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I’m sure people have said it, but Rose was incredibly flawed and made a lot of mistakes. But her story is one of changing for the better, just like all the characters in this show. The only difference, is that her story is told in reverse, so we slowly see all the bad she did long ago, making it difficult to remember all the good she did do.
It’s much easier to see and keep in mind during re-watches though, so I don’t blame you guys. You’re just being honest.
I really like how they handled Steven Universe Future, pushing the idea that there isn’t really an ending to something. Once the “main story” ends, the characters are still there. Like… Imagine you’re a kid living in Nazi Germany who had some sort of talent.
During the war you’re scouted and picked to become a scientist or a musician or whatever (picked as in forced, because they’re evil) who uses their natural talent to further this awful agenda. In the future, once the war is over and you’re given asylum (if you’re lucky and haven’t done super terrible things), what are you meant to do then? Like, at first you were forced into one single path because it fit the role the dictatorship saw based on your attributes, but at this point you may be a world class scientist or musician etc. Then imagine the scenario where at that point, when you’re free from being shackled into this role, maybe you’ve learnt to love science or music or whatever else you’ve been forced to do your whole life. Of course, you probably would have wanted the freedom of choice rather than be forced into any sort of discipline, but, in the context of doing it you may have found that once you’re given your freedom, you don’t want to do anything else.
Imo every single (non off colour lol) gem in the universe, who was designed intentionally to carry out one specific role for their entire life, likely feels this way. This analogy only fits for those who had accepted their roles back in Era 1 – 2, like most of the Gems at Little Homeschool did. Like, you would have wanted more options before you committed your whole life to it, but, you can’t change the past.
Just look at Bismuth, she was building towers for the diamonds before she met Rose, then once she became a crystal gem it’s not like she suddenly cast away all her blacksmith / manual labour skills. She used exactly the same skillset to further an agenda that she actually had faith in, that’s the beauty of having the freedom of choice. But, you don’t need to change what you enjoy or are good at, even if it’s a role that was initially forced upon you, you just need to choose and use your judgment to decide how you feel about it. These skills are a part of you and you can either run from it, or you can decide whether or not it’s truly what you want to do. If it is, then do it your way, if it isn’t then you’ve got so many options (even if it is scary to start from the beginning… but don’t put someone with no idea how to fly into a plane lmao). Gems are immortal anyways so they can become good at literally anything.
Though, that “you can decide whether or not it’s truly what you want to do. If it is, then do it your way” bit isn’t entirely true. They showed that part of the discussion in “Why so blue?” with the lapis’ who loved terraforming. It partially applies to them, but some people need a helping hand (since their skills aren’t the only thing affected by their roles), their moral compasses and ability to think freely also need some work.
React to Star Vs The Forces of EVil please.. another disney masterpiece.. it followed gravity falls and was predecessor of owl house and amphibia.. it did suffer from network thouugh since they didnt give them the 5th season they asked for and needed and renewed s4 late
You should definitely react to OK KO. Its simular to adventure time and steven universe where it can be goofy and then extremely lore-heavy in between episodes. Yall would love it
I do not appreciate the fact that the boys are jumping on the bandwagon of “Rose sucks” that people invented like during the finale of the show and has… not much in common with the actual portrayal of the character
Rose was written in such an interesting way. I think it was such a phenomenal choice to show the viewer her character arc in reverse. The first time we actually get to watch her talk was through the video tape, and that was right at the end of her life. She was shown as this perfect being. Rose Quarts the Saint. Then we see some of her life with Greg and start to notice her sort of disconnection from life and how regular people exist. Then we see Bismuth and start to question why she would lock up her friend and never tell anyone, only compounded by the reveal later that everyone believes Rose killed Pink. We keep catches glimpses of her earlier and earlier in story until we see that she started as a villain. In a different story she would’ve been alongside the other diamonds to happily kill and oppress others.
I personally would like to think that Rose became a better person towards the end of her life. It just didn’t matter much for anyone else since she felt like she couldn’t fix anything she had ruined
OK K.O: Let’s Be Heroes is an amazing show that got unfairly cancelled before it could run it’s full course. It’s made by the husband(?) of Rebecca Sugar the creator of Steven Universe and both of the shows have many similarities, it would be a perfect choice to start right after Steven Universe.
Let’s be real here about gems. A lot of them can’t handle the idea of being able to do whatever they want because they live forever so under home world they literally had an eternal purpose now it’s just like they have all the free time in the world I mean which they do because death isn’t really a concept to them so they aren’t in a rush to do anything. In a lot of ways they don’t really have a purpose outside of what HomeWorld gave them.
And yes, we can all agree that Rose was not a very good person, but in her defense, she was trying to be better. She really was. I think we have to at least give her that credit, unlike the other diamonds who just got worse.
At the end of the day. Rose did way more good than she ever did bad. She gets significantly way too much hate.
It’s almost lime people wanted her to let earth die
OK KO is amazing! I’d LOOOOVE it if you started watching! And it’s mad hilarious too, there wasn’t a single episode of that show that didn’t make me belly laugh at least once.
“Revolutionary Girl Utena” is a late 90s anime (with queer/gay themes) that have heavy influences towards Steven Universe if anyone’s interested in checking it out!
The thing about Rose is that you see all her character development in reverse. Think about how you felt about Pearl in the beginning, and imagine how you’d feel about her if you saw all her flaws intensifying as the series went on.
Pink Diamond was a spoiled aristocrat, and did some terrible things, but she recognized that she was hurting people, that her society was killing planets. She grew and changed, and in the end was a pretty decent person. We just see that whole arc getting deconstructed the more we learn.
I like how Pearls episode covers how even if someone didn’t mean to hurt you you were still hurt and that matters. I always feel sad that Steven never got to meet Rose because his perception of her is always filtered through someone else’s.
The amount of Utena references in Steven Universe is crazy. Even Utena Pearl’s theme song sounds like it was taken out of the Utena soundtrack. I never watched Future, after the movie I thought there wasn’t going to be anymore so I just stopped paying attention. When I first saw Utena Pearl I thought was fan art.
OK KO is a pretty cool show. I think it was made by Ian Quincy Jones, who worked on Steven Universe. It’s very anime inspired. I’ve only seen a few episodes. You should definitely watch at least one of the crossover episodes since one of you keep bringing up Levar Burton
if you guys remember, when steven first started having the flashbacks through pink diamonds eyes, there was a scene where pink punched “a mirror” after yellow told her she couldnt have a planet, and then i believe during the last season (when steven was at homeworld), there was another flashback scene where it actually does show pearl before the punch but it cuts off before contact, so thats how it all happened
Nope. The dream sequence only showed Pink and the Pearl secretly having fun together (and then acting “proper” when Yellow is around) and maybe a little flirty if the look Pink gave and the kiss she blew is any indication, and then the Pearl moved away and faded into darkness, indicating something bad happened to her that took her away from Pink.
Also, Pink did not hit her like that. She screamed near her and she was accidentally struck by the impact.
if you guys remember, when steven first started having the flashbacks, there was a scene where pink punched “a mirror” after yellow told her she couldnt have a planet, and then i believe during the last season, there was another flashback scene where it actually does show pearl before the punch, so thats how it all happened
That Pearl episode really lays out Rose’s character development really well, and ties in the angry flashback of Pink on the Jungle moon with the reserved nervous Pink that Pearl remembers on the early days of the earth colony. Basically Pink Diamond was a destructive little brat until she hurt someone close to her, the Pearl she was close to and played with was taken away and when time came for her to get a new Pearl she had grown much more reserved almost afraid to show her feelings because of what had happened. The entirety of Steven Universe is about deconstructing the growth of the “legendary Rose Quartz” and that it took a LOT for this person to become as kind and gentle and amazing as she was, and even at her end she wasn’t perfect. She didn’t really understand human feelings at first, Greg was probably the first human partner she couldn’t treat like a plaything, she wanted to create a life that would grow and change (something she was obviously obsessed with due to her disgraceful beginnings) but it doing so she left him to pick up the pieces. Did Pink leave Spinel because she wanted to abandon her? Or was she just that afraid of hurting her that she pushed her away, and she just wasn’t mature enough to realize that would hurt her just as well? Rose Quartz is the single most interesting character I’ve seen on this show by a long shot.
Don’t forget. Every time we see Pink/Rose or hear something about her it’s from earlier in the timeline. Our Pearl never even knew Pink Diamond had a destructive scream and couldn’t ever recall a single tantrum that she threw.
Blue and Yellow’s Pearls had their gems on their chests like their Diamonds and reflect their Diamonds’ personalities. Volleyball had hers on her stomach like Pink. Our Pearl has hers on her forehead and is also a white pearl rather than a pink pearl. It’s not hard to connect the dots.
In a small doodle in the Steven Universe art book Pink holds herself in the fetal position while Whitewashed Volleyball says “try not to break this one, Starlight”
Yup, this is why Rose/Pink Diamond is one of my most favorite characters. 🙂 She 100% used to be an awful terrible person, and ever since Pink Pearl was taken from her, she worked every second to try and be better than she was. That said, she still wasn’t able to be the best she could be even up to her end. I love seeing such a deconstruction of the “don’t say anything bad about those who are gone” concept, and I love seeing her character development go in reverse.
Fun fact! All common gems have the same voice actor, rubies, pearls, sapphires, quartz’s (Rose and Jasper) except for the Diamonds. The Diamonds have unique VA and one of the tells for our Rose being Pink was her VA
Well, it wasn’t really a ‘tell’ so much since the show was very, very careful never to let us hear Pink Diamond’s voice until after the reveal. When we see her in Steven’s dream-visions before the reveal, she is always either silent, voiced by Garnet (in ‘Your Mother and Mine’) or voiced by Stevonnie (in ‘Jungle Moon’). In the vision Steven has on Earth’s moonbase, Blue Diamond even literally “shush”es her just as she’s about to speak, all to ensure that we never hear Susan Egan’s giveaway voice. It was actually one of the things that convinced me that Rose had to be Pink Diamond on my first watch. It was just so suspicious how they never let us hear Pink’s voice.
by the way the are 3 steven universe games, The Light Series: Attack the Light, Save the Light, Unleash the Light.
release in the order I wrote, the first game is a mobile game and the other 2 you can find it anywhere but mobile.
After Future It would be cool if yall watched xiaolin showdown. Its like avatar in many ways, but not as story heavy. Maybe you could watch the first episode of some of the shows we recommended and pick the most intressting one to continue watching. Just an idea
Btw the main antagonist for save the light is Nephrite’s (aka Centipedle) commander. We got to see her a little when Nephrite was with Steven drawing how she got corrupted.
OK KO is an incredible show that really helped me through parts of my life when I really needed it. its fucking hilarious, heartbreaking, dumb fun yet profoundly insightful. it also has one of the best final episodes of all time that fucking broke me. I highly recommend watching it after you finish future
Yep, “Volleyball” was Pink’s original Pearl and it’s heavily implied both Spinel and our Pearl were created specifically to replace her: Volleyball was too playful and casual with Pink for a Pearl, so Spinel was created as an unique Gem whose purpose is to act as a playmate and a friend (unfortunately, Homeworld generally knew shit about friendship, so she was just made to constantly be silly and playful instead of like…paying attention to others’ feelings and know how to comfort people with words. Not blaming Spinel because she was literally made to be that way,) while our Pearl was made to be more uptight to act like a “proper” Pearl.
Our Pearl did not originally belong to White Diamond like some fans theorized, but the same gem placement is likely there to show how Pearl is also focused on organization, has some compulsive behavior and perfectionist tendencies and such and to represent White Diamond’s control over Pink…though that didn’t really work out as we know lol.
And yeah, what Pink did was horrible, but she did feel really bad about hurting Volleyball (not excusing it, just explaining since some people seem to miss this part of her characterization.) It seemed to be a wake-up call and she changed a lot as a result: she stopped having tantrums and started to hide her emotions and stuff. I think it (along with the other Diamonds abusing her) may have also given her a fear of confronting others, since she regularly avoided doing that (for example, she was shown to be annoyed with Spinel, but she did not seem to directly tell her that and seemed to try to hide it.) Another wake-up call was with Greg, when Greg demanded to be treated with respect and have an actual conversation (Rose had acted very condescending towards him, without seeming to realize it.)
I find Rose very interesting, because a lot of the bad stuff she did isn’t intentional “buhahah I love hurting people >:),” but she more really struggled with empathy and understanding the consequences of her actions and she just kinda casually did harmful things without thinking, more like a kid. It’s frustrating, but it makes a very interesting character.
The creators have stated that the Diamonds represent the three parts of the psyche, with Pink being the impulsive Id which focuses on desires and instincts with no filter. According to the concept, little kids only have Id and develop things like self-control and shame later. While Pink is not an actual child (not a thing for full-Gems,) she represents a child in the dynamic with the other Diamonds (who are treated as the adults in the situation,) and is described as a very unusual Gem: very silly, childish, emotional, casually friendly with “lesser” Gems and creating games and doing random goofy stuff just for the fun of it and having disregard for the Homeworld norms in a way Gems normally don’t.
And ultimately she did not seem happy about the bad things she had done: when she sadly talked to Greg about Gems forever being one thing and not having the power to change like humans, it seems she was referring to herself. While she did have Steven because she genuinely wanted to create new life and have him be his own person, her choosing to do it while knowing it would kill her definitely has some suicidal implications.
You noted the stare of the Rose Quartz who looks like her in this episode: she has such striking eyes because they are just like our Rose’s, and according to Rebecca Sugar she was designed to always have sad eyes “even when smiling.” She basically always looked a little dead inside, which can make her a little uncanny-looking at times.
Rose’s arc happens backwards so people think she’s a piece of shit, and maybe at times she was, but the Rose from the start of the series didn’t go anywhere. She’s still there. She loved and she fought and she tried so hard, and I think people forget about that once they learn everything about her past at the end of the show. Remember, she didn’t intentionally leave any of it for Steven to deal with. She truly thought everything from the war was over and wouldn’t ever come up again. I believe with my whole heart that if she had *any* inkling about what would happen in the main series she wouldn’t have had Steven to begin with. She never would’ve consciously put him through any turmoil. Anyway tldr Rose isn’t purely evil or just a POS, she’s layered and complicated and messy and so many things!
I always hate that people only remember the bad stuff she did that they ignore everything she did. Including saving earth, allowing garnet to be garnet, giving freedom to countless gems, learning about real love, and giving birth to steven
Yeah, save the light is a really good game. It takes place sometime during season 4 and is actually the second game in a trilogy. The first one is attack the light on phone app store, and the third is unleash the light also now on switch.
It’s cool to see how they develop Rose Quartz’s story arc in reverse. If it was told like a normal story, you’d meet a spoiled, privileged princess who threw tantrums and mistreated the people under her. Then she damaged her pearl, which if Steven’s memory dreams are to be believed, she loved, and was punished by having her taken away. That seems to have been a turning point, as in the next few thousand years she cleaned up her act enough to be given a new pearl and then even her own colony. From there she learned to appreciate life, and to respect other gems, and to reinvent herself as a caring healer who loved Earth’s life cycle so much she sacrificed herself to participate in it. When Greg said he barely knew her, she insisted that was a good thing. She knew her own past and was not proud of it.
Instead we get the story of a perfect caring Rose, whose image slowly unravels over the course of the show revealing her roots: the childish, selfish diamond with a lot to learn. It’s an inspiring story, but telling it in reverse makes an interesting statement on our memories of people important to us who are deceased, and dealing with problems they caused but aren’t around anymore to fix (even if she might have been willing to, if she’d been around still). It does suck a bit that the result of this storytelling choice leads a lot of folks to straight up hate Rose Quartz, when if they’d seen her redemption arc happen in order, they’d have probably found her as compelling as any other reformed villain turned friend, like Peridot.
I mean, that really is just on the writers. Pink and the other Diamonds are undeniably among the most terrible people (at least to begin with chronologically) in the show’s universe, but the narrative spends SO much more time dwelling on Pink’s shortcomings specifically (while cramming the other Diamonds’ sins into as little runtime as possible) that you really can’t blame the audience for coming away with the impression that Rose/Pink is supposed to be *the* worst person in the world.
Look at the fourth episode of Future here for example – BOTH White Diamond and Pink Diamond hurt Volleyball, but White’s harm is reduced to a throwaway exchange establishing that she stole *eight thousand years* of Volleyball’s life which is never addressed or resolved (especially weird considering that the eye injury was psychological, which makes the fact that Volleyball hasn’t had that much time in her own mind to process her trauma and move on very relevant). If the episode was aiming to paint Pink as a worse person than White – her own abuser, mind you – then it did a stellar job of it.
I don’t agree with your impression because the only reason we’re dealing with Pink’s issues more is because it’s much more personal to Steven. Pink was the only Diamond to try to change and she caused a lot of collateral damage doing it. The other Diamonds were too callous and indifferent for far too long to even have a pedestal to fall down from. Also, for the episode you’re citing, the the focus on Pink was to jump-start this series’ entire arc of Steven being fearful that he may turn into his mother one day. The issue with White is that focusing on her harm to Volleyball and the entire universe wouldn’t have the same emotional impact because we already know White is the most guilty of all the issues the universe dealt with. In fact, Steven couldn’t even bear to be in the same room for her for more than like 3 minutes before images of the scariest moment of his young life flashed before him (White smiling as she prepares to and then pulls away the gem from a scared, shaking, and shivering Steven. If the Diamonds’ harm will be confronted, it won’t be by Steven, but somebody else who can going through that trauma.
I would be SO HYPED to watch OK KO with yall! ? It was such a cute little show!
It was made by Ian Jones-Quartey and he’s married to Rebecca Sugar who made Steven Universe. You’ll recognize his voice acting after a while too. He voiced the Snowflake Obsidian who crashed the plane, as well as characters in Bravest Warriors, and his own show.
If I remember correctly Steven is still 16 in Future. I might be wrong though.
I’m happy you all are enjoying Future so far ^^ So Pink Pearl/Volleyball, there was a flashback in one of the last episodes of Steven Universe that showed her with Pink Diamond so maybe you all missed the scene or thought she was normal Pearl?
If I remember Ok KO had a big event where it crossovered with mainly Steven Universe, Reboot Ben 10 and someone else but had cameos of tons of past Cartoon Network characters. Plus it had some crossovers in its normal episodes.
If you look at the opening of Future, you can see Centi/Nephrite (the Centipeetle that Steven befriends and almost heals in SU) right as it opens.
Also side note, not related to SUF, but I hope you all react to the movie Scott Pilgrim Vs the World. It’s amazing, it’s based off a comic series, and it’s getting a Netflix anime adaptation in November that brings the movie cast back to voice their characters.
Granted it’s been a while since I’ve seen Ok KO, but the only crossover I remember was *not* with either SU or Ben 10. It was with a character originating in video games who’s had a few TV shows over the years. I also remember they did an homage/parody of an old Hanna-Barbera Saturday morning cartoon from the 70s. That one surprised me, as a) the show ran in 1977 & Ian Jones-Quartey was born in 1984, and b) it’s doubtful that there were many 45+ year-olds other than myself watching. Ok KO just didn’t get as much of the all-ages leadership that things like Adventure Time & SU got.
(is there an edit button I’m missing?) In the above, “leadership” should have been “viewership”, but I missed that my tablet autocorrected it until after I hit the Post button…
I might also be wrong! But Steven’s birthday is in August, and these episodes of future have to take place in either late summer or early fall (for reasons in a future episode) so unless this all takes place *immediately* after the movie there’s a chance he could even be 17!
I think they missed what that dream part was about, as they didn’t comment on the different-looking Pearl. Though they did note Yellow’s famous long neck, the fact that she managed to actually smile, and the disturbing turn of the dream. I don’t think they realized Steven had taken Pink’s place in that dream and that it was basically like a memory.
Rose sucks because you learn about Rose in reverse. As the audience the story you get is “Rose was such a perfect magnanimous person but no, it turns out she did terrible things and was callous and uncaring” when the story in chronological order was “Pink Diamond was an incredibly shitty person who learned from her shitty abusive parental figures before eventually realizing how shit she and they were. She clumsily fumbled around trying to fix things, failed, and spent the rest of her life in exile with survivor’s guilt before finding love and dying in child birth.”
Steven Universe: Save the Light is actually the sequal to a mobile game called; Steven Universe: Attack the Light, is on IOS and Android for like 3$ i think, but i don’t think you need to play it before Save the Light?
About Volleyball,what happened to her was really shitty but at the same time was something that Pink didn’t have control about it, the same way Steven loses control of his powers sometimes because he’s still a kid and is learning so did Pink back then, that doesn’t excuse her actions or make it fine but do explain them
English isn’t my first language and I can’t remember the specific wording, but Rebecca actually answered a question about that: basically, the world of Steven Universe is meant to be kinda whimsical, mysterious and weird, with some stuff intentionally not given full answers. Like how all the people except Ronaldo just really don’t give a damn about aliens being a thing (which reminds me of other favorite aliens of mine in the Lilo & Stitch show where Lilo can just claim all the alien experiments are some normal animal and literally everyone goes “eh, I guess that makes sense.”)
I mean, the Gem War took place over a 400 year period that the Sumerians and early Egyptians also existed during. Pink Diamond’s gem is on American currency, and corrupted Gems have been roaming the Earth for thousands of years. It’s all probably only as interesting as normal history is to most people.
I’m sure people have said it, but Rose was incredibly flawed and made a lot of mistakes. But her story is one of changing for the better, just like all the characters in this show. The only difference, is that her story is told in reverse, so we slowly see all the bad she did long ago, making it difficult to remember all the good she did do.
It’s much easier to see and keep in mind during re-watches though, so I don’t blame you guys. You’re just being honest.
I really like how they handled Steven Universe Future, pushing the idea that there isn’t really an ending to something. Once the “main story” ends, the characters are still there. Like… Imagine you’re a kid living in Nazi Germany who had some sort of talent.
During the war you’re scouted and picked to become a scientist or a musician or whatever (picked as in forced, because they’re evil) who uses their natural talent to further this awful agenda. In the future, once the war is over and you’re given asylum (if you’re lucky and haven’t done super terrible things), what are you meant to do then? Like, at first you were forced into one single path because it fit the role the dictatorship saw based on your attributes, but at this point you may be a world class scientist or musician etc. Then imagine the scenario where at that point, when you’re free from being shackled into this role, maybe you’ve learnt to love science or music or whatever else you’ve been forced to do your whole life. Of course, you probably would have wanted the freedom of choice rather than be forced into any sort of discipline, but, in the context of doing it you may have found that once you’re given your freedom, you don’t want to do anything else.
Imo every single (non off colour lol) gem in the universe, who was designed intentionally to carry out one specific role for their entire life, likely feels this way. This analogy only fits for those who had accepted their roles back in Era 1 – 2, like most of the Gems at Little Homeschool did. Like, you would have wanted more options before you committed your whole life to it, but, you can’t change the past.
Just look at Bismuth, she was building towers for the diamonds before she met Rose, then once she became a crystal gem it’s not like she suddenly cast away all her blacksmith / manual labour skills. She used exactly the same skillset to further an agenda that she actually had faith in, that’s the beauty of having the freedom of choice. But, you don’t need to change what you enjoy or are good at, even if it’s a role that was initially forced upon you, you just need to choose and use your judgment to decide how you feel about it. These skills are a part of you and you can either run from it, or you can decide whether or not it’s truly what you want to do. If it is, then do it your way, if it isn’t then you’ve got so many options (even if it is scary to start from the beginning… but don’t put someone with no idea how to fly into a plane lmao). Gems are immortal anyways so they can become good at literally anything.
Though, that “you can decide whether or not it’s truly what you want to do. If it is, then do it your way” bit isn’t entirely true. They showed that part of the discussion in “Why so blue?” with the lapis’ who loved terraforming. It partially applies to them, but some people need a helping hand (since their skills aren’t the only thing affected by their roles), their moral compasses and ability to think freely also need some work.
React to Star Vs The Forces of EVil please.. another disney masterpiece.. it followed gravity falls and was predecessor of owl house and amphibia.. it did suffer from network thouugh since they didnt give them the 5th season they asked for and needed and renewed s4 late
spindel XD
You should definitely react to OK KO. Its simular to adventure time and steven universe where it can be goofy and then extremely lore-heavy in between episodes. Yall would love it
YOOO 1 eps? Thanks!
LMAO I meant 4
I do not appreciate the fact that the boys are jumping on the bandwagon of “Rose sucks” that people invented like during the finale of the show and has… not much in common with the actual portrayal of the character
Rose did suck though. She was a terrible person but she became a good person by the end of her time.
Rose was written in such an interesting way. I think it was such a phenomenal choice to show the viewer her character arc in reverse. The first time we actually get to watch her talk was through the video tape, and that was right at the end of her life. She was shown as this perfect being. Rose Quarts the Saint. Then we see some of her life with Greg and start to notice her sort of disconnection from life and how regular people exist. Then we see Bismuth and start to question why she would lock up her friend and never tell anyone, only compounded by the reveal later that everyone believes Rose killed Pink. We keep catches glimpses of her earlier and earlier in story until we see that she started as a villain. In a different story she would’ve been alongside the other diamonds to happily kill and oppress others.
I personally would like to think that Rose became a better person towards the end of her life. It just didn’t matter much for anyone else since she felt like she couldn’t fix anything she had ruined
OK K.O: Let’s Be Heroes is an amazing show that got unfairly cancelled before it could run it’s full course. It’s made by the husband(?) of Rebecca Sugar the creator of Steven Universe and both of the shows have many similarities, it would be a perfect choice to start right after Steven Universe.
I’d love if these guys watched OK KO
Let’s be real here about gems. A lot of them can’t handle the idea of being able to do whatever they want because they live forever so under home world they literally had an eternal purpose now it’s just like they have all the free time in the world I mean which they do because death isn’t really a concept to them so they aren’t in a rush to do anything. In a lot of ways they don’t really have a purpose outside of what HomeWorld gave them.
And yes, we can all agree that Rose was not a very good person, but in her defense, she was trying to be better. She really was. I think we have to at least give her that credit, unlike the other diamonds who just got worse.
At the end of the day. Rose did way more good than she ever did bad. She gets significantly way too much hate.
It’s almost lime people wanted her to let earth die
can’t wait for more… i’m excited;)
OK KO is amazing! I’d LOOOOVE it if you started watching! And it’s mad hilarious too, there wasn’t a single episode of that show that didn’t make me belly laugh at least once.
And thus the ‘Revolutionary Pearl Utena’ connection was born??
“Revolutionary Girl Utena” is a late 90s anime (with queer/gay themes) that have heavy influences towards Steven Universe if anyone’s interested in checking it out!
They should totally watch the pilot episode
And some of the shorts, if they can find them
The thing about Rose is that you see all her character development in reverse. Think about how you felt about Pearl in the beginning, and imagine how you’d feel about her if you saw all her flaws intensifying as the series went on.
Pink Diamond was a spoiled aristocrat, and did some terrible things, but she recognized that she was hurting people, that her society was killing planets. She grew and changed, and in the end was a pretty decent person. We just see that whole arc getting deconstructed the more we learn.
I like how Pearls episode covers how even if someone didn’t mean to hurt you you were still hurt and that matters. I always feel sad that Steven never got to meet Rose because his perception of her is always filtered through someone else’s.
The amount of Utena references in Steven Universe is crazy. Even Utena Pearl’s theme song sounds like it was taken out of the Utena soundtrack. I never watched Future, after the movie I thought there wasn’t going to be anymore so I just stopped paying attention. When I first saw Utena Pearl I thought was fan art.
OK KO is a pretty cool show. I think it was made by Ian Quincy Jones, who worked on Steven Universe. It’s very anime inspired. I’ve only seen a few episodes. You should definitely watch at least one of the crossover episodes since one of you keep bringing up Levar Burton
I messed up on the name but there’s no edit button ;o;
It’s Ian Jones-Quartey so I got most of the name right
if you guys remember, when steven first started having the flashbacks through pink diamonds eyes, there was a scene where pink punched “a mirror” after yellow told her she couldnt have a planet, and then i believe during the last season (when steven was at homeworld), there was another flashback scene where it actually does show pearl before the punch but it cuts off before contact, so thats how it all happened
Nope. The dream sequence only showed Pink and the Pearl secretly having fun together (and then acting “proper” when Yellow is around) and maybe a little flirty if the look Pink gave and the kiss she blew is any indication, and then the Pearl moved away and faded into darkness, indicating something bad happened to her that took her away from Pink.
Also, Pink did not hit her like that. She screamed near her and she was accidentally struck by the impact.
if you guys remember, when steven first started having the flashbacks, there was a scene where pink punched “a mirror” after yellow told her she couldnt have a planet, and then i believe during the last season, there was another flashback scene where it actually does show pearl before the punch, so thats how it all happened
Theres save the light which is after smokey and unleash the light which is between end of su and the movie
The very chill rose is called the zaza rose quartz.
Save the light game is so good i love it and apparently the game is also canon
Let’s fucking go I need to see all the episodes now I can’t wait
That Pearl episode really lays out Rose’s character development really well, and ties in the angry flashback of Pink on the Jungle moon with the reserved nervous Pink that Pearl remembers on the early days of the earth colony. Basically Pink Diamond was a destructive little brat until she hurt someone close to her, the Pearl she was close to and played with was taken away and when time came for her to get a new Pearl she had grown much more reserved almost afraid to show her feelings because of what had happened. The entirety of Steven Universe is about deconstructing the growth of the “legendary Rose Quartz” and that it took a LOT for this person to become as kind and gentle and amazing as she was, and even at her end she wasn’t perfect. She didn’t really understand human feelings at first, Greg was probably the first human partner she couldn’t treat like a plaything, she wanted to create a life that would grow and change (something she was obviously obsessed with due to her disgraceful beginnings) but it doing so she left him to pick up the pieces. Did Pink leave Spinel because she wanted to abandon her? Or was she just that afraid of hurting her that she pushed her away, and she just wasn’t mature enough to realize that would hurt her just as well? Rose Quartz is the single most interesting character I’ve seen on this show by a long shot.
Don’t forget. Every time we see Pink/Rose or hear something about her it’s from earlier in the timeline. Our Pearl never even knew Pink Diamond had a destructive scream and couldn’t ever recall a single tantrum that she threw.
OK KO is great and just got screwed over by lack of advertising visibility etc
Blue and Yellow’s Pearls had their gems on their chests like their Diamonds and reflect their Diamonds’ personalities. Volleyball had hers on her stomach like Pink. Our Pearl has hers on her forehead and is also a white pearl rather than a pink pearl. It’s not hard to connect the dots.
In a small doodle in the Steven Universe art book Pink holds herself in the fetal position while Whitewashed Volleyball says “try not to break this one, Starlight”
Yup, this is why Rose/Pink Diamond is one of my most favorite characters. 🙂 She 100% used to be an awful terrible person, and ever since Pink Pearl was taken from her, she worked every second to try and be better than she was. That said, she still wasn’t able to be the best she could be even up to her end. I love seeing such a deconstruction of the “don’t say anything bad about those who are gone” concept, and I love seeing her character development go in reverse.
Fun fact! All common gems have the same voice actor, rubies, pearls, sapphires, quartz’s (Rose and Jasper) except for the Diamonds. The Diamonds have unique VA and one of the tells for our Rose being Pink was her VA
Well, it wasn’t really a ‘tell’ so much since the show was very, very careful never to let us hear Pink Diamond’s voice until after the reveal. When we see her in Steven’s dream-visions before the reveal, she is always either silent, voiced by Garnet (in ‘Your Mother and Mine’) or voiced by Stevonnie (in ‘Jungle Moon’). In the vision Steven has on Earth’s moonbase, Blue Diamond even literally “shush”es her just as she’s about to speak, all to ensure that we never hear Susan Egan’s giveaway voice. It was actually one of the things that convinced me that Rose had to be Pink Diamond on my first watch. It was just so suspicious how they never let us hear Pink’s voice.
by the way the are 3 steven universe games, The Light Series: Attack the Light, Save the Light, Unleash the Light.
release in the order I wrote, the first game is a mobile game and the other 2 you can find it anywhere but mobile.
OH MY GOD I’D LOVE A OKKO REACTION
yes please watch Ok Ko lets be heros its a good show
After Future It would be cool if yall watched xiaolin showdown. Its like avatar in many ways, but not as story heavy. Maybe you could watch the first episode of some of the shows we recommended and pick the most intressting one to continue watching. Just an idea
ok ko is cool, made by ian jones-quartey (co-creator and writer on steven universe)
Btw the main antagonist for save the light is Nephrite’s (aka Centipedle) commander. We got to see her a little when Nephrite was with Steven drawing how she got corrupted.
OK KO is an incredible show that really helped me through parts of my life when I really needed it. its fucking hilarious, heartbreaking, dumb fun yet profoundly insightful. it also has one of the best final episodes of all time that fucking broke me. I highly recommend watching it after you finish future
YOOO 1-4 in one video let’s goooooo
Yep, “Volleyball” was Pink’s original Pearl and it’s heavily implied both Spinel and our Pearl were created specifically to replace her: Volleyball was too playful and casual with Pink for a Pearl, so Spinel was created as an unique Gem whose purpose is to act as a playmate and a friend (unfortunately, Homeworld generally knew shit about friendship, so she was just made to constantly be silly and playful instead of like…paying attention to others’ feelings and know how to comfort people with words. Not blaming Spinel because she was literally made to be that way,) while our Pearl was made to be more uptight to act like a “proper” Pearl.
Our Pearl did not originally belong to White Diamond like some fans theorized, but the same gem placement is likely there to show how Pearl is also focused on organization, has some compulsive behavior and perfectionist tendencies and such and to represent White Diamond’s control over Pink…though that didn’t really work out as we know lol.
And yeah, what Pink did was horrible, but she did feel really bad about hurting Volleyball (not excusing it, just explaining since some people seem to miss this part of her characterization.) It seemed to be a wake-up call and she changed a lot as a result: she stopped having tantrums and started to hide her emotions and stuff. I think it (along with the other Diamonds abusing her) may have also given her a fear of confronting others, since she regularly avoided doing that (for example, she was shown to be annoyed with Spinel, but she did not seem to directly tell her that and seemed to try to hide it.) Another wake-up call was with Greg, when Greg demanded to be treated with respect and have an actual conversation (Rose had acted very condescending towards him, without seeming to realize it.)
I find Rose very interesting, because a lot of the bad stuff she did isn’t intentional “buhahah I love hurting people >:),” but she more really struggled with empathy and understanding the consequences of her actions and she just kinda casually did harmful things without thinking, more like a kid. It’s frustrating, but it makes a very interesting character.
The creators have stated that the Diamonds represent the three parts of the psyche, with Pink being the impulsive Id which focuses on desires and instincts with no filter. According to the concept, little kids only have Id and develop things like self-control and shame later. While Pink is not an actual child (not a thing for full-Gems,) she represents a child in the dynamic with the other Diamonds (who are treated as the adults in the situation,) and is described as a very unusual Gem: very silly, childish, emotional, casually friendly with “lesser” Gems and creating games and doing random goofy stuff just for the fun of it and having disregard for the Homeworld norms in a way Gems normally don’t.
And ultimately she did not seem happy about the bad things she had done: when she sadly talked to Greg about Gems forever being one thing and not having the power to change like humans, it seems she was referring to herself. While she did have Steven because she genuinely wanted to create new life and have him be his own person, her choosing to do it while knowing it would kill her definitely has some suicidal implications.
You noted the stare of the Rose Quartz who looks like her in this episode: she has such striking eyes because they are just like our Rose’s, and according to Rebecca Sugar she was designed to always have sad eyes “even when smiling.” She basically always looked a little dead inside, which can make her a little uncanny-looking at times.
Rose’s arc happens backwards so people think she’s a piece of shit, and maybe at times she was, but the Rose from the start of the series didn’t go anywhere. She’s still there. She loved and she fought and she tried so hard, and I think people forget about that once they learn everything about her past at the end of the show. Remember, she didn’t intentionally leave any of it for Steven to deal with. She truly thought everything from the war was over and wouldn’t ever come up again. I believe with my whole heart that if she had *any* inkling about what would happen in the main series she wouldn’t have had Steven to begin with. She never would’ve consciously put him through any turmoil. Anyway tldr Rose isn’t purely evil or just a POS, she’s layered and complicated and messy and so many things!
I always hate that people only remember the bad stuff she did that they ignore everything she did. Including saving earth, allowing garnet to be garnet, giving freedom to countless gems, learning about real love, and giving birth to steven
when they looked at the steven uniiverse games and saw ok ko now i REALLY want them to react to it
If I’m remembering correctly the games and comics are 2nd cannon. Which means that it’s cannon unless the show says otherwise.
LETS GO BABY!!! FUTURE HYPE TRAIN
Yeah, save the light is a really good game. It takes place sometime during season 4 and is actually the second game in a trilogy. The first one is attack the light on phone app store, and the third is unleash the light also now on switch.
It’s cool to see how they develop Rose Quartz’s story arc in reverse. If it was told like a normal story, you’d meet a spoiled, privileged princess who threw tantrums and mistreated the people under her. Then she damaged her pearl, which if Steven’s memory dreams are to be believed, she loved, and was punished by having her taken away. That seems to have been a turning point, as in the next few thousand years she cleaned up her act enough to be given a new pearl and then even her own colony. From there she learned to appreciate life, and to respect other gems, and to reinvent herself as a caring healer who loved Earth’s life cycle so much she sacrificed herself to participate in it. When Greg said he barely knew her, she insisted that was a good thing. She knew her own past and was not proud of it.
Instead we get the story of a perfect caring Rose, whose image slowly unravels over the course of the show revealing her roots: the childish, selfish diamond with a lot to learn. It’s an inspiring story, but telling it in reverse makes an interesting statement on our memories of people important to us who are deceased, and dealing with problems they caused but aren’t around anymore to fix (even if she might have been willing to, if she’d been around still). It does suck a bit that the result of this storytelling choice leads a lot of folks to straight up hate Rose Quartz, when if they’d seen her redemption arc happen in order, they’d have probably found her as compelling as any other reformed villain turned friend, like Peridot.
I mean, that really is just on the writers. Pink and the other Diamonds are undeniably among the most terrible people (at least to begin with chronologically) in the show’s universe, but the narrative spends SO much more time dwelling on Pink’s shortcomings specifically (while cramming the other Diamonds’ sins into as little runtime as possible) that you really can’t blame the audience for coming away with the impression that Rose/Pink is supposed to be *the* worst person in the world.
Look at the fourth episode of Future here for example – BOTH White Diamond and Pink Diamond hurt Volleyball, but White’s harm is reduced to a throwaway exchange establishing that she stole *eight thousand years* of Volleyball’s life which is never addressed or resolved (especially weird considering that the eye injury was psychological, which makes the fact that Volleyball hasn’t had that much time in her own mind to process her trauma and move on very relevant). If the episode was aiming to paint Pink as a worse person than White – her own abuser, mind you – then it did a stellar job of it.
I don’t agree with your impression because the only reason we’re dealing with Pink’s issues more is because it’s much more personal to Steven. Pink was the only Diamond to try to change and she caused a lot of collateral damage doing it. The other Diamonds were too callous and indifferent for far too long to even have a pedestal to fall down from. Also, for the episode you’re citing, the the focus on Pink was to jump-start this series’ entire arc of Steven being fearful that he may turn into his mother one day. The issue with White is that focusing on her harm to Volleyball and the entire universe wouldn’t have the same emotional impact because we already know White is the most guilty of all the issues the universe dealt with. In fact, Steven couldn’t even bear to be in the same room for her for more than like 3 minutes before images of the scariest moment of his young life flashed before him (White smiling as she prepares to and then pulls away the gem from a scared, shaking, and shivering Steven. If the Diamonds’ harm will be confronted, it won’t be by Steven, but somebody else who can going through that trauma.
I love this, the opening, the new stuff, the end credit scene thing. I had a smile on my face pretty much the whole time. This is awesome !
Just so you guys are aware (if you weren’t aware already) Save the light is actually a sequel to the Steven Universe mobile game Attack the light.
Ah future, its gets much sadder as we go on. Hell rewatching this made me tear up when i didnt back in 2019, guess its gonna be bad for me as well.
You guys should react to ok ko
Save the light is the second in a trilogy.
I would be SO HYPED to watch OK KO with yall! ? It was such a cute little show!
It was made by Ian Jones-Quartey and he’s married to Rebecca Sugar who made Steven Universe. You’ll recognize his voice acting after a while too. He voiced the Snowflake Obsidian who crashed the plane, as well as characters in Bravest Warriors, and his own show.
ok ko would definitely give them lots of childhood nostalgia with its many references and cameos. it would be the perfect show to watch after SUF
OK KO is AMAZING i would love for yall to watch it !!!
Ok ko is really fun and a good show to take over Steven tbh
If I remember correctly Steven is still 16 in Future. I might be wrong though.
I’m happy you all are enjoying Future so far ^^ So Pink Pearl/Volleyball, there was a flashback in one of the last episodes of Steven Universe that showed her with Pink Diamond so maybe you all missed the scene or thought she was normal Pearl?
If I remember Ok KO had a big event where it crossovered with mainly Steven Universe, Reboot Ben 10 and someone else but had cameos of tons of past Cartoon Network characters. Plus it had some crossovers in its normal episodes.
If you look at the opening of Future, you can see Centi/Nephrite (the Centipeetle that Steven befriends and almost heals in SU) right as it opens.
Also side note, not related to SUF, but I hope you all react to the movie Scott Pilgrim Vs the World. It’s amazing, it’s based off a comic series, and it’s getting a Netflix anime adaptation in November that brings the movie cast back to voice their characters.
Granted it’s been a while since I’ve seen Ok KO, but the only crossover I remember was *not* with either SU or Ben 10. It was with a character originating in video games who’s had a few TV shows over the years. I also remember they did an homage/parody of an old Hanna-Barbera Saturday morning cartoon from the 70s. That one surprised me, as a) the show ran in 1977 & Ian Jones-Quartey was born in 1984, and b) it’s doubtful that there were many 45+ year-olds other than myself watching. Ok KO just didn’t get as much of the all-ages leadership that things like Adventure Time & SU got.
(is there an edit button I’m missing?) In the above, “leadership” should have been “viewership”, but I missed that my tablet autocorrected it until after I hit the Post button…
isnt that third fact a spoiler?
I might also be wrong! But Steven’s birthday is in August, and these episodes of future have to take place in either late summer or early fall (for reasons in a future episode) so unless this all takes place *immediately* after the movie there’s a chance he could even be 17!
I think they missed what that dream part was about, as they didn’t comment on the different-looking Pearl. Though they did note Yellow’s famous long neck, the fact that she managed to actually smile, and the disturbing turn of the dream. I don’t think they realized Steven had taken Pink’s place in that dream and that it was basically like a memory.
Rose sucks because you learn about Rose in reverse. As the audience the story you get is “Rose was such a perfect magnanimous person but no, it turns out she did terrible things and was callous and uncaring” when the story in chronological order was “Pink Diamond was an incredibly shitty person who learned from her shitty abusive parental figures before eventually realizing how shit she and they were. She clumsily fumbled around trying to fix things, failed, and spent the rest of her life in exile with survivor’s guilt before finding love and dying in child birth.”
Steven Universe: Save the Light is actually the sequal to a mobile game called; Steven Universe: Attack the Light, is on IOS and Android for like 3$ i think, but i don’t think you need to play it before Save the Light?
it’s also got a sequel called ‘Unleash the Light’, and all the games are Canon to the show
About Volleyball,what happened to her was really shitty but at the same time was something that Pink didn’t have control about it, the same way Steven loses control of his powers sometimes because he’s still a kid and is learning so did Pink back then, that doesn’t excuse her actions or make it fine but do explain them
Check out Steven universe song parodies songs they’re really good and yeah they’re good
Correct, Attack the Light is not necessary. Also, there is a third game, also on Switch, Unleash the Light.
I love how Onion just doesn’t age
English isn’t my first language and I can’t remember the specific wording, but Rebecca actually answered a question about that: basically, the world of Steven Universe is meant to be kinda whimsical, mysterious and weird, with some stuff intentionally not given full answers. Like how all the people except Ronaldo just really don’t give a damn about aliens being a thing (which reminds me of other favorite aliens of mine in the Lilo & Stitch show where Lilo can just claim all the alien experiments are some normal animal and literally everyone goes “eh, I guess that makes sense.”)
Also, short answer: because Onion.
I mean, the Gem War took place over a 400 year period that the Sumerians and early Egyptians also existed during. Pink Diamond’s gem is on American currency, and corrupted Gems have been roaming the Earth for thousands of years. It’s all probably only as interesting as normal history is to most people.
YES LETS GOOOOOO
This alone makes Diamond worth it
?Here we are in the future?
I was just wondering when this would be coming. Can’t wait to watch when I get home.
Ruff finally got his peridot intro
Let’s gooo
FINALLY LET’S GOOOOOOO ?
OK KO is such a good show please please please react to it