The Crazy, Messed Up, Amazing Universe of Steven Universe

Clockwise from left: Amethyst, Garnet, and Pearl. And Steven!

This has to be the fastest and hardest I've ever fallen in love with a TV show. Or at least the fastest I've gone from "Meh" to "PUT MOAR IN MAH EYEBALLS!" I had only heard of this show in passing on Twitter and Tumblr, vaguely interested at best. Thanks to my wonderful sister, (who has a cool Tumblr you should follow) I was able to get into the insane, wonderful show that is Steven Universe.


For those who've never even heard of the show, or have at least heard of it but have no idea what it's about, it's a Cartoon Network series about ~11-year-old Steven Universe, half Magic (on his mom's side) and his adventures with the entirely magical Crystal Gems, a team of super powered aliens that are personifications of gemstones. Pearl, who is obsessed with elegance and perfection, Amethyst, who is fun, but rough around the edges, and Garnet, a pinnacle of strength and determination, if a bit stoic. Together they protect and mentor Steven as he learns to use the powers contained in his gem, a pink stone that functions as his belly button. His Dad, Greg Universe, and his best friend, Connie, are his human anchors in this incredible world of magic and super powers. The opening theme song does a pretty good job of describing what the show is about (a testament to simple-yet-awesome songwriting) and giving you a good look at what the characters are like (a testament to strong character design).


This show has some really great music, and my favorite kind to boot; simple melodies combined with elegant lyrics to convey a lot of emotion very effectively. The original extended version of this song is actually so endearingly positive it makes me furious with joy.

It's actually been surprisingly difficult to articulate why I like this show so gosh darn much. It's an adventure show with super powers. It's a character piece with intricate interpersonal relationships. It has an epic alternate universe sci-fi backstory that spans the entire length of human civilization. And it's also about a mostly normal kid just trying to have a good time. It doesn't look like much, especially just from the promotional material. I first heard about it as it was originally being broadcast, and I thought it was just another Ben 10/Regular Show/Whatever else was a popular cartoon and just passed it by. But actually giving it the time of day, I found it both endearing and intriguing as it slowly revealed itself to be a show not about one thing, but many. It shares a lot of it's DNA with old Magical Girl Anime, like Sailor Moon and Revolutionary Girl Utena, but it also has sprinklings of Dragon Ball Z, Future Boy Conan and even the Simpsons. There's a lot going on beneath the surface, but it's mostly there just to give texture to that surface, and the happy go lucky, fun loving surface is the reason why I wanted to continue watching the show. It celebrates the marriage between the Magical and the Mundane, literally in the

Rose Quartz

case of Steven's Mom, Rose Quartz, a gigantic woman with flowing pink hair who gave up her physical form to bring Steven into the world, and his Dad, a balding former rock star with a bad farmer's tan who now lives in his old van and runs a car wash. There's an entire world of strange and amazing things, with Steven at the center of it just being a normal kid who likes video games, eating ice cream and playing his ukulele. If that part of the show wasn't good, then I, or any other member of the audience, wouldn't give two cares about sticking around for the crazy world building that is slowly rolled out throughout the entire series.

But for those those that are interested in the back story for this crazy world, part of what makes Steven Universe so unique is the concept of Gems as an alien race and their ability to Fuse. Gems are literally sentient gem stones, and due to magic or science or some mixture of the two, are able to generate physical bodies based on their personalities. They usually take feminine forms, or at least that's all that we've seen them do, but they don't actually have genders. They exist on a truly geological time scale with lifespans of several thousand years, at the least, and can't really die unless their gem is actually shattered. Gems don't need to eat or sleep, but the can if they want to, and they have some ability to shapeshift, though Amethyst is the only one we see exhibiting any of these quirks.

Amethyst (the rowdy one) + Pearl (the neat one) = Opal,
awesome four-armed archer giant woman.

Two or more Gems also have the ability to Fuse together to create a new personality that is both a combination of them and unique to itself. This Fusion is also larger and stronger than either Gem could be on it's own, often having multiple eyes and limbs, and combining physical characteristics of both Gems. Fusion is both highly ritualistic and very personal, where each of two Gems perform a sort of dance unique to their personality to create a moment of openness and trust that allows them to literally join together. The stability of the Fusion is dependent on both how compatible and how committed the two gems are; if the gems can't cooperate, the Fusion usually doesn't last very long, or at worst, makes some very uncomfortable looking amalgamations. The dances that are used to create the Fusion have been interpreted by some to be the Gem equivalent of Sex, an idea which I disagree with. Though not overtly sexual, the dances are undeniably... intimate, and for that reason Fusion is quite possibly what put this show on the map for a lot of people. I'll go deeper into it after the spoiler bar because the themes that Fusion allows the show to explore are pretty core to some of the more intense reveals, but for the moment I'll just say it provides a fascinating context to explore all kinds of relationships; romantic, professional, friendly, platonic, obsessive, and even abusive. The fact that it's primarily a female cast in a show about relationships, this has led a few to write this off as "Liberal Propaganda Brainwashing the Children!!!" and while I would call it one of the most progressive children's shows on television, I think it has more to do with showing that people in less than perfect situations can and should still be able to be happy, and that people with flaws, especially people with deep emotional scars, can and should be loved.

It's almost impossible to go into more of that without making assumptions that you've seen the show, or at least that you don't care. If you do want to get into the show, I feel like I should recommend one episode that exemplifies everything that's cool about it, but the fact that each episode is both self contained and a part of the larger whole makes this supremely challenging. The creator of this show, Rebecca Sugar, noteworthy for being the first woman to be the sole creator of an animated TV series, has stated on various occasions that it was designed to be simultaneously an episodic show, where you can just watch a random episode on TV and have some idea of what the characters and the stakes are, and a story arch show, where episodes lead into each other and the plot is resolved over multiple episodes. I'd tell you to just go watch it anyway (episodes are literally 11 minutes long and they're only a quarter into their second season), but it's just that Steven Universe requires some patience if you want to go into it cold. Thankfully, it warms up fairly quickly, and as I've mentioned, most of the charm of the show comes from just the mundane nature of the small town Steven lives in colliding with the mystical power of the Gems, with Steven being the focal point. There is currently no "official" way of watching replays of the entire series legally (although the first 35 episodes of the first season are available on Hulu Plus). So instead, there is an unofficially supported fan webpage called The World of Steven Universe that has all the episodes archived, and handily in both English and Spanish!

Alright. If you have watched the show, (and I really hope you have, cause it's a good one,) its time to drive our 80s roadie van into--

                                        ***SPOILER TOWN***                                  

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The thing I love about all of the most "spolier"ish stuff in this show is that while it may have surprised people at the time, it was set up in such away that when you look back on it, you see how obvious some of the hints were and you realize that you always knew.

One of the worst kept secrets on the internet is that Garnet, the tallest and strongest of the Crystal Gems, is, in fact, a Fusion between two Gems; Ruby and Sapphire. I say that because when that was first revealed, it was all that tumblr and twitter would talk about.


This bit is so rad on so many levels.


I went into the show knowing this was the case the entire time, but in truth, it didn't actually ruin anything about my experience. If anything, it was only reinforced by some pretty obvious hints at that side of her, but also gave great texture to the character. Ruby is a hot head (literally), easily frustrated, but deeply loyal. Sapphire is cool (literally) and calculated, patient almost to a fault, but mostly because she can see into the future (no really). Together they form Garnet, stoic, powerful, farsighted, and protective. They balance each other out,  as you can see in the video, they obviously care about each other a lot, but because they both present as female, it's not hard to make the mental leap that this is a homosexual relationship. I would again remind the reader that these are aliens that don't technically have a gender, (not homosexual, but still homogeneous) but it's pretty much besides the point now. Personally, I don't see it as "topical," I see it as an example of a stable and caring relationship, just one that features two lady-looking entities. This relationship is actually very well detailed in music form in the video, but one of the most potent lines is when she says "I am their fury / I am their patience // I am a conversation." Which explains that their relationship, and Fusion in general, isn't just a simple cut-and-paste metaphor for sex. The relationship between people that are Fused is just that, a Relationship. In the case of Garnet, this relationship is a romantic one, their compatibility being based more on Yin and Yang than similarity, and their differences conflict, but they don't clash. As mentioned above, they are a conversation, though real arguments between them bubble up past Garnet's stoicism, though they would occasionally in any relationship. In the case of Opal, it's a professional relationship between two people who can't stand each other, but know that they have to do it in order to do their job of protecting Steven. Sugilite, the Fusion between Garnet and Amethyst, is a destructive friendship where their rash and reckless personalities feed off of each other and can cause them to easily get carried away. The more complementary a pair, the more stable their Fusion will be, which is exemplified beautifully in the Fusion between Steven.... and Connie.

Connie is Steven's closest friend, at first a shy, lonely young girl who only visits Steven's beach town whenever her dad is doing security work there. As the series goes on and their friendship deepens, Connie comes out of her shell, expressing her joy of fantasy and sci-fi, as any geeky kid would, as well showing an uncanny aptitude for sword fighting. (All that tennis practice must have paid off.) One day, as Steven is trying to figure out if a half-human is even capable of Fusing, they just start dancing, not romantically, but in a cute childlike way.

And then this happens.


That's something else I really like about this show: it gets that these are kids. They get that kids don't do romance, but can still have almost-crushes. It never states peoples ages outright, but my guess is that Steven and Connie are somewhere between 10 and 12. They should be allowed to be kids.

You are an experience

Stevonnie, an androgynous young adult looking person, found to be universally attractive, and the first ever instance of a human Fusion. This, more than anything, has helped me understand the concept of the preferred pronoun "They," because Stevonnie is a combination of two people and both personalities show through. But as Garnet eloquently explains: "You are not two people, and you are not one person. You are an experience. Make sure it's a good experience."

It was pointed out by one of the LoadingReadyRun people I follow on twitter that this could be seen as a paraphrase of a Buckminster Fuller quote; "I live on Earth at present, and I don’t know what I am. I know that I am not a category. I am not a thing — a noun. I seem to be a verb, an evolutionary process — an integral function of the universe." He exclaimed that if he had known that was waiting for him going in, he would have devoured the show sooner.

Something else that the show touches on that makes it so unique is the space where Optimism and Failure converge. For most of my adult life, I have had an irrational anxiety for letting people down, for failing at a critical moment. I find joy in helping people, but any major career where that could happen, medicine for example, never felt doable because I knew that the consequences of my failure could do more harm than good. This show faces that same exact fear with a finesse and compassion that comes from the viscous streak of optimism at its core. It makes itself very clear when it distinguishes between honest mistakes that can't be helped, like crying over spilled milk, etc., and the kinds of mistakes where you've actually hurt someone and lost their trust. 

You aren't a bad person...
you just make mistakes...

The the last big dump of episodes that came out this past summer (know as a "Steven Bomb") focused on the Fusion between Garnet and Pearl, known as Sardonyx, who has the bubbly personality of an excitable British stage magician. She is a compilation of Garnet's up-for-whatever mentality as well as her strength, and Pearl's high-strung, yet amicable personality plus her commitment to elegance. Extremely show-offish and flamboyant, but very entertaining, this was the first time that the audience had seen this particular Fusion, and, as we are led to understand, the first time that the characters have had reason to make this fusion in a very long time. A fact which makes Pearl very excited. In fact, Pearl has so much fun being Sardonyx, sharing power, strength and ability far greater than she could have alone, she goes out of her way to dismantle the progress that they made when Fused just so that they would have an excuse to Fuse again. She lied to one of her oldest compatriots, and set back their efforts to stop the antagonists by days, for the sake of getting in just a couple more moments of awesome that didn't actually accomplish anything. Needless to say, this did not go over well with Garnet, and the rest of the Steven Bomb is about her dealing with the anger and bitterness that she feels towards Pearl, something that literally tears her apart in the following episode as Ruby and Sapphire take time to sort out their feelings about the situation. Garnet does eventually forgive Pearl, but not before telling her that there's nothing she could do to make her forgive Pearl. No amount of apologizing, self-sacrificing or catching the villain could make her trust her again. And this brings it to Garnet's view of: "Don't make excuses. Just fix what's broken or made it break." Pearl thinks she is by her very nature unable to do anything of herself, that anything of value has to be done for or with somebody else. Garnet tells her that once she learns that she does have her own strength, that she is in fact her own person, then she can begin to trust her again.

There are so many awesome pieces of this show, like how awesome of a "TV Show Dad" Greg Universe is, or  how I've grown to love the character of Peridot as so many others have, or how beautiful of a flawed character Pearl is, and so many more that I wont be able to discuss every all of them here, but maybe later in separate posts. (This is already over a month late :P ) If you haven't started watching this show, I can't recommend it more than I have, it's one of the best animated shows on television (though, by all accounts, that is becoming a very common descriptor these days, which is a very good thing). If you have Cable or Satellite, new episodes come out on Cartoon Network every Thursday at 5:30pm Eastern/5:30pm Pacific. If you don't, I believe it can be streamed live from the Cartoon Network website and on demand on that World of Steven Universe thing I talked about earlier.

And so for now I leave you with a beautiful piano ditty that is the end credits music for the show.