From Something That May Shock And Discredit You, Daniel Lavery

reading this book rn and it is several dozen moods

Splatoon Era Greek philospher Pleco was applauded for his definition of a Cephalopod as a “beaked, featherless biped”, to which Shrimpogenes the Cynic plucked the feathers off of a seagull and brought it before Pleco, and declared “HERE is Pleco’s Cephalopod”

And so Pleco changed his definition to “Beaked, featherless biped with no bones”

im gonna talk about steven universe crying

theres been a lotta talk lately abt how su has changed and isn’t like, as good anymore ? and i dont rly have a comprehensive conclusion about that bc the amount of analysis id have to do to sufficiently back anything up is BONKERS, but like. heres just a quick personal observation of little to no value, so. grain of salt

i went back and watched episode one of steven universe today just by chance. it was one of those dealies where somebody had, like, posted it in parts on youtube, and i saw the thumbnail and steven was making a weird face that would never happen in current su and i was like ahah, lets give this a look. lets look at our boys ugly baby pictures

and what i think im feelin based on that is that,,ppl arent imagining that things are changing, or have changed.

and i think in a lot of ways, some things have changed for the better, like. the designs are a little less awkward, the voice acting is more consistent. like, stevens voice in episode one does not even sort of sound like current steven and i remember thinking he sounded weird back when it premiered. like, less like a little boy and more like an adult man talking through his nose

but i watched that scene where they all collectively point the light cannon up into the sky and fire it and, yknow. something has changed. the literal entire visual style of the show, which i will remark, is PART of storytelling. it changes what we take away from the story.

and for some people that might JUST be a good thing; if you LIKE the current visual direction of steven universe, you might very reasonably argue that the trend of change is just artists getting better at their craft. and if the crewniverse is getting closer to what they want to make rather than farther away through these changes. and id be inclined to agree. ultimately that is decided by the artists, and whether or not theyre being loyal to their own artistic vision. whether or not a piece of art is what the artist wanted to make is up to the artist. if they wanted to make steven universe a cartoon where steven sits on a toilet and farts for eleven minutes and made that change, regardless of how we criticized it, if it was what the creators wanted to put into the world with their art, they would have been technically successful in doing so

but i wanna say that i do think theres meat to the argument that its losing what made it good. and im not saying that as a generalization bc, again, some people like the direction things are going in and thats valid, You could very very reasonably argue that all of this is actually a mark of success. but it seems like a large portion of the su audience (or at least the piece thats adults who post here) do not like the way things are, and i think i know why. or, at least, part of why, or part of why for me, or part of why that i remembered when i watched that light cannon fire into the sky

outside of my criticisms of su’s pacing and story problems (of which there are many, and i will fight anyone over su’s unstable, regressive narrative structure) su is generally pretty solid in addition to being visually gorgeous. but as its creators become more and more comfortable with what they’re creating, as theyre falling into a rythm (which they chose, so i cant fault them for it) su is kind of losing a piece of what made a lot of people fall in love with it in the first place

like, theres none of the visual awkwardness, first of all, any more. and by that i dont mean, like, off model drawing (bc theres certainly plenty of that, even for a board driven show) i mean theres no more amethyst picking her nose or chewing with her mouth open. thers no awkward conversations. the most common complaint and hands down the most legitimate one is about stevens body, and it rly serves as a good example of what im talking about. in their effort to streamline and create more visual appeal, the crewniverse has scrubbed away “ugly” or “undesirable” imagery from the cartoon. sure, amethyst still eats mayonnaise with her hands, but now its done in one clean gesture in stead of in some gross, awkward way with a big closeup on her face

but that gross awkwardness was part of what humanized steven universe, i think, to me and to a lot of people. that steven was actually fat and not just a tube, that they used to draw pearls butt like a weird awkward C when she turned around, that amethyst chewed with her mouth open, that all of the characters were allowed to have conventionally “undesirable” visual traits.  greg and steven were ugly when they cried. they arent any more.

and thats kind of what i took away. i havent done any proper analysis, but. that was the feeling i got. that there was something rly human about the first few episodes that rly got lost the more things got streamlined. like, when was the last time steven ugly cried ? or pearl screeched and made a silly face ? or amethyst did/said something gross? or garnet did/said something rly awkward or weird? now they’re all “perfected” versions of themselves bc the crewniverse have been drawing and perfecting them for so long, but for some of us, perfect is less human

and in some way, yes, the way things are now is better. pearl, for one, looks less like a weird alien in the face region. voice acting is more consistent. characters do have a generally more “appealing” “”cute””” look to them. steven is tinier, everyones bodies are smaller with bigger heads, bigger eyes. do you remember the first time we fucking saw garnets eyes ??? they were small and kinda scary and weird, and they reminded us that she was an alien and brought up so many weird theories about why she had three, and we all began to suspect she might just have been, MAYBE, a fusion. now theyre three huge anime eyes on her face

and thats cute ! i like that about garnet, that she has a baby face. but shes not a slightly scary, foreign being any more. that served to remind the audience of her alien-ness, and in a way to remind us that she too was flawed. that she had things to hide, that she was different from us, but that we loved her anyway, scary eyes and all-and there’s value to that, i think. value to that visual storytelling.

when you wipe something clean, sometimes you take some of the texture that made it good with the dirt, yknow? these days steven is more like an always-right jesus figurine than an awkward teenager. what he says these days comes out of his mouth perfectly and poignantly phrased rather than broken and confused and through an ugly cry. how he was in season 1 was totally different. and a lot of that can be chalked up to character growth, which is important. but i think an important piece of who he was-and the identity of the show, with it-kinda got lost in the polish. and a lot of people rly enjoyed and now miss that, i think. i think a lot of us miss the “ugly” in ALL of the characters, bc it was part of who they were that we now perceive as forgotten by everyone but us.

ANYWAY !

the look now is more generically appealing. but it lost a very humanizing element, i think, that a lot of people really liked about the show in earlier seasons and id appreciate if everyone stopped jumping on the “oh anyone who critiques su is doing it out of SPITE bc its COOL NOW !!” kneejerk-bandwagon as a result of anyone criticizing something they like, as if people arent allowed to change their fuckin minds about things, bc things HAVE changed, and for some people that might be a good thing, but for others it may not, for equally legitimate reasons 

I Know Things Now (Song Analysis)

I Know Things Now from Into The Woods

This song has so many amazing points that I could write a novel about it. however, I won’t make you sit through that, I will focus on what I feel is the most important phrase in the song, and that is “nice is different than good.” 

Nice and good are at odds from the begging of the show. but hey, “if the end is right, it justifies the beans.” right? Even the Witch at one point accuses the group of being “nice”. We are told all our lives to be “nice” do the “nice” thing, be “nice” to kids at school, be “nice” to your brother, but what is the distinction between nice and good? Nice is on the surface. There is no real emotion or drive behind nice. Good, on the other hand, is very different. Good comes from within, and good is not always nice. Like how the easy thing, and the right thing are rarely the same, I’ve found that good and nice are merely acquaintances, not friends. 

Going back to the Witch saying “you’re so nice. You’re not good. You’re not right. You’re just nice.” What she means is that you can be nice, but at what cost? To sit back and let something bad happen because you didn’t want to step on anybody’s toes is being “nice” but not being “good”. Good does what is right, regardless of what others may think at the time. Though in the context of the story the Witch is not in the right just yet, but she’ll get there “Witches can be right”.

For example The Wolf was very nice to Little Red, but he was not good. His nice words were only a mask to talk her into getting off the trail and into his stomach. 

“Nice is different than good” is such an amazing thought provoking lyric and I hope you all keep in mind that “nice” is VERY different than “good”. 

Reaper Man, Terry Pratchett.