Week 1
(These reviews contain
spoilers!)
The Summer of Steven is finally upon
us, as Cartoon Network has decided to give us the entirety of Season 3 over the
next couple of weeks! Since that’s a lot of episodes to go through, I decided
to have one post for each week, so I don’t flood my blog with Steven Universe
stuff. I’ll try and update every weeknight sometime after the episode airs with
my review, so if you want you can keep up with that!
Steven Floats
The first episode of the Summer of
Steven was Steven Floats, which, for all intents and purposes, felt like a
Season 1 episode. Now, this isn’t a bad thing by any means, but it did feel a
bit repetitive, like we’ve seen this story before, to the point when the Gems
even make jokes about it.
The basic premise is that Steven wants
to get to the Big Donut right when it opens to get fresh donuts. Simple, right?
Well, as it turns out, he discovers a new gem power on the same night. As it
turns out, he can control how high he ascends when he jumps and how slowly he
descends. This leads him to get stuck in midair, as he can’t lower himself very
fast.
What follows is a cute episode, and
all the Gems get a few funny lines in, between Pearl’s over-the-top
neuroticism, Amethyst initially ignoring Steven’s floating by saying “eh, he’s
probably done this once before”, and Garnet going off-screen to steal someone’s
phone, they were at the peak of their humour.
However, this episode also broke a few
rules in terms of the storytelling. Steven seemed to teleport in midair
depending on where the pacing needed him to be, and the supposedly “fresh”
donut Steven wanted being sitting out on a plate when no one was supposed to be
in the shop. I’m also not huge on another gem power being controlled by Steven’s
emotions, but I’m guessing that that won’t last long before he’s able to
control it like he does his shield.
Overall, a decent episode that wouldn’t
feel out of place in Season 1, but it’s ultimately a bit too slow and
forgettable for my tastes. Still, when I inevitably rewatch the show at some
point, I’m sure I’ll enjoy seeing Steven Floats again.
FINAL SCORE
6/10
Okay
Drop Beat Dad
I’d like to make one thing clear: I
enjoy the Beach City episodes and characters, for the most part. There are some
of them I like, and some I don’t. Sometimes, these episodes can do something
unique with a concept that’s been done a million times before, or perhaps it
will give Steven or someone else some good character development.
Drop Beat Dad wasn’t one of those
episodes.
If you ever want to show someone the
absolute worst example of a Steven Universe episode, by all means, go with this
one. It was full of tropes, annoying and uninteresting character interactions, jokes
that didn’t land, and it just overall felt like a slog. Each of those 11
minutes felt like an hour on their own.
The story isn’t much more than a bunch
of cartoon tropes mixed in together, like the liar revealed story, the bad role
model story, the dad bonding with his son story, the list goes on. What annoys me
here is that I know Steven Universe has taken these tropes and created
something excellent with them before, in episodes like Cry for Help and House
Guest.
Here, from minute one you can tell
exactly what’s going to happen. Marty, Greg’s former manager who we’ve seen in
flashback, returns, and it’s revealed that he’s Sour Cream’s biological father.
He decides to help Sour Cream with a DJ show, but surprise! He’s only doing it
for his own gain. Also, now Greg has 10 million dollars or something. That part
wasn’t exactly clear.
The problem here is that that’s all
the story is. There’s nothing special or different about this story. Neither
Sour Cream nor Marty get much character development. It’s just a bland, cookie
cutter plot, from a show that I know can
do much better.
FINAL SCORE
3/10
Bad
Mr. Greg
This episode felt like someone came up
to me, asked me what my favourite things about Steven Universe were, and then
made an episode around it.
I’ve always felt Steven Universe uses
musical numbers better than any cartoon I’ve seen before. They feel like a
treat, instead of a requirement for each episode or a painful slog. I feel
that, in combination with the exceptional songwriting, the fact that we don’t
get one that often adds to their appeal.
When it was announced Steven Universe
would get a musical episode with multiple songs, I’ll admit I was a bit skeptical
at first. I now realize that this was pretty dumb of me. Of course they could pull it off. I just
didn’t know they could do it this
well.
This episode follows up directly after
Drop Beat Dad, following Steven, Greg, and Pearl, as they take a vacation to
Empire City in full Broadway style, flaunting Greg’s newly-acquired fortune.
There are about 4 or 5 different songs in total, and they’re all fantastic. The
best of them is easily Pearl’s new song about her relationship with Rose.
Pearl is easily the most complex Gem
in my opinion, even more than Lapis or Amethyst. Her still burning love for
Rose Quartz and resulting feelings towards Steven and Greg have made for some
exceptional episodes in the past, like the phenomenal Rose’s Scabbard. While Mr.
Greg doesn’t quite scale the heights of that episode, it adds yet another
dimension to the relationship between Pearl and Greg, and why Steven brought
her on the vacation in the first place.
And let’s not forget the animation,
which was at its absolute best this episode. The Empire City backgrounds were
rendered amazingly, and the artists had a lot of fun with using different
colours in rendering it. However, I can’t be the only one wondering if Greg and
Pearl being rendered in yellow and blue during the final song is a
coincidence, right?
All in all, this was a near-perfect
episode of Steven Universe for me. This is why I watch the show, along with the
fantastic overarching plot. The small character interactions are just
exceptional, and the songs are fantastic. This was the first time I immediately
wanted to watch an episode again after finishing it since the finale of Gravity
Falls. Hang on, I’m gonna go watch it again.
FINAL SCORE
10/10
Legendary
Too Short to Ride
This episode reminded me a lot of Log
Date 7 15 2, one of my personal favourite slower Steven Universe episodes. Both
of them involved Peridot’s daily life interacting with Steven, the Gems, and
now we got to see her interact with the denizens of Beach City for the first
time.
People are often quick to call Steven
Universe “the cartoon about people crying”, and while this can be attributed to
several episodes (primarily Pearl-focused ones), I really feel that Steven
celebrates happiness and good times over tears and sadness. Too Short to Ride
was the perfect example of this, as Steven and Amethyst were more than happy to
take Peridot out with them on a day out at Funland.
The jokes were out in full force
tonight, and if I were to list all my favourites, I’d just give a recap of the
entire episode. It’s best to just watch it for yourself. We also got lots more
development on Peridot’s end, and even a little more about Homeworld. We
learned that she’s a Class 2 Peridot, stripped of most of the classic gem
powers such as shapeshifting. Instead, she can levitate metal! I suppose this
is her gem weapon, similar to Lapis’s hydrokinesis, and I’m looking forward to
seeing more of it.
One other thing I really enjoy about
this show just in general is that the Gems don’t feel the need to hide from the
humans of Beach City. The residents of the City just accept that there are
superpowered aliens walking among them, and I think that’s great. Not only does
it rid us of any potential “secret aliens revealed” storyline or a similarly
tired equivalent, but it allows the world to be established as different from
our own. The gems walk among the humans, and that’s just something they live
with, and that’s just great to me.
All and all, this was a delightfully
hilarious episode. I’m so glad Peridot is really getting the attention she
deserves, but they aren’t overusing her either. I can’t wait to see where her
metal manipulating powers take us.
FINAL SCORE
9/10
Amazing
The New Lars
I don’t like Lars. I’ve always felt
that this grumpy, pessimistic, and flat-out mean
character really feels out of place in Steven Universe’s colourful,
love-filled universe. I can’t relate to him, and I can’t remember a single one
of his episodes I’ve really liked.
With that in mind, I was ready to hate
The New Lars. I’ve been going into these episodes as blind as possible, so all
I knew about this episode was it was going to revolve around one of my least
favourite characters.
After seeing the episode, while it was
a tad cliché and brought to light a lot of the reasons why I dislike Lars, it
was a fine episode, and not one I regret spending the time to watch.
The basic plot is that (as usual) Lars
is being awful to Steven and Sadie, and Steven wishes he’d change. Then,
overnight, Steven takes control of Lars’s body (yet another new gem power, I
assume?), and gets to experience a day in the life of Lars.
At this point, I’m a little sick of
the whole “body-switching” episode in these cartoon shows. While it can be fun
if handled differently, like Gravity Falls’s Carpet Diem episode, usually it’s
just “oh hey how would these characters react if they were in this character’s
body”, and here was no different. Steven went around as Lars, trying to make
people smile like always, but people react with confusion because, well, he’s
Lars.
And that’s my biggest problem with
Lars’s character. Aside from Steven, who sees the good in basically everybody,
and occasionally Sadie, even the show’s own characters don’t like Lars! He hasn’t
changed all that much since his first appearance back in Episode 1 of Season 1,
even after episodes like Lars and the Cool Kids and Joking Victim. He’s still a
whiny jerk that no one likes, so how am I, the viewer, supposed to like him?
Fortunately, this episode is played
mostly for laughs, as we get a little bit of development on the relationship
between Lars and Sadie, but not much else. It’s just the characters reacting to
the new, kinder Lars, and for what it is, it’s fine. Onion’s expression upon
seeing him is especially hilarious. Lars’s voice actor also does a great job as
Steven pretending to be Lars. At times, it’s hard to tell that there’s supposed
to be a difference, it sounds so natural.
I also really liked that, after 2
seasons and then some, we’re finally seeing what Lars’s home life is like. If
you remember what Robbie’s family was like in Gravity Falls, it’s basically the
same old story here. The parents had a few good one-liners, especially towards
the end, but nothing about them really stood out in my mind.
FINAL SCORE
5/10
Average
Beach City Drift
Well…I hope you guys liked Alone
Together, because this episode was just Alone Together again with a new coat of
paint. It wasn’t very nice paint, either.
What a disappointing way to end our
first week of Steven’s Summer Adventures. Pretty much anything that could go
wrong with this episode did go wrong. I’m sure Stevonnie fans liked it, but as
someone who isn’t such a huge fan of Alone Together (it’s a good episode, don’t
get me wrong, I just don’t really like it as much as everyone else), this
episode did nothing for me.
The plot is that Kevin is back in
town, and Steven is dead set on getting revenge on him…for some reason. As I
said in my review of The New Lars, Steven has always been a character who sees
the good in everyone, even people like
Lars or Ronaldo. Here, from minute one, he’s fully convinced that Kevin is a
completely bad person, despite having only one negative experience with him in
the past. It would’ve made more sense to have Connie be the one who wanted
revenge, and Steven was trying to justify him, only for it to be revealed that
Kevin is really an overall bad guy at the end.
So Steven and Connie fuse into
Stevonnie to challenge him to a race in Greg’s new car, down what must be the
longest mountain trail in the world. It doesn’t look that big in the art, and
they’re able to get out and talk for a few minutes while Kevin speeds ahead,
and yet they’re still able to catch up to him. Doesn’t make much sense, but it’s
a cartoon, so I can forgive it.
So they race Kevin, and they lose, but
Steven learns that jerks like Kevin aren’t worth his time. It’s definitely a
good lesson to teach kids, especially those dealing with bullies or mean
teachers. It’s really something I wish I could’ve heard when I was the target
demographic for this show.
This episode had some other good
aspects as well. Greg got a few funny lines, and the backgrounds and car
animation, while not exactly the show’s best, looked really nice. Overall,
though, I felt that this episode was little more than an excuse to give
Stevonnie a second speaking role. Perhaps next time we’ll get a new story
instead of the same thing again.
FINAL SCORE
3/10
Bad
So that’s all for this week! It really was a mixed bag. We
got two excellent episodes, two decent episodes, and two bad episodes. I hope
next week will be a little better in terms of quality. See you Monday!
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