Here’s an interesting compare/contrast parallel from the newest SUF episode.

Steven and Spinel are both reacting to the perceived threat of someone they want to be alongside “abandoning” them, and interestingly Steven’s reaction is framed very similarly to Spinel’s by the boarders. There’s even a little climactic “shock” riff in the background music when Steven’s pupils shrink, (I don’t really know how else to describe it?) just like when Spinel’s expression grew all the more distraught in that scene.

What I find so fascinating about this parallel, is that they’re both reacting to the same situation, but react in practically opposite ways. Spinel breaks outwards, growing angry and shouting “NO” as a means to coerce people to stay, and Steven breaks inwards, actively denying his own desires and doing whatever others want as a means to coerce people to stay.

Both are of course absolutely influenced by these characters’ traumas, and their histories. But they’re still not healthy reactions- neither of them.

I find moments of comparison like this super fascinating on a meta sense. It makes me super hopeful that Steven and Spinel will get some interaction amongst the last eight episodes of SUF we have left- with all the talk of Steven being worried about his friends and loved ones “drifting away,” there really is a lot they could relate to with each other, right now, huh?