#ametyhst

I finally managed to see the new six episodes of Steven Universe and overall my impression is somewhere between “Hmm…interesting” and “Eh…ok”.

Why I am saying this? Well, because there were episodes which were kinda good and episodes which seemed mostly pointless. Let me elaborate. 

Dewey Wins

The first kind of pointless episode. The moral of this episode felt very forced. The story of Mayor Dewey losing, or, er, giving up being Mayor is supposed to paralel the story of Connie and Steven falling apart and not talking. Or rather, what Dewey feels is supposed to mirror how Connie feels. I don’t know, but I felt it coming from a mile away. Though I must say I liked seeing Dewey acting differently than his usual self and Nanafua was amazing as usual. 

Also, character development for Dewey is good, so there’s that.

Raising the barn

I REALLY disliked this episode because of Lapis. I thought she was inconsiderate and selfish. She only cared about herself, she didn’t want herself to go through another war but didn’t ask Peridot if she wanted to leave Earth, she just assumed she would. If they are such good friends, Lapis should have already picked up on the fact that Peridot likes it on Earth and wouldn’t leave. And what makes it worse is that, after Peridot tells her just that she up and leaves anyway but she takes the barn as well. 

First off, the barn was Peridot’s home and Peridot shared everything with Lapis and Lapis just takes it away and leaves her “friend” without a home. 

The only character development we got was from Peridot who finally got her pre-redemption arc personality back. Also, on a side note, we kinda also got an explanation for why she was so different personality-wise after her redemption. From my understanding, Peridot was living a very scripted life. She basically followed orders, did not form a single thought that was hers alone and she was merely just another face in the crowd. She did her job and that was that. But then, as Peridot adjusted to Earth and made friends her REAL personality shined through. She curious, she’s hyper, she’s smart, she likes gardening and tv shows and art, things she didn’t know she likes. 

Having said this, I’m glad to see the old Peridot back and I think that between the cold and calculated Peridot and the hyper and chatty there Peridot could be a middle ground of sorts. 

As for Lapis, she just went back to her old ways. Basically, her staying on Earth was pointless because a) Her feelings weren’t addressed. No one talked to her about her obvious PTSD, no one took the time to really get to her. 

b) She made friends with Peridot but even that was pointless. Lapis didn’t change her point of view. She just remained a static character that the writers probably had no idea what to do with. 

Gemcation

This was a rather cute episode, albeit a tad useless. The only things we only got from it were a silhouette of Pink Diamond and a hint that Pearl may be physically incapable to tell Steven anything about her past. Which, to be fair, is a really awful excuse to just delay plot related information. I mean, if the writers really wanted to go this route they should have hinted at it a bit earlier than SEASON 5 when we are already starved for information and when we don’t exactly care because we waited so much time for someone to tell us anything about Homeworld, The War, Rose etc. 

I think Steven desperately awaiting a message from Connie was dragged a bit too much but all in all it was an ok episode. The humour was on point though. We need to see Party Guy. 

Back to the kindergarten

This was a really nice episode. The colors were nice, the characters were in character and it had an all around nice feel around it, albeit a tad bittersweet. I like that Steven and Amethyst took Peridot on a trip to make her feel better. They even told her she can be a smartass and tell them when they are wrong if it makes her happy. 

If anything these two are better friends than Lapis. 

This episode reminds me of the good old days of SU. Peridot wasn’t obnoxiously loud this time. She was just herself, genuine and honest. 

Sadie Killer

This is one of the pointless episode I was talking about in the beginning. I mean, sure, it showed us the inner struggle of Sadie, and that was good and all but did it warrant an entire episode? Also, Sadie kind of rushed in her decision to quit her job. Her job does suck and it is physically impossible to work alone at a shop and not crash and burn at one point, but what is she supposed to do now? She is living in a ridiculously small town so her prospects are limited. She did illustrate how most young adults feel nowadays so points for that. The only good thing is that this episode, along with Dewey Wins, which is also pointless, is that it upsets the status quo of the show. Dewey and Sadie are now jobless and even though there are bigger things at play here it does matter that, little by little the status quo is crumbling. One could argue Lapis leaving is crumbling the status quo, and, one one hand yes because now Peridot has to live in Steven’s bathroom but, on the other hand, it just reverted back to when Lapis was away the first time. 

Kevin Party

This episode was weird. They could have made Steven and Connie make up in so many ways yet they chose this very VERY forced plot where Kevin invites them both to a party just to form Stevonnie. 

To be fair, from Kevin’s perspective it makes total sense. He stays in character. But why have them have a forced and rushed reconciliation after we’ve had to sit through 5 episodes of Steven mopping around and being sad. The payoff should have been bigger. 

Connie said she wanted to talk to him and went to his home for that but when she didn’t find him there she got invited to Kevin’s party where Steven was also supposed to be. That’s ok BUT who on Earth makes up at a party of all places? Especially since they didn’t argue over petty stupid things, they had a serious motive for all of this.

Anyway, Connie’s haircut was cute but from Stevennoie’s look in Lars of the Stars I bet she doesn’t get to keep the haircut. 

Afterthoughts:

- Lars’s fate. It was treated so…lightheartedly. Steven is not at all fazed by the fact that he literally brought someone back from the dead. Like, he should have asked the gems how the hell he is able to do that and if Rose could do it. 

- I kinda see why Connie was upset with Steven. Anyone would be, but when you factor in that Steven’s only choices were: a) Deny to go with Topaz and Aquamarine and potentially kill everyone around or b) go with them and see what he can do from then on. We have to remember that Topaz and Aquamarine were new gems and no one knew what they were capable of not even our gems so of course Steven did not want to put Connie in harm’s way by fusing with her and battle them. Who would do that? Connie has a right to be mad at him but she also has to understand that, from the little power they displayed while on Earth, Aquamarine and Topaz were insanely powerful so Steven just chose what he thought was the safest route, give himself up and improvise from there. Maybe he and Connie could have taken on Topaz, but Aquamarine? Not so sure. 

- GO ON WITH THE PLOT ALREADY! Thank you. 

Pearlmethyst week @annadesu

Chapter 27 up on MSPFA

Just to make things clear I love Steven Universe, I think it has some good messages and nice songs and, when it wants to, nice and good episodes. But lately I’ve been starting to feel a little let down by it. Why? Well...

What with the last Steven Bomb I feel a bit lost. Instead of providing more answers it just raised more questions. Like:

-How does PD look.

-What did  PD do besides collect humans as trophies of  her conquest.

-Where is White Diamond?

-How was PD shattered?

-What happened in the rebellion exactly?

-Why was that human zoo so oddly handled?

and many others.

On top of these questions there were the already existing ones like:

-Where did the corrupted gems subplot go? Did it just vanish? Ever since the Kindergarten Kid we have had no mention of them.

-When are we going to see Homeworld?

-Is the Cluster just going to stay bubbled?

etc

When I started watching SU I thought it was amazing and very creative. It was setting up this incredible world where the mundane combined with magic stuff. In Season 1 and 2 we had a lot of magical items like the shooting start or the geoede that really seemed to expand the universe. But they’re gone now. It seems as if the show throws stuff at us but never bothers to explain it or adddress it.

That inverted pyramid in the strawberry field is never explained and we have no idea what gem was that that was inside it. Pearl never bothers to tell Steven what is Centi’s name despite knowing how to read Gem language. It’s just ignored. Rose, who I used to like, has been reduced to being a device to move the plot along. That’s fine to do but give us more background, tell us how she came to rebel, how she was before, if she had any friends before rebelling, did she like Homeworld before? what made her rebel? Anything?

A flashback episode would really be useful.

I did read in an interview somewhere that apparently the flashback episodes follow a certain order so they are liniar and the writers are trying to move forward with them so we might never get to see flashbacks to the rebelion because of that. But why? it seems stupid to do that.

Look, I love shows that have a lot of mystery. For instance, I love Gravity Falls but they know how to pace their mysteries in a way that it doesn’t get boring. With SU we are in season 4 and we still know next to nothing about anything. We have no idea how Pearl came to support and follow Rose Quartz, how they found Amethyst, how the rebelion started and how it unfolded. We have no idea how the gems got corrupted aside from a flash of light and we have no idea about the Gem world.

Worse part is that everytime I rewatch an episode i get more questions. Today I was watching Mirror Gem and Pearl was saying that they found a GEM POWERED MIRROR and give it to Steven so he can learn about the Gem world. But consider this:

- If it’s gem powered and the gems know then why didn’t they check to see if the gem powering it is ok? Ametyhst had her gem cracked and no one assumed she was dead.

-Secondly, shouldn’t the CGs be appalled by a thing powered by a gem seeing how they are gems?

-Are gem powered objects so common a punishment that no one bats and eye?

See? tons of questions.

I really wish Steven would ask more questions especially because we’re in Season 4 and we barely know stuff and it’s starting to get annoying. I love reading theories but sometimes I just need to know stuff.

Like, in the new Steven Bomb the whole Zoo thing was weird. Why? Well..

-It would be impossible for the humans to be that naive unless they were somehow brainwashed which we weren’t told they were.

-Were no stories passed along from other humans? No human there wonders about Earth?

-How do they not know what pain is? No one fell? No one bumped into another? I don’t get it.

After the zoo thing I wondered about the Rose Quartz bubbles and how it was just a little nod thrown in there just because. Im happy it was but I wanted more.I like Blue Diamond’s design, I don’t mind it at all I just expected her to be more stern but then again it kind of makes her more threatening this way. Why? Well because when she changes her attitude the moment Sapphire enters the room she becomes threatening. We don’t know what she’d do to Sapphire if she found out the truth and it’s all the more frightening because we’ve seen her be weak before. It basically makes BD unpredictable.

Finally, aside from all the answers I really want I wish they’d make an episode about the different gems that can result from fusion. Like Pearl maybe fusing with Steven and then Garnet. Maybe Lapis or Peridot. Just an episode where we get to kick back and see cool designs.

All in all SU is not horrible or anything and I still love it but I wish it would not be afraid to tackle its own plot. Bring back the corrupted gems, heal them, talk about the Cluster, bring the Diamonds to Earth, have fights, let us know more about Gem culture.( As a side note: Are gem fusions regular gems on Homeworld or not? like I need an answer. Can we find an Opal or Garnet that is independent? hmmm).