these are are minor writing mistakes no one caught before airing. They are not proof that this isn’t a canon aspect of Garnet, any more than animation mistakes prove that sometimes characters canonically lose their pants for several frames or change their skin color temporarily.

Rebecca Sugar is also aware that this has happened, and even explicitly discusses being personally responsible for one of them (and regretting it), also on the podcast episode mentioned above. (She says she wrote the line “can’t you see that my relationship is stable?” in the famous “Stronger Than You” song, and she specifically states that even though it’s a rhetorical question, it should not have been allowed.)

Yes, I’m saying the show itself has busted its own canon at times. It happens because it is an imperfect show written by imperfect people. So what I’m saying above in my review, about Garnet’s questions violating canon, also takes into account that the show itself does this every once in a while too. It’s a mistake those times too.

I understand how people can get confused about this but believe the heck out of me, I know what I’m talking about.

That seems to clearly explain that isn’t physically incapable of asking questions, but rather that she chooses not to.

“minor writing mistakes”

are you implying pool hopping isn’t canon? that episode was literally dedicated to garnet doubting herself.

I don’t know why you’re expanding a verbal idiosyncrasy (”Garnet doesn’t ask questions”) into some bizarre suggestion that Garnet also never questions anything, doesn’t have doubts, etc. Garnet does do those things, in many episodes besides “Pool Hopping.” This is meant to be a speech pattern she has, and of course it is supposed to represent the confidence that is usually behind it, but anyone who understands Garnet knows that sometimes her confidence is a show for others. She canonically gets scared, is unsure, gets confused about what to do, makes poor choices. She is an imperfect character who often thinks she has to make herself seem perfect to be a good leader.

You also mentioned her “pact with rose”, which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don’t like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose. People who bring up “garnet can’t ask questions” often mean it in a literal, unable to physically ask questions sense.

I’m not “moving goal posts”, the goal post is; does garnet ask questions. She does. Not often, but she does. The writers don’t want her to, but she does anyways and even has episodes that revolves entirely around that, so it is not simply minor mistakes.

I’m not denying established statements, I’m logically interpreting that they didn’t mean it as “garnet has and will never ask any question whatsoever”, but rather that they seem to not want her to ask questions because they don’t wish to fall into a trope, and also because if Steven and other gems actually asked more questions a lot of the mysteries would be ruined.

Also, just like how “garnet doesn’t ask questions” is a big part of garnets character, a big part of pearls character is that she is often an opposite to amethyst, she doesn’t like eating food or drinking liquids, she prefers to be neat, she considers thing logically and carefully, she doesn’t like to be impulsive, and more.

Does this mean when her character develops over time and we see her do the opposite of what she normally would in last one out of beach city that it’s somehow not canon because it breaks the rule of how she’s usually written? Of course not.

If you claim that something happening in the cartoon means it is canon that it happens, then I guess you’re also saying Bismuth sometimes makes her pants vanish and Amethyst sometimes switches back into her old outfit and Marty’s face sometimes canonically appears in Greg’s hair. Those things weren’t supposed to happen, but they did, and they were published, and the writers can’t really fix them now. So what I said is that the comic made the same mistake.

“You also mentioned her “pact with rose”, which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don’t like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose.“

Really? So I just dreamed the podcast where Rebecca Sugar discussed “a pact with Rose”?

You didn’t listen to it, or you don’t remember it, and now you’re trying to call me out on things you have no business pretending to have knowledge of. Stop saying things are “headcanons” when you don’t know what you’re talking about. If you’d like to listen to the podcast I linked above, Volume 2, Episode 10, the phrase “a pact with Rose” is part of A SENTENCE REBECCA SUGAR SPOKE. I didn’t make it up. Things the creators say about their characters are not “headcanons.” It’s really annoying that you’re being dismissive about things you haven’t checked out.

When you say “”””people”””” bring up “Garnet can’t ask questions” as if it’s a physical impossibility–comparable to Pearl’s previous inability to speak about Pink Diamond, I guess–you’re reaching again because YOU ARE ARGUING WITH PEOPLE WHO ARE NOT ME. I didn’t say, and am not saying, that Garnet’s speech pattern is a physical impossibility, and you keep talking to me like you know that’s my position. Why in the world would you say “well other people say X” as if it’s an argument I must be making? In fact, I’ve argued with those people too–people who theorized that Garnet might have been commanded by Rose to not ask questions in a similar way that Pearl was unable to reveal Pink’s secrets. I argued with them because I DON’T BELIEVE THAT. Do not bring up other people’s arguments, which I haven’t made, as if they represent my position.

Your statement suggestion you aren’t moving goal posts:

“The goal post is; does garnet ask questions.”

NO. THAT IS NOT THE GOAL POST.

The statement I made–stop changing what you think I’m saying–is “Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon.” (If you scroll up, that’s literally cut and pasted from my comic review. It is what I said. Not “does garnet ask questions.”)

I’m saying it’s canon that she isn’t supposed to ask questions. When she does, that breaks the intended canon. And, at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I’m saying the cartoon has broken its own canon several times, and small errors do not establish overall rules. The creators Rebecca and Ian are still saying in very recently released podcasts that they don’t intend Garnet to ask questions. I’m sure they also intended Bismuth to keep her pants on. They are telling you, without any ambiguity, that they have this writing rule about Garnet and they are also SPECIFICALLY TELLING YOU IN THAT PODCAST that they know they have accidentally broken it before.

Now, I do understand the logic of “if a character is observed to have done something, we should be able to assume they do it,” sure. But when the people who write these characters are accessible and are able to tell you “we actually didn’t mean to do that, and this is still a rule we use to write this character,” then I’m telling you “they use this rule to write this character, and here is one of the examples where they forgot to stick to the rule.”

We’re supposed to assume Vidalia wears a wedding ring even though it pretty much just appeared for the scene where they were discussing her marriage. We’re supposed to assume Blue Diamond’s sadness wave doesn’t affect humans even though there was one glitchy scene where the animators accidentally included Connie in those who were affected. We’re supposed to assume Ruby’s Gem is on Garnet’s left hand even though I know of a few scenes where it was on the wrong hand or her Gems were completely absent. The rule of drawing Garnet is that her Gems are on her hands and certain facet patterns are on certain hands. But we’ve repeatedly seen her Gems disappear (Ruby’s, too!), and the fact that it did happen in the cartoon does not mean “sometimes, Garnet doesn’t have Gems.”

But it happened, right? Garnet’s Gems disappeared for a scene. Therefore, by your logic, it’s canon that sometimes she just doesn’t have Gems.

Well, or someone like me says “the people in charge had a quick oversight and nobody caught it before they ran the cartoon.”

Which seems more likely? Small mistakes that happen in any artistic work by imperfect people? Or tortured logic explaining why creator-established rules don’t apply if you can find anyplace onscreen where someone messed up?

Again, the rules established by the canon of the show–as REPEATEDLY described by the creators and as REPEATEDLY indicated on their model sheets–do not necessarily prevent slip-ups.

(Note: I could find at least a dozen more screencaps of Garnet or Ruby featuring animation errors on their Gems. That’s far more times than Garnet’s accidentally had a question in her script. You can’t say one counts and the other doesn’t when there are explicit statements from the Crewniverse to the contrary.)

Steven Universe is a show written by people and Garnet is not a real person. Her words and actions are written for her. The people who write these have a rulebook and they’re revealed parts of it to us. It’s fine to notice when the rules get broken–nearly every movie has an “errors” section on IMDB–but it is not incorrect (or “A HEADCANON!!!”) in the least for me to point out what I know the rule to be and include an example of it being broken in the comic.

You are mischaracterizing the “Pool Hopping” episode as well. You’re claiming that the show has episodes “revolving entirely around” what we’re talking about, and again, again, again, I am telling you that Garnet doubting herself and questioning is not the same thing as the speech pattern saying she doesn’t ask questions. That’s what I mean by moving the goalposts. It’s ludicrous to say that episodes where Garnet experiences confusion and uncertainty are proof that she asks questions. Her questioning herself is certainly canon. I don’t appreciate that you keep coming back acting like I’ve argued against this.

As for whether the comic ties into the upcoming movie, I don’t have inside information on this, but no, the heart-shaped Harmony Core is not “heavily implied to be important to the movie coming out” just because it is heart-shaped. The comics are not written by the same team and are not stated to be tie-ins with the actual show timeline–it would not be logical for something important like Gems getting trapped in an old Homeworld artifact to have happened between “Sadie Killer” and “Reunited” and never be mentioned on the show. There is no indication that the movie crew is involved with the comics at this time. The heart shape is making a lot of people jump to conclusions (shall we say…headcanons?), but there are a limited number of common shapes gemstones are cut into, so personally I’m taking it as a coincidence. I have no statements from Crewniverse members to this effect, though, unlike the other points discussed above.

"the goalpost isn't does garnet ask questions but that her asking questions breaks canon"

if her asking questions breaks canon...then that means that we are implying that garnet cannot or does not ask questions ..aka asking if garnet asks questions. yes, the phrasing is different, but the two statements are inherently connected.

Lastly, please stop bringing up animation errors. Dialogue and and episode plots are written and rewritten multiple times, and span for often multiple minutes of multiple episodes. It is not the same as an error that occurs for a few frames where one singular artist forgot to draw something.

BTW, as I stated in the previous arguments, when Rebecca and Ian say they don't want garnet to ask questions, that doesn't mean it's impossible to the point that if she asks questions in a future episode, it can only be "non-canon", because people change their mind and often have their characters do things that they normally wouldn't do, especially in special circumstances. As I mentioned with pearl in last one out of beach city, despite hating food and drinks, and never being impulsive or breaking rules, pearl does multiple of those things because it's relevant to the plot of that one specific instance. it's possible for a character to break their own rule depending on special circumstances, and it doesn't make it non-canon.

So, if you're saying garnet DOESNT ask questions, but is PHYSICALLY ABLE to ask questions, it's very possible that in the comic, or more important the show, her asking a question isn't inherently noncanon, because sometimes characters change or do things they normally wouldn't do based on the circumstances. That's the reason I brought up the argument some people use of her being physically unable to ask questions.

Lastly, I would really prefer if you didnt imply that I'm annoying and don't check things out simply because I didn't remember one line from one of many podcasts, and say that I'm moving goal posts simply because I rephrased a statement that is still a necessary link to the other statement. It may have been accidental but some of your messages are coming off as rather rude.

Steven Universe: HARMONY is a five-issue miniseries focusing on Sadie Miller’s personal life and the Gems’ problems associated with a Gem artifact called the Harmony Core. It’s written by S.M. Vidaurri and illustrated by Mollie Rose, with colors by Meg Casey and letters by Mike Fiorentino. The paper issue I bought has the main cover by Marguerite Sauvage!

Plot:

Having figured out that they can activate the controls of the Harmony Core by harmonizing with it–at least one person on the outside, at least one person on the inside–Pearl and Steven connect through the song they established.

Peridot explains that the Core must have been developed to suppress organic populations, but as she mechanically describes how they have to be partially operated from the inside and therefore any number of Harmony Cores could be holding trapped Gems that would have been abandoned by cruel Homeworld commanders after invasions were complete, Amethyst grows angry and sullen. She doesn’t like that other Gems may be left and forgotten, and Steven of course agrees with her. Peridot and Pearl are more practical, saying they need to be safe themselves first and it would be very challenging to boost this signal to space, but Steven wants to try.

They set up a plan to awaken the sleeping humans by sending out a new signal, and Pearl is ready to send Peridot and Amethyst back out of the core as well using the controls she can now access, but she intends to be the one to stay behind and operate it. Peridot and Amethyst elect to stay with her for support instead.

The plan is successful in awakening the humans who had been affected, like Connie, Greg, and Sour Cream, but there are still affected humans associated with the third Harmony Core in the Arctic of Earth. Garnet runs with Steven’s debriefing and goes in search of the third Core, assuring Steven that she’s trusting him with handling Pearl’s messages, not leaving him behind. When Garnet gets to the Arctic, she easily locates the third Core, but it’s implanted on a pretty dangerous guardian and she unexpectedly has to fight it while avoiding letting the Core touch her. It gives her a run for her money.

Meanwhile, Steven, Connie, and the band are trying to figure out a way to get a signal to space so they can reach other trapped Gems and free them. They set on the idea of using an amplifier to summon the Cores to Earth so they can destroy them. Garnet finishes up her battle with the guardian, assisted by Lion showing up to help her, and she accompanies her battle with a melody about being together as one.

When Garnet and Lion return with the captured Harmony Core, Steven and his dad and the others are setting up loads of amps and speakers on the beach. Steven congratulates Garnet on her capture and she says it was easy. Steven delivers the plan to Pearl, and Peridot says it can work since unlike radio waves, the Harmony Core works like Warp Pad technology. Pearl notes that someone will have to stay behind in case the Cores activate and hurt anyone else while they’re executing this mission, and before anyone can stop her, she sends everyone else out, staying behind herself.

Steven is upset, but Garnet is trusting him, so he goes forward with the mission, pressing the Harmony Cores together and starting up his own song. All the townspeople who have gathered begin to harmonize, while from inside, Pearl redirects the signal. Steven’s song is able to reach other Cores out in space, but an unforeseen consequence activates: one of the cores sets off a security protocol, and a huge guardian appears on Earth, with various Harmony Cores all over it. The townspeople helplessly watch as it arrives.

Notable:

1. There are a few typos or mistakes, like the wrong “it’s,” and the word “suppress” is written as “surprress,” and I think when Peridot said “recourses” she must have meant “resources.”

2. Buck Dewey is HILARIOUS in this issue. He just keeps throwing out all his Buckisms, like calmly suggesting they could “get really into minimalism” if they still want to record a demo like they planned, or “free associating” to come up with a solution and then just tossing out random words.

3. Garnet and Lion fighting in the Arctic is super cute. They don’t have much interaction in the show so seeing them being cute together is amazing.

4. One of Amethyst’s attempts to help harmonize included making a fart noise. It didn’t work.

5. Garnet asked questions in this comic, which kinda breaks canon. She asked Steven “what did they say?” and when Lion unexpectedly shows up in the Arctic to help her, her reaction is “Lion?!”

6. Garnet got to participate in the musical aspect of this issue, but she didn’t get to do it with the band like the other Gems. Still cool, though Garnet rocking with the Cool Kids is something I still really wanna see.

7. Pearl assuring Amethyst that SHE won’t get left behind is so typical Pearl. She’s aware that Amethyst has abandonment issues and acts quickly to protect Amethyst, even though she’s sacrificing herself.

8. Man, that Arctic Temple is really cool looking.

Point #1:

No, it is not “a headcanon” that Garnet never asks questions. The creators of the show have more than once discussed their intention to have Garnet written as a character who does not ask questions–in explicit terms, no wiggle room. Two examples:

One, from a Toon Zone article in 2015 from San Diego Comic Con.

Conversation with Rebecca and Ian:

Rebecca Sugar: Garnet never asks questions. Ever. She’s sure of everything she says, so if you’re putting this in, she’ll never ask a question.

Ian Jones-Quartey: If you see Garnet ask a question in something, it’s not canon.

Two, from the podcast: Volume 2 Episode 10.

Rebecca Sugar discussed there that one “rule” for Garnet is that she does not ask questions (in her present state, that is; she certainly asked many questions in “The Answer,” before she was sure of anything). Ian and Rebecca knew about the character trope of someone who’s there to ask questions and push the narrative along, and they wanted her to be the opposite. The lack of question-asking also represents a pact with Rose.

Usually, if Garnet wants to ask something without technically asking a question, she reframes it as a “tell me” imperative statement. It’s a technicality she uses to get around asking questions. I made a GIFset of that here.

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173203636572/questions-without-question-marks-youve-heard

So please, do not say Garnet not asking questions is some made-up fan thing. It is not a headcanon at all. That’s an oversimplification and misrepresentation of the situation.

Point #2:

HOWEVER.

You are correct that Garnet HAS asked some questions in the show proper, though the point you made about Sapphire is irrelevant; Sapphire questioning their certainty in forming Garnet does not mean Garnet started asking questions again, but even with that acknowledged, Connie fights with Rose’s sword in the Harmony series so if we wanted to fit it into the timeline, it’d have to happen before “Reunited.”

The times Garnet has asked questions in the show are rare, but they exist. I’m aware of them and even made a GIFset detailing some of them here:

https://love-takes-work.tumblr.com/post/173473415732/a-few-questions-garnet-supposedly-is

What these are are minor writing mistakes no one caught before airing. They are not proof that this isn’t a canon aspect of Garnet, any more than animation mistakes prove that sometimes characters canonically lose their pants for several frames or change their skin color temporarily.

Rebecca Sugar is also aware that this has happened, and even explicitly discusses being personally responsible for one of them (and regretting it), also on the podcast episode mentioned above. (She says she wrote the line “can’t you see that my relationship is stable?” in the famous “Stronger Than You” song, and she specifically states that even though it’s a rhetorical question, it should not have been allowed.)

Yes, I’m saying the show itself has busted its own canon at times. It happens because it is an imperfect show written by imperfect people. So what I’m saying above in my review, about Garnet’s questions violating canon, also takes into account that the show itself does this every once in a while too. It’s a mistake those times too.

I understand how people can get confused about this but believe the heck out of me, I know what I’m talking about.

That seems to clearly explain that isn’t physically incapable of asking questions, but rather that she chooses not to.

“minor writing mistakes”

are you implying pool hopping isn’t canon? that episode was literally dedicated to garnet doubting herself.

I don’t know why you’re expanding a verbal idiosyncrasy (”Garnet doesn’t ask questions”) into some bizarre suggestion that Garnet also never questions anything, doesn’t have doubts, etc. Garnet does do those things, in many episodes besides “Pool Hopping.” This is meant to be a speech pattern she has, and of course it is supposed to represent the confidence that is usually behind it, but anyone who understands Garnet knows that sometimes her confidence is a show for others. She canonically gets scared, is unsure, gets confused about what to do, makes poor choices. She is an imperfect character who often thinks she has to make herself seem perfect to be a good leader.

You also mentioned her "pact with rose", which again, is a headcanon. The writers might have said they don't like having garnet ask questions, but they mentioned nothing of a pact with rose. People who bring up "garnet can't ask questions" often mean it in a literal, unable to physically ask questions sense.

I'm not "moving goal posts", the goal post is; does garnet ask questions. She does. Not often, but she does. The writers don't want her to, but she does anyways and even has episodes that revolves entirely around that, so it is not simply minor mistakes.

I'm not denying established statements, I'm logically interpreting that they didn't mean it as "garnet has and will never ask any question whatsoever", but rather that they seem to not want her to ask questions because they don't wish to fall into a trope, and also because if Steven and other gems actually asked more questions a lot of the mysteries would be ruined.

Also, just like how "garnet doesn't ask questions" is a big part of garnets character, a big part of pearls character is that she is often an opposite to amethyst, she doesn't like eating food or drinking liquids, she prefers to be neat, she considers thing logically and carefully, she doesn't like to be impulsive, and more.

Does this mean when her character develops over time and we see her do the opposite of what she normally would in last one out of beach city that it's somehow not canon because it breaks the rule of how she's usually written? Of course not.

there were 37 worthless episodes

Plus, people have different ideas of importance. Some people think garnets wedding isn’t important because it doesn’t actually affect garnet as whole whether she gets married or just goes back to fusing. So does that mean people who like the fact she got married are bad for liking something “unimportant” to the plot of the show?

Also when you consider things like how a tiny detail like sardonyx having pink diamonds on her shoes foreshadowed pink diamond, tiny details can matter a lot.

there were 37 worthless episodes

Plus, people have different ideas of importance. Some people think garnets wedding isn’t important because it doesn’t actually affect garnet as whole whether she gets married or just goes back to fusing. So does that mean people who like the fact she got married are bad for liking something “unimportant” to the plot of the show?

Also when you consider things like how a tiny detail like sardonyx having pink diamonds on her shoes foreshadowed pink diamond, tiny details can matter a lot.