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When people say that Steven can’t corrupt himself because it doesn’t adhere to the the “rules” of what is known about corruption (like it only being a side effect of the Diamonds blast), then I think people forget about Cat Fingers and how Steven essentially managed to lose control over his form and turn into a monster with its own feral mind, similar to corruption.

We also learned from Volleyball that gems can have other types of damage, which is inflicted by one owns mental health. And we hadn’t seen any gem with Volleyball Pearl’s type of damage until now, so us not having seen other gems self-corrupting yet doesn’t disprove that Steven can’t self-corrupt.

Also the Diamonds themselves were unaware of what corruption was at first, so it’s not like we know everything there is to corruption and we might have not seen all the ways corruption can manifest.

Steven also continues to discover new powers, so we don’t even know what all his powers can do.

steven universe steven universe future SU meta corrupted steven my stuff

When did Steven begin to fear his own powers and hold back?

Throughout the original su, Steven fought hard to be a Crystal Gem, to be useful to his team, and that meant also developing his powers. We know that in the episode “Steven vs Amethyst” he confesses how he has been trying so hard, training to hone his powers, so we know he wasn’t trying to hold back there. We know Steven is afraid of his powers in suf after they start acting up, but I believe Steven began to hold back before suf.

Take Steven’s polygon powers. We see Steven using the polygon shields and spikes and all in suf. But he already had that ability to create various polygon shapes with his shield in the movie. He consciously played around with it when he gained his powers back, and yet he never used it in the movie during fight. And neither he used it in the start of suf when he consciously used his powers in a fight, it was just his old bubble shields and rose’s shield. The polygon shapes only happened when his pink stress mode either did it for him and in the later half of suf, when he didn’t hold back when training with Jasper.

And what’s interesting is, while Steven might have had the polygons pop up involuntarily when he was panicking in pink mode, then he knew how to summon it himself if he wanted to. He consciously made the polygon shields when he sought out Jasper in Fragments even before his training, and then began using it more confidently after the training. This implies Steven did know how to use this power since the movie, but chose not to consciously use it until Fragments—When he learned not to hold back.

So when did he become afraid of his own power that he felt he had hold back in the first place? When did that transition from su Steven wanting to use his whole range of powers to the movie and suf of him holding back happen? Well the polygon powers did appear before the movie: in CYM, with gem Steven.

This was Steven seeing the raw power of his gem side for the first time. That’s when he became afraid. You can see human Steven flinching and being in pain when gem Steven screams. And human Steven desperately cries out “stop, you’re hurting them” when gem Steven pushed the others back with his shield. Steven become afraid of that side of him, his Diamond side. Human Steven sees a raw powerful side that could potentially hurt others.

su meta steven universe steven universe future my stuff pink steven

Steven has so many abilities, even compared to other Diamonds. The reason I believe that he has so many abilities is because he has been constantly fighting and been put through situations where having a diverse skill set is necessary. This has lead him to hone and develop his abilities.

Meanwhile the Diamonds had a rigid and unchanging system, they rarely had to fight others and had a system where most other gems did tasks for them. Also they only now discovered their new powers after taking up different work than they did in the old system and being open to change. Therefore I believe they also could have many more abilities that they haven’t discovered yet.

SU meta steven universe steven universe future my stuff hugthesquids Steven is a hybrid, NOT a fusion

So this is just an essay to this topic I really wanted to make:

Steven is a hybrid, not a fusion. I think this is very important to Steven's identity and the message of the show as a whole.

Not only that, this is actually confirmed by the Crew, that Gem Steven and Human Steven aren’t full beings of their own, but just two halves of a whole.

Identity

One of the core themes of SU is identity. Every character has something in their arc to do with their own identity, either finding it, or accepting it, or fighting to have it be accepted after being denied it.

Identity is so ingrained into SU that its main antagonists, Homeworld, the Diamonds and especially White Diamond, their ideology and society are literally the anti-thesis to identity and individuality. The whole reason Peridot defected is that she was just another number to them, but to Steven she was a person. Every gem is just a cog in the machine, and even the Diamonds themselves are not exempt from this as White treats every one of them in the roles she sees them fit to be.

Blue laughs at Garnet calling herself a Garnet, Amethyst is reduced to just being a defective gem and a mockery of a Quartz, and Pearl is just a Pearl, an objectified servant who is only as important as the owner she belongs to, bereft of her own identity.

And no one has been denied their identity as much as Steven has.

Not only on the Homeworld side but also among friends and family.

There is obviously the whole Rose Quartz and Pink Diamond thing, either being treated as her or having to live up to her or just being an extension of her.

There are also his family and friends who deny Steven's gem or human side, only seeing him as one of them and not the hybrid he is. His dad treats him like a gem, which neglects him in the human department. And his mom only considers his human side, which makes her blind to all the gem stuff he has to deal with that she inadvertently leaves him with.

The Crystal Gems veered into only seeing him as the human, making him feel left out of their group to the point of crying about the idea the gems would abandon him of he didn’t prove his useful worth as a gem, to then veering into seeing him only as the gem he was later on, making them blind to the human neglect that caught up to him later on as we see in SUF.

And in CYM, White treated him just like a gem embedded onto a human child, as two separate people.

Ironically, it’s White Diamond in SUF that actually has Steven the most spot on. When the Diamonds changed their ways, White actually sees Steven as the hybrid he is, “Half a Diamond, half a creature of earth, in all the universe there's no one else that could know what you’re going through”. He is one of a kind hybrid.

This only further highlights the importance of that scene in Change Your Mind (CYM).

CYM

With identity being so central to SU and White Diamond and the entirety of Homeworld’s ideology being the anti-thesis of identity, it’s no wonder that the most crucial scene and theme in CYM has to do with the identity of the protagonist himself, the one who’s been struggling with identity the most.

The whole point of CYM is that Steven's identity has been denied for so long, which is why Gem Steven screams at White who's trying to deny him being anything other than Steven. Steven literally says "I'm me, I've always been me" after becoming whole again.

Steven is Steven. Him being anything else, a fusion, having a brother, having this separate Pink Diamond gem attached to him is so wrong and goes against everything the scene stands for, and by extension what Steven Universe stands for.

Gem Steven and Human Steven are two halves of a whole hybrid, not a fusion or anything else. They’re not meant to exist separately, they’re not two individual beings.

Split Steven is a shattered Steven.

This is why that scene in CYM is so important, because Steven was forcefully split apart—essentially shattered because White denied his identity. Shattering has been shown to be essentially the worst offence one could do.

Which also fuels why Steven has such a visceral reaction to WD in SUF compared to anyone else, even Spinel who almost killed his entire planet and reset the gems he didn't have that visceral reaction to. Treating him like a fusion would take away the sheer violation of being a whole being shattered in two that he experienced in CYM.

As we see when split, the two halves act like they’re shattered where the pieces are still conscious but can only focus on becoming whole again, as we’ve seen is the case for shattered gems. And the way Steven’s parts “fused” back together, works just like how the shattered gem parts “fused” back together after Yellow Diamond put them back together.

This is actually confirmed by the Crew, specifically Joe Johnston, the one who wrote and storyboarded this very scene in CYM and is a director on the Crew:

Question: "If gems can’t fuse with humans how did Steven’s gem fuse back with him?"

Answer: “Think of the split Stevens like they’re two halves of a whole. The two Stevens are each only half of a being, they can’t not fuse back into a full Steven. If you kept them apart they would only ever be focused on becoming whole again, seeking their other half. A little like two magnets that get close to one another and then snap together.“ - Joe Johnston

We see this in action during CYM.

A heart without body, a body without heart

Both Human and Gem Steven are lacking what a full human and gem is, and both their body and mind seem to not be fully there. They’re obviously not fully functional beings of their own, but are missing what the other has, because they’re one full being split apart, like bones without muscle, heart without body.

The show makes it especially clear with how the PoV was literally cut in half in that scene.

Another way they make it clear is showing how both halves are lacking vital parts on their own.

Gem Steven struggles to be animated like a normal gem with his face mostly blank, unblinking and has very mechanical movements. He also almost looks like a hologram instead of a proper light form as the gems have. Meanwhile Human Steven obviously can't even walk and is very pale and weak.

Gem Steven is pragmatic in his thinking, while the human side is very empathetic. Human Steven gets concerned when Gem Steven pushes White back along with his controlled friends and shouts “don’t hurt them”, but Gem Steven isn’t hurting them or shows any interest in engaging with them but sees pragmatic side of stunning them so White doesn’t keep attacking which delays Gem Steven’s movement to reach Human Steven.

Both have emotions still, as we see Gem Steven’s anger at White denying his identity, which is an anger that has been building up for so long as nearly all of Steven’s trauma comes to this, and him being denied being Steven ended up with Steven essentially being shattered.

Gem Steven seems to be fast to act on his defensive reflexes when attacked by WD but struggles with his mind on the finer details. Human Steven is the opposite. We see how Human Steven is the first to reach out and crawl to his gem, and it’s only when Human Steven falls that Gem Steven seems to realise what’s going on, since he’s not used to operating on half a brain.

When Gem Steven screamed, he didn’t realise it also hurt his human side and it’s only when he sees him crying that the camera pans to the gem’s face like an “oh” realisation.

It’s only when they’re united again, Human and Gem Steven in physical contact that they gain what they’re missing. Gem Steven becomes more animated, able to smile and blink, and Human Steven gains more energy and is livelier, able to keep up with the dance.

Originally posted by stevenfaces

They're literally missing pieces of themselves which is why each half doesn't function properly.

Shattered like a heart ripped from the body, or like a brain cut in half with a right brain and left brain. There is no separate gem and human consciousness when they are whole, there is only Steven.

If you try to separate him, it’s creating an artificial divide. It’s like when you cut a brain in half irl (yes that’s a medical practice that existed); so yeah the two brain halves will act differently when split, but they’re not meant to be split in the first place. And when whole the brain will not even consider there being two separate parts.

This is why it’s wrong to treat Steven as two separate individuals.

What fusion are and what Steven is not

The show has also made a very clear distinction what a fusion is.

A fusion is a relationship between two or more individuals, separate beings with identities of their own. And as we've seen with Garnet's arc, it's important that fusions aren't co-dependent, something Rebecca Sugar herself talks about and the components are still allowed to be individuals of their own outside that relationship. Garnet makes it very clear that Ruby and Sapphire are their own people.

That's why it's very wrong to treat Steven as two separate people as that would basically nullify the meaning of Steven saying "I'm me, I've always been me", in response to seeing his gem side being actually Steven and no one else or external entity, it's just him.

It would also go against what fusions stands for, because even a “permafusion” like Garnet had to go through an arc of recognising the components as their own individuals who should be allowed to explore themselves who they’re outside of their fusion.

Another thing that we see about fusions is that they are a conversation between two people. Steven doesn't have that, he doesn't have a mental plane with a human and gem Steven because he's just Steven. He can't "unfuse" from mental disagreements since there are no two people arguing, he's just one person.

And he can't "unfuse" by taking damage either. He can only be forcefully pulled apart like ripping a heart out of a body or cutting a brain in half, not meant to exist without the other.

Unlike fusions, he can’t exist being split apart; he is only half a human and half a gem when split, not two whole functional human and gem. Again, stated as canon by the Crew.

Identity and the neglected hybrid

SU is inherently a very queer show with queer themes interwoven into it (heck, it was the whole reason the show got cancelled, since the wedding happened and Rebecca didn't want Ruby and Sapphire's relationship denied).

And the same goes for identity.

The core message of the show is identity and Homeworld its anti-thesis.

Pink and Rose got to choose her identity outside of the Diamond she was expected to be, Pearl chose hers to be more than a servant, Ruby and Sapphire became Garnet, Amethyst is not defined by her "defectiveness", and lastly we have Steven, someone who has been denied his identity the whole franchise, which is why it's so powerful to say Steven is Steven.

And we know the show is called Steven Universe and we see things from his PoV. Which makes sense why his identity is central to the show.

SU was about Steven being denied even being Steven, while SUF is him knowing he is Steven Universe but struggles to figure out what Steven Universe even is, as most of this identity has been built in the shadow of constant conflict and the neglect he inadvertently encountered.

I don’t think I can write this section without also writing a whole essay and analysis on Steven’s perspective in SUF to really understand what he’s going through.

But I’ll at least say this.

Steven being a hybrid is so central to Steven’s character. He’s one whole being, one person going through all of this chaos, trauma and neglect. And this trauma and neglect stems from his hybrid nature and how no one really knows how to accommodate him.

This is why it’s so important that Steven is a hybrid, not a fusion or anything else. Because acting like his gem is a separate entity to him really takes away the pain and identity struggles that Steven goes through.

Steven in SUF never treats his gem as a separate being to himself (neither his human side either). His frustration with his family, as we saw with the argument in the van, is that they only see one side of him.

And it’s ironic that being blind to his human and hybrid side is exactly what causes his gem powers to act up. The feeling of being brushed aside, unheard, blind to his pain and needs. Meanwhile in contrast we saw that someone like Priyanka, who actually treats him as a human and gem is the one who manages to help him. Acknowledging that the very human experience of his trauma and stress response is what causes his gem powers to act on that stress response.

This is why it's important that Steven is Steven, not two people in a trench coat.

hugthesquids

Not only that, Rebecca Sugar herself confirmed this in a podcast.

Question: If Steven dies, what would happen to his gem half?

Joe Johnston: “Oh, I hate this question.”

Rebecca Sugar: “That’s so… That’s so grim. They’re one, they’re together. There is no… (interrupts herself). Steven is Steven, he has a gem. They can’t exist as Steven without each other. Immensely impossible, it’s impossible for both of them, it’s horrible.”

From the podcast “The Fantasy Of Steven Universe” with Rebecca Sugar, Ian Jones-Quartey, Kat Morris, Joe Johnston, Matt Burnett, and Ben Levin. At the 27:30 mark.

(Now you can understand even more the anger and trauma Steven had at being broken in half in CYM, it’s literally being shattered and dying and torture for him. His identity is Steven.)

su meta steven unvierse steven my stuff

Garnet’s biggest flaw

So I’ve seen many people in the fandom state that Garnet has no flaws or virtually no flaws outside her co-dependence in the form of Ruby and Sapphire. But that’s not true.

No character is perfect and Garnet is no exception as she carries with her some fundamental flaws that I find interesting exploring. In fact, her flaws are in a way very ironic to her character.

Btw she’s an excellent character and this is by no means to discredit her or anything. If anything, I think it’s good that characters have flaws and aren’t perfect as it gives depth to them, and SU is all about not putting anyone on a pedestal.

(There is a TLDR at the end)

Garnet is bad at communicating

Despite often preaching about the importance of communication in any relationship, Garnet has major trouble in this department.

Even after Garnet opens up later on in the seasons, she still struggles in this aspect.

There are many times where Garnet doesn’t explain a thing to others like Steven, and because of this lack of communication, he ends in trouble. In fact, Garnet often resorts to letting her actions speak for her.

And with Steven in particular, someone who needs guidance, it becomes a tough point for him. And it often lands him in trouble.

In a way, Garnet acts like the subversion of the old troupe of “learning your lesson the hard way”. She follows this line of reasoning, and yet she fails to consider that this isn’t a healthy way for Steven to learn. SU likes to subvert classic cartoon troupes, deconstructing them like how all the cartoony heroic adventures were actually traumatising for Steven and hindered his development in a healthy way.

So letting Steven “learn his lesson” with stuff like the proposal in SUF, it actually became the turning point in him spiralling so badly.

It hurt him so much (already dealing with a loss on what to do in life, losing trust in those nearest to him, losing his support system, lots of unresolved trauma bubbling through as Steven freshly processes how screwed up his life was and why he’s struggling so much now), and it essentially started the huge domino effect to what later happens in SUF.

(I’m not excusing Steven’s own actions, though as we’ve seen, he has things that contributed to the path that was taken. For this post, I’m focusing on Garnet’s stake in all this.)

The proposal, a point of neglect

I think the proposal especially highlights this weakness from Garnet in several ways. First a little background from Steven’s PoV.

He reached out to a guardian that he trusted and admitted he didn’t know what to do with his life, who only turned back and said he should’ve known better and he was dumb for listening to Ruby and Sapphire.

This is when we’ve just learned that Steven was scared at opening up to people because he’s afraid that it’ll push them away but Steven anyway worked up the courage to ask Garnet, who only told him she didn’t have time for him and let Ruby and Sapphire take charge.

This is also just after learning that Steven wasn’t socialised properly and doesn’t understand human conventions too (so he didn’t know it was weird to propose as 16 either. Most of his knowledge comes from cartoons and other media, where Steven himself loved reading books about adventures falling in love like The Unfamiliar Familiar, so this stuff was normal to him. Still not okay, but he was neglected socially.)

(Btw this also adds to Steven’s frustration with his dad later on, as the proposal stuff hurt so much and he didn’t know it was a bad thing to do as Steven was unfamiliar with human stuff and what to even do with his life and his dad didn’t provide that guidance and neither did the gems.)

Steven isn’t the one that brings up the proposal, that is a very important fact.

Steven opens up to Garnet, who dismisses him and lets him talk to Ruby and Sapphire, who are the ones that tell him to propose. Ruby eggs him on even as he goes “really?” and even then he doesn’t immediately do it but double checks by going to Sapphire, the one that Steven trusts to be the logical one of the pair. Ruby and Sapphire are still his guardians, and Steven has made it very clear that he struggles with knowing what to do with himself.

So imagine the betrayal that Steven feels, when his guardians, the ones he trusted and had trouble opening up to but decided anyway, just brushes his feelings off and makes it all his fault for trusting his family, essentially calling him dumb and makes it all about being a hard lesson for he himself not realising it was a foolish idea.

We as the audience know he didn’t have the tools to know, neglected socially and traumatised, and that he was in a very bad headspace.

And even the gems have seen Steven has not been in a great headspace for a while prior to this.

Robbed of agency

But because Garnet just accepts the future she “sees”, expects it to come and sees it as inevitable, she forgets to take responsibility.

She didn’t help him afterwards even if she could. She didn’t tell the other gems and left him all night and day after to be alone in his slump even though Garnet knew he was miserable and in a sensitive spot and wanted to reach out for support (like calling Greg). Instead he was left to spiral in those bad thoughts and feelings with no sympathy or aftercare.

Garnet let her role as Steven’s guardian slip.

She essentially robs both Steven’s agency with the proposal by saying it was inevitable, but also robs herself of her own agency to act. All because she believes her visions are certain and there is no reason to act otherwise.

But we know this is false, her visions aren’t certain!

Future vision

Garnet’s “visions” are merely calculations. She doesn’t see the future but calculates likely outcomes. Garnet herself has admitted that several times, but continues to contradict it as she still falls back to her habit.

Sapphire’s future vision coupled with Ruby’s influence that lets her see multiple outcomes, gives Garnet the notion that she knows what will happen.

Steven’s complaint that Garnet thinks that she “knows better” is an interesting one, because in a way, he’s right.

Garnet inadvertently robs other people of their agency by over-relying on her visions. In her eyes she knows they won’t change, that they will always do this.

And that also inadvertently robs herself of her own agency.

It’s kind of ironic too, because if she truly could see the future in all certainty, she should’ve known that Steven would spiral badly after the proposal and needed support. But that’s the thing, Garnet doesn’t know better, she doesn’t see everything or every outcome.

The biggest irony of this is that despite Garnet being a fusion, has a whole spiel about how conversation is important in any relationship, how her own existence was due to Ruby defying what Sapphire “saw”, Garnet herself is often a hypocrite to her own ideals.

The episode “Future Pool” is proof that her vision is flawed, as it isn’t really future vision, but a probability calculator based on the facts she knows (which is also why Garnet never predicted Rose being Pink Diamond or all other numerous surprising things). Even Sapphire in SUF shows it’s all a probability calculation that she’s running.

Even Garnet didn’t predict Bluebird to turn on Steven and all and try to kill him. If she even “saw” that possibility, she didn’t even warn Steven and she egged him on to give her a chance.

But ironically, Garnet didn’t really “learn her lesson” in these episodes, did she? Not the crux of it at least. Her future vision was getting more and more inaccurate in “Future Pool” as she couldn’t get a read on how Steven had grown as a person and wasn’t behaving as expected.

But instead of stepping back and assessing whether she should reconsider her relationship with the ability, as Steven tires to nudge her to think for herself instead of over-relying on visions that aren’t set in stone, Garnet goes back to the same as usual as she learns Steven had matured and factors that in to get back her more accurate future calculations.

Pink’s palanquin

Another example of Garnet robbing people of their agency and being bad at communicating is when Greg was kidnapped by Blue Diamond.

Instead of communicating to Steven that Blue Diamond was in Korea and that she would kidnap Greg if they went there, she just told him to not go.

Steven was at this point super frustrated at the gems not telling him anything and not communicating, while his rising frustration (and trauma) with the gem stuff was rising and he didn’t want to be constantly dismissed and denying knowing about this gem past that was affecting him so much now.

But again, Garnet is bad at communicating.

And when Steven goes to Korea, she robs Steven of his agency by saying this would’ve happened regardless.

Realistically speaking, if Garnet sat down and talked with Steven, acknowledging his feelings instead of dismissing them and how he felt about his heritage and Rose, (which has been a huge contributor in going into Korea in the first place, being denied his feelings) and Garnet actually explained Blue was there and the consequences going there, Steven would’ve likely not gone.

But in this twist of irony, Garnet denies her own agency with her flawed view on her vision, doesn’t make an effort in communicating with Steven, it ends up fulfilling her vision.

Denying responsibility

It’s very interesting that being the leader of the team, the one everyone looks up to, she sometimes struggles acknowledging fault or responsibility.

It’s not that she doesn’t ever not admit fault to something, she has admitted plenty of times. But there are times where she’s steadfast in not having any responsibility or that she had a part in too.

And this stands as an interesting contrast to her companions in the cast, Amethyst and Pearl, who are often confronted with their issues and are expected to change their mind or admit fault.

But there are many times where Garnet simply denies her doing anything wrong. And being the de facto leader, it gets accepted.

Garnet was still very responsible for the proposal thing. And even if Ruby and Sapphire were the ones telling Steven to propose, Garnet could’ve unfused, let the two of them take responsibility and apologise to Steven.

She just brushes it off as them being lovebirds so it’s okay for them to almost ruin Steven’s closest relationship and pins it as his fault for trusting them, despite them being his guardians who he opened up to with a sensitive issue. She denies Ruby and Sapphire their agency and even justifies their bad behaviour because love (but at the same time faults Steven to act on his emotions, despite being actually considerate enough to ask his guardians whether this was a good idea).

Garnet is still responsible for Ruby and Sapphire, because even if Garnet is technically her own person, Ruby and Sapphire are still a part of her and the two of them can choose to become her at any time just as Garnet can choose to become Ruby and Sapphire any time.

Fusion

And that’s another flaw Garnet has. She thinks she “knows better” about fusion, just because she’s a permafusion for thousands of years.

And while she does have a lot of sage and good advice about fusion

She still has her flaws about it. And often lets fusion become a scapegoat for her own responsibility or other people’s.

Like when Sugilite runs rampage.

They don’t even apologise to either Steven or Pearl for all the hurt Sugilite had caused (heck, she almost seemed fine with killing Pearl or at least being fine with all the destruction she caused. Steven even had his bones cracked when a huge boulder hit his face due to Sugilite).

Even if Sugilite wouldn’t be able to apologise, Garnet and Amethyst still could as it was their decision to fuse in the first place even with Pearl’s warnings that they tend to lose control. In fact, Garnet was the one to bring up fusing with Amethyst in the first place.

The only comment Garnet makes afterwards is how Sugilite overworked their bodies and that’s why they’re tired at the end of unfusing. No apology for the hurt they caused.

It’s an interesting contrast to how other fusions act.

Smoky is still apologising on Steven’s behalf with the havoc caused in “Guidance”. Steven apologises to Mega Pearl for Pearl and Pink Pearl, since the trip to the Reef didn’t turn out well. Even Stevonnie is treated as both their fusion and Steven and Connie, and Stevonnie treats themself as that too.

Meanwhile Garnet flip flops between being the result of Ruby and Sapphire’s actions to having no responsibility for Ruby and Sapphire.

Garnet even excuses Bluebird, saying Steven can’t judge her just because she’s a fusion of two of Steven’s enemies that wanna murder him. Which first of all, that was his house and he has every right to not want some strangers invited in there, let alone the fusion of his previous murderers.

Second of all, he absolutely can judge people based on their components. In fact, Garnet is yet again a hypocrite as she really likes Stevonnie, Smoky and all the other fusions because they’re the fusions of their friends. She doesn’t treat them as just their own people, the components matter too with the relationship she has to them. Garnet likes Fluorite, sure, but she isn’t family. But Smoky Quartz is family even at first sight, just because they’re a fusion of Amethyst and Steven.

Reflection

Garnet is by no means perfect, and that’s what makes her a good character. She has flaws like everyone else, just as she has strengths like everyone else.

She doesn’t mean ill with any of this. A lot of it is her being well-meaning too, and she tries a lot to be a leader for the team which is a tough spot.

In fact, being thrust in a leader position is probably why Garnet started over-relying on her future vision. She had to fill the spot Rose left for them, be the mature one as everyone processed their grief and keeping the team together, especially how prone to conflict Pearl and Amethyst were with each other earlier on before Steven stepped up to be the heart of the team.

So it just becomes this interesting if a little tragic and ironic thing that the very things Garnet preaches about and is a symbol of that others look up to, are the very things Garnet is really bad at.

TLDR

While Garnet is often seen as flawless or nearly perfect aside from her fusion with Ruby and Sapphire sometimes showing co-dependence, she does have significant flaws. Her biggest flaw is poor communication, which contradicts her emphasis on its importance in relationships. This flaw becomes especially apparent in her interactions with Steven, where her lack of guidance contributes to his struggles, such as in the proposal situation and the Korea thing.

Garnet’s over-reliance on her future vision also leads her to undermine others’ agency, assuming outcomes are inevitable rather than communicating and acting on them. This creates a paradox, as Garnet’s vision isn’t always accurate, she knows it isn’t, she knows it isn’t really future vision but a probability calculator and she often has blind spots and she herself is a result of that blind spot.

But Garnet still falls back to treating her visions as inevitable and misses opportunities to protect or support others, including Steven, by denying their and her own agency. Additionally, she sometimes avoids taking responsibility, particularly when it comes to the consequences of her lack of communication, and also using her future vision and fusion as an excuse in certain aspects.

Despite these flaws, it makes Garnet a more complex and compelling character, as dealing with her leadership role she was forced into after Rose’s absence. Acknowledging her flaws gives depth to her character and emphasizes the show’s theme that no one is perfect.

steven universe garnet su meta my stuff rosenotactuallyquartz-deactivat rosenotactuallyquartz-deactivat

in-character interview with newsarama by rebecca sugar, 2015

this official steven universe interview is no longer available on the website, but it’s archived!

it’s canon & written by rebecca sugar, an interview of the characters pearl, greg, & steven.

ALT

ALT

there’s some really sweet and subtle pearlrose moments, i particularly love this one:

steven: i'm changing a lot all the time, but that's good, i think, since everybody changes all the time. i like it because even if you know somebody, you can know them again, all the time, when they're different, & what doesn't change is how you feel, you know? that can stay the same, which is really cool. like if you love somebody, that's the thing that can stay the same no matter what.

greg: steven, what a really nice thought.

pearl: oh greg, can you believe it, sometimes he sounds just like—well, just like steven.

greg: yeah, he’s really something else.

pearl stops herself before she can say rose, because that would be quite awkward in the interview setting. she also says she trusts rose & calls her incomparable. there’s a bit of jealousy with greg, because the timeline is at around the beginning of the show, so pearl hasn’t really found closure yet & is questioning things. eventually she’ll understand that rose never chose a partner over her, but anyway! really cute & canon pearlrose here.

ALT

hugthesquids

The whole interview for reference. It’s got really nice characterisation!

Date of the interview: 07 January 2015 (This is when season 1 episode 35 “Lion 3: Straight to Video” was the latest episode out)

Newsarama: Hey Steven, thanks for talking to us!

Steven Universe: Happy to!

Nrama: Now, you’re a little younger than who we usually talk to, so we wanted to make sure you had a parent or guardian present.

Steven:Yeah that’s cool! Here’s my dad!

Universe:Wow, I haven’t done an interview in ages! I’m Mr. Universe, uh, interstellar rock star! But it’s been a few decades since my last tour so I guess you can call me …Steven’s dad Greg!

Steven: Woo! Oh hey look, Pearl is coming over too. Hey Pearl!

Pearl of the Crystal Gems: Excuse me, excuse me, who are you and what exactly is going on here?

Greg: Newsarama’s doing an interview with us!

Pearl: I was asking this complete stranger, not you, Greg.

Nrama: …this is great! A rock star… and a rock from the stars!

Steven: Oh that’s good!

Pearl: How much have you two told this human?

Greg: Don’t worry Pearl… this isn’t about Gems… it’s just about Steven.

Nrama: Okay, well, that brings me to my first question. Steven, you’re the first half human, half Crystal Gem, is that right?

Steven: Mmhm!

Pearl: Yes, he’s the son of the incomparable Rose Quartz! He’s inherited her Gem and her legacy.

Greg: …and I had a little to do with it! Uh… Steven… existing!

Nrama: Greg, I have to say, it’s not every parent who’d let his son be trained by magical beings. Why do you feel it’s important for Steven to live with the Gems?

Greg: I mean he’s got Rose’s Gem so… sooner or later we knew his powers might come out somehow, and I’m not much help in that department?

I mean, the Gems didn’t know much about raising a baby. That I get, I had that covered. But I don’t know much about being a Gem. They sure do, they’re really exceptional Gems. They’re really thoughtful, you know… they really try their best to understand people.

Pearl: Yes, people are wonderful.

Steven: Go people!

Nrama: And Pearl, I’m sure it must have been very unusual for you when you found out Rose Quartz had fallen in love with a human. What was what like for you?

Greg: Wow, you’re really zero to sixty with these questions, buddy.

Pearl: That is absolutely none of your business!

Nrama: Well, what about when you found out Rose Quartz was going to have a half-human child?

Pearl: Brilliant leaders do brilliant things, that’s why you look to them for answers, answers no one else could have, that’s why you trust them, even when you can’t understand why they chose …Greg.

Greg: Well, ahh, we were so excited to see who Steven would be! When we… well, when we figured out that it might be possible!

And there’s never been anyone like him, and he really is a Gem and a human at the same time, it’s just incredible.

Steven: Yeah, I’ve been training and a lot of my powers are coming out! I can bubble up really easy these days, and I can warp on my own, and for a little bit I could even heal people and stuff.

Pearl: Yes! He’s been doing fantastic!

Greg: And he’s got my knack for music too! It’s really something, it’s unreal, you should hear him play!

Nrama: Wow that’s exciting! So Steven, you’re really talented.

Steven: Yeah! I can draw too! I drew last year’s Beachapalooza flier! Guess what I figured out – if you draw with a pencil but you draw really hard, you can smudge the line around with your finger and give everything really cool shading, and make shooting stars and comets… go look, the flier’s still up on the bulletin board at the Big Donut!

I want to get better at drawing… and I want to get better at my shield powers.

Nrama: You sound more excited about the flier than the shield powers!

Steven: Yeah, well, my flier came out really good and you can go see it! I’d show you my shield too, but I can’t make it come out whenever I want.

Pearl: Oh Steven, you’ll get it! You’ve manifested it twice!

Greg: Yeah I’ve seen him do it, it’s really something! He blocked this crazy water ball with it, and it gonged out all the water clones. It’s gorgeous, it’s Rose’s.

Steven: Thanks… yeah, I know I’ll get it… I’ve been practicing in the mornings! I just can’t seem to get it. Shield is harder than bubble I guess…

Nrama: Look, Steven, I didn’t mean to make you self-conscious about your Gem abilities – besides, aside from all that, you seem like most other kids your age. Actually, it seems like you’re pretty popular in Beach City!

Steven: Oh, I dunno about that! I just like talking to people, and then a lot of the time, they talk back! Ha!

Pearl: Human beings just adore each other, and Rose just adored human beings, so Steven is a real “people human,” as they say!

Greg: Heh… I think you mean “People person.”

Pearl: What? That can’t be right. That’s so redundant.

Nrama: So I have to ask – do you have any favorite comic books?

Steven: Oh man, me and Dad were going through all his old comics in the van! I got to keep a bunch of them, Casper, Richie Rich, Hot Stuff, Baby Huey, Spooky the Tuff Little Ghost… Wendy Witch…

Greg: I gave him lotsa Harvey Comics.

Steven: Dad says I can’t read his Heavy Metals till I’m older.

Greg: You can have those in a couple years!

Steven: Oh yeah and I just got the No Home Boys graphic novel adaptation! But I think it really missed the mark. And I like Sailor Moon. It’s really down to earth.

Nrama: And what’s coming up for you?

Steven: I dunno, I guess anything could happen, that’s usually how it is! I met a new Gem recently, her name was Lapis Lazuli and she seemed really cool! She flew away to the Gem Homeworld!

Pearl: Steven, please. Look, stranger. There’s nothing to worry about. Earth is an independent planet, and Lapis Lazuli couldn’t possibly have made it all the way home.

Steven: What? Oh no, oh Pearl, you really think so?

Pearl: Or, well, Steven, I’m sure she did, yes, right, she definitely made it back, I’m sure she’s… having a really fun time… telling everyone… nothing!

Steven: … ok…

Greg: Hey! Hey, everything’s ok, whatever happens we can always roll with it, am I right?

Pearl: Yes, yes. We’ll roll! We are planning to roll.

Nrama: So, Steven – what is the best thing about being Steven Universe?

Steven: I get to be a Crystal Gem, and I learn a lot all the time, and hang out with Dad and with my friends …and everybody!

I’m changing a lot all the time, but that’s good, I think, since everybody changes all the time. I like it because even if you know somebody you can know them again, all the time, when they’re different, and what doesn’t change is how you feel, you know?

That can stay the same, which is really cool – like if you love somebody, that’s the thing that can stay the same no matter what.

Greg: Ah boy, gosh Steven, what a really nice thought.

Pearl: Oh Greg, can you believe it, sometimes he sounds just like …well …just like Steven.

Greg: Yeah. He’s really somethin’ else.

Nrama: Thanks again for talking to me!

Steven: You’re welcome! Crystal Gems forever!

Greg: Hey yeah thanks! Keep watching the skies! Haha hahaha… heh!

Pearl: No ah, please don’t! We’ll take care of everything. Stay safe, human!

steven universe su meta buzzheadchick

ALT

These notes in the End of An Era book are the only thing I’ve seen on Gemglyph. It’s not a lot to go off of but it’s interesting.

I’ve the letters are kinda fuzzy but this is the best quality pic I could get so if they’re hard to read, the underlined top part says, “welcome sign,” then under the glyph reads, “the reef” in blue, “white’s planet” in pink, “her 5th planet” in yellow, and “under Diamond rule” in purple. The sentence below that, next to the circles reads “Writing on disks suggests which Diamond’s court the Pearl below would belong to.”

hugthesquids

So the name for “The Reef“ in gem glyph is compromised of the symbols “White’s planet, her 5th, under Diamond rule“.

When Steven warps to Homeworld there are some banners with similar symbols and based on this info, I can infer what Homeworld’s name is in gemglyph.

So the top part here

means “White’s planet, her 1st, under Diamond rule“ which is Homeworld’s name in gem glyph.

su meta !!! steven universe the previous post talked about it but I wanted to give an example with some sources backing it up artbyblastweave

On occasion you’ll see a Who-would-win matchup where people try to get Steven Universe to Talk-no-jitsu a host of “irredeemable” villains, and it really highlights something that I think gets lost in the weeds in discussions of, and perceptions of, Steven’s character. I’d argue that he’s not actually uniquely good at talking people down, he was just uniquely well suited to talking down the handful of people he did talk down.

He had an in with the Diamonds to start, and honestly coasted a lot on the outcome of actions taken before he was born in order to survive the endgame. He never talked Jasper down. He never talked Aquamarine down. Lapis came around but she wasn’t exactly a decisive victory and the show makes a point of how she has to carry herself over the finish line. He never really convinced Bismuth so much as the material circumstances changed and put the two of them in the same camp on their second meeting. Peridot decisively feels like a feather in his cap- he made a lot of right calls in quick succession with her, and they paid off fairly straightforwardly with no backsliding - but the sucess was still super contextual in that they only worked together at all because of the mutual danger posed by the cluster. He talked down Spinel but lost her almost immediately because she (correctly!) perceived him as only having reached out to her because he needed to in order to stop everyone from dying; he didn’t think far enough ahead to realize this was probably going to happen, and honestly he kinda got lucky the Diamonds showed up when they did because they might have been in that cycle for a while otherwise.

The kid’s not a rhetorical genius- his successes in redeeming his enemies are contextual, dependent on immediate circumstances, a lot of luck, and oftentimes on the person being “redeemed” making a personal decision that has nothing immediately to do with any argument Steven made. What Steven is actually consistently good at is providing support to his friends and family, convincing them to do stuff, managing their neurosis, and this is part of why Future hits him so hard- they don’t really need him to do that anymore. Indeed, one thing I really liked about Future is that it highlighted the ways in which Steven can be genuinely emotionally incompetent in ways that don’t pop as much when he’s a kid. I’m thinking of Guidance, Volleyball, and Together Forever in particular. The show actually has a very reasonable grasp of how far rhetoric and fuzzy feelings alone will get you!

All of this to say that if you’re treating it as a given in your battleboarding that proximity to Steven is going to result in a character being redeemed, you’re doing it wrong. Being on the television show Steven Universe is what results in a character being redeemed. If you want Steven to be why, you’re gonna have to write an actual story. With context for how they met and got stuck together for the long haul. Maybe a plot, too.

hugthesquids

Some really good tags

su meta steven universe

Just thought it was interesting to look at the meaning of Steven’s name:

Steven = matyr, honor, royalty, crown, encircleQuartz = hardCutie Pie = cuteDeMayo = of May, of the greater, of the motherDiamond = unchanging, unconquerable, unbreakableUniverse = universe, whole, turned into one

steven universe SU meta steven universe future

Diamond essence headcanon

So it’s canonically confirmed that gems are created from the Diamonds’ essences and the colors correspond to the Diamond’s colors (so like Peridots are from a mix of YD and BD’s essence). I headcanon that all four of the Diamonds’ essences are still used for each gems. I believe that there is a minimum requirement needed of the remaining Diamonds’ essence to make the gem “optimal” (So a Peridot won’t just be made of only YD and BD’s essence, but also have minimal amounts of WD and PD’s essence)

In era 2, it’s confirmed that the resource crisis was because PD was missing, and we know our Peridot is less optimal than era 1 Peridots because of this resource crisis. And the only way for that to make sense is that PD’s essence is still used for gems that aren’t pink or mixes of pink.

That’s why era 2 gems are weaker and shorter, since they get less than the optimal amount of pink essence. It’s still possible to create gems with only one essence, like only PD’s essence being used to create the pebbles. Homeworld probably doesn’t see it necessary mix the other Diamond essences, since they are some of the lowest of workers.

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