”But what about you?”

Okay, maybe Dewey Wins doesn’t provide the break we expect after a harrowing arc. And Gemcation, an episode where characters have the expressed goal of taking a break after a harrowing arc, is even more stressful. But the difference between those episodes and classic cooldown romps like Log Date 7 15 2 and Kindergarten Kid and The New Crystal Gems can be boiled down to one key figure: the Great and Lovable Peridot. Surely she’ll make things happier!

…so yeah, Raising the Barn is the reason I can’t say Gemcation is the harshest episode in the Breakup Arc. I’m honestly not sure which of them hurts more, but these back-to-back episodes are neck-and-neck. Gemcation lets us live in discomfort far longer, spending most of its time stewing with Steven’s misery and giving just a moment of hope near the end. But Raising the Barn is a whole episode of hope, building us up after two bummer episodes with the idea that maybe, just maybe, we’ll finally get a win. And then we don’t.

The hope begins early, with Steven handling his angst in a healthier way. He still yearns to reconnect with Connie, but has accepted that she needs time and now wants to let her talk instead of drowning her out with explanations. He’s working through his emotions by writing a song rather than obsessing over his phone. We’re on the right track, and even another false alarm brings more joy than annoyance, because instead of Ronaldo we get two close friends that are more interested in how he’s doing than talking about anime.



Things go south fast, as Steven’s quick recap of the abduction makes Lapis freak out about the Diamonds; the show remains excellent at incorporating exposition, and this time it prompts the entire plot of an episode on top of catching viewers up. Steven heads to the barn to work things out, making the great point that the Diamonds couldn’t possibly know about Lars’s magic hair portal, so they wouldn’t be looking for him here. But Lapis isn’t wrong about the amount of noise Earth has been making lately, and that the Diamonds have a history of lashing out against the planet. It’s true that they think the Cluster is going to blow it up any minute now—I’m honestly surprised Peridot doesn’t mention this, considering she brings up Cluster in her list of victories later in the episode—but if there’s a single trait that binds the Diamonds together, it’s pettiness. They all have massive egos that make them overreact to slights, so it’s not out of the question that they’d attack Earth out of spite, redundancy be damned.

Steven, already in a mindframe of acceptance from the Connie incident, doesn’t put up a fight when he sees how serious Lapis is about leaving. But Peridot has always worn her heart on her sleeve, so it’s clear that she wants to stay no matter how slick she tries to be about it. Her concerns are sprinkled with humor, but Lapis is in no mood for art commentary; still, I love the way Jennifer Paz and the animators temper her fear and anger with lived-in affection. She’s gone from hating the idea of sharing space with Peridot to taking as a given that Peridot will share her space adventure, and comparing her actions here to her frustration in Barn Mates shows how much these two have grown together.

Pumpkin’s disappearance buys Peridot more time, and I appreciate that this wasn’t a Peri-Plan: it’s one thing to beat around the bush about your feelings, but it would be another to manipulate Lapis by feigning an emergency. Because Pumpkin really does run away when Lapis raises the barn, we can spend time with Steven and Peridot alone without losing focus on the episode’s core dilemma. Peridot retains her intense self-confidence, agreeing with pride when praised, but her greatest teacher when it comes to being a friend is Steven, and as we’ve seen, Steven’s way of helping his friends involves putting them first to a self-sacrificial degree.

She’s right that Lapis has been through a lot. But that doesn’t mean Peridot’s own wants and needs don’t matter, or that Lapis is too broken to handle an honest conversation. The impulse to be sensitive is good, but the execution needs finesse; as it is, Lapis is comfortable steamrolling over Peridot’s feelings because Peridot hasn’t done anything to stop it. Their bond is far healthier than Lapis and Jasper’s, but non-toxic relationships still need work to maintain.

Peridot’s idea of space life involves no change, no surprises, and no developments, and as hard as she tries to make it sound like a plus for Lapis, this is presented as a hellish notion. Nobody values self-growth quite like Peridot, who started as a Homeworld drone but found herself on Earth, so she argues against the stagnation of a life without change well before the movie turns that into its core premise. It’s one of the many ways she’s comparable to Steven in this episode: she’s taken the idea of selflessness to such an extreme that it damages her relationship with the person she wants to protect, she understands the value of change, and she’s a wreck when she gets dumped.

But it isn’t as simple as Peridot standing in for Steven: Peridot also finds the courage to be forthright about her feelings, and is rejected anyway. Peridot is the one who gets taken for granted, and the one who wins custody of the pet after the breakup. Yes, she has shades of Steven throughout Raising the Barn, but there’s also a lot of Connie in her.

It’s great that we don’t get a straightforward Peridot=Steven/Lapis=Connie dynamic, because this is a very different relationship and it should be treated as such. By giving Peridot elements of both kids, we can instead have an episode where Steven sees himself and Connie in the same person, and gains a better understanding of his own fight without making the whole thing about him. After the more straightforward metaphor of Dewey Wins, it’s nice to see the crew avoid the same technique twice.

Peridot’s smugness and irritability are delightful, but they make it even more of a delight when she’s sweet. It’s such a small moment, but I adore the way she kisses Pumpkin to apologize for yanking her vine; it’s just a lovely, casual gesture from a Gem who debuted by crushing a small round pet beneath her mechanical boot. And while it’s no surprise that Shelby Rabara nails Peridot’s anxiety during the big confrontation, it’s beautiful to hear that sweetness burst out as she works her way through an argument on behalf of Earth. She begins each point with “I think,” hesitant at first but gaining confidence as she goes, culminating in a heartbreaking read on “I think we can win. I think you can win.”

Lapis Lazuli’s theme is so powerful that we don’t even need a verbal response to know her reply, just four notes on a celesta and a shadowed expression. Poor communication, perhaps Steven Universe’s greatest villain, strikes again after Peridot’s impassioned defense of Earth. Her closing argument is a belief in Lapis’s strength, both physically (because damn is that waterbending impressive) and emotionally as part of a pair. It’s a wonderful, sincere sentiment. But this sort of encouragement implies that Lapis is afraid of losing, and that isn’t her problem at all: she’s afraid of war itself.

And for good reason! Her last war left her imprisoned for millennia, and she wasn’t even a combatant. She says twice that she’s not getting caught in another one, and Peridot doesn’t understand that it isn’t a matter of who would be on top when the dust settles. Whether or not Lapis could help vanquish the Diamonds is irrelevant when she, like Steven, just doesn’t want to fight.

So she’s made her mind up, she must live her life alone. And though it’s not the easy way, it’s what she’s always known. Lapis’s time with Peridot made her happy, but the only way she can understand the value of that happiness is to shun it for the sake of safety. It’s a hard lesson, with ramifications for herself and Peridot alike, but running away now is the only way she can learn that she doesn’t want to run anymore.

Even if it’s harsh, Lapis abandoning ship (pun intended, you’re welcome) is telegraphed so well that it could’ve easily happened in Alone at Sea; she lives with one foot out the door, because allowing herself to settle means allowing herself to be vulnerable. Comparisons between her and the far more earthbound Peridot are inevitable, as both began as opponents and became allies around the same time, then they became a duo in their own right. But the way they contrast tells us everything about why Lapis has to go and Peridot has to stay.

When Peridot joined Steven, it was in an effort to save the planet. She bonded with each of the Crystal Gems, stood up to her Diamond, and played a key role in protecting Earth. All the while, she’s been heavily associated with the ground: she went from growing Gems in the dirt to growing plants, she built a drill to dig deep beneath the surface, she’s compact and durable, she’s stubborn as all hell, and she loves the word “clod.” She’s a fighter who has faced impossible odds against Homeworld and won, and remains firmly rooted to the world.

When Lapis joined Steven, it was in an effort to find sanctuary after a lifetime of turbulence. She only bonded with Steven and Peridot, never bothering with the other Crystal Gems (or humans, for that matter). Now, this part might shock you, but she’s heavily associated with water: there’s the whole “total control over everything liquid” thing, sure, but she was also trapped in a reflective surface for ages, she wears flowing clothes, she’s physically and figuratively blue, and unless contained she’s always in motion. Her priority is safety, which Earth provided for a time, but she doesn’t know what to do on solid ground.

So of course Peridot’s reaction to an imminent attack is to face it head on, and of course Lapis’s reaction is to find another escape plan when her current escape plan is in question. There’s no solution to this argument that doesn’t involve one of these characters completely changing their worldview (literally, they need to change their view of the world they’re on), and considering Peridot has already had her major arc, it makes sense that Lapis is the one who must make that change. Her cycle of captivity and fleeing is something she’s so used to that she hasn’t been able to process that life on Earth isn’t another prison, and that she’s allowed to be happy without looking over her shoulder for signs of trouble.

But again, Lapis isn’t the only one who has to suffer for her to learn that lesson. Peridot loses Lapis as well as her home, and despite an episode full of fun distractions like stray basketballs and an enterprising Onion (complete with a hat stolen from all the way back in Watermelon Steven), Steven is right back to where he started, staring at a phone without messages. Both of these breakups will end with stronger relationships than before, but for now, misery has to be content with company.

Future Vision!



When asking about the Diamonds, Lapis emphasizes Blue Diamond for the first time. The identity of our blue friend’s former boss isn’t any sort of twist, but confirming it here allows the barn’s return to Earth to have some extra oomph.

I’ve never been to this…how do you say…school?



At least Steven and Connie are doing fine in Hilary Florido’s High School AU? I also love that a grimacing Sapphire is there to foresee a bad ending.

I’ve been slipping lyrics from breakup songs into these reviews because I’m a dweeb, and a bonus example comes to mind regarding my ranking of Raising the Barn (a song that includes the line “You want me down on Earth, but I am up in space,” which I mean come on). This is an episode that’s just plain mean, punishing all of its characters as well as the audience hoping against hope for a break from the breakups. Its ending is devastating, and its timing makes the anguish of this arc feel relentless.

I don’t care. I love it.

Top Twenty-Five

Love ‘em



Like ‘em

Enh

No Thanks!

6. Horror Club

5. Fusion Cuisine

4. House Guest

3. Onion Gang

2. Sadie’s Song

1. Island Adventure