I wonder how that would work, since he’s mostly human. He has, like, blood and bones and skin.
Though on the podcast, Reb Sugar explained his body was in essence human cells held together by magic. So… I guess they could theoretically be dispersed or absorbed into his gem, then reconstituted somehow?
He has fused and shape-shifted, so presumably this would follow in those lines?
right? be a good break for a lasting shape-change anyway
i thought that’s what happened in the battle at the wedding for a second
And similarly yipe, Sunshine Justice?
Joan Jett.
Yeah.
Debbie Harry would probably be a better fit. I suppose it’s either/or, though.
I knew I knew her voice, but I couldn’t place it.
And, “Nightmare Hospital”? I guess… the associations one makes with that whole scenario are a deliberate thing, since Connie’s mom is voiced by Mary/Maria from Silent Hill 2.
This show really is one of the most beautiful things.
Also.
This lo-fi relaxation thing is a YouTube trend that I can 100% get behind, incidentally.
This article kind of goes over well-thumped beats, but there are hints of an untapped harmony in here.
Something that Sugar gets at, that I don’t know that I’ve seen framed in exactly these terms, is that when she was younger probably the reason “girly” media never hit home with her is that it felt inauthentic. And the reason it felt false was almost certainly because it wasn’t women telling the stories, about their own experiences. These were by and large stories from the patriarchy, told to marginalized groups about the roles they were meant to fit into. Like, there weren’t true stories. They were social propaganda.
And her goal with this show was, to some extent, to try to redress those wrongs and tell an alternate history where she’d gotten the show she needed at the time. (Which also fits in with the above observation about the show’s strange timeline, where it seems to be set around 2000, 2001, except with wi-fi and smartphones. I wonder when the GameCube starts to show up? Is it around when Steven turns 14, I wonder? That would line up with Sugar’s age.)
Update: the GameCube shows up as early as “House Guest.” This is also when the shelf behind Steven’s bed updates, and we start to see the media lined up there.
Given that this picks up right after Mirror/Ocean Gem, and seems to go on for a few weeks (?), I guess an explanation might be that they pick up the newer console and games to help entertain Greg while he’s staying over?
The N64 still appears randomly after this, IIRC. Curious to see if the shelf behind his bed ever reverts in those instances, or how much attention they pay to what background assets they’re using. I’m guessing lots, but. Hm.
my favorite background detail from House Guest is the Sailor Moon manga sitting on his bedside table!
Do you ever wonder the wisdom of making an eight-foot loft with no railing the personal area of a young child?
He’s not so young by the time the show starts, I guess, technically, but he sure seems to act the age he looks.
yknow honestly instead of a time skip wouldnt it be better to just go stevonnie the full time
yes
I keep catching things I missed before.
So, uh, new episode today.
It’s super unclear what’s going on with the season length. In theory today’s episode, “Familiar,” should be the finale. That would have been how it was originally produced. Then “Together Alone,” next week’s, would be the season six premiere.
A bunch of sites are reporting this whole run of episodes as an extension to season 5. But as far as I can tell, there’s no actual justification for this. It seems to be a game of telephone based on this one GeoCitiestastic TV-related Web site that I’d never previously heard of but that everyone kept parroting, “Oh, no, they’re reputable!”
Going to their records, this reputable site looks like it has a history of crossing out and changing previous listings for the show, presumably as new information arises. Which to be fair is reputable behavior. But, um. Yeah. Internet, right?
It’s not implausible that CN has done something weird and granted a production extension to season 5, or randomly reclassified the first six episodes of season 6 as the end of the prior season, but there’s been no prior indication of this. Everything we’ve heard until now is that this is the back half of a 52-episode order, the original season 3. So. I dunno. I guess somewhere, somehow, we’ll eventually get clarity on this.
What I’m really here to talk about, though, is chests. By which I mean busts. On the female characters, here.
I mean, it’s technically a kids’ show. It makes sense that they wouldn’t be focusing on boobs. The Gems… well, conceptually they have no reason to even be humanoid, but if you just take it as read that characters like this are going to kind of look like people, even then it’s hard to explain why they would have breasts as such, considering what they are. But there’s a grander stylistic thing going on here, that the show does, that I find kind of interesting.
With few exceptions, none of the female (or female-presenting) characters seem to have clearly-defined boobs, but neither, usually, are they drawn with conspicuously flat chests. Rather, their torsos are all sort of rounded trapezoids, so that depending on their posture and clothing, breasts can be implied or not. Often, draping something over the top of the torso and baring the midriff (e.g., default Stevonnie, sometimes Jenny Pizza) is enough to suggest a bust without actually drawing one.
But, stick 'em in a different outfit, have them stand a different way, and that vanishes.
It’s all kind of androgynous on a physiological level.
The two obvious exceptions I can see are Rose and Sadie.
Both of them are heavier characters, and in terms of symbolism I can see how the legendary dead mother figure is going to have boobs, human or not. But it’s… a little curious that it’s really only these two.
Like, is there any other connection besides them both being heavy-set? Some thematic parallel I’m missing?
Also why is it nearly for every Steven Universe character, a generic Google Image Search is perfectly fine whether or not you’re using safe search – except for Priyanka Maheswaran?
guess we don’t need a tumblr anymore
anyway thanks for reminding me theres a new episode
It’s a slow boil, and would work better in a binge watch after the insanity of “Legs,” but it’s here.
Some fun lines in there. And actually… for all its slowness there’s a hell of a lot in this episode, now that I think of it.
It’s pretty weird.
Why do I get the sense there’s more to the line, “White hasn’t left her head…” than it sounds?
And the pebble thing, can Steven just… do that now? Like, with any rock?
EDIT:
Hang on, Pendleton Ward contributed to this episode?
Hang on, on a second watch, in the extraction chamber, Steven sweats a pink fluid… and that’s the fluid that drips on the pebble, bringing it to life. The first time, it went too quickly; I thought it was another of his tears.
So, it’s as many speculated, after seeing Pink’s crayon drawings. The diamonds seem to be what give life to the other Gems.
Rose must have found it so novel for Greg to inject life-giving essence into her.
oh my gosh the Pebbles!! 
theyre basically Doozers and that’s excellent
i like how this episode explicitly calls back to the early ones with more annoying kid Steven and links his character growth to what he’s going to try to do with the diamonds. i also like that they took steps to make the diamonds more nuanced and sympathetic but don’t seem to be losing sight of the fact that they’re terrible invaders (“I know they’re busy, because they’re dictators” made me laugh out loud)
edit wtf is up with this stupid spoiler tag
