Steven Universe is a series created by Adventure Time alum Rebecca Sugar for Cartoon Network. In its basic essence, the storyline follows a half-human half-gem named Steven and his magical friends who protect the earth, the Crystal Gems. The Gems came to Earth thousands of years ago and became the protectors after a thousand year war against Homeworld. With its bright colors, adorable characters, and catchy musical numbers, it’s no wonder that the show became an instant hit after its first airing in 2013. Rebecca Sugar beautifully weaves a fabulously complex and heart-wrenching plot that’s so much more than a fantastical story of a boy.
1. Obviously, Steven
Steven is a character that is truly hard not to love. With his youthful ignorance, you easily become strangely protective of this boy. He’s smart, but not always in the most conventional sense. He’s charming and incredibly sweet, but still a child struggling to live up to his mother’s name. Steven makes mistakes, but never stops until he fixes them in a way that appeases everyone. His childlike nature helps maintain the light airy nature of the show, even in its more emotional episodes.
2. The Continuity
Rebecca Sugar has created a world on earth that is beautiful, magical, and surreal, but still very natural. With every Gem structure Steven comes across, the story of the Gems and his mother, gets slowly revealed. In the background of each structure are hints and signs of the great war. While there are many filler episodes, there is not a single episode that doesn’t continue the story line further. In this season alone, there have been so many references to past seasons that help fill in the blanks of the gem’s pasts. The storyline is amazingly interesting and I am not ashamed to admit that I, a 19 year old girl, has spent many nights on Tumblr scrolling through the “SU theory” tag.
3. Representation
All of the gems look incredibly different in their physical bodies. There are short and stout gems, long and thin gems, light gems, dark gems, and gems with more than one appendage. The gems never display any insecurities about their bodies, except getting stronger to fight. The show does a wonderful job in showcasing how a group of powerful women can work together without competition and body comparisons. In addition, "Steven Universe" explicitly illustrates a healthy lesbian couple without making that their defining feature. Rebecca Sugar has incorporated diverse body representation as well as normalizing homosexuality for children at a very young age. Yes, this is a kid’s show. She also extended the diverse representation past the television by casting every gem as a woman of color.
4. The Messages
This is going to sound very cliché, and I know you’re thinking “Katelyn, all kids shows have messages.” And you would be right, they do. However, Rebecca Sugar tackles messages like the importance of consent, how it’s okay to miss a toxic person who is no longer in your life, the importance of embracing individualities and recognizing the different strengths of other people, as well as finding out that even idolized people are not perfect and make difficult decisions. This is all done subtly through astonishingly complex storylines and never outrightly stated like some messages in children’s shows.
"Steven Universe" is an unusually progressive children’s show, and I genuinely wish I had a show like this when I was a kid. After Adventure Time struggled to make Bubblegum and Marceline’s relationship canon and the continuous censorship of Gravity Falls, it is truly amazing to see the progressive nature of the series. Rebecca Sugar has created a show that really can be enjoyed by all ages and one that has already established itself as a legacy.
