… … …

I wanted to start this by quoting Pearl singing “It’s over, isn’t it? Why can’t I move on?”, but, one, a lot of people are already doing that so I’ll spare you and, two, that’s not how I feel. Well, maybe I do feel her sense of heart-ache and sadness, but not for the same reasons everyone else is…

I’ll give you my first-blanch impression of these final episodes before doing a full-scale review and retrospective of the whole series in my next post…

Let’s start with:

Everything’s Fine

What it says on the tin. Steven returns from Homeworld and tries to convince himself, and everyone around him that he’s fine. The moral is yet another recapitulation on the “don’t clam up” Aesop this show has spewed dozens of times. Steven struts around Little-Homeworld trying to “help” his fellow gems as though it were another day on the farm, but only succeeds in nearly burning it to the ground. Honestly, if that had actually happened, this episode would have felt more climactic, but don’t worry! There’ll be plenty of opportunities to deflate my expectations down the road!

In other news, we see Garnet doing the job literally anyone else on the planet would be more qualified for considering the events of Together Forever: Marriage Counseling.

The highlight of this episode, and honestly the only scene I wouldn’t change is the one where Steven’s friends all confront him and he starts breaking down. The best part of his downward spiral (if “best” is the word to describe such a shocking scene) is where he goes on a tirade about how easily all his problems seem to be fixed:

Steven: “Oh, don’t worry! I already fixed that (shattering Jasper) too! I can fix anything! I can just keep messing up and fixing things forever, and you’ll never have to know or think about any of it! … How messed up is that. That I’ve gotten away with this for so long. You have no idea how bad I am. You think I’m so great, and so mature and I always know what to do, but that’s not true! I haven’t learned a thing from my problems. They’ve all just made me worse! You think I’m some angel, but I’m not that kid anymore! I’m a fraud… (sobbing)…I’m a fraud…I’m a monster…

It honestly is. It’s so satisfying seeing things come to a head with this arc, despite my gripes with its execution. We’ve finally gotten to the heart of the matter and I think it was done splendidly. Once again we are getting layered subtext levied by Steven at Pink Diamond. His problem wasn’t being unable to fix a problem, per se. The whole time it was him being disturbed by how easily his (and her) problems were all solved and swept under the rug so all their friends could get back to adoring and idolizing them. Despite trying so hard to be a supportive family for Steven, they’ve unknowingly been reinforcing the pressure they’ve put on him from the start of the show, that he is the team’s moral guardian who can do no wrong. The parallels between his rant and the lyrics of the show’s original ending theme really hit this message home.

As repetitive as the full-disclosure lesson has been over the course of Future, I’m glad it was at least leading up to this. In a way, it’s almost a subversion of this trope, showing that letting out all your feelings isn’t always a pretty picture. It also acknowledges what I think has been an objective fault in the show, how ephemeral the repercussions seem, in a way that sheds new light on it…Not enough to make me ignore it, but it’s impressive seeing how the writers have turned a weakness into a strength in this scene.

I only wish I could say the rest of the finale actually built on this.

Overall: 7/10

Last Two Minutes: 10/10

I Am My Monster

Picking right up off the last episode, we see Steven has been transformed into a dragon-like monster and is rampaging around Beach-City. Okay, a bit on the nose, but appropriate enough. We’ve seen evidence enough that Steven can alter his physical form to reflect his self-image which is now that of a monster.

Stevenzilla then thwarts all attempts to restrain him, their darkest hour lampshaded by the clouds literally blotting out the sun. Our heroes then lament over their failure to console him, which would’ve been fine if the scene didn’t keep dragging on with each character adding to a laundry list of self-pity. It’s all painfully corny. Thankfully, Connie is there to pull them out of their heads and finish the fight.

Connie: “Yes, it is! (Their fault)” “Yes, you hurt him. But this isn’t the time to make all of this about you! That is not helping! Maybe Steven would care how sad you are because he’s always putting everyone else’s feelings first! But he can’t do that for you right now because he needs us this time!” “We all had Steven when we needed him, but the only person who’s never had Steven is Steven. He’s always been there for us, so *sigh* how can we be there for him now?” -Connie, being the MVP

Their spirits renewed, they press on. They make a final, daring, valiant charge…straight into Steven’s arms… … …That’s it…they hug him…that’s literally it…They hug him and make tearful confessions that, in turn, bring Steven to tears which spill into the ocean around his feet and heal his own corruption… … …He then has a good cry and…the episode ends there…

Well, it’s not that I’m surprised these sacs of throbbing emotions would hug it out eventually. This is Steven Universe we’re talking about, after all.

It’s just…I was hoping the climactic final battle would be a bit more…climactic. I just thought well, you know…we might finally be pursuing a certain plot thread the writers have been hinting at throughout these episodes…Such as when White Diamond tried in vain to reach Steven through his hideous facade…

And Spinel was crying over having tried to erase his memories…

I thought we were perhaps leading up to a direct confrontation with that certain character who’s been behind the curtain all this time and has yet to truly face the music for her actions…a certain gem whose memories of loving earth and sacrificing to save it were wiped by Spinel’s scythe, leaving her reset to her default tyrannical persona which has presumably been bubbling forth into Steven’s subconscious and driving his irrational outbursts of rage…you know the one…

NOPE! JOSSED!

Now, the theory may still be sound. Perhaps Pink’s loss of memory to the scythe is still responsible for Steven’s downward Spiral, just not directly confirmed by a reappearance from Pink herself as I had speculated would happen. Some might say this is for the best. It preserves the subtlety of the established subtext and leaves her current state ambiguous. It preserves the “Pink is gone” mentality that Steven’s gem-half itself established. In that sense, I suppose one could say we’ve already heard Pink’s final word.

I was just hoping we’d finally get a major denouement, that we’d close off this series having built off the previous show’s story in some meaningful way. We’ve already had sappy confessions and happy reunions capping off the series twice already. It would have been nice if we’d come away from this one with some actual payoff.

Overall: 6/10

The Future

The final episode is set several months after Steven’s “meltdown” (I know. ANOTHER time-skip!), where Steven is making plans to leave Beach-city and find himself…which is pretty much what Greg offered to help him do several episodes before, but I digress. Steven says his final farewells, even bookending his time with the crystal gems with the cookie-cat jingle he sang in the first episode. The Crystal Gems, however, seem to take the news more gracefully than he’d anticipated and he’s perturbed by their lack of an emotional display…Oh, come on, Steven! PTSD or not, now you’re just being a diva!

But, of course, they can’t hold back their emotions for long and they bid Steven a tearful farewell as he drives off into the sunset. I was hoping this scene would be set to a reprise of “Love Like You”…That’s really all I have to say. This just doesn’t quite impact me like the other bittersweet departures I’ve had with the beloved characters of my favorite stories. Watching the season five finale, the movie’s ending and now this has been like sitting through the end of Lord of the Rings: Return of the King while holding in your pee until it finally decides on an ending.

If I’d known that the Season Five finale or the Movie were going to be the end of Steven Universe, I think I would’ve been much happier or emotionally convalescent than I am with Steven Universe Future. It just feels like I’ve sat through one long filler episode. The creators didn’t build on the previous story in any meaningful way. They didn’t raise the stakes or explore a grander conflict. They didn’t flesh out the world in any more detail than they already had. Sometimes I wonder why they even bothered. To help highlight my frustrations, here’s a list of story threads that still remain untied:

Jasper still refers to Steven as “my Diamond”, fanatically serving him and failing to attain redemption in any meaningful form.

The genesis story of the Diamonds and gems remains a mystery. How they were created, why they founded their empire, their history of conquest across the stars, Homeworld’s current fractured state and famine for resources all remain unexplored.

Humanity’s apathy towards the gem race remains inexplicable. From the episode Keep Beach City Wierd, it’s clear that national governments with armed forces exist in their version of earth, yet have never been brought to bear on the gems even when showing hostility. Could the Diamonds, as Ronaldo postulated in Rocknaldo, have tainted Earth’s water with mind-altering gem particulates to subdue our sense of self-preservation? Are we simply incompetent? We’ll never know…

The existence of other organic alien beings in the cosmos is never confirmed. For all we know, gems are the only other form of sapient life.

The “Mystery Girl” remains as enigmatic as her name implies.

Aside from “Royal Pearl” in the episode Volleyball, no other fusions have been introduced.

And, perhaps, most damningly…

I still need to reconcile and collate my thoughts on this series, and Steven Universe as a whole, so, for now, this is where I’ll leave you. I’ll return shortly with a more comprehensive review. Farewell.

Episode Overall: 6/10

Steven Universe Future Overall: 6/10