#I was watching series 1 clips and came across this absolute gem

[hwu-adventures-blog]

Incorrect Pixelberry Quotes #2: Desire and Decorum

Desire and Decorum MC (to Henrietta): you know, Stepmother....there have been times where I have doubted my own judgement.... but there is one thing of which I am quite certain. That however many mistakes I have made, or perhaps I’m yet to make... I know I am a better Countess than you could ever be.

[shinneth]

Gem Ascension Tropes (Steven-specific: A - B)

Peridot-specific was actually the biggest list of tropes I had, so putting up the rest of these should be much less of a pain in the ass! Anyway, next up on the GA Trope list is our little protagonist-turned-deuteragonist-turned-co-protagonist, Steven himself.

Primary General Post ★ Full Article ★  Primary Peri Post

Steven Universe

A God I Am Not: His justification for not being able to heal (or revive) Pumpkin in Chapter 8 of Act III, despite knowing he has revived others with his powers in the past. In Pumpkin’s case, she is mutilated beyond repair.

A Mind Is a Terrible Thing to Read: When Steven journeys to the center of Peridot’s mind to repair the damage White Diamond inflicted on her, he ends up seeing clips of various memories and dreams and gets quite a variety of moments to see with his own eyes. Steven witnesses exactly how diabolical Peridot was as a Homeworld gem while also seeing her desire to settle down and have a loving family with him. Subverted in the sense that while seeing Peridot’s worst moments was hard for Steven to watch and he didn’t enjoy it at all, he also knows Peridot already feels great shame for her past misdeeds and is already well underway atoning for those times. Steven’s also aware ahead of time just how deeply Peridot loves him, as her Video Will in Act II went over that in great detail and informed Steven of the dream she’s had of the two being married and having a family.

Accidental Pervert: Near the end of Chapter 9 of Act III when Steven is consoling Peridot over the loss of Pumpkin, he reaches from behind to touch her forehead to express that Pumpkin will always be in her memories. He also says Pumpkin will live on in her heart, and on reflex his other hand covers the area where the heart would be on a human (but not Peridot, obviously) … and inadvertently gropes her in the process. 

Affectionate Nickname: Ste-man by Amethyst, Schtu-ball by Greg, Jam Bud by Connie, and Starlight by White Diamond.

While it isn’t exactly a “nickname”, Peridot considers Steven her “center of gravity”, which is a term she frequently uses for him across the series (though rarely openly calls him that until after they officially get together).

Agree to Disagree: Mostly with characters like Bismuth and Peridot, who tend to look down on Steven’s Thou Shalt Not Kill philosophy for absolutely any situation.

All-Loving Hero: Per canon, of course. For GA specifically (and especially the post-GA stories), he plays as a steady contrast to Peridot’s Pragmatic Hero. He comes really close to averting this trope in Chapters 4 and 6 of Act III as far as White Diamond goes, but Steven eventually rebounds from it. Although he’s notably very cross with White Diamond towards the end, she did kill off Pumpkin for no reason (and nearly killed his dad in the process), so it’s justified. Even then, before everyone leaves a defeated White Diamond to fend for herself on what remains of Homeworld, Steven honors her request for an Energy Donation to repair her many wounds despite agreeing with Peridot that doing so is a terrible idea. He still does it because him giving her a final chance at redemption won’t mean anything if she’s too banged up to survive Homeworld’s destruction. Even at that point, after everything that happened, Steven wants to believe White Diamond can turn herself around. She doesn’t.

Amicable Exes: With Connie, although they were never properly an official couple in the first place.

Angst Coma: Steven falls into this towards the end of Chapter 1 of Act II. Not only due to the trauma of Peridot being Left For Dead, but not wanting to watch the Video Will she made for him, as it’s too painful for him to bear. He sleeps for nearly 20 hours, only waking up towards the last quarter of Chapter 7 thanks to a group effort from all his friends. After hearing from their respective messages from Peridot how much Steven meant to her, Steven gets over himself and springs back into action.

Attack Reflector: This is mostly in play during the final chapter of Act I. The only real means of offense against the pallified Blue Diamond is for Steven to use his barrier (or shield) to bounce the attacks right back at her.

Aura Vision: Gains this power in the final chapter of Act II when he watches Peridot’s Video Will. Only he can see how Peridot inadvertently siphoned off something from her nearby friends to heal her throat well enough to finish her message to Steven. He later puts this ability to use tracking down Peridot, and this is not only how he figures out that Chartreuse Diamond is Peridot, but how he figures out what exactly White Diamond did to Peridot in Chapter 2 of Act III. By Chapter 7, this ability becomes immensely useful in locating White Diamond’s clones so that the Crystal Gems finally make their way past that stalemate by wiping them out.

Badass Pacifist: Per canon. Despite being pacifistic often to infuriating and unreasonable levels in GA, Steven doesn’t hesitate to participate in fights when his services are needed, actually contribute something to them, and look awesome doing it.

Bad Liar: Much like his Love Interest, Steven is notorious for his inability to tell a convincing lie. It’s only averted on one small occasion in Chapter 8 of Act II, and Steven owes a lot of his success to the unique circumstances at the time, no doubt.

Barrier Warrior: Per canon, Steven can create barriers around himself and others to protect from attacks or deflect them. He can even make the barriers spiked to further deter any opponent from messing with him.

Battle Couple: With Peridot.

Battle in the Center of the Mind: This happens (offscreen) when Steven’s Sanity Slippage becomes Blinded by Rage. The rage stems from the trauma of seeing Peridot’s Gory Discretion Shot so many times over that it makes half of his consciousness to throw away his morals and want to shatter White Diamond no matter what. But there remains a half of Steven who still remains firm on his pacifistic stance. It’s insinuated that it’s basically two Stevens duking it out in his mind. Peridot refrains from asking in Chapter 4 which side came out victorious, and in Chapter 6, Connie strongly believes his pacifism won out, but then Steven had his very brief stint of sharing Peridot’s Ax-Crazy nature shortly following this. By Chapter 8, Steven confirms that his pacifism did indeed win out in the end.

Be Yourself: When Steven asks Lapis how to act around Peridot now that he’s fully aware of how enamored she is with him in Chapter 7 of Act II, this is the advice Lapis gives him.

Befriending the Enemy: Per canon, this is how Steven would like to resolve all problems between the Crystal Gems and the Diamond Authority… but Blue Diamond is the only one Steven achieves this with, and Blue ends up dying shortly afterward. Yellow and White die due to circumstances beyond his control, and they die as enemies. This trope is frequently discussed in GA – mostly the risks Steven puts his friends through by being so insistent on this approach. With how things are in the post-GA environment, this trope will likely be in play to a lesser degree with all the remaining Homeworld gems.

Beware the Nice Ones: Per canon, but this trope is really only in play in Act III. Steven’s Sanity Slippage makes him a very unstable and dangerous individual. He’s completely out of control like a rabid animal when it first happens in Chapter 4. When Steven falls into it again in Chapter 6 over the mutual PTSD shared with Peridot, he’s much more in control of himself, resulting in a pretty disturbing O.O.C. is Serious Business moment (albeit a brief one).

Big “NO!”: His first reaction when Peridot fails to reunite with him and Garnet at the end of Act I and is doomed to be left behind at White Diamond’s mercy. This is also how he reacts when an alligator ambushes Peridot in This is Who I Am Chapter 2; Chapter 4 shows Steven doing this once again when 5XF traps him and Peridot in a temple chamber so she can escape via ward pad unhindered. 

Blinded by Rage: A side-effect of the Sanity Slippage brought about by being forced to watch Peridot’s Gory Discretion Shot on loop for a long period of time; it causes a Battle in the Center of the Mind for Steven. Half of him still clings to his pacifistic morals, but now the other half of him wants to abandon those morals and shatter White Diamond no matter what. On the outside, Peridot’s only seeing the raging Steven, but Steven himself isn’t acknowledging anything at all as his mind is so preoccupied in its civil war. 

It returns to a lesser degree by Chapter 6 of Act III, when he readily joins Ax-Crazy Peridot (who’s shifted into Chartreuse Diamond by this point) hacking away at (the presumed) White Diamond’s neck with a giant blade. He comes out of it more easily this time as a deadly attack is about to fire off in Alexandrite’s direction; he’s able to break out of that vicious cycle to warn the fusion. That doesn’t stop this from becoming something Steven is massively ashamed of later, though.

[monstress]

any korean variety show recs?

alright so saddle up because this is long

 for new watchers who know next to nothing about the korean entertainmentindustry, wants to learn more abt culture:

abnormal summit, esp s1. group of semi-diverse expat panel discussculture/issues and how it pertains/compares to south korea and their owncountries. also ngl some of the panels are hot so shoutout to sam oykere anddaniel from australia.

first time in korea. changing guest of long-time expats bring their friendsover to south korea to experience the culture for the first time. you getrambunctious friend shenanigans and crash course of interesting places to visit+ eat.

korean food table. long-ass running, well-beloved food show. im hungry.

for new watchers who want to get into it because of the hallyu wave:

x-man. the start of it all. fixed members and guests play games and try tofigure out who is the spy among them. the precursor to running man. it endedyears ago but it’s LEGENDARY. i can’t tell u how many clips from some eps thatare still being played on other shows today. see your favorite stars at theirmost humble of beginnings. introduction to the dominating MCs of today: yoojaesuk and kang hodong.

happy together s3 (the sauna version). the only talk show of its kind withequal number of male and female mcs (sad ik). funny as hell, even withnon-celebs guests. way back when even jun hyun moo, the MC with the most showson his belt right now, was a nobody and made his bread and butter dancing toshinee’s Lucifer. great talking segments which i’m sad they got rid off in thelater iterations.

strong heart. a talk show where celebs share interesting stories from theirlives. if you can manage through kang hodong’s overly boisterous MC style,there are some absolute gems from this show but imo just watch based on theguests. also lee seunggi!

knowing brothers. popular talk show with a school-like setting. imo watch it based on the guests, again if you can manage through kang hodong lmao

i can see your voice. celebrity guests try to guess if a person is a good singer or tonedeaf.already multiple versions in asian countries. honestly surprised americansdon’t get in on this.

masked singer. a panel try to guess who the voice from an unknown, masked singer belongsto. i don’t know why they made an american version since the formula is onlythrilling with a tight-knit industry but ok!

weekly idol. if you’re into kpop, surely you’ve seen random dancing segmentsby now. watch it based on who you stan i guess.

doesn’t care about idols, just want to have fun:

new journey to the west. cast travels to a country and needs to win gamesfor food/sleeping place/dragon balls. fuckinnnn??? hilarious?? established cast and production team chemistry (from their previous show, 1night2days) so even the pilot doesn’t have new cast awkwardness. stellar editingand ingeniously entertaining yet simple games. they’re not afraid to rip eachother apart (some of the members’ have some…interesting past which is fun tobring up).

i live alone. a clip show of an average day of celebs who live alone. while it does haverotating celeb guests, the major draw of the show is the permanent panelmembers established in 2017, esp park narae (who is a legitimately talentedentertainer and tbh deserves better! you’ll get what i mean when u watch theshow!!).

omniscient interfering interview. clips of daily lives of celebs and their managers (who in the industry arealways in the shadows but now it’s their time to shine). wildly popular thateven most of their managers have shot for commercials. watch for the fooddescriptions from lee youngja which was a career-defining talent for her thatshe won the channel’s top entertainment award. the first woman to have everdone so across all three major channels.

infinite challenge. this show has a LOT of episodes but imo watch these specials: the ballroom dance eps, the summer music festivals, bobsleigh challenge, calender model challenge, extreme part-time job, history x hip-hop, the jack black eps, saturday saturday i am a singer, and the (very incredible, very powerful) express delivery special. iconique.

running man. i’m amazed that this show is still airing. the choi minsoo eps and sherlockeps are one of the show’s stand-out. again, if you’re into the cast chemistry,check this out.

2 days 1 night (s1, skip to s4). where the new journey to the west’s cast chemistry and production team isfortified! season 1 was very popular but it ended because the director wantedto pursue his studies. season 2 and season 3 tried to capture its magic with new casts and directors but it just wasn’t the same. when season 4 came ploddingalong, people thought it’ll be canceled soon enough. the newest director was amentee of the original director though and with great luck in the new cast, season 4was herald as the show’s comeback. the ‘no smoking’ episode was brilliant. edit post chatroom scandal: from the bottom of my heart, don’t watch s4 because of one member who is an honest-to-god piece of shit.

what on earth??. an underrated show! a limited series of four men who embarks in a dangerouscross country trip. the first few eps was set in a Qatar desert, the next inthe wetlands of Scotland. educational, good chemistry btwn the members, sharpediting. also not gonna lie part of the reason i did watch this was for ji jinhee. sue me i was in a jtbc misty withdrawal! shares the same director as 2d1n season 4!

sister’s slam dunk. a rare show with an all-female cast with the premise of fulfilling eachmember’s dream with the help of the other members. honestly just watch seasonone for min hyorin’s dream of debuting as an idol (hence dragging in the othermembers too, much to the chagrin of the older members). if you like thechemistry between members enough, stick around! the cast is funny andcharismatic and it’s just (sniffs) i love women! i still bop to the songs onthe regular too.

doesn’t care about guests, just want to relax (my fave kind):

lee hyori’s bed and breakfast. popstar lee hyori and husband opens up their home as a bread and breakfast. depression? cured! streamit on netflix!

little house in the forest. this show is glacial…in the best waypossible. it’s like an ingmar bergman film. honestly best to watch when you’rein bed ready to sleep

youn’s kitchen. legendary actress youn yeo jung opens a restaurant in a foreigncountry with season one in indonesia, season two in italy. idyllic af.

hodong’s kitchen. a spinoff show with the cast from new journey to thewest (they won a bet that if they win a game, their wish is to shoot a showlike youn’s kitchen since they share the same director). if you like the njttwcast and want to see them run a small restaurant, here’s your show!

blind date cafe. what it says on the can. blind dates are done in a cafe withwaitservice that consist of musician lee juck, actress yoo inna,comedian yang sehyung and sf9 member rowoon. it’s very…cishet lmao buti love yoo inna and will watch her wait for paint to dry. some of the couplesare EXTREMELY valid tho (if anything, watch for the webtoon artist andchildrens horror book author! i STAN their love!)

coffee friends. actors set up a cafe. fulfill your coffee shop au daydreamwith yoo yoon seok here!

may food bless you. a team of close female friends that consist of actress hwayeong and comedian lee youngja, song euni, and kim sook gives advice and suggest food to aid for submitted concerns while having a meal. a great show to watch while having dinner.

note: these shows…aren’t perfect. lemme be upfront that there can be elements of casual -isms in them (the relaxing shows are generally okay tho) and i’m just gonna leave it at that.