#people were so cruel to Rebecca Sugar for no reason

[kiapet2]

Alright, it’s less than a week since the Owl House finale aired and as expected I’ve already seen two direct comparisons to Steven Universe’s ending and several more vague-blogs, because one of this site’s hobbies is using other queer shows to put down Steven Universe. So let’s do this, then. Let’s compare the endings of Owl House and Steven Universe, and what each is ultimately trying to say.

Steven Universe and the Owl House are both shows that deal heavily with the clash of individualism and self-expression vs. socially-mandated conformity, and both shows’ final villains ultimately embody this conflict. One major difference, however, is that Owl House approaches this from the perspective of legal/societal structures, while Steven Universe approaches it from the perspective of family structures.

Steven Universe has always been about family--and particularly the ways traumas and biases are passed down through a family--and it has always heavily used the language of metaphor to discuss these topics. The Diamonds are the ultimate extension of this theme, something a lot of bad-faith (or just bad) takes on the ending miss; they interpret the diamonds in their literal capacity as dictators, rather than the way Steven Universe always portrays them, which is as matriarchs, i.e. the heads of a family who dictate and control all the family’s other members. This metaphor becomes more and more blatant until it outright becomes text, with the Diamonds turning out to be Steven’s literal family members, with whom his part of the family is estranged because of their previous controlling behavior.

In accordance with this theme, we ultimately find out that the Diamonds’ toxic ideology, with its rigid standards of perfection, are not only something they enforce on the gems below them, but also on themselves. They are suffering from the system in their own ways, unable to live up to the standards they themselves created. And who among us hasn’t known someone like that? A parent or grandparent who grew up under a cruel, oppressive worldview, and instead of rebelling against it internalized it--who turned around and said “I dealt with this, and so can you”? And so the ending of Steven Universe is the Diamonds realizing exactly how toxic the rigid ideology they’ve spent their lives perpetuating really is, and confronting the fact that their adherence to this ideology is what destroyed their relationship with Pink, and that the only way they’re going to have a relationship with Steven is if they’re willing to commit to changing both themselves, and the family structure they’ve enforced for so long.

Emperor Belos, in contrast, is not suffering from the structures he created, because his rules were never meant to apply to him. He sees the witches (and demons, and so-on) as lesser beings, evil beings, who exist to be controlled, and ultimately, exterminated. And every element of the society he built--the schools, the government, the police force, the religion--he intentionally constructed to keep these lesser beings under his control. The real-world allegory isn’t hard to see, here. And because what Belos represents in the story is, in fact, a fascist leader, the story shows that he can’t be reasoned with in any way that matters, and instead he is ultimately ground into paste beneath the boots of the people he sought to destroy. Different themes, different endings.

Now the usual argument that comes up here is as follows: but the Steven Universe ending isn’t as realistic! Not everyone is going to change, not everyone is going to be able to be reasoned with. Not every older, conservative family member is eventually going to accept you for who you are. And while that is true, ultimately SU isn’t meant to be realistic; it’s meant to be a power fantasy. Rebecca Sugar has come out and said before that they wrote a world in which there was good in everyone, because that’s the way she wishes the world could be. That’s the world they want to be able to believe in. And I am never going to begrudge a person, much less a queer person, for finding healing in writing that kind of world.

But you know what else is unrealistic? What else is ultimately just a fantasy? Grinding your government’s fascist leader into paste under your boot, then taking over and remaking society into something that accepts everyone. Sadly, Trump is not likely to get his ass beat any time soon. And more generally, punching fascists, while ideologically sound, is something most people are not going to get to do, due to real-world consequences such as “getting beat up by the fascist’s angry friends” and “being arrested for assault”. And even if you did depose one leader, our very society is set up in a way that perpetuates all manner of injustices, and systemic change is a complex and lengthy process that almost certainly won’t be completed in our lifetimes. But it’s fun to imagine we could, isn’t it?

Both endings are power fantasies. Both show the way they want the world to be, rather than the way it is. They are very different power fantasies, which fill very different--and at times conflicting--needs. And in situations like that, internet culture really likes to pick one to be the right fantasy, the right way to look at the world. 

But the truth is, both fantasies are needed! Some people need stories about your queerphobic relatives finally realizing the error of their ways and taking the necessary steps to accept and reconcile with you. And some people need stories where you get to grind fascist bastards beneath the heel of your boot. It’s okay if you prefer one type of fantasy over the other! But in the end, both are valuable, and both are important. 

And isn’t it wonderful, for us to have such a diversity of great queer stories? That we can explore both of these deep, conflicting needs? Let’s appreciate each of these fantastic works for what it was meant to be, rather than trying to pit them against each other or make them conform to a single, “best” way to tell a story.

[rosenotactuallyquartz]

“rose was saying awful things about the diamonds, especially pink diamond, 100% of the time. the reason that bismuth considers herself to be the ultimate crystal gem is because she was following rose’s vitriol more to the letter than anybody else.” — steven universe podcast, vol 3, ep 1

rose & bismuth’s story is incredibly devastating. in the return, steven starts to learn that there’s no such thing as a good war. yet, rose went into the rebellion intending to protect lives, not destroy them. but war is brutal & it can bring out the worst in everyone, even allies.

when the war started, rose had recently faced lifelong abuse on homeworld and she was deeply ashamed of herself & her past.

when she spoke to the crystal gems, she described pink diamond as “wicked” because white told her she only made things worse, & “cowardly” because she felt powerless on homeworld. bismuth followed rose closely, as she was passionate about the cause.

rebecca also notes that rose said terrible things about pink diamond especially, which shows how deeply the emotional abuse affected her. rose carried so much pain & she blamed herself for it more than she blamed her abusers. which aligns with white’s manipulative & cruel statement in change your mind, [pink] makes things worse, i make things better

rose always wanted to destroy herself, either through escapism (running away from her past self) or complete self-destruction (running away from herself completely). she couldn’t stand herself & believed that everyone around her was better than her, and that by destroying herself, everyone would be better off. these feelings were incredibly intense, as rose is described by sugar as being very extreme & having strong emotions.

“i really thought all of our problems would disappear if we could just shatter a diamond! guess she ended up taking my advice.” — bismuth, made of honor

bismuth picked up on these feelings, unaware that rose was pink diamond. bismuth concluded that the only way out was to destroy pink.

the breaking point never destroyed pink, but rose & bismuth’s bond was destroyed instead. everything leading up to the bubbling shows how war brings out the worst in people, & rose’s abuse trauma and self-hatred deeply impacted her. it also symbolizes how running away from past pain can be harmful & the pain will come out in other ways. as connie said to steven in mindful education, you have to be honest about how bad it feels so that you can move on.

[mr-nauseam]

The Case of Lonely Mothers p. 2

A study about the "similarities" between Mrs. Plinth and Mrs. Everdeen and their relationships with their respective children

Read only if you are interested in parallel Sejanus/Katniss. Otherwise just don't read it

For Juli (@julietasgf)

.

Remember I'm doing this for fun. I do not believe that such "parallel" between Mrs. Plinth and Mrs. Everdeen is something Suzanne put in the text with intention, I just notice a lot of coincidences in them

First part here

.

IV. The Conclusion

"You cannot fathom how much I've mourned, what thousands of years of grief has done to me"

(Rebecca Sugar)

Sejanus Plinth and Katniss Everdeen are two teenagers, lacking the skills necessary to navigate the world they live in. They survive as best they can, on their own

Why are them by their own if they are so young? Because they had no one

Their fathers, unable to communicate with them and to guide them properly, either because there is a great Incompatibility that prevents them from being on the same channel or something greater, such as death, creates a barrier between them that is impossible to overcome, are not a option

Their mothers would naturally be the other option to consider to be their guides - and in reality it is socially expected that they are the ones in charge of raising them, and not their fathers, with all that implies. But if they have no one, this mean that their mothers are neither an option?

The answer is yes, and we will now explore this further

Let's pick up where we left off: Mrs. Plinth and Mrs. Everdeen are women with previous stories of trauma, who are re-traumatized by an event of great magnitude that forever disrupts their lives (and their relationships with their children)

In Ma's case, it was the loss of home, of her family upon moving to the Capitol that plunged her into an eternal mourning of longing and sadness

For Mrs. Everdeen, it was the loss of the love of her life and the bleak future she saw before her that plunged her into catatonic depression and death mourning

Their pain ends up impacting and significantly altering their family dynamics

In the Plinth's case, Ma has many advantages that Mrs. Everdeen does not. First of all, her traumas do not have such severe effects on her body (catatonic state) and by having Strabo by her side, she has assured economic stability for her and her son, which alleviates many discomforts (they will never go hungry, they will always be warm), in fact, her privileged position within the Capitol saves her son from one of the most distressing and common experiences that parents live in Panem: the reaping ceremony, which represents the very real possibility of losing their children in a dehumanizing and cruel way

However, this does not prevent her depression, as her more fortunate position in certain respects still lacks important pillars for Ma person

Ma is isolated in a very particular way. Outside of her husband and son, she has no one to talk to, not only that, she lacks the ability to be vulnerable with another human being, as the people around her are hostile to her at every turn

While I don't believe Ma has suffered more than a few incidents of discrimination that were overly explicit verbally or physically, the Capitol is still a world of many delicate social rules, guided by microaggressions and a constant passive aggressive attitude, which makes for a very stressful environment, which for someone like Mrs. Plinth who could never adapt to the ways of the Capitol must be as overwhelming and stifling as it was for Sejanus, if not more so

For she had the responsibility of taking care of him, and having to deal with Sejanus' own trauma and xenophobic experiences (he suffering from bullying for example), placed her in a very complex decision to deal with

Which ended up causing her to become unable to handle it properly or ideally: Making her ends up becoming very dependent on Sejanus. He is her reason for staying in this world (and that may not sound so bad but it is a lot of pressure)

She don't do that with intent - in fact I would like to say that will is not something that intervenes in this analysis- but who else does she have?

No friends. No family. No community. No home. And full of emotions (sadness, frustration, homesickness, etc). She also many emotional needs that cannot be satisfied by anyone

I must say. Her relationship with Strabo doesn't seem to be bad but we know he may not be the best person to go to when it comes to her grieving for her home (he had a very strong opinion about this matter). In the text they seem to have talked about it (the mention of Strabo opining that for Sejanus' children the situation will be better), it's just that his comfort is not in tune with her emotions

But she had Sejanus and he suffers in a similar way to Ma. He can understand her and offer her the comfort she needs. They are each other's unconditional support -for Sejanus has no one to be completely vulnerable with either

The problem is that Sejanus was comforting his mother since he was 8 years old

Ma has been Sejanus' mother, she has been able to be. I'm not deny it, she's not in Mrs. Everdeen situation at the end of the day, but I don't think it's such a stretch to say that she has unwittingly forced Sejanus to meet her emotional needs

If we go with this assumption it is not strange to see why Ma Plinth could not teach her son to survive in the cruel world he was born into. For she does not know how to live in it either

Ma navigates the Capitol in the ways of the district. She doesn't fit in, she mismatches. She doesn't know how to make friends. She doesn't know how to stop the scorn of the people she lives with - or the people she left behind.

She doesn't have the tools so she can't pass them on

Mrs. Everdeen is a difficult case, and while her neglect of Katniss - and to a lesser extent of Prim - is undeniable, her circumstances were too harsh to expect her to get through them without a support system

I reiterate here something I already mentioned: willpower has nothing to do with these stories. It's not a question of if they would have wanted to / if they would have tried harder. Plain and simple, circumstances overcame them or at least impossibly - severely limiting their actions.

And this is essential to understand especially when we talk about Mrs. Everdeen. Let's review her context: she lives in District 12 -one of the most fucked districts in all Panem-, she grew up as part of the merchant class so she had certain privileges and then lost them. This influences the kind of lack she is used to face -how she lives it- and also the knowledge she has of how to survive in difficult circumstances -but let's remember that she is still a smart and capable woman, here I'm talking more about the facilities for adaptability

She falls in love and marries a miner from the Seam. The poorest and most oppressed area of D12. A totally new environment for her in which she does not know very well how to manage but she is fine because she has her husband to help her with the process. Her husband who has a high-risk job where it is possible he get injured a lot

Then they have two daughters. Whom she loves and they bring her joy, but in her world there are the hunger games. That monster on the prowl, threatening to take her daughters away from her; to kill them.

And Mrs. Everdeen knows better than anyone the suffering the games cause to the tributes and to their loved ones. Her best friend was chosen in the past, and in the midst of her grief she was forced to do interviews, without being allowed to grieve adequately for the hell that Maysilee lived through and then she perished in the arena

That nightmarish fate was more than a possibility for Katniss and Prim. What probably affected their bond, Mrs. Everdeen could not afford to love them too much without thinking about how quickly they would disappear when they reached the age of 12

There is a short time in her life where Mrs. Everdeen is happy, or as close to it as she can get. Her husband is with her. He comes home, her daughters are small and adorable. Her work as a healer flourishes, and it is a bitter reminder of their cruel reality but nothing impossible to cope with

Until a cave-in in the mines kills Mr. Everdeen. And everything falls apart

The man for she sacrificed everything to be with, her life partner, her support and joy is gone. Now only she is left, trapped in the Seam, and her poverty. Not only that, her daughters are also doomed, the girls -especially Katniss- have their own grief to face

Mrs. Everdeen will have to support them as they suffer unbearable pain, while her own will is shattered. And that is only the least of their worries. How will they live now?

Their budget was already limited for sure, but without the money Mr. Everdeen brought: What will happen to the food, to the clothes they will wear? She now has to support them financially on her own. Also her daughters could one day disappear at the games so Mrs. Everdeen is alone

She has no one who can offer her a helping hand, she gets depressed and her body betrays her. Mrs. Everdeen goes into a catatonic state. It's the only way she can cope with what she's going through

There is no treatment she can receive. There is nothing to be done. If Mrs. Everdeen couldn't take care of herself, how could she expect to take care of her daughters? How could she care Katniss? So she is neglectful of her because there is nothing to be done. No one will come to save her family and Mrs. Everdeen just can't do it

And as we know little Katniss has no choice but to be the one who tries. She doesn't want to die. Her little sister Prim can't die either and neither can her mother -even if she looks dead. So Katniss has to do it -and she does it after an act of kindness; she takes back and uses everything her father taught her, she can't ask for guidance from her mother, so she try to figure out the rest. Or as much as she can because she is still a child

Even if Katniss had no choice but to become the mother of Prim (and this is why I mentioned gender earlier, because while Katniss is inclined to follow typically male molds, she cannot escape the work that is expected of her as a woman)

Which reflects the somewhat strange and tragic cycle that surrounds motherhood and its relationship to powerlessness in the world of Panem, but before we delve deeper, let's conclude the case of Mrs. Everdeen

A woman whose grief forced her daughter to take her rightful place as the provider, and primary caretaker of her family after the death of her husband. Mrs. Everdeen was unable to care for Katniss. In fact she was cared by her, receiving her attentions, unwittingly taking away Katniss childhood and making her take care of her emotional needs and even her physical and mental health

Katniss navigate the world of Panem all by her own -before her games, where she ends up getting a strong support system and also we had other people in D12 giving her certain support later but that's another story

I'd like to end this with the theme of impotence /powerless as a characteristic feature of the motherhood that both characters experience

Mrs. Plinth and Mrs. Everdeen can't overcome their traumas, they have no way of doing so and it impacts their parenting. Both faced heavy and crushing circumstances that prevented them from living a better life. Their world is Panem. A world that slowly kills their children

And there is nothing either can do to change the reality in which they live in any meaningful way; The Capitol. The subjugation of the Districts. The Hunger Games. They are institutions that determine their fatal circumstances, and to be changed, or destroyed takes more than they can do

The truth is that they are just powerless mothers

And there is something so brilliant and tragic that in the end Mrs. Everdeen who has lived with all the disadvantages on her side; gives birth to a daughter capable of making that change in her time and Mrs. Plinth who has lived with all the advantages on her side: gives birth to a son incapable of making that change in his time

.

And BYE

[ben-the-hyena]

Ok so far

I HATE The Legend of Korra for focusing on a Mary Sue and ruining a lot of things from the original show (OH LOOK NEW AIRBENDERS ! HEEHEE NO MORE AVATAR CONNECTION ! IROH IS IN THE SPIRIT WORLD BECAUSE HES A FAN FAVORITE ! AANG AND KATARA ARE BAD PARENTS ! TOPH IS A FUCKING COP !) and adding a lesbo couple to be Tumblr bait reall was the cherry on top with HOW MUCH IT SEEMS TO WORK

I HATE Star VS the Forces of Evil except the Meteora and Eclipsa (and Toffee let's admit) arcs for all the forced humor and THE MOTHERFUCKING ROMANCE PLOT THAT IS TOXIC AS FUCK AND MAKES THE 2 MAIN CHARACTERS TOXIC PEOPLE ESPECIALLY THE VERY LAST EPISODE WHERE THEY COMBINE 2 UNFITTING WORLDS INTO ONE WHICH WILL LEAD TO WARS AND PROBABLY KILLED A LOT OF PEOPLE SINCE ALL MAGICAL BEINGS DIED BUT IT'S OK THAT WAY THEY WILL BE ABLE TO MAKE OUT

I HATE the 2nd and 3rd season of Ducktales while I loved the first one but season 2 with all its "lit coolio cynism whatever hip" jokes, characters and pacing and forced nostalgia baiting crossobers and Frank Angones being a hypocrite holier than thou discord creator disgusted me

I HATE Steven Universe with its stupid morals, rushed developments and episode pacing choices from season 5 and forward while I loved the previous seasons and that made me sad especially with me not knowing if Rebecca Sugar is a holier than thou hypocrite or an actual dumbass when it comes to her view in bullies and that "nOboDY is BorN eVIl aNd eVERyoNe caN reFOrm wItH LOVe" she keeps saying on her social media accounts

I don't HATE She Ra but I HATE its ending for the sake of diversity baiting (CATRA IS TOXIC AND ABUSIVE DAMMIT AND WAS TIL THE VERY END BUT I GUESS "IT DOESN'T EXIST IN LESBIANS" !?!?!)

I don't HATE Rise of the Guardians but it's tasteless with bidimensional characters and a moral that doesn't know where it goes to me and a rushed childish ending with the human kids helping in a ridiculous way like a 1990's kids TV movie

I don't HATE Bojack Horseman but I DISLIKE it for even if indeed it is smart and realistic the humor is forced and it is not because it is smart a d realistic it makes it good IT IS WAAAAY TOO DARK I know life is dark and cruel but we have the real world for this thank you I mean of course dark stories exist buuut they really are not my cup of tea especially when they just keep and keep and keep torturing the characters for the sake of saying "life is shit, you audience will never be happy", I just love the psychology notably Beatrice's arc

I don't HATE but Hazbin Hotel feels very MEH to me

Same, I don't HATE OK KO but it's even more MEH

I HATE Frozen 2 while I loved the first one for making so many retcons, so many tasteless songs to try to insult/redo Let It Go (A FUCKING BOYSBAND PARODY... BIG LIPPED ALLIGATOR MOMENT...), forced and rushed developments and cancelling the ones from the first movie

I HATE the tv show of Tangled for forcing its villains not subtley at all and DARING to force their redemption afterward

I don't HATE Gravity Falls in fact I love it but I HATE how Wendy Ford and Mabel are awful people the show tries to show as good and on the contrary plays dirty in the end against Pacifica while she already had a redemption as if nothing had happened

The first movie aside I HATE the How to Train your Dragons franchise for so many reasons : the tv show for having too many clichés and exagerating Hiccup's alpha role and again the bad humor, the second movie for forgiving so easily his mother while she could have been home anytime "but boohoo I didn't dare" bitch you just were happier far from your family don't dare regretting and also for forcing humor as usual and forcing tiny ass Toothless to become the dragon alpha of all just because he roared the best and LET'S NOT TALK ABOUT ALL THE SHIT THE THIRD MOVIE DID (GIRLFRIENDS MORE IMPORTANT THAN FRIENDS, IT'S GOOD TO RELEASE THE DRAGONS AS IF THEY WERE ENSLAVED WHILE THEY ALL CHOSE TO BE TAMED BEFOREHAND, TOOTHLESS STUPID AS FUCK, VILLAIN DUMB AS FUCK, CHARACTER DEVELOPMENTS ERASED AND NEW USELESS SIDE PLOTS AND THE LIGHT FURRY BEING AN UGLY SNOBBISH BITCH AND ALL THE BOYS THINKING ABOUT THEIR COCKS FIRST BEFORE THEIR FRIENDS TOOTHLESS NOTABLY IT JUST THE WHOLE FRANCHISE'S MESSAGE AND MORAL I HATE IT I HATE IT SO MUCH)

I HATE Miraculous Ladybug for habing bidimensional characters, focusing on a very forced and toxic ship, constantly teasing and disappointing fans' expectations, ruining character arcs out of whims and Thomas Astruc for acting like it is the most wonderful show ever and being rude if you dare to remark something or do fandom things

And now I HATE the end of the Dark Crystal prequel Mayrin comic for being a WHOOOOOLE retcon ruining the hopes of making a bitch sympathetic and actually making her a total irreedeemable bitch when raking account of the show while these retcon comics ignore the show just for the sake of cute OC X Canon ships from the writers (AND LET'S NOT TALK OF SKEKSA'S CHARACTER AND THE CLANS' RELATIO SHIPS)

In short I feel like I less and less share Tumblr's mind and excitement regarding fandoms and quite feel lonely these last years

[viioletpixels]

Back Then | Shuri + T’Challa

≫ summary: in the wake of her brother’s passing, a lonely princess thinks about all that has happened and will happen.

≫ song: time adventure by rebecca sugar

≫ notes: this is a quick songfic I wrote in honor of Chadwick Boseman’s birthday on November 29th. rest in power, king <3

***

Time is an illusion that helps things make sense So we are always living in the present tense It seems unforgiving when a good thing ends But you and I will always be back then.

Shuri lays on her bed, staring blankly up at the ceiling. Another night has gone by with no sleep; once again, the dull ache of her broken heart has kept her awake. The Royal Palace is still and quiet outside her room. It's always been that way, but for the past week or so it's for a different reason than usual. Everyone is grieving, suffering from the loss of Wakanda's very heart and soul.

The passing of T'Challa had taken the entire country by surprise. Just a few nights ago, he'd been wishing her good night, a smile on his face as he retreated to his chamber.

"Don't stay up too late, little sister," he'd told her.  

"I won't." She'd said it dismissively, eager to finish working in her lab. "Don't worry about me, brother. I'll be in bed within the next hour or so."

"I will hold you to that."

She'd smirked, rolling her eyes slightly. "Good night, T'Challa."

"Good night, Shuri."

That was the last time he had ever smiled at her, ever uttered her name, ever spoken at all. The next morning, instead of the tranquil silence of the palace, Shuri had awoken to the anguished cries of her mother. That was the day she learned that while she had been fortunate enough to wake up that morning, her brother wasn't so lucky. The entire world stood still that day, like if it dared to move even an inch, everything would come crashing down. Part of her wants to believe it's all just a horrible dream. Maybe any moment she'll wake up to his smiling face, telling her to hurry up and get dressed so she's not late for the first meeting of the day. Even so, she knows there's no point. Her beloved older brother is gone—a painful reality, but reality nonetheless.

No one realized his health was so poor. The public had no clue, and while his family was aware he wasn't feeling his best, they never suspected it would be his downfall. Shuri had noticed the exhaustion behind his eyes, the slowness he moved with and the bulk lost from his body. But every time she asked about it, he insisted he was fine with a reassuring smile. He must've been tired, she'd concluded after a while. After all, stabilizing the kingdom following Thanos's devastation was a daunting task, one that must've taken a toll on him. But it was nothing her brother—the King of Wakanda and the mighty Black Panther—couldn't overcome.

How utterly wrong she had been.

You and I will always be back then, singing: Will happen, happening, happened Will happen, happening, happened And will happen again and again 'Cause you and I will always be back then.

The princess has always considered herself a genius, but for once, she finds herself unable to comprehend what's going on. None of it makes sense. How can someone be with her one moment, then gone the next? How can someone just disappear out of thin air, never to be seen or heard from by the living again? Barely a year after her father's passing at that. It's like a cruel joke with an even crueler punchline, one that makes her sick to her stomach.

If there was some amazing force outside of time To take us back to where we were And hang each moment up like pictures on the wall Inside a billion tiny frames so that we could see it all, all, all...

The little moments are the ones she thinks about the most. Leaning her head on his shoulder during morning meetings in the throne room, when she was too tired to stand on her own. Shouting at him when he messed with something in her lab, only to burst out laughing moments later at his cluelessness. Smiling gratefully when he could tell she was nervous during conferences, and slipped his fingers gently through hers. She'd give anything to go back just a few days, to return to where they once where. She could tell him that, although she sometimes acted like she didn't care, she loved him more than anyone else in all the world. She could tell him how he was always her light, the one she trusted to lead her and the rest of Wakanda through darkness. She could tell him what she never had the courage to say when he was alive—that she wanted to be just like him. To lead, to inspire, to love just as he had.

Deep down, Shuri knows T'Challa isn't completely gone—no one ever truly is. His spirit is probably roaming the Ancestral Plane at this very moment. No doubt he's reconciling with the rest of their family lost to the ages, maybe even speaking with Baba. Even so, his worldly heart no longer beats. His lips can no longer speak or smile, and his hands can no longer reach out to her, holding her close the way they did not so long ago. It's another thing that baffles her, how someone can be dead yet simultaneously living. She just wishes he could be back living with her.

Will happen, happening, happened Will happen, happening, happened and There we are, again and again 'Cause you and I will always be back then You and I will always be back then.

Shuri sighs, sparing a glance out her bedroom window. Wakanda spreads out before her in a vast sea of rolling hills and towering city spires, glowing with the warm orange hues of the sunrise. With her brother gone, this land is hers to rule as decreed by law. She's always known she'd have to assume the throne one day, but never thought it would be this soon. Her mind refuses to even think about what will happen next.

Will happen, happening, happened Will happen, happening, happened and There we are, again and again 'Cause you and I will always be back then 'Cause you and I will always be back then You and I will always be back then.

T'Challa would want her to be strong during such a difficult time. She knows that. And one day she will be. Time's arrow will continue to march forward, and her life will go on. Slowly, things will return to a new normal. Wakanda will endure as it always has—after all, the sun could never set on such a great empire. It'll take time, but she will heal from the wounds inflicted upon her heart, as will the rest of her people. But not now. Right now, she's stuck back then, on what has happened and not yet on what will happen. And that's alright. Surely T'Challa would understand...wouldn't he?

The young princess sighs. She shuts her eyes, allowing the tears she's been holding back to flow free. Her voice shakes as words leave her trembling lips, carrying weakly through the emptiness of her room.

"I miss you, brother."

You and I will always be back then That's why you and I will always be best friends.

[nacrepearl]

why did you excuse PD's actions towards Spinel? She could've got her and she never told anybody not even pearl about her?? like??? And really there is no evidence that the Warps are broken, there's no evidence that the diamonds we're going to be alerted, this is really absolutely NO evidence for anything and God damn Rebecca sugar a knowledge that she was very cruel and can be very cruel! I'm just fucking pissed off at this point about the "positive" takes on pink as a character that is so fake!

I haven’t said anything about my stance on what happened with Spinel and Pink... but I’ll entertain you on this one?

First, the warps were broken. Literally there are multiple episodes that show the galaxy warp smashed to bits and doesn’t work.

Space Race, all the warps are checked to make sure they’re inactive, which they are. Peep the crack on the Homeworld warp and a few others. Only the local warp (where Pearl is) works.

Catch and Release, Peridot drags Steven to the assembled-from-scrap-but-still-broken warp and demands he fix it so she can escape before the Cluster emerges.

So... yeah, the warps were broken. How would Rose have gone to get her if she wanted to? The Leg Ship was out of the question--she buried it for a reason. That would’ve fully given her away, let alone if she even got Spinel she would have given Rose away just by nature. Tell me you wouldn’t expect a “Wowie Pink, this Rose Quartz game sure is fun!” etc. Rose was absolutely terrible for abandoning Spinel, I’m not arguing on that front. But the aftermath was out of her control since she hadn’t fixed it and gotten her from the start.

On the Pearl not knowing front, honestly... after ASPR, I don’t think Rose would tell Pearl about her abandoning Spinel. Not after she didn’t trust Pearl to just not blab but ordered her to keep silent about the secret. Not to be a downer, but Rose did have her secrets, even with Pearl as shown in again, multiple episodes. She kept Lion a secret for heaven’s sake, why would she have blabbed to Pearl about abandoning a whole ass gem that Pearl knew?

Rose/PD is a very morally grey character as we all know--she’s done a lot of good things and has grown a lot. People forget we see her character arc backwards. She’s grown from her Pink Diamond ways, and she probably regretted a lot of what she did, including Spinel. But I think by the time she realized she fucked up, it was too late to do anything about it without giving away the big secret. I think she acted like a dick back then. But you have to remember that by the time she had Steven, she matured a lot.

TLDR; I’m not defending what she did to Spinel, but I’m not outright yelling at her/hating her for it. Both characters acted toxic to the situation, but both grew and you can’t look past that.

[beevean]

The post I made about Spinel made me think about something.

I already got two people who told me, “are you seriously trying to defend this abuser? It’s clear that she was a little shit”.

And I think this is more of a general problem, that comes out both with morally grey characters and in more important real-life situations: no one wants to put themselves into the shoes of a bad person.

Since I was younger, I always loved to read stories from the POV of victims of horrible things, victims of abuse and rape and witnesses of tragedies. I wanted to understand trauma and PTSD and depression, and how they manifest, and what these things might lead to. It’s one of the reasons I fell in love with works such as SU, Berserk and Bojack Horseman, who all deal with trauma and its effects.

But I’ve very rarely seen works that are told from the POV of a rapist, an abuser, or basically the kind of person who does something unforgivable, the kind of thing that makes us think “you’re a monster”. The only examples I can think of are again Berserk and BH - in the former, the entire Golden Age arc explained in great detail how Griffith could ever come to sacrifice his Band of the Hawk (but it doesn’t even try to explain why in the world would he rape Casca in such a cruel way), while in the latter not only Bojack often looks like the villain of the story with how much he hurts people, but two whole episodes were dedicated to Beatrice and how she herself became the pathetic excuse of a mother we have seen. Especially in BH’s case, the show wants to to feel both pity and anger at the two.

Now, Pink wasn’t even that bad - she was a chronic (literally) two-faced liar who rarely if ever took into consideration the feelings of people around her, but she was no abuser, she never hurt anyone intentionally, she has quite the tragic backstory that explains every action of hers, and she did plenty of good that we musn’t forget. But generally speaking, very few people want to understand what really goes on in the mind of a really awful person, because there’s this idea that “to understand” means “to lowkey approve”, or that if you empathize (not sympathize) you’re just like them. So we tend to generalize and distance ourselves. They do what they do because they’re evil! And I’m not evil, so I can’t possibly comprehend what they were thinking. Who cares about their reasons, who cares about how they feel, they are evil and I am good and that’s the only thing that matters.

Personally, I've always found the dark parts of our psyche, the ones we’re ashamed of, fascinating, and I think understanding them is important. Reducing people to “awful pieces of shit” doesn’t help. It doesn’t help those who might be bad people now but have the potential to change, and it doesn’t help us, who are not perfect and might screw up and aren’t always the hero of the story.

And this is why I want to understand why Pink Diamond abandoned Spinel like that, even though I relate much more to the latter than the former - aside from the fact that doing otherwise would be a disservice to Rebecca Sugar’s writing, it’s because I refuse to reduce anyone, character or person, to simply a “piece of shit”, because we could also hurt others and be branded as bad people because of it, and it’s necessary to face our ugly side if we ever want ourselves and others to become better people.

[therobloxgodfather]

How Rebecca Sugar and the Crewniverse RUINED their own series: The Designs and Ruining of the Diamonds

This one is an issue I really have regarding the show and is pretty much the cause of the other two issues/plot points. This is the biggest issue I have regarding the show. The Diamonds had so much potential as villains. They were hyped up to be these flawless, ominous, powerful, mysterious beings back in 2015 and 2016. Everyone was so hyped for the Diamonds. 2016 was a glorious time in the Steven Universe fandom but no Rebecca Sugar had to ruin all that. While you may argue this was planned from the beginning, it’s still bad writing. The Diamonds weren’t everything they were cracked up to be which was a huge disappointment to some of the fandom. They’re supposed to be these genocidal dictators and yet they’re being redeemed. That is not okay. Especially the fact that they were being redeemed before Jasper. Also the Diamonds were hinted to be these great villains but no they got ruined with shitty writing from Day 1. That is bad writing. Hinting at something and then it turning out to not be all it was cracked up to be. They were supposed to be the be all and end all but no we got the opposite. I’ll be going over each diamond to discuss my points.

Pink Diamond: Now I have a lot of problems when it comes to Pink Diamond. Especially the fact that they made her Rose Quartz but I already discussed that and how much potential she had as her own character. I want to discuss two things regarding her. Her design and how she turned out to be. Now I do not like her design as it was inaccurate to her mural and it was not everything it was cracked up to be. Pink was hinted to be this benevolent motherly diamond. Heck we should’ve gotten Jasper’s thoughts on her. Jasper seemed to really care about her so that kind of says something. Pink Diamond should’ve been what most people imagined her to be. It would’ve made the writing interesting if Pink Diamond was in on the rebellion or if she was Lion or if she was the nicest diamond or if she wanted Rose to shatter her. She would’ve been a tragic figure in that case. We could’ve seen more of her relationship with the other diamonds. We could’ve seen her relationships with Jasper and maybe even Eyeball. We could’ve seen her be like a grandmother to Steven. There was so much potential and it all went to hell. What we got instead was a clown-like diamond. A child. A joke. Even the gem shape on the mural is inaccurate.

Blue Diamond: This diamond is one I particularly have a lot of problems with when it comes to design and personality. She’s inaccurate to her mural and not everything she was cracked up to be. Blue Diamond back in 2016 was perfect. The depiction of her in The Answer was perfect. Elegant, flawless, ominous, ruthless. Everything the Diamonds were supposed to be. This was also shown in her mural in It Could’ve Been Great. She was brought up to be this dark gem with a cold and cruel personality from what Garnet implied. Her mural was perfect and it depicted that. However when we saw her in present day for the first time during the Zoo arc, we got the exact opposite. She looked nothing like her mural and her design was off from her design in The Answer. Her face was off. In The Answer, she had an Indian like appearance, but what we got was a disgrace of a diamond. An emotional mess of a diamond. Blue Diamond did not live up to her expectations. She turned out to be this big blue cinnamon roll that was given waifu qualities by the fans. I completely hate Blue Diamond’s canon design. It sucks. Blue Diamond has so much potential and it all got destroyed.

Yellow Diamond: I especially have problems with how this diamond turned out. Not so much with her design. She was built up to be this ominous and mysterious leader when she got mentioned in The Return and when she was shown in the extended intro. Now I have no problems with her design in Message Received. It was perfect. However after that, it was kind of off and lost it’s touch. The main problem I have with her is that after Message Received, she completely lost her touch and luster. She was built up to be a great villain among other greats like Bill Cipher, Toffee, Lord Dominator, etc. This is what we got instead. A ruin of a diamond. She got ruined big time by shit writing. She wasn’t everything that she was cracked up to be. She lost all of her potential. Look at how she is now, she’s this big softie and a big yellow cinnamon roll. In the new intro, she looks like this peppy soccer mom. Yellow Diamond turned out horribly.

White Diamond: This diamond I don’t really have much problems with except for how she turned out and her design. I have major problems with how she turned out. She was kind of accurate to her mural however there are some inaccuracies like the one-piece V shaped shoulder pads we saw in the mural, head shape, and gem shape. But even though she was kind of accurate, I still didn’t like her design. It just wasn’t everything it was cracked up to be. In my opinion, it wasn’t what her mural represented despite it being kind of accurate. She was built up to be this ancient, ominous, majestic, malevolent, and powerful gem. Her design lacks most of that. Being the leader of Homeworld, you would think that she would have this elderly-like majestic look. She herself wasn’t everything she was cracked up to be. She was supposed to be the final boss. Someone who Steven couldn’t reason with. A force to be reckoned with. We got the exact opposite. We got an insecure joke of a diamond. The personality was great in Legs From Here to Homeworld and Change Your Mind but it could’ve been more like it was cracked up to be. She was supposed to be the embodiment of everything Homeworld stood for. This perfect villain. The perfect antagonist. The most ruthless diamond ever. The most cruel diamond ever. The most EVIL diamond ever. Pure evil. Pretty much like a Disney Villain. They wasted White Diamond completely. She had so much potential. She had a lot of potential. We could’ve gotten a great epic fight scene between her and Steven. However like Yellow and Blue Diamond, she turned out to be a big cinnamon roll. A big white cinnamon roll. White Diamond is a major failure of a villain.

To sum it all up, the Diamonds turned out terribly. They all had so much potential and it was all ruined and obliterated. We could’ve gotten this epic final battle against them. A fusion of Yellow, Blue, and White Diamond against the Crystal Gems should’ve been the Season 5 finale. We should’ve seen the Diamonds accurate to their murals and expectations during Season 4 and Season 5. Rebecca Sugar ruined her own series by ruining the villains of her series. This is what ruined Steven Universe.

[malwarewolf404]

M’kay

At the risk of self-ostracism, I’m gonna talk a little about Steven Universe.

Number One: pink diamond isn’t being “demonized” just because more and more of her flaws are continuing to come to the surface. She was. Well not human, but you get the idea. She was a being that was flawed in nature. Just because she did somethings that were cruel or apathetic doesn’t make her unredeemable. All it means is that she did things that had unforseen consequences to the present. So she didn’t tie up the Bismuth or Spinel plot lines before she decided to turn into Steven. Everyone makes mistakes.

Number Two: the Diamonds aren’t? Like? As bad as everyone makes them seem? Okay this is a bit more complicated one and I’m gonna be a bit reductionist in how I talk about it but to put it simple, the comflict between Pink and the other Diamonds is wholely a family conflict. Millions of other gems were caught in the crossfire to be sure, but the fact of the matter remains Pink’s family was doing something awful to the galaxy and she decided to change that. What I think people don’t get about Change Your Mind is that it was never about fighting the Diamonds in the same way that you shouldn’t fight your racist homophobic or transphobic family members. The best thing you can hope for is to change their minds. Yes there is no way to redeem the thousands upon thousands of years of tyranny and genocide against organic life, but shattering them wouldn’t change that either! At the very least now they are not that way and are also still in power and are capable of correcting their mistakes (liberating colonies, disbanding armies, supporting gem equality and the dismantling of the caste system, etc.) If you really feel the Diamonds are unreedemable, that’s fine, but I urge to consider it ain’t that deep.

Number Three: Steven being a male protagonist who solves every problem he faces with reason and respect and compassion as opposed to violence is a good thing. I dunno where the idea that having the Diamonds be evil even in death would be a good thing or something you all would think steven would even be capable of, especially considering his track record. Jasper has tried to kill him for weeks or even months incessantly but is now becoming corrupted? Steven tries to help her. There’s a massive cluster of millions of gemshards incubating in the earth that will emerge shortly? Steven tries to help it. White Diamonds standards for perfection puts every gem, even the other Diamonds, under crushing pressure to be flawless? Steven tries to help all of them. This show wouldn’t be able to push this message if Steven were in any way discriminatory with whom he helped. I wouldn’t wanna watch a show were someone who has the power to help people only helps those who he deems worthy once he knows all their flaws. And granted that is how things work in the real world, but Steven is half human and was raised apart from Homeworld’s society. He didn’t know how bad the Diamonds were apart from what everyone told him. Idk this part has already gone on too long, I just urge you to consider that the Diamonds were controlling but they weren’t unreedemable just because they had a government that resembled something we wouldn’t like to live under here on Earth.

Number Four: Leaving Spinel in the garden was probably an accident. If you’ve seen the video of Rebecca Sugar’s inspiration for Spinel then you already know where I’m going with this. Essentially, Rebecca Sugar stated in an interview that some of the inspiration for Spinel comes from one of her own childhood memories of accidentally leaving a stuffed rabbit in her garden, and having the sun bleach it over a period of months. When she went back to find it, it had changed without her despite staying where she left it. We’re not 100% positive how long building a colony is supposed to take, but presumably it isn’t supposed to take six thousand years. It’s entirely possible Pink only meant to leave Spinel freeze-tagged for a little while, but once she realized what she was doing to the planet, all of her possessions, her status, her ownership of a planet stopped mattering to her. She could’ve very well intended to come back and un freeze spinel once her duties on earth were finished, but just because she chose to stay on earth to fight for the cause of organic beings doesn’t mean she meant to leave Spinel alone for thousands of years. Other things happened to her in that time, and she chose to fake her own death for gods sake. I get it it’s a sad an unfortunate situation for Spinel, but please don’t act like the writers are intentionally trying to make Pink look as bad as possible just because she forgot a toy in her garden, especially when that is based on the creator’s own experience of loss and guilt as a child of losing her toy.

I’m not here to tell you what to think but In general try to just look at this show in some light that isn’t the one way that makes you angry? Just maybe?

[saintheartwing]

The Diamonds ARE Space Nazis.

Lily Orchard made this little video called “Steven Universe is Garbage, and Here’s Why”. I made my own commentary on it, I felt she got some serious things wrong, like the character development, or the whole “there wasn’t really proof Rose was Pink”. That’s not really true. For one, the episode that shows Pearl longing after Rose has Rose outright saying that “we can never go home” and “My Pearl” and other clear implications that Earth clearly WASN’T her original home. But that alone could just mean “Oh well maybe she wasn’t made on Earth” but that didn’t fit with her origin story told by Garnet. Neither did the whole “I never miss my home” thing she said to Greg in the episode where they just talk to each other and Greg tries to fuse with her. That implied that maybe she actually WAS Pink, disguised as Rose. That, to me, seemed like the obvious implication, and those episodes came out looong before the episode in which Pink is said to be shattered by Pink Diamond. So those two episodes were pretty strong evidence to me.

But she DID make a point I REALLY agreed with. One I was furious that more people weren’t bringing up.

HOMEWORLD ARE F--KING AWFUL. They’re literally space nazis. They got the “huphuphup” marching around with their guards who all dress exactly alike, they’ve got the genetic superiority angle thing and the purging of the weak mindset, the whole SLAVERY angle, and the fancy salute to their “fuhrers”, and the disgusting unethical experiments on innocent people for the sake of making weapons...

But SOME PEOPLE said that Lily was being cruel to the creator of the show, Rebecca Sugar. Saying that "a jewish nonbinary woman” was a "nazi sympathizer because she made the irrefutable crime of making her antagonists sad”.

No offense, but that's NOT what was said in the video on Youtube.  What Lily had said was that Homeworld's done Nazi-level things.

They've racked up a GALAXY-WIDE BODY COUNT.

They wanted to blow up the Earth and everyone on it using a superweapon made from the MESHED-TOGETHER-BY-FORCE remains of their OWN PEOPLE. THOUSANDS of them. And they figured out they could do that by doing it to thousands of OTHER gems in unethical experiments!

They've been doing this horrific stuff for literally millennia. They have slaves. What do you think PEARL is?

They view organic life as inferior. The ONLY reason they got stopped at Garnet’s wedding and the Earth got saved was literally because Steven was Rose. If it WASN'T for that, they would have murdered everyone, including the closest Steven's ever had to an actual family.

And the show NEVER ADDRESSES how cruel, ruthless, sick, twisted and WRONG they are for doing all this. There's NO point beyond Peridot screaming at Yellow Diamond, an episode SUGAR DIDN'T WRITE, and HATED, where the Diamonds are confronted about the awful things they've done! And I haven't even gotten to the ZOO yet. That’s it’s OWN can of worms. As is the problem of Bismuth being shown as being in the wrong for wanting to kill the Diamonds. No, she didn’t want to kill off ALL homeworld gems, just the “upper crusts”, she would have “brought the war to the Diamonds” and shattered them. And it’s hard to argue that’s a bad thing after all the Diamonds did! And Bismuth, being coded as black, being told by the main voice of the show “no, you can’t kill these space nazis, that makes you just as bad as them” is...UGH.

So Lily's point is "They Diamond Authority and Homeworld are literal space nazis who've been exterminating entire worlds for millennia, and Rebecca Sugar keeps asking us to sympathize with them". But it's FAR TOO LATE for that! Them being SAD doesn't excuse the fact they STARTED this war AND they've been doing so many disgusting things to countless races for literally eons!

What about all the dead species who got slaughtered? What about the homeworld gems made into monstrous mutants? Or forced into becoming the Cluster? Or made into slaves without realizing how crappy their existence is?

Rebecca Sugar hasn't ADDRESSED this when she's had four, five seasons when she could have instead of an episode about Ronaldo again, or a racing episode against Kevin! When people do stuff THAT BAD, they need to be called out on it, and confronted about it, and made to understand "This is WRONG, and you need to be punished for it"!

And look. I GET IT. I like redemption arcs. I LIKE it when villains get to show a more softer, sympathetic, nicer side that hints that maybe deep down, they’re not all that bad and could maybe be turned. As a Catholic I’m BIG on redemption, kindness and the power of guilt leading people to a “What have I done, I must make this right” moment. I support that kind of thing. But when you’ve got people who’ve done stuff THIS BAD? For literally THOUSANDS OF YEARS? And for even now, after YEARS of the show being on, to have NOBODY call them out for the disgusting stuff they’ve done at all beyond that one episode with Peridot?

What is WRONG with Rebecca Sugar and the SU crew? Did NOBODY stop and say “Wait a minute, why are we making these genocidal leaders so sympathetic, if they were people in real life we’d want them before the Hague���? Did NOBODY in the entire crew go “Shouldn’t we address the whole “Pearls being created to be slaves” thing more properly?“

For the love of God, Ms. Sugar. PLEASE ADDRESS THESE PROBLEMS. And I say that was somebody who ADORES the show.

[rametarin]

You ever get the feeling a lot of people these days are declaring themselves to be bi or trans mostly so they won't have to deal with the self-hatred instilled on them by their leftist peers? I mean fuck if I was a straight white man living exclusively in ultra-leftie circles I'd fucking shoot myself, no wonder I got friends desperately trying to divorce themselves from those labels.

Yeah.

There’s a reason Rebecca Sugar defines herself as, “A non-binary female,” and it’s not because she’s trans.

The hip and trendy trendsetters vying for the role of the people dictating what counterculture is and with high falutin’ ambitions to “chance society and culture,” kind of believe that cissexual and heterosexual people, just by existing as a majority, oppress LGBT. Not by laws or even behaviors, but by thoughts and self-identity. Their EXISTENCE is a form of oppression, in their eyes. Because inherently, homosexuality occurs only in about 5% of the population (for either sex), making them, “unequal.”

Hence, they reason, to just be a normy who doesn’t see any need to quantify their gender or sexuality as identification nor any reason to try and make a seat at the table as large as the one for the regular population (effectively giving LGBT as big a seat and importance, not equality, as the 95% of the population that is NOT gay, bi or trans) is to be some sort of LGBT-phobe.

They torture language and perform to be different from the “common sinners” of “this horrible cisheteronormic, white, male chauvinist culture,” when really they’re just trying to not raise suspicions and make entrench that position and the authority of it as moral, absolute truth. in the minds of other people. To inspire them to bow down to it, the same way.

So no, it doesn’t surprise me at all. Because in the 90s we had people tease they were bisexual despite clearly being stomach turned by the idea of sex or romantic intimacy; there were gay people that aspired to bisexuality, to “get over” the “historical and cultural stigmas” (and later discovering, no, you can’t train or teach sexuality. One way or another. It’s cruel to try) and later decided nnnnooope... they’ll just be straight/gay. Over it.

I prefer to not call them. “ultra-leftist,” however. They themselves might define themselves that way, but philosophically speaking, left wing and right wing when it comes to social constructionists and socialists/communists are really more an effort to rebrand themselves and other things, like secularism, racial equality and civic equality, as left-wing things, and theocracsy, racism and ethnosupremacism as inherently right-wing. Up to and including pretending that authoritarianism is exclusively a right-wing thing, so, “I can’t be authoritarian, I’m left wing!”

Same reason I wouldn’t call them liberals. An actual liberal is not an authoritarian, nor someone with a particular disdain against religion so much a the idea of entrenching it into civic and republic law as an institution. So, I personally prefer not to invoke the langauge describing these extremists as liberals nor left wing, because that inherently invokes images you criticize them simply because you’re “right wing.” I’m not going to validate or even humor that.

In Ye Olde Days of the 90s, yeah. You know that whole stupid American, “I’m totally 1/32nd Cherokee!” shit? That’s not just a stupid meme. That’s a scar. Because once upon a time the same girls that would segue “conversations”, you know, those progressive “advanced 4-8 year old girl” conversations put there as conversation starters and “social education” by short haired, mouthy aunts big into humanities courses, into conversations about how if you were an unmixed white in this society, you were just one populist uprising away from being unconsciously swept up into a wave of anti-immigrant, anti-non-white-person frenzy. So, naturally you tried to insist to the person arguing from emotion as your peer with this very illogical, emotionally driven conversation, you weren’t a Nazi, you had no loyalties to white supremacists just because you were descended from Europeans, and you weren’t numb and stupid to other races and their feelings and histories or unable to comprehend their pain JUST because you were white and, “never experienced those things yourself, so you can’t possibly know.”

The natural, logical train to refute that to console them and stop this bombardment of accusations, mockery and antagonism was to talk about how as an American you weren’t even 100% caucasian. Since most Americans can trace SOME level of ancestry back to native Americans anyway, or at least fake it, it was good enough to at least convince Clara or Debbie during her big histrionic shitfit you weren’t one outrage away from participating in a race war or something, just because you were white and a boy. “Haha, I’m not even ubermensch material! I’d be tossed in the ovens and beat up by the KKK too! Fuck them!”

That later got made passe and a cliche statement they recognize and dismiss as “typical white boy deflection. :^) LOL I’M HALF CHEROKEE. LMAO MY MOM WAS A CHEROKEE PRINCESS! *mocking face* shut up white boy you aren’t native.”

So you had people trying to divorce themselves, desperately, because to be unmixed and white in those conversations was to be drawn into a conversation you weren’t allowed to escape without being disregarded and written off as a white supremacist/racist, and you weren’t allowed to refute it if you were unmixed and white. So people desperately tried to do mental gymnastics to escape that.

Another popular and patriotic out was to say you didn’t emphasize your race or heritage, but you cared more about your national identity and your patriotism of a country that by its very nature was neutral, benign and ambivilant about your origins, so long as you came the legal way and became a citizen. Then not only could you take the high ground of inclusivity and prove you didn’t care about race at all, you could state not just what you were AGAINST (racial supremacism- specifically, white. Your own) but you were FOR incorporation and harmony with any and all as the status quo. That kind of flustered and flabbergasted the people trying to convince white boys that the US was evil and wrong and inherently racist. For a brief time.

And in the late 90s, after it became socially okay to actually even MENTION such a thing as sexuality existed to children, that they had one too, and conversations were to be had about it, all to explain away and validate being homosexual as normal, not gross and totally natural nor threatening, the same girls that ran around making weird conversation starters about how awful boys were graduated to how homophobic and how heteronormic society was.

So naturally you had boys and girls that tried to prove how not “pathetic, heteronormic normie” they were by running around being swishy and kinda queer, despite just being hetero and performing. People performing bisexuality despite never actually lusting after the same sex, people performing it despite never actually lusting after the opposite sex. It was awful. But it got you attention from the cool “progressive” minded girls, so calling them out for something that’s almost 100% inborn and up to a person’s personal conscience, you’d get made persona nongrata.

But yeah everybody could tell acting gay as fuck was getting you inexplicable attention from girls. Everybody knew some of the others were just putting on performances. But nobody could throw accusations around, especially not straight people, in progressive circles. Not without getting cold glances, ignored and treated like thin air if you tried to converse or engage with them.

They’ll try to divorce themselves from whatever background they have from European extraction, up to and including just calling themselves Hispanic or Romantic, or trying to emphasize being Eastern European, because, “Slavs were enslaved, they never enslaved anybody. We have nothing to be ashamed of and everything to celebrate. We were oppressed by the colonizers too.”

They’ll try to divorce themselves from being a “cisheteronormic oppressor of LGBT” by adopting their language and sentiments.

And they’ll sometimes even try to not be an “icky icky boy,” because the only difference between trans exclusive radical feminism and intersectional feminism is whether or not they allow the evil oppressive boys to “change jersies” or not. Radical feminists do not believe you can transubstantiate your sex and BE the opposite gender. If you’re born a boy you’ll be a boy, a hostile potential rapist and predator, because the male class are abusers, exploiters and rapist predators of women. Intersectional Feminists believe gender identity is a social construct and biological sex is a misnomer at best and circumstantial evidence at most. TERFs would not let boys be something else. Gender Theorists whom believe all things male/female exist in our own minds as social constructs, will let them be “good” by not being boys anymore.

And with that my thoughts and word soup conclude.

[monkey-network]

Good Stuff - THE (FULL) TROOF ABOUT STEVEN UNIVERSE

WARNING: What you’ll see under the cut is possibly one of the grandest things I will ever do and generally one of the biggest SU Crit posts of all time. Be advised that explicit language is present and we ask that readers are open-minded and reasonable with any given retort. Note that this has been edited due to Tumblr’s limitations of presentable media so click here for the Director’s Cut.

Do like & share if you enjoyed it or if I fought your boredom. Thank you and take care out there. 

Steven Universe is a charming, popular show with a quad-polar fandom, and I’m only here to point out what I say is legitimately wrong with this cartoon. Simple enough? Fair enough.

POINT #1 - THE ACTION:

Okay, my first point really doesn’t just apply with cartoons, but fights in general. Question: what’s the one thing that people get the most out of seeing a fight? The impacts. Those moments where the opponent is given such a crushing ass blow, that you can feel the effort that went into that attack. Yeah, Steven Universe lacks this. I mean, it can look like the characters are putting effort into fighting their opponents and it can look like they’re getting hurt pretty bad (thanks to applied visuals and sound effects), but it never feels like the characters are actually hitting each other. There are instances of impact, but they’re menial and they’re scattered between the duelists smacking each other like helium filled action figures; feeling as tender as any other motion the characters do throughout. Now if you’re wondering what I mean by impacts, note these prime examples; because animes know their action.

Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure

Hajime no Ippo

Summer Wars

My Hero Academia

If present, violence can/should provide a stark raving contrast to the supposedly grounded world in any series, and the impacts of violence should be escalating with every punch or kick. Attacks should fly with fierce swiftness, the weight/force of any blow can be seen; raw power, speed, and stamina should be pushed to limits unknown. Now, I’m not saying Steven U has to imitate any incredible, well animated fight scene that anime has flawlessly provided by now, but more effort should have been made to escalate the impact of their fights, not keep it steady tuned with

*Smear work to make the boring motions look fast paced

*Spiky white marks to show a clash

*quick visual instances of impact that lets you know a character is getting hurt

*and tons of smoke to cover the possibly graphic imagery

Steven Universe has the fundamentals of action down, but they don’t go beyond that (plus ultra). Their fights can look technically similar with the characters being the only real source of variation, especially when you can figure out their attacks ahead of time. So I hate to say this, but if you’ve seen one fight, you’ve seen ‘em all.

Another reason I presented Steven U’s lacking action is because tts not just about fists flying or weapons clashing, but the balance of emotion that goes with the foes putting their heart and soul into taking each other down. But, for most of the time, I don’t see SU’s fights present any real hook of seriousness, even if it wants me to, and most of them feel present for (basic) comedy. I feel less invested in who’s fighting, or why, than I am at how they’re getting beat up. Ironic, being a show that’s all about being open with its “serious” emotions. Combined with its lackluster animation, and they don’t add much contrast towards an otherwise easy going series

This here is honestly the most funniest a fight scene of theirs can get (mostly ‘cuz Peri deserved that), but after seeing the pretty slow animation, it can lose its luster no matter how deserving it may seem. Now notice this whopping scene, from the anime One Punch Man, below.

You can know nothing about One Punch Man, who these characters really are, but you can tell from these 5 seconds alone that when a fight happens, there’s a fast, over the top sense of comedy that comes with the brutal nature of a man that can apparently KO anybody in one swing, ironic and even more comedic with said one hit wonder being the most emotionless looking character on the show.

Seriously, that’s his face for almost the whole series

Now I know what you’re thinking, “But Monkey Network, it’s mostly a slice of life cartoon. The action scenes aren’t that prominent in the series as you might think and hope. It’s not supposed to be a violent show.” And I’d say fair point except for the fact that Friendship is Magic is also a slice of life cartoon that only has a few real action scenes under its belt, and this particular one is the best fucking thing I’ll ever see.

AGAIN, you can know nothing about the series as a whole, or this episode in general, but this fight alone perfectly captures the game Steven Universe has never really utilized since its early days. It has some seriousness with its escalating over the top attacks, the pace never feels constant, and even though they’re evenly matched, the things they do look fucking cool. The only downside is that since the show has puppet flash animation, it does looks limited, but even then they made the most of it. Steven Universe is hand drawn, so with all due respect, they have no fucking excuse. Their fight scenes amount to stay the course animation with glimpses of impact and a flashy style to avoid it from being pod racing levels of BORING. I’ve seen fan animations that would give this show a run for its money.

The Fandom provides more than the actual show

Even before Garnet’s fight with Jasper, Steven Universe’s action sequences was a sweet chunk of what made the show investing to watch, and looking at back at it, I was a bit too invested in something that wasn’t that invested in itself. Again, I know it can’t stack up to the God tier works that the anime world’s made for itself, but compared to other action present cartoons (Voltron, Star vs. the Forces of Evil, Avatar, The Powerpuff Girls, MLP, OK KO, any shonen anime), I think maybe they could/should git a little gooder in providing actual fights, not sparring matches. That, and if Sugar Honey Ice Tea and her crewniverse can put such effort into the facial expressions, they can make the fights more expressive too.

POINT #2 - THE “VILLAINS”:

Now, I fucking love villains. Not just for the who, but why and how they do it. When bad guys like the Joker, Lord Dominator, DIO, or Him do their thing onscreen, I enjoy every moment of their threatening essence (except Jared Leto’s Joker, he sucked). Villains remorselessly do unethical, downright vicious, things to fulfill their goals while initiating setting up the heroes to correct these effects with their efforts and abilities. Steven Universe has villains, sure. Yet, after having so many chances, Rebecca Sugardaddy has failed to make them REAL villains, specifically the Great Diamond Authority.

Now originally, I was gonna compare the Diamonds to the likes of Fire Lord Ozai(Avatar: The Last Airbender) or DIO (JJBA); villains that work in the shadows and when they’re eventually revealed, they’re already a force to be reckoned with. But looking into how they and Homeworld is set up, there was no other villainous ensemble that could stack up with the Diamonds perfectly like the Gorosei from the anime One Piece.

Looking more badass than the US Government

Now these five gentlemen aren’t necessarily what make up the end all be all for the series, but above all, the Gorosei are the ruling leaders of the organization that controls the entire world of One Piece. They command the military, the police, and other agencies, like their investigative and espionage departments, and the only people that out rule these gentlemen are the descendants of those who created it several centuries ago. Like the Diamonds, they seek to maintain order and justice for the people of their world and doing so means taking on any sign of revolution (namely Pirates) that could damage not only their image, but their purpose. Both Authorities possess absolute rule over the many classes that are under them and their stance of power can be present with the many actions that effect the characters we focus on currently. The difference between the two ruling classes is nuance, aka a grey sense of morality, aka an actual sense of relatability. So when I see a series having an overall narrative villain, Steven Universe has shown me that sympathy should NOT be a factor in storytelling.

Now when I say this, I don’t mean you can’t sympathize with any villain you see. Most of the time, you can feel for the antagonist when their lives never were good to begin with, that’s namely how villainy starts out, therefore making their actions not so much justified, but understandable. Take the rogues gallery that are the enemies of Batman.

Every one of them has a story to tell and a method to their madness. Their histories weren’t as nice or as hopeful as they may have hoped, and you can feel their pain as their efforts to be successful at something grand falls apart due to the Dark Knight or life’s unforgiving nature. However, the sympathy stops there because none of these masterminds, with the Joker being an exception, serve as a main villain to Batman’s crusade for justice, they’re continuous rivals and one off stories that expand the DC Universe. No evil in Gotham is powerful enough because Batman’s story has no real endgame. Steven Universe and One Piece will eventually have an endgame. And while the Gorosei represent an Oligarchical commodity that separates its order seeking rule from their affiliating countries, The Diamonds have amounted to being under one system alone:

Or generally cruel Collectivism if you wanna sound smart

And it’s weird I bring this up. For I would’ve thought to have called Homeworld an authoritative caste system where the gem you’re born with defines your class and status, coinciding with the gems’ natural abilities. The specific gems are given a role and everyone plays a part to maintain societal order, like what India has, with the Diamonds being the biggest and strongest gems and therefore are the de facto Matriarch of the gem society, you feel me? That would’ve earned a little sympathy from me, because the Diamonds losing Pink would’ve meant the massive changes to accommodate their order and resources might not have worked out so well and their image as leaders are slowly diminishing and that can explain the huge resentment for Earth and Rose’s Rebellion.

But no. Instead the Diamonds are a repressive totalitarian government that basically control everyone and everything, all the gems below to strictly follow and almost never question their line of reasoning, and they’re reasons for destroying the Earth has been summarized down to the emotional baggage and grudge that came with their failure long ago.

CAN YOU NOT FEEL THEIR STRUGGLE?!

Wanna know why I didn’t compare the Diamonds to Avatar’s Fire Nation when talking about humanizing the enemy and the connection couldn’t be more obvious? Because before Ozai is ever mentioned, The Last Airbender states very clearly that the Fire Nation is the region Aang and his friends need to infiltrate to stop their manifest destiny. And when we’re early hinted that Zuko’s not full on evil, it lets the audience know that not everyone is on board with those in charge of the Fire Nation invasion, leading up to Ozai’s big debut where we see that as the endgame villain, he’s irredeemable and has such a lust for power, that he’s recognizably the main drive everyone has to stop. Avatar did this right because little by little, the main enemy was narrowed down to a single force that hasn’t made itself known until near the end when his presence bear more importance. The same can’t be said for Steven Universe because Rebecca Sugar Rush presented yet another faint mistake.

The Diamond’s personalities are given to us before they’ve shown us who they are and what they’re capable of…

So we see Yellow Diamond as a vindictive, no nonsense leader that wants shit to get done and Blue Diamond as a more tender looking, yet no nonsense leader that’s grieving over Pink Diamond’s death and does whatever she can to move on and remember the fallen fondly. So, have they done anything before we’ve met them personally? Sure.

*They corrupted thousands of their own kind (because of the rebellion)

*Allowed experimentation towards shattered gems to make artificial fusion or disembodied amalgamates (because of the rebellion)

*And let’s not forget the Cluster (because of the rebellion)

So yeah, quite a lot actually. Now you might be thinking, “But Monkey Network, what does those five old men have to do with what the Diamonds did?” Well, when you see the villainous shit the Gorosei have commanded, their actions are actually more relatable than one would expect.

*Ordering the destruction of an island of archaeologists because they were secretly researching forbidden history

*Ordered death to any pregnant woman in sight fearing that one could be pregnant with Gol D. Roger, the OG Pirate King’s, child. Said slaughter lasted for around two years (Special thanks to @des-the-girl​ for this info)

*Directing the Marines, or the front line enemies of our Pirate heroes

*And contemplating their system’s next move when updates arrive

Now I don’t know about you, but these gentlemen make up quite an authoritative class with understandable motives and relatable notions on running the world without necessarily being on the front lines. Kinda like the US over the years? Even when their level of corruption can be on par and we still know little of their true power and who they really are, they’re instantly better than the Diamond Authority because we can see why they’re in command, their thoughts and actions towards our heroes shows no sign of being sympathetic, and yet we see where their motives lie. I mean, their Government’s enemies are pirates. You know, Pirates? People who’ve robbed and killed and are the opposite of order? See where I’m going here? They namely go after our heroes who are seen to be the enemy even when the Pirates and plenty others consider them the enemy. It’s almost as if there’s a grey choice for the audience to wonder whom the real bad guys are. OooooOOh. Also, quick side note. The Gorosei look fucking cool. Like their designs aren’t exactly human, credit towards Eiichiro Oda and his expressive designs, but they’re drawn with such a level of seriousness and stature that it presents their elder wisdom and grave subtlety towards a subject in a contrasting light to the pirates bombastic, emotional appeal.

So, what’s the tl;dr aspect of this since you probably won’t take this seriously? Well, call this a domino effect. Basically, Rebecca Sugardop has given us nonthreatening villains that showed no sign of any redeemable qualities beyond their ability to mesmerize us with their acting, and the audience should have a bit of sympathy for their side (see ”Bismuth”). In doing so, she failed to make them real villains. In doing that, there really are no real villains in the show. And when there are no villains, the conflict feels dry and absent. And without conflict, she failed at putting together HALF an overall story. And when you’re a coming of age story where it has to end on some note with maturity and change, after almost five years in the making, you just FUCKED yourself over when you didn’t even invest time in HALF of what makes an overall story of good and evil investing and engaging. Oh I’m sorry, what makes an overall story of a blurred line between good and evil. Investing and engaging.

Ugh, I can’t care anymore. If they get redeemed, sure. If they end up dying like a tragedy, fine. They feel less like villains to overcome and more like stairs Steven has to step on to become a better person. Just let White Diamond be as grandiose and badass as Tumblr’s AUs of her, because again…

The fandom is doing the show a bit of justice

POINT #3 - BEACH CITY:

Okay, before I provide attention to our main gem heroes, I thought I’d give their home of Beach City a vocal point to express the diversity they offer and what makes them an essential drive for Steven and the Crystal Gems to protect the Earth by any means. I mean, they offer such valid representation for the show’s world building and can offer plenty of stories to tell to give us that slice of lifevibe the show really needed. But I believe, after seeing Beach City time and time again over the course of 4 years, that I can summate its presence in the show with a single- Nay. With two simple yet comprehensible words.

Who cares?

Whooo CARES?

Thank you, respectable actor Elaine Stritch. Rest in Peace

To continue, don’t get me wrong. Worldbuilding is more than essential for a story like Steven Universe, Berserk, Friendship is Magic, Legend of Zelda, and so on. Whether big or small, expanding a setting is important to giving characters a versatile way to look at their world in a differing light than before. But suffice to say, what world has Steven Universe built for itself?

*A populated province in the East Coast?

*A barn?

*Ancient ruins? Among other distant gem territory?

Aye, this troof is gonna be hard to explain. We just have locations, people. That’s it. They’re no special than the mini Galaxies from Super Mario Galaxy 2, only on Wii, Rated E for Everyone. A place can look cool and a population there can bring life to it, but they should have something for the characters to interact with and visibly wonder about what they might get into as they adapt and progress in some way. And by some way, I don’t mean insert plot devices that help make the characters do significant looking things, and I’ll get to that a bit later. But to sum it up, Steven Universe present locations, but those locations lack identity and coordination.

Stick around, Link, I might need your example

I got a short story to tell. True story. And this story provides my reason, above all else, for why Beach City doesn’t hold much water anymore when talking about world building, specifically after the show’s first season (or Full Disclosure).

There’s a comic book TV show called Preacher, premieres Mondays @ 9, only on AMC. Essentially it’s about a criminal turned Priest, possessed with a supernatural power, going on a cross country road trip to find the physical form of God with his his mate who’s also a vampire and his ex-girlfriend. Pretty vivid premise, but see for yourself. The first season however sets up the road trip where the priest, his ex, and vampire friend stay in a small town in Texas to not only introduce them, the power that the priest gets, and the type of humor throughout, but flesh out a few citizens they encounter pretty well in a thematically connected turnabout for ten episodes straight. All seems good.

Up until the entire town loses their minds, after losing all faith in belief, which eventually leads to a methane nuclear sized explosion that wipes out everybody except the three main characters who exited a few scenes before.

The End.

Now, let’s talk relevance. If I ran Steven Universe, and I don’t think I can, and I pulled 👆👆 that on Beach City at season 1′s end. Erase everything you’ve seen, every citizen will be forced to disappear except the major plot oriented characters, basically resetting the structure. If I did that, how much would it change? What would we really lose? The diverse Beach citizens that don’t and can’t do shit against the enemies we’ve see unless they’re forced to get involved in some way which rarely happens?

You can put as many people of color and as many personalities in your world all you want, but effort should also be put into not just making them NPC levels of value to the point where a reset button wouldn’t put much a dent to the “world building”. The worst part is that it’s not like Batman’s Gotham City or Spider-Man’s New York; places where the villains are plotting while they’re within city walls. Steven Universe’s enemies have to either be brought out somewhere (gem monsters, Lapis) or brought to (Jasper, that red Eye, Aqua and Topaz) Beach City for the place to provide any significant or value. So…

Just saying.

Now if the whole series was like season one with the non “To Be Continued”slice of life episodes, then it would’ve work. Phineas and Ferb, Foster’s Home, and Friendship is Magic has done this well with keeping their main location (The Foster House, Danville, Ponyville, etc.) as their central hubworld for casual stories with a venture outside of them from time to time. I would’ve been okay with Beach City being the spot for Steven and his limitless squad to grow together like Rebecca intended at first. Then I’m reminded that there’s an world expanding story in this, with bigger consequences and threaded arcs, and I’m stuck between investing in the many things they give me, complaining towards full episodes that add up to nothing and went nowhere special, and whining about the lack of reruns it gets on TV compared to Teen Titans GO.

Bottom line, you had/have your comic series to commit to your slice of life genre instead of trying to keep it in the show.

Now, I’m at a disadvantage here. If I want to talk about the actual “SCIENCE FANTASY WORLD BUILDING”, then I’ll have to talk about the Crystal Gems’ involvement in them and I can’t really do that. Luckily, I don’t have to, for SU has unintentionally played itself: when it comes to the Gem oriented locations outside Beach City, they tell but never really show. And turns out I don’t need Link’s example, but Samus Aran’s. Namely, her universe in the Metroid Prime series.

A key element to world building is the control and fun in exploration where you find and somewhat interact with aspects of an environment’s purpose and history while you’re on the go, giving the place more of an identity. Metroid Prime does this well where you journey through different parts of the Galaxy and with your scan visor, you can catalog and figure out the intricacies of the settings, the enemies within them, and info that seem trivial at first, but can offer much in progressing ahead in the game. Note the example before you…

And don’t stare deep into Samus’s blue eyes

Sure it’s an optional part of the game, and you can still trek on with or without having to continuously research the world’s lore, but it offers that versatility where you’re well in control in how to experience the game. Then again, this is a video game, where your skill in figuring things out is the only way to progress anything. What cartoon has this similar level of versatility? I mean, what else?

What else?

Gravity Falls may have stayed in one place, but it gives the characters and audience so much to explore and theorize on. They don’t tackle “everything” the world might have offered (bigfoot), but still give you so much to look out for without ever holding your hand or giving a cliffnotes version on a mystery of theirs. Hell, the fandom was hollering on Tumblr over predicting one of the show’s biggest mysteries being confirmed long before it aired. Hirsh didn’t just give those theory nuts what they wanted, his crew eased us in on how the narrative is taking a turn to someplace different and new without really forcing it on everybody. There was still that enjoyable sense of control that resonated in both the show’s direction and the audience’s experience.

I mean come on, this just oozes the moment of truth

Don’t get me wrong. The crewniverse offer very interesting locations and things that resonate with Gem stuff. My final problem with this is that when I think they might utilize these different places and things, they hold back to sharing but a glimpse of anything the show has plenty of utilizing potential for. Like…

Could this control room present more information about Homeworld’s plans for the gems than just the Cluster? “Probably not, it fulfilled its purpose. Let’s move on.”

What about these drills? Could we personally see how one works, like accidentally reactivate it to see how it functions? “Nah, they’re all dead. Let’s move on.”

Or what about the holes? Could we have some kind of flashback depicting how a gem leaps out the ground? “Nope.” Not even the off col- “NOPE.”

What’s that supposed to be? Is it something important to Homeworld? “We’ll get to that later. Let’s move on.”

Man, this place looks cool. Connie might consider this since she handles weapons and might want something new, like armor or throwing weapons. “Look man, this tour is scheduled. You’ve seen it, we’ll get back to it later. Moving right along.” This tour sucks. “You paid for it, my friend.”

Egoraptor said it best: I’m not witnessing an adventure, I’m a guest at their theme park. This is Kingdom Hearts levels of dragging it along, and I know… “But Monkey Network, they might come back to all that stuff soon. It’s called foreshadowing, you whiner.” To that, I say HA! There’s a huge difference between foreshadowing and giving us cameos. And that is in...

PRESENTATION!

Long story short, if it’s subtle and holds a threatening or vague presence, THAT’s foreshadowing. If it’s already out in the open and is not given a lot of screentime or detail, that’s cameo-ing and waiting for more. The last thing a show should do is hold back and have its audience wait like shoving a secret box in our face, and that’s all Steven Universe has been doing. That’s why so many rant about what’s filler or not. That’s why so many theorize on the most reaching of details. That’s why people proudly growl at what could be the crew’s simple decisions. Because when everything must come back to Beach City, post “Full Disclosure”, exploration can be limited, detail can be limited, and it’ll be up to the audience to speculate/construct the world-building for themselves, making the control and experience for the show feel one sided, therefore UNFAIR.

Like I said, the things I’ve seen offer so much to think about, but Rebecca Sugar sack could’ve done better with presenting them in a better light than a dim mode. The fate of Steven Universe’s future is a mystery to me, and I don’t know what they’re gonna cram in season 5 this fall. All I know is MJ (or Mystery Girl) is fine as fuck and we’re all gonna get something good eventually. My man Ian Jones-Quartey said good world building takes time, and they sure are taking their time.

POINT #4 - THE REPRESENTATION:

Representation in media can be easy when the right writers are at the helm to present (not push) a message of acceptance and acknowledgement towards an audience that may or may not feel the same way. It takes different strokes to rule the world, after all. However, when it comes to character in general, there are two factors in characterization that when used correctly can appeal their message of acceptance for their audience. One, visual acknowledgement of the representing characters (POC, LGBT, belief, etc.) in question and two, giving the subjects good quality participation to show that they are just as adept to the world as any other without phoning in the fact that they are this or that. Long story short, make ‘em good characters and the representation can earn the audience’s respect for itself. Steven U lacks this too, and this comes from them often showing us stuff and expecting us to just go with it, with themes that are enough just to get by fans. Hell, they show us as much as a drive by…

Not even a cool one at that, fresh

I’ll say this to start off: Lars Barriga (my neega) was a stagnant and frustrating character to deal with; nobody in Beach City moved him in any way (not even his own supporting parents), and the writers just shotgunned him growth (more than once) after he basically had to cheat death (more than once) to gain a better conscience. It’s like they wanted to call him a lost cause but had to hook him back in some way for the audience to not deem him a lost cause. So with all due respect, does it matter that he’s Filipino or a trans boy when nothing valuable or thoughtful has come from him especially? Those trivial tidbits can mostly come off as add ons or secondary nods, when they should’ve been welcomed knowledge about his character. Want an good example? Look to the comic series Lumberjanes, especially issues 14-17 and 28. SPOILERS, though…

They did this right for characters Jo and Barney (Jo’s the one in the 2nd panel, Barney’s in the first). They already established these two as well defined characters that make mistakes but are willing to get shit done for their friends by any means. The dialogue above is when Barney is thinking about joining the girl oriented scouts even when he’s considered a boy scout, wondering where does he want to belong. Jo gives him reassurance that she herself felt the same and just wants Barney to assert himself with what he wants to be like she did. And when he does later on, he’s accepted without any forced gratification and the writers gracefully accommodate this to not only make him (now “them”) a good addition to the story’s world, but a welcoming new perspective.

The representation is therefore earned, not just shown off

Now I’d talk further on other characters like Lars, but that would be singing the same beats as my previous piece on world building and would spoil notes on the final 2 parts I’m working on now. Instead, the gems are another reason why the rep-pres-sen-tation in SU is nothing but small fractured penny in the gold mine that is anything else going on, with fusion diminishing the relationship representation of Steven U; however you may see it. Now excuse me… this is the hardest part of my job.

Criticizing love

Garnet is not a good embodiment of Ruby and Sapphire’s love; Ruby and Sapphire is. I would love to see Ruby and Sapphire being together and showing me why they decided to elope, but I can’t because Garnet is a curtain that metaphorically and literally covers said love from having anything more to say than “HELL YEAH WE LOVE EACH OTHER!”. You could say ‘Keystone Motel’offered some adversity for the two, but knowing Steven U, it didn’t feel like much beyond me knowing they’re getting back together in the end because they love each other and they just go back to being Garnet because she’s the personification of their love and such.

Fusion is something I have a disdain for now because they’re exchanging two characters’ development of united growth for basically an entirely new/different character, that don’t have much screen time or development anyways (vice versa in Flourite’s case). You could say ‘Know your Fusion’ presented an evolution for Smokey Quartz, among the other known fusions, to being more than a versatile fighter, but not really no. We were already aware that Steven and Amethyst were acknowledged sad sacks before they fused, so what else does this fusion offer differently than in their ability? As for Sardonyx, she hasn’t changed from her first cameo awhile back and her vanity was the only thing that made her stand out in said episode. All in all, fusion doesn’t reflect a relationship, no matter how hard Rebecca Suge Knight is saying otherwise, it reflects an aftermath; one that’s in and out as a firework. This and up ‘til now, the real couples we see are pretty general or under the rug. To show how the most mentioned and presented couple in the series, RubyXSapphire, has continuously got the shaft, I present the one dynamic you’d least expect: A boy and his stuffed toy.

My personally favorite example so far.

Calvin and Hobbes is a series about boy Calvin and his stuffed tiger Hobbes that comes to life through Calvin’s imagination. Reality is like Garnet in this case, where it’s just Calvin having his stuffed animal around to get into zany hijinks like any other kid his age. Then again, the imagination or the living Hobbes is whom is given more of a focus, allowing their dynamic to bloom in a way that wouldn’t be understood if we just saw Calvin just talking to his toy the whole time. It makes their bond feel real and that’s what RubyxSapphire should be, giving them the floor in a way that adds up to Garnet’s eventual debut. “But Monkey Network, what about ‘The Answer’?” The Answer is an episode that, while sweet and good looking, literally danced over much necessary development in favor of only showing us how they eventually stuck to being Garnet forever. Not saying Garnet doesn’t have any character herself, but her integral backstory was/is one of the most beloved and talked about in terms of relationships, yet little has actually been given to us beyond face value and basic understanding and the writers have generally avoid pressing this any further. In a way, that episode diminishes the representation of real queer relationships, bogging it down to early Disney romances like Snow White’s, and practically blindfolds us about what we want to see vs what we should be seeing.

And I already got cute girls not kissing last year. It’s the current fucking year

I would talk about all the other canonning “ships” but nothing comes to mind other than the gems are getting along better than before, Mystery Girl is still fine as fuck, Steven and Connie are bound to elope since it’s been presented since the beginning, Lapis and Peridot get along as college roommates, Lapis might still have issues after Malachite happened, Jasper regrets nothing, Topaz sounds cool from the little we got of them, and everything has amounts to having a sob story and/or a recollection of thoughts just to say “Hey, we’re good together”. They implicitly share infatuation and good vibes to each other, but nothing to say their themes of LGBT, relationships, and characterization are groundbreaking. The latter I’ll get to next time. I mean anybody can put effort into writing a genuine romance novel, though it takes more effort to push the romance to challenging means without leaving skeptics at the door, something Sugar has been very casual about and is starting to openly show in the show. That and tears. Because you know what they say, open emotions are better than emotional maturity. Isn’t that right, TV?

Don’t get me wrong. Rebecca Sugarbark is out here doing her darndest as…

CARTOON. NETWORK’S. FIRST. FEMALE. ANIMATED. SERIES. CREATOR!

and when she does themes right, the show provides some good things to think about. But when she muddles them up or casually throws them in, especially when these themes come from the different aspects of what makes a person different yet real, it is unforgivable. And when people of all ages are watching this, thinking with their living ideologies about what could be used to think differently? This makes for a very risky tightrope that can lead to either people taking it appropriately or blindly, good and bad alike. I can only hope that as the show goes on, there are less assumptions and implications from both the show and the audience alike and more assertions and certainty that elements like representation of any kind are brought to a more applied approach than a glanced approach.

AND STEVEN - POINT #5:

What makes a great character? Charm? Growth? Badassery? Nah, it’s the struggle son. To cheaply quote Pixar: “You admire a character more for trying more than for their successes.” And while Steven does try, does he really fail? Let’s look back. He has three skillful and powerful guardians that care for him. He has a father who is filthy rich (’member that). He has a sweet ass pad. Everyone that knows him likes/respects him. He has powers retained from his mother. He has a lion for a pet. He redeemed/helped three of what were once his enemies. He has a best friend that joins in the action with a sword. He clearly has the capable knowledge of reaching out to anyone. He’s outdone death more than once. He’s practically invulnerable (see “Steven vs. Amethyst”). Everyone that doesn’t like him could eventually see his way with good convincing and a middle road to come to (except Kevin). While there are things he needs to do and characters that’ll he have to confront sooner or later, I’ve started to think less of how he’ll succeed and more of when he’ll succeed. I’m thinking less of who he is and more of what he is. Here’s what I mean…

I don’t see Star Butterfly as an upbeat, independent, cocky, and enduring magical princess who loves rainbows and puppies and struggles to balance fun, romance, and responsibility in one go. I see an up and coming teenage princess that’ll defeat all the evil, hook up with her friend Marco, and claim the title of Mewni’s Queen while doing it all her way.

And I don’t see the JoJo bloodline as a group of distinct protagonists that have their own goals and passions all the while seeking justice against the evil that surrounds them. I see the main characters of 8 different parts that have the ability to defeat the final enemy at the end.

It’s the “Man of Steel” effect; when you do nothing but show how Steven is becoming like or better than Rose, it takes away from letting Steven see who he really is and wants to be. Season one did Steven good (begrudging to say, I know) where he was devious, self-centered, and oblivious but basically was a goofball kid with a good heart; like Ash Williams from Evil Dead. Halfway in and they basically took that away in favor of him just being the pacifistic hippie boy scout that doesn’t want to do wrong or hurt anybody and wants to be a better version of his mama and… and…zzzzzzz. Yeah, I don’t know how to put this, but Steven is now as good of a main character as a sheet of paper. Like, on paper he had potential, but as paper he’s pretty ineffective.

Hell, even paper can show you wonders

“But Monkey Network, he’s a character that goes through many hardships and has a lot on his mind and is going through plenty like most people.” Yes he is, but he’s really done nothing to better himself. “Mindful Education” brings this up, but immediately sweeps it clean in favor of a song about trauma (ironic) and giving Connie more of the floor. And “Storm in the Room” perfectly captures how flat his guilt complex really is…

This episode could’ve given Steven a better perspective on what he wants to be, how he should see Rose, and how things in his life will change from that point on. No, it amounted to saying Rose wasn’t in the wrong for anything (clearly a lie) and Steven being basically gaslighted to believe that he’ll be around to fix what she didn’t do herself, never stating how he should go about doing so. He has guilt and unsure regrets, and yet now nothing feels like things for him are getting any better through his efforts. Knowing that he’s basically Jesus, I am stunned I don’t see him curing every ill-ridden human on the planet and is instead trying to make peace with everything that wants him dead. Also, if I wanted a show that mirrors the possible regret and turmoil I force myself to suffer with everyday, weed and a literal mirror would create a similar effect. And all this leads to–

“But Monkey Network, he’s at least a pacifist who tries. He only wants to share peace and enlightenment to everyone he meets and that includes those who are trying to defeat them.” True, but there is something called “being pushed to a limit”. Yeah I see Steven stand up for himself while choosing not to hit anybody, but there are some people that don’t deserve anything but a good blow to the face. We see Steven get angry and mean, but has he really been pushed to a limit?

Mob Psycho 100 (Ep. 3) A limit that, while possessing regretting, let’s one know they can be a force to be reckoned with?

Trigun: Badlands Rumble A limit that forces them to take immense action without breaking their code of pacifistic honor?

I mean there’s being a pacifist, and there’s being an peaceful spouting wimp I can whup easily before somebody beats me up to stop it. The point of having pacifism in a show is the counterpoint where that ideology’s being tested and momentous reactions result from it. Yeah, he showed sheer ire towards Kevin in that one episode but that was it, and that was a one off excursion with the only irredeemable character in the series. Now I know violence is not always the answer and this isn’t suppose to be a violent show, whatever, but violence is present more than enough times in this show. So I must topically ask, what was stopping Steven from five knuckle shuffling Aquamarine when he clearly had the chance to, freeing his friends and getting the chance to escape their clutches? There’s the peaceful route, and there’s showing us nothing.

Boy must have a weak ass jab

“But Monkey Network, he has development and growth with this being a coming-of-age story.” True dat, but to an extent. I’ve noticed that when it comes to Steven Universe’s development, everyone is given development with Steven tagging behind. Connie, Amethyst, Pearl, Peridot, Lapis, Lars, you see them learning and growing on the front lines, but Steven’s been kinda consistent wouldn’t you say? I mean, he does grow in seeing many different perspectives, but does he really grow with the said varied perspectives or does he just acknowledge them while doing his usual helping routine to try making things better? You know who is a better main character than Steven? Well….

You could get with this^Or you could get with thatv

Wouldn’t you agree? They’re forced to look out of their comfort zone, they make mistakes but see to getting back up, they grow to understand how this new world works and take it to heart, they’re not mopey little shits and constantly take initiative, still having a lot to learn, and I find their voices less annoying than Steven’s. Okay, that last part is a preference but still.

I’ll say Steven’s a fine protagonist, but he’s a boring protagonist to sum it up. Nothing about him makes me want to care anymore and while I look towards new episodes, all I can do now is tolerate him. They could do better with season 5 upping the ante, but at this point I’m more invested in the world of Steven Universe than Steven himself, and that is sad. You know your cartoon is crumbling where your world generally revolves around the main character and said MAIN CHARACTER is whack! Rebecca Sugar Schnapps and her crew just better git good this season; because it can look good and sound good as long as it wants, but it needs to feel good to be a real show, you feel me?

And that’s my Troof. The whole and nothing but. Thank you <3 Roy M.

[rain-jay]

My Thoughts and Theories on Pearls and Diamonds

...and Homeworld as a whole. So I'd like to start this long ass mess with my thoughts on Pearls. A lot of people like to make the statement that Pearls on Homeworld are basically slaves and the Diamonds are horrible irredeemable tyrants and... I just think that is untrue and here's why I think this. Now a lot of people would claim that the Pearls are slaves because they are treated as objects but the thing is... I kinda know what that is like. I mean in my own home I'm there to cook, clean, walk the dog, give my dad's fiancee money, fix their computer, buy them things, sort their work out and stay out of the way, I'm like a convenient inconvenience. I'm not saying the pearls are like that I just think that like myself they're treated more like secretaries than slaves. I guess this point is kinda irrelevant to my argument as it doesn't make much sense but I kinda know how they feel. However, tere is no stone evidence to suggest that the Diamond's Pearls have been abused physically or mentally. You could argue that YP backing away in fear from YD conveys this but YD is seen to just have a big temper in general and is also just... Pearl probably didn't want to get stood on. YP is also smug little shit who before YD began getting angry was seen to make snide faces and back talk. She's seen to look down upon others, she is snooty and has air of superiority around her much like Aquamarine; 'I am Yellow Diamond's Pearl! I am the best! Only the best for my Diamond! Blue Pearl is chilled out and is allowed to doodle during a court case, she is shown to perhaps be a bit sassy around Greg and even in the crewniverse zine, Blue Pearl is seen comforting Blue Diamond and touching her face, wiping her tears away, this suggests that Blue Diamond trusts Pearl. Blue Diamond probably doesn't have her Pearl do much either apart from open doors and do Pearl things, this is hinted at when she doesn't automatically react to Yellow Diamond and by extension Yellow Pearl's command to sing, she just not used to doing much and is used to Blue Diamond being easy going. Yellow Diamond also trusts her Pearl as well as Blue's, especially when they are allowed to witness such private exchanges between their two leaders and not be sent away as well as witness important political meetings and know information no other gem would ever dream of knowing. I could even say that Pearls would probably be allowed to order gems around on behalf of their Diamond, even someone like Aquamarine. I don't think people who are constantly in danger of being reprimanded would be so comfortable around the person who would hurt them either, if the Diamonds were that ruthless I doubt their pearls would be allowed to even move or speak without their say so when it is clear that this is not the case as Yellow Pearl has a little attitude on her. They're not slaves in the way people think they are, they're more like secretaries and as long as they do their job and stand next to the Diamonds then they are probably the most well protected gems in the entire empire, after all who would mess with a Diamond's Pearl and not expected to be punished? I could probably imagine that if BP went missing or had gotten lost or abducted Blue Diamond would be distraught and would not want another one and would do everything within her power to find her and an furious at the gem responsible and as for Yellow Diamond would be angry that her Pearl, if she had went missing, hadn't been found yet but her anger would come from a place of frustration because she is worried because YD expresses all of her emotions through anger, it's all she knows. I couldn't ever see the Diamonds just replace their Pearls without a single thought, they're around them 24/7 and it is hinted that the Pearls also care about their Diamonds that being with Blue Pearl mourning alongside Blue Diamond and Yellow Pearl getting offended when Peridot runs her mouth at Yellow Diamond. They must have some kind of bond. The Pearls wouldn't say no to their Diamonds and would do anything for them because they probably love them and the Diamonds probably know this. If the Diamonds were that cruel then wouldn't they ask their pearls to complete unreasonable tasks? Because they don't, their tasks are very easy and don't ask too much of them when they know fine well that their Pearls would follow them to ends of the universe. Also it is probably seen and viewed as unprofessional to loose your temper at something as little as a Pearl or to treat them with cruelty, the Diamonds probably see it as acting very juvenile and petty. Of course this would come from a pretty gemist(?) View that getting angry at something so harmless as a Pearl is pointless and if your Pearl makes mistakes it just means you are an inefficient owner and are blaming them for your own mistakes, as they are viewed as stupid of course to the Diamonds a pearl who is stupid must have a stupid owner and if there is something the Diamond's don't like is a gem who is stupid or for them to appear as if they are stupid. A regular pearl on the other hand is, yes probably treated like shit behind closed doors or around gems who don't have the balls to tell on them, its probably something the Diamonds would frown down upon as the Diamonds, Yellow Diamond in particular seem to dislike petty behavior and outright sneer at it. To put into perspective, upper crust gems are less likely to be nasty to Pearls than a more common gem. A Sapphire for example is probably quite nice to a Pearl, they are patient and calm gems from what we have seen and Rebecca Sugar claims that they are kinda like Zelda. So a Sapphire would probably see it as obscene or dirty to abuse a Pearl as it is probably a practice among more common gems and common gems = stupid gems. Going back to my theory up above it would make sense as to why a Sapphire would be perfectly pleasant and why someone like Holly Blue Agate would be quite vicious or passive aggressive, since she has a same rank as a Quartz. Aquamarine is another good example. She is extremely proud yet snarky. If her Pearl were to make a mistake she would most likely make a sarcastic remark but let it go, but since Aquamarine believes she is the best then she would probably reason that a Pearl made for her would have to be the best Pearl who would not ever make a mistake. These are just my own theories and things to consider. I don't think the Diamonds are all that bad and I think there's something else going on and it is to do with WD. Part of me thinks that both YD and BD are terrified of WD. I think YD knows that WD got rid of Pink and can't have Blue finding out because 1) she was threatened by WD and 2) Homeworld would fall apart. Homeworld is about to fall apart as Blue and Yellow Diamond have emotional breakdowns. As much as YD seems like, she likes to work I don't think she likes the weight on her shoulders. YD scoffs and rolls her eyes a lot as if she is fed up with her subjects, specifically brown nosing but also them just being ridiculous in the first place. I think this is because YD expresses love with actions rather than words. When Yellow sees how other gems treat those lower than her like shit basically only for them to kiss her feet, Yellow might view words as meaningless which is probably why she hates brownnosers. This also suggests that White might say some things that are hurtful to her and Blue which could make her think that all words said to her are empty and hold no value. Yellow shows love through actions, specifically her love for Blue and her mercy for Peridot. Let's first take Peridot as an example, Peri is a lower caste gem. Just a little technician who happened to destroy a whole ship, loose Lapis and Yellow's prized Jasper and yet Yellow Diamond was still willing to send out a ship to pick up Peridot when its clear that there is a resource crisis on Homeworld. Not only that but she then sends a Ruby Squad out to go get Pink Diamond's Jasper before Earth blows up. Yellow Diamond cares about her subjects, so much so that in the views of perhaps White Diamond she is wasting resources and should just leave them to die, I mean if I were the ruler of Homeworld and I wanted a strict system I would think this. Yellow Diamond has also shown her love for Blue by listening to her, dressing more formally to visit Pink Diamond's Zoo, placing her hands on Blue Diamond's shoulders when Steven accidentally makes her break down. Yellow has picked up the slack for her, that is very clear 'where's their Diamond when they need her Blue? You've got to be a leader Blue!' Which says to me that YD is telling her that there's only so much work she can do for BD and only so much time until someone notices her slacking. So perhaps Yellow does her work so White doesn't notice and reprimand her for it. And Yellow Diamond doesn't want Blue Diamond to be any more distressed than she already is so she tries to speed up her grieving process so no one notices. Blue Diamond should definitely not be in a position of authority as she is too mentally unstable, she needs a break and quite clearly does not want to deal with her job right now. It seems as if both the Diamonds do not want to do their job the way they are doing it. Blue Diamond seems like a gem who probably would not want to purge planets, she seems like a peacekeeper, she doesn't like conflict, this is evidenced by her loosing her temper at Yellow for silencing the Zircons because she didn't like what they had to say. Blue Diamond got mad because she is tired of Yellow getting angry and causing conflict. 'Can't you restrain yourself!?' As if to say just stop fighting for five minutes and listen, this is important, its important to me! Another piece of evidence is when Blue runs away from the battle in the sky arena to protect herself but also to stay away from the conflict. She was so relieved when she was told that the war was soon going to be over, she obviously does not like fighting. So why would a gem who hates war want to purge planets and start more potential wars, it doesn't make sense. It seems as if these two gems and probably Pink Diamond were forced into their jobs just because of their gem type yet their personalities suit either a different job or ruling a society that isn't so ridged and toxic. I think Pink Diamond got killed because she tried to utilize the planet without disrupting the Eco system or found a way to manufacture gems without sucking the life out of planets (they could just use a fertilizer but that's another post for another time) and I don't think White Diamond liked this Diamond who seemed to not be as whipped as the other two so before she could get to Yellow and Blue all the way with her ideas White quickly silenced her and got rid of her and didn't tell ANY of her era 2 subjects about the gem war or that Pink even existed. She was removed from every artifact and logo, from the minds of younger gems, told not to speak about her, it was as if she never existed and is probably why Blue is desperately clinging onto what is left of her and why Yellow is trying to destroy it. Yellow loves Pink Diamond too so it doesn't make sense, it makes a lot more sense when you think that White is threatening her and is basically saying 'get rid of it all or else'. These are my thoughts and I like them because angst. I kinda hope I'm right because this would be so dramatic and juicey and would explain a lot of actions that do not make sense. Most of this is speculation but its fun so whatever.

[ba1aphoebeowen]

Analysing Character

corIn order to decide on my essay question, I thought I would start by looking into my chosen character in more depth, both character wise and in design. I’m hoping that this research will solidify the route I wish to take. 

Character Design

To start looking into Marceline’s design, I took a look at the Art of Ooo book, which is a comprehensive compilation of the artwork of Adventure Time from conception to full on production. 

Marceline, like many of the other characters, has always had quite a simplistic, simple design. She fits in well with most of the other characters on the show, having a rounded head and a long, skinny body. 

There were quite a few outfit concepts, as this image shows, and when the show did go into production she ended up being one of the more varied characters in this respect. Anytime she would appear on screen, it would be in a new outfit. 

Looking through the art book, it seemed that Marceline’s concept art didn’t have a massively cultural drive in her design. A lot of things were experimented with, inspiration varying from many places. She shows a range of more modern and more dated styles, this putting the idea of how old she is across more strongly. 

When looking into her design, I found a quote from the series creator, Pendleton Ward, where he says that Marceline varies in design because  "girls own more than one outfit". 

Her style is seemingly centered around her being a teenager in many different ways. Some of her outfits (such as below) take on a more rebellious approach to her physical age, whilst some other (such as above) are more stylish. Her outfits also showcase variations in hairstyles, seeming to change with what mood she’s in with the outfit. For example, a torn dress is accompanied by a half shaved, unkempt head of hair, contrasting her more friendly and perhaps more appealing long locks going down her back. 

Her design being kept close to her age is kept as the show is developed, all connecting to her age and, at some points, her character’s point in the story. For example, this design (below) is from an episode where Marceline gets to meet her childhood caregiver again for the first time in a long time. The episode as a whole highlights her less than pleasant childhood, and her outfit makes her feel like more of a child. It also refers to another episode that does actually delve into her childhood, where she first meets said caretaker, and she’s wearing a similar outfit - a red top with a dungaree-skirt of the same purple colour. 

 Overalls are seen as more of something a child would wear in the modern day despite originating as covers for more dirty work in the 1770s. 

While it could be considered that the overalls could both refer to the modern view, which is more childish in appearance, as well as their original use hundreds of years ago, I find this unlikely. The time period of the show suggests that Marceline wouldn’t have been alive for a time where this style choice would have been anything other than a more down to earth and carefree outfit. 

As Marceline’s character develops, her outfits become less and less frazzled and unkempt. The start of the show suggests a lot of instability, some things she needs to work out in order to get along with people and to keep her style steady. She also shows a change of posture, even in the character turnarounds (above and below), where her stationary pose is quite hunched over, and for the concept of a later episode she’s straightened out and appears more confident. 

Marceline’s colour designs, like her outfit styles, varies from episode to episode, but not as much. Her hair is kept black throughout the show, and her skin is a pale blue, and these create the base for all other outfits. Red is a common colour for her to wear, this relating both to her character as a vampire that can ‘eat red’, as well as her character. 

Red isn’t a colour that is used often in the other characters, the ones coming to mind are Marceline’s father and Peppermint Butler, both characters having quite evil traits, which could be hinting at Marceline’s vampire origin. Another character that comes to mind is Princess Bubblegum, a character that isn’t red but pink, and becomes quite a large part of Marceline’s character later on in the show. This colour choice could be suggesting their connection.

The darker colours that Marceline usually wears is most likely to make her seem more foreboding, as you would expect a vampire to be, but as the show progresses this ‘fear’ that she’s meant to inspire becomes more and more diluted as her designs change. 

Marceline has some smaller details that relate to her vampire half, the most notable being the two bite marks on the left of her neck. She does also have fangs, although these are prominent a lot of the time. The concept of vampires has existed for millennia across many cultures, so the exact origin of the concept is hard to pin down. Marceline’s character isn’t too centered around her vampirism in design, but she does use a couple of the tropes this creature tends to carry, such as the bite marks, an aversion to the sun and some other powers (such as floating, healing, shapeshifting). 

The first time it was mentioned in the English language was in 1745 in a book called “Travels of Three English Gentlemen“, but it had been mentioned in other languages before this. How a vampire was created changes between cultures, such as in Slavic and Chinese traditions where there was no biting involved, just a deceased person being jumped over by an animal. Fangs weren’t really involved in earlier accounts of vampires, but they all relate by drinking the ‘vital essence’, mostly blood, from people. 

The most clear tie between Marceline and vampire folklore is in the modern beliefs of vampires, where they have a certain charisma in order to get their prey, for blood or non blood reasons. 

 A lot of her vampiric traits seem to be more inspired by more modern takes on the species, such as in Dracula (1897), Murnau's Nosferatu (1922) and The Vampyre (1819). Some traits are easier to find in folklore also.

Although Marceline isn’t shown to need the moon to heal, the vampire that she takes this healing ability from seems to gain strength from it. A possible inspiration for this could be from the 1819 print of The Vampyre, where Lord Ruthven can heal from the moon. 

Shape-shifting when related to vampires originates from the Jewish folklore Estries, but a more modern example would be Dracula who has this ability also. 

Marceline’s pointy ears could be sourced, as much of vampire traits are sourced, from Dracula. In the 1924 play of Dracula, the character is made to ‘disappear’, which could contribute to Marceline’s ability to turn invisible (or a general trait of being able to disappear when needed, either through invisibility or speed).  One of Dracula’s more notable traits is the ability to turn others into vampires, which is something Marceline shares. 

Her ability to turn into a bat could originate from Asian cinema, where in the 1950s a vampire woman, a ‘manananggal’, is said to have bat like wings. This could also relate to how bats are often connected to rabies, which is passed on through bites.

Marceline’s roots in vampire history and fictional culture do make her seem to be a more threatening villain, but she counters this with her personality. Her design holds very little in physical ties to vampires (the most notable being Dracula, a character that had a big impact on this kind of creature) which could be a way of separating the two, so her vampirism does exist but doesn’t define her. 

Personality and Background

When looking into Marceline’s personality as demonstrated in the show, she starts off as a minor antagonist to the main characters. As the show goes on, she maintains an almost cynical and cruel but humourous persona.

Looking into the Art of Ooo again, I found some details as written by people that worked on the show. I also found the Adventure Time Pitch Bible which details her early concept as well. 

From this image from the pitch bible (above) Marceline started out as a musical character that provided an almost guilty pleasure to the protagonist - with the “allure of a daredevil”. Of course, when the show went into production, more was added to her character.

Rebecca Sugar, a story boarder and songwriter for Adventure Time worked a lot on Marceline and this influence really boosted her popularity with audiences. Olivia Olson is her voice actor, and a singer. 

Rebecca Sugar: “She seems bad, but she’s anxious and doesn’t have a high opinion of herself.” “Tries to hurt people on purpose because that’s less painful than hurting people by accident.”

This quote is evidenced throughout the show, starting from Marceline’s premiere “Evicted” in episode 12 where she seems to be friendly with the protagonists, but is meaner than she needs to be to them. Later on as Marceline and Princess Bubblegum’s relationship is shown, it can be seen that she does this to her as well, especially following some relationship that they had before the show. 

Olivia Olson: “The world sees confidence, maybe even a hint of intimidation or haughtiness. Yet, deep down, there’s always a reason she got that way. She has lots of layers.” 

The origin of this attitude could be seen through flashback episodes, such as “I Remember You” where Marceline’s childhood is looked into. She was left alone during the Mushroom War (a nuclear war that wiped out most life) as a child and found by Simon (the Ice King before he lost his mind). Simon then had to leave her to keep her safe from himself, which continues her record of being abandoned by people she looks up to.

The episode “I Remember You” is a turning point not just in Marceline’s development but in the show as a whole, as it shows it’s audience a darker side to such a bright and colourful world, and how they are willing to delve deeper into themes of abandonment and flaws in childhood. 

Marceline’s background is shown through flashbacks, the environment of these seeming to be in the 1980 - 1990s due to some cultural hints within the episodes, such as the singing of the “Cheers” theme song, a show that ran between these years. This show was almost exclusively aired in America, so it’s safe to assume that this is where she started out - despite the mapping of Adventure Time being a lot more scattered compared to real world Earth. 

Essay Question

How does Marceline portray vampires historically and culturally in Adventure Time?

How she diverts (drinking red instead of just blood)

Connections to Dracula

Character design differences to standard vampires

To what extent has Marceline’s childhood affected her adulthood?

Psychology of children and trauma

Effects of mentors (Simon, Ice King, Hunson Abadeer)

Character design (Changes in outfits)

Interaction with other characters (Finn and Jake, other vampires, her father)

To what extent did Marceline affect the popularity of Adventure Time?

Songs (Rebecca Sugar’s influence, Adam Muto)

Backstory

Character Design

[faelapis]

so i’ve had these jasper asks in my inbox for a while... and it’s about time i addressed them. i’ll be focusing especially on that last one and the idea of “deserving” redemption, + some of my own general thoughts to talk about the su narrative, jasper, her relationship with peridot, trauma, steven, and where we go from here. 

it’s time for another jasper post under the cut. 

steven universe is pretty loyal to the rousseau was right-trope, which basically means that while yes, people are accountable for their actions, everyone are born as a moral blank slate and drawn towards doing what they perceive to be right - if someone is “evil”, it’s because of outside influences, not because they were ‘born’ weak or selfish or cruel. it also implies that anyone has the chance of redemption and renewal. 

one of my more radical stances in fandom is that i don’t think jasper is a bad person. partly because she’s dedicated to a cause she believes is just, and partly because i don’t think any gem is supposed to be “bad”. i think she’s rather selfless - a “neutral good” within her own mind - and to her, the people and places she’s loved are more important than she is. she holds herself to just as high standards as anyone else, if not higher. her views on defects and corrupted gems are incredibly similar to peridot and yellow diamond, and this seems to be the general rule within the yellow sector - your “use” is very much the focus. 

for this reason, it’s deeply unfair to compare her to, say, blue’s quartzes: gems who have spent the last 5000 years with a loving support network of fellow quartzes with and without defects, playing daycare for the zoo humans, not living to fight, under a diamond who wants them to grieve, love, and feel their emotions to the fullest. 

i think it’s also noteworthy that despite living a completely different life, i don’t actually think jasper’s so hardcore against defects as people give her beef for. not really - at least no more so than peridot, who trash-talks pearl and corrupted gems alike. 

jasper’s treatment of peridot herself is the main example of this, and works as an important contrast between how jasper treats gems with defects VS. how say, someone like holly blue treats them (because yes, actions still matter, even if the why makes sense): 

jasper never lays a finger on peridot, insults her, or otherwise mistreats her. in “the return”, she sounds outright bored, because she believes peridot can handle herself when it’s just a handful of gems. she doesn’t define peridot by her defects. peridot, in turn, feels comfortable around jasper - enough to argue with her, roll her eyes or whine (”we can’t leave yet!” “ugh, fine”), and talk shit in a casual way. she doesn’t think jasper will punish her, hurt her or do anything more than argue back.

holly blue seems to terrorize gems on homeworld’s side, physically and verbally. it’s part of her job, but it’s also out of her own perfectionism and impatience, to keep them in line and remind them to defer to superiors. this is before they do anything wrong, and she’s very much wrong to do so. by contrast, peridot can mess up, or even depend on jasper’s help, and the worst jasper will do is tell her how to attack with the ship, or that they gotta get back to homeworld - she’s stressed, but she doesn’t say either in a demeaning, harsh or cruel way. 

jasper is cruel to amethyst, yes, but there is a very important key difference here: amethyst is a crystal gem. jasper doesn’t fight her for shits and giggles, to keep her in line or “just” because of a superiority complex - she sees her as The Enemy(tm). this is such an important difference, because jasper doesn’t treat gems on her own side this way, even when their defects are blatantly obvious. 

peridot, without her enhancers, is basically “useless” - she’s a crystal gem, and she can’t do her job properly without her screen and fingers... but jasper is outraged at what the crystal gems did to her - taking her enhancers, her status, her dignity. she still wants to reason with her, and doesn’t take any shots (physical or verbal) at peridot the entire time - she may have been told someone like peridot no longer has a use, and she does repeat some of yellow diamond’s rhetoric... but a part of her resists that mindset, because jasper’s a very emotionally-driven person. like pink diamond, peridot is in a box labelled “people i care about”, and so anything bad that happens to them is unfair. it’s not what they deserve... and peridot wants to help her. she tries, genuinely, to explain what’s so great about earth. 

this is what i mean when i say jasper holds herself to higher standards of usefulness than anyone else. above all, jasper’s fatalistic mindset is a combination of the “yellow sector” ideology and how she copes with trauma. her base response is that if she didn’t do enough to prevent it, she deserved it. she pities herself, but she sees herself as worthless if she can’t do her job - protecting/avenging herself and others.

she also serves to hold characters accountable, in a way that is reminiscent of lapis in “mirror gem/ocean gem”. jasper’s treatment of the crystal gems seems excessively rude and violent at first, but the show dances a very long dance around her motivations. a lot of the point of jasper’s big episodes is to play with your assumptions - even a relatively straightforward episode like “crack the whip” is really about setting up “beta/earthlings”. not just to show what an empathetic and growing character amethyst has become, but to show why jasper was so desperate for revenge. we got to see her actions before her motivations, so when you find out that oh boy did she have reason, it’s a gut punch. it puts everything that just happened in perspective. 

there’s a reason the show lets steven think jasper is “mean” or “terrible” for a while - and it’s not because she is. it’s because steven, at that point, is holding on to this idea that if jasper’s angry with people he cares about, she’s wrong. everyone he loves are Good. when jasper says something about wanting to beat up rose, or how pissed she is at lapis, that’s just Bad. he “got away” with this mindset with peridot, because peridot was young and didn’t really have any serious beef with the crystal gems. she was “easy mode” - not necessarily a better person, but younger and less cynical about her enemies. 

“why do i never ask follow-up questions?!” is a great line steven says to himself, because that’s exactly how he treated jasper - he eventually tries to help her, but it’s out of wanting to “fix things” more than understanding her. that’s why it needed to fail. steven needed to hear her speech, and to learn the whole story without assuming the other side is evil... and of course, that’s part of what jasper was punished for, too, because that’s how she’s lived her whole life. 

jasper was right about one thing, though - steven only helped after she was declawed. he didn’t care about any of the things she said beforehand. he took every situation at face value, and never considered that maybe she had reason... because that would mean taking a hard look at the crystal gems, his friends, and his worldview. jasper, with her parting words, sort of saved steven from becoming like her - completely entrenched in his own views, never questioning his “side” or the people he cares about. (she wasn’t alone in that, and the whole "bismuth -> bubbled” run was mainly about steven facing hard truths about the people he thinks of as ‘good’, but i digress.)

all of that so he could be punished for not knowing, for assuming, by the show delivering him a failure after harsh truth after failure when trying to help people. jasper being among them, she had to corrupt - a horrible situation born out of assumptions on both sides (that steven is rose and must be held accountable for her actions, that jasper is “bad” and that rose/lapis/ect were right to hurt her). the best way for the show to hurt steven is by hurting others, making him feel both like it’s his responsibility and like he’s helpless... so steven and jasper are a bit alike, in that one, particular self-blaming way.

ok, i’ve gone on and on, but all of that just leads to the current question: where do we go from here? 

after reaching a truly low point, steven had to slowly recover and build himself up again. starting with small human relations - “onion friend” and “future boy zoltron” were both about this, (which is why i’ll fight anyone who says they were just filler). so was “gem harvest”, letting him connect with family he didn’t know he had... and now, after slowly recovering from some pretty harsh trauma, he’s started to explore. he’s asking questions, finally, about the gems on his side. about rose, pink diamond, and about why the crystal gems won’t just tell him everything. this took him to space, to characters he can still help, if he tries to understand them - which is probably gonna be a part of the road ahead.

but then what about jasper? 

...we can’t know for sure, but i think she’ll be back. i really want her to. corruption is still one of the bigger mysteries of the show, as is the whole situation around pink diamond. jasper is the character who is most obviously involved in both of these, so it’s hard to imagine she won’t pop up in either context. by my own view of redemption - which is redemption in the narrative, through learning that she’s a person and not just a “bad” gem - she’s already achieved that. my main focus is really healing, and i think that’s possible. steven wants to help, and he actually understands her now. 

in the same interview we got this gem about jasper, rebecca sugar also talked about wanting to focus on self-love outside of relationships going forward. as someone who’s been alone, isolated and felt completely unlovable, jasper is a great candidate. that doesn’t mean she’ll never get to connect with anyone or have meaningful relationships... but as with steven, she has to recover first, and focus on herself, too.

[tumblunni]

NEW STEVEN UNIVERSE AND BUNNI RANTS THOUGHTS ABOUT IT

* i love zircon and i feel so sorry for zircon aaa And even for Other Slightly More Smug Rival Zircon! I mean, they’re both just doing their job and it was merely a stroke of fate that the blue one got assigned to steven’s side of the trial. Rival Zircon barely even got two lines of dialogue so we dont even know if she was remotely evil or just like.. well, a smug office rival. It was a really nasty shock that yellow diamond just poofed both of them! I hope they’re okay when they reform, i hope they dont get blamed for what happened and shattered or something!! steven plz come back and rescue the endearing neutral office gems along with the more clear ally ones and stuff * I’m not quite sure if Zircon was right, though... I mean yellow diamond being 100% super bad and having framed rose for killing pink diamond would probably be in-character but it wouldnt be revealed so soon if it was what actually happened, right? What I took from this instead is that maybe Pearl was actually pink diamond’s pearl, and she’s the one who betrayed her instead? OR... possibly whenever we finally get white diamond revealed, she’s the one who’s the big evil boss who did it all? at least we saw some sort of statue of her so we can confirm she has the crazy cool goku hair, lol * I LOVE THE OFF COLOURS AAAA * I kinda love that its now canonical that conjoined twins can happen with gems, I mean its always nice to know that your favourite fictional characters could be like you which is why I think its great the show has all these different disability metaphors. Also I did not know that that kind of strange shape is actually possible with Rutile gems! * also, as predicted, I ADORE CENTIPEDE GRANDMA!!! and apparantly she’s a fusion of like.. the most gems ever. Polyamory grandmas! Combined into the ultimate grandma!!! did anyone else picture that ‘ariel needs legs’ comic tho ‘seven fusions... maybe more. imagine.’ * I think it’s spelled Paradshvana? No, its parashivana, I think. I hope she gets mentioned in a book or a comic or something so I can make sure I have the correct spelling of her name. But I love her! I like that the writers picked a type of sapphire that has such an interesting name, it helps set her apart from the blue one we all know and love. * LARS IS STEPPING UP!! aaaaa I’m actually kinda liking lars A LOT, he’s had so much character development and for once is actually keeping it between episodes and showing self awareness of his problems and providing actual reasons for why he’s doing them, rather than just sitting there refusing everyone else who keeps trying to help and support his salty ass. I wish we’d seen actual signs of this a lot earlier though, tbh it feels more like theyre rewriting his character rather than revealing something that was always there. * I didnt expect that humans would actually have an advantage against gem tech that only recognises gems! that was a cool way to have lars actually be able to make an impact when he gets his character development and decides to fight back. It was pretty badass! * okay, I’d seen so much speculation about the lars death thing and then i got spoiled for him being revived by steven’s magic somehow, so it didnt have as much of an impact. but it still hit my heart a little even as someone who knew it was coming and someone who ABSOLUTELY HATED LARS until like right this exact episode when he finally showed some character depth. But still, even if it succeeded at being sad, it kinda suffered a lot from the show’s usual rushed pacing. Like.. even in a ‘one hour special’ it seemed like every episode was still forced to work as a standalone and squish every plot point into 15 minutes. We BARELY got actually meet the off colours before we moved on to this next lars death plot, and like.. he died SO FAST, and it had barely a moment to breathe before he’s suddenly back. You couldnt even really tell what killed him, he just fell off the exploded robonoid and was dead immediately. And like.. with no clear wounds except one small face scar, so it seems like it did indeed run on harmless cartoon explosion rules. And I guess he just fell too far and hit his head or something.I mean I know they couldnt show a guy realistically covered in burns with limbs missing or whatever, but could they have at least had him covered in shadow or something so the nature of his wounds is left up to out imagination? When it all goes by so fast it seems almost unintentionally comical that he died by just falling over a little too hard.I mean, characters have survived way longer falls in this show even if in real life you obviously wouldnt... And SERIOUSLY give us more than FIVE SECONDS to believe he might be really dead, before reviving him with a never foreshadowed new magical power. Clearly it actually was planned out a long time earlier in the show, but somehow it still feels like a bit of a cop out? I just hope this faux death revival magic has some sort of further plot effects, and could be like a catalyst for Lars’s character development or something. Cos its clear that he didn’t just come back the same as before, it seems this magic comes with some kind of cost to it.. * IMMEDIATELY WE SEE SEVERAL COSTS TO IT * okay lars is LITERALLY A ZOMBIE * a CANDYFLOSS ZOMBIE * what the FUCK * steven how did you somehow never notice lion had a weird zombie heartbeat * wait i guess steven must have assumed lion was a gem creature of some sort * WAIT LARS IS LIKE A GEM HYBRID MUTANT ZOMBIE * he isnt even hungry or tired?? suddenly?? that must be?? REALLY FRIGHTENING?? WHAT THE FUCK?? * why is this episode SO RUSHED, why are you throwing terrifying existential horror and then just immediately lars is left trapped on homeworld and thats the end, and we dunno how long we’re gonna have to wait for the next episode or if it’ll actually address this or anything!!! * GAHHHH * also in retrospect WE DIDNT SEE ANY OF HOMEWORLD DURING THIS ARC. We still know practically nothing about their culture, aside from a mild bit of hope that the gems they persecute are at least able to escape and have a small sort of rebellion here rather than all being destroyed. But seriously there must have been millions who’ve been slated for shattering and only this tiny group managed to keep hidden long enough to meet steven... gahhh how many friends has centipede grandma seen die... * but okay seriously LARS IS A GEM ZOMBIE THING * and this means LION IS ALSO DEAD * LION HOW DID YOU GET HURT AAAAA * oh god so rose must have rescued him and then he had to see his whole lion family die and sit around for ages waiting for rose to come back and now all he can do is try and protect her son. poor loyal pet... poor hachiko: kitty edition... * WTF LARS IS DEAD AND HE’S STUCK ON A PARALLEL WORLD AND HE CAN NEVER EAT AGAIN AND HIS WHOLE FUCKING JOB AND HOBBY WAS COOKING and AAAA he’s the one out of everyone who was most hung up on like.. Normal Human Society Things. of all people, this is the most torture for him! god, the only consolation is that the off colours chose to stay there and protect him, and maybe it’ll help him work out his issues to be away from it all and have some close friends he can relate to. Cos like.. we all know steven and co are always trying to be his friends, but he had that weird inferiority superiority complex that kept him from accepting the friendship. At least we know here that he feels he’s able to be equals with these gems, and they’ll all be able to protect each other and learn from each other in different ways. But still DEAR GOD POOR LARS I thought you were an asshole but I didnt want you to GET TRAPPED IN SPACE AS AN ADORABLE ZOMBIE AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA * steven could you like.. throw the ube cake through the portal. i mean he cant even enjoy eating it anymore but it might still help him feel better. * steven can you throw rebecca sugar through the portal so everyone can throw legos at her for writing such torturous fates for all her characters then throw her back cos i mean its not like anyone’s gonna get a happy ending to the show if it ends on this cliffhanger, lol but still LEGOS * steven can you throw the ube through the portal to me and I’ll eat it and write a review for lars and maybe send him a small plush doll of himself * rebecca sugar can you open like a mailbox to all your characters where I send them letters encouraging them to keep going even though the world is cruel as fuck ok thanks bye * I STILL REALLY LOVE CENTIPEDE GRANDMA THOUGH * and zircon had better be okay! please tell me she escapes and ends up joining the off colours or something * also can we have the same for topaz + topaz thanks * this is just the arc of introducing fifty new characters and not being able to save any of them and also one already introduced character is also LITERALLY FUCKING DEAD * aaaaa