This post contains spoilers up-through and including “Jungle Moon.”





Post “A Single Pale Rose” Update:

I’m like 70% sure Rebecca Sugar has seen this post, and mentions in at the 17:50 mark in the Heart of the Crystal Gems episode of the official podcast.





(No other changes have been made to the post below, since the “Stranded” special aired.)





The Theory:



At some point during the colonization of Earth, Pink Diamond became enamored with organic life on Earth. While the other diamonds regarded organic life as nothing more than a resource for creating new gems, she created a zoo in an attempt to preserve the species she knew was doomed to extinction by the colonization process.

She was fascinated by humans’ ability to choose their own destiny outside of a rigid caste system, but the humans kept safe in her zoo were deprived of that freedom. Eventually, keeping a relatively small number of humans alive, with no real freedom and away from their home, which she was helping to destroy, wasn’t good enough for her anymore. She wanted to save the Earth, and give gems the same freedom that humans enjoyed.

Maybe she proposed this plan to the other diamonds, but they rejected it. Maybe she knew they would never agree to it and didn’t even bother asking. In any case, she decided to rebel against them, end the destruction of the Earth, and free the gems severing under her.

However, Pink Diamond realized that those gems were programmed to follow her orders, and would rebel against the other diamonds without question if she ordered them to. This would completely undermine her goal of granting her subjects free will outside of the caste system. So, Pink Diamond created an alter-ego: Rose Quartz. “Just another Quartz soldier, made right here in the dirt.” Pink Diamond wouldn’t lead the rebellion, Rose Quartz would. And her subjects would be able to freely choose which side they wanted to fight for.

Only one other gem would know about this plan: her pearl.

Pearl: It’s a secret, even to Garnet and Amethyst. Rose had a place that she kept hidden from all but me…

Pearl: I was your mother’s sole confidant— for the words she could share with no one else, I was there to listen. Steven: Why’d she keep so many secrets? Pearl: She had to, Steven! It’s the mark of a great leader, knowing just what to keep hidden from everyone you’re trying to protect.

Garnet: Rose kept many things secret, even from us. Pearl: But not from me, I was the one she told everything!

For a thousand years, Pink Diamond led a double life, operating as herself out of her moon base and as Rose Quartz out of her secret armory and other rebel bases. Although in a position to try and minimize casualties, she also needed to give the rebellion the best possible chance of success while keeping up appearances with those gems who had remained loyal to Pink Diamond and homeworld.

She would have been forced to make terrible, impossible decisions as she issued battle orders to soldiers on both sides, often sending gems who loyally served under her to certain doom.

Eventually, as the war became more and more desperate and the huge number of soldiers taking orders from the other three diamonds threatened to overwhelm the rebellion.

Revealing her deception was no longer an option. Too many of Rose Quartz’s soldiers, like Bismuth, were now completely opposed to the authority of “upper crusts” like Pink Diamond. If they learned they had been taking orders from a diamond the whole time, and that their beloved leader had also been commanding the forces they fought for a thousand years, they would never follower her again. She would become an enemy of both Homeworld and the rebellion, and the latter would surely fail without her leadership.

There was only one way out. Pink Diamond would fake her own death and hope that the other diamonds would be sufficiently terrified of Rose Quartz to abandon Earth. However she did it, her plan worked, but she failed to anticipate the the other diamonds would emit the corruption signal before departing.





The Evidence:

Rose Quartz and Pink Diamond were both pink, had big hair, and their gem in their belly button.



Rose has a cave with a giant penny in it that only her most loyal servant knows about. Just like Batman, who has a secret identity.

Pink Diamond = Bruce Wayne



Rose Quartz = Batman



Pearl = Alfred



Moon Base = Wayne Manor



Secret Armory = Batcave

It seems like Pearl was programmed to loyally serve Rose Quartz. In the holographic memory in “Rose’s Scabbard,” Rose called her “My Pearl.” Pearl tells Steven, “Everything I ever did, I did for her. Now she’s gone, but I’m still here.“ Indeed, Pearl’s main character arc in the first three seasons is that she is constantly uncertain of her purpose in life now that Rose is gone, and must learn to function without Rose now. She’s a Pearl, programmed to serve, but the gem she’s programmed to serve is gone now.

to loyally serve Rose Quartz. In the holographic memory in “Rose’s Scabbard,” Rose called her “My Pearl.” Pearl tells Steven, “Everything I ever did, I did for her. Now she’s gone, but I’m still here.“ Indeed, Pearl’s in the first three seasons is that she is constantly uncertain of her purpose in life now that Rose is gone, and must learn to function without Rose now. She’s a Pearl, programmed to serve, but the gem she’s programmed to serve is gone now. But why would a Pearl be programmed to follow a common Quartz Solider?



In addition to the evidence that Pearl served Rose Quartz, there are also several hits that Pearl served Pink Diamond. (See the numbered list below, and my master-post on the question of Pearl’s ownership.) This apparent contradiction is resolved by the realization that Rose Quartz and Pink Diamond are the same person.

(1) In “Adventures in Light Distortion” Pearl says, “When I still served ….Homeworld.“ Why that pause there? Why is Pearl hesitant to tell Steven who she used to serve?



(2) Later, in “Gemcation,“ Pearl again seems hesitant to tell Steven something about her past. “Steven, I’m sure you have a lot of questions you’d like answers to, like about the Diamonds, for instance. There are things that are impossible for me to explain. But I want to. I– [covers her own mouth]. Steven I – [covers her own mouth again].



(3) In “Back to the Barn,” Peridot says our Pearl “looks like a fancy one.” Fancy enough to be reserved for royalty?



(4) Pink diamonds appear on Pearl’s flight-suit, hologram-Pearl, and on Sardonyx’s shoes.



(5) Pearl strikes an interesting pose in “We Need to Talk.”

(6) In “It Could’ve Been Great” Pearl is the gem who knows that there was a Diamond base on the moon.

Steven and Rose are often associated with the imagery of royalty.

Bismuth believes Rose Quartz was made on Earth, but we know from flashbacks to Rose’s private conversations with Pearl and Greg that she’s from homeworld. Why would she lie to her fellow rebels about where she was made?

Rose Quartz’s power set seems to be completely different than any other quartz soldier we’ve seen in the show. Other than having the strength, durability, and ability to summon a weapon that all gems have, the only special power both Amethyst and Jasper have is the ability to perform simple ‘spin attack.‘ Rose Quartz has never been seen performing a spin attack, but she can float, heal gems and organic life, control plants and even instill them with sentience. In “The Trial,” Eyeball states that Rose Quartz was the only know gem ever to have healing powers, and none of the diamonds or zircons present disagree with her on that point. Why are the abilities of this alleged common quartz solider from earth so unique?

When Eyeball says she witnessed the death of Pink Diamond, she is literally talking to a gem that is tricking her with shape-shifting.

Steven’s baby onsey is left partly unsnapped in a very interesting way for most of “Three Gems and a Baby.”

In “Lion 4: Alternate Ending,” we see two large pink structures outside of Rose’s landfill. Most fans think these are either the fingers of Pink Diamond’s hand-ship, or the legs of her…leg ship, which could form a Voltron-esque robot with the other Diamond’s ships. Either way, this is Pink Diamond’s ship. So what’s it doing where Rose Quartz kept all her old things she doesn’t need anymore?

Furthermore, the fact that Rose’s landfill doesn’t seem to have been on the map of gem locations Pearl gave to Buddy Buddwick, and that nobody thought to use Pink Diamond’s old ship when Steven was trapped on homeworld, would seem to imply that existence/location of Rose’s landfill and Pink Diamond’s ship was a secret Rose kept from the rest of the crystal gems.

In “Steven’s Dream” Steven has visions through the eyes of Blue Diamond after she arrives on Earth. None of the other gems on Earth seem to be effected by Blue Diamond’s relative proximity in the same way. Why does Steven have a special connection to the diamonds that allows him, and no one else, to have “diamond dreams?”

"The Trial” revealed that Pink Diamond was allegedly shattered with Rose Quartz’s sword. A sword its designer, Bismuth, said was incapable of shattering gems.

Rose Quartz is nowhere to be seen in Garnet’s brief flashback to fighting Pink Diamond in “Gemcation.” (Has anyone ever seen Rose Quartz and Pink Diamond in the same room at the same time?!)

Also, Pink Diamond is seen wield dual gem destabilizes. How suspiciously nice of her to use a weapon that just poofs gems instead of shattering them.

In “Jungle Moon,” Stevonnie has a strange dream where they are acting out a memory of Pink Diamond from a time before she was put in charge of colonizing Earth. Why is Stevonnie remembering something that happened to Pink Diamond in the alien moon base at all?

There’s some interesting symbolism going on in the dream sequence in “Jungle Moon” as well. In the dream Pink Diamond, shatters her own reflection. Foreshadowing that she faked her own shattering?

It’s currently open to interpretation how literal any individual element of Stevonnie’s dream is, but it seems like Pink Diamond may have been significantly smaller than Yellow. Maybe about the same size as Rose Quartz? This seems to be confirmed by the height of the spot where she punched the glass, and the size of her chair back on Earth’s moon base, compared to Yellow Diamond’s on the alien moon base.

(Yellow Diamond’s chair)

(Pink Diamond’s chair)

Pink Diamond’s lips and nose are identical to Rose Quartz’s.