Channel Awesome
Connie’s family wants to meet Steven’s family. This could get awkward.
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There’s a foreshadowing in one particular scene for a few frames… 😉
“Nuclear family?! It’s true that they can explode sometimes, but…” I love that part XD
I loved Pearl going crazy over food actually because it makes you realize how Alexandrite is much more like Garnet 2.0 than a fusion.
That makes sense, I mean, Garnet is sort-of their leader. While Amethyst or Pearl on their own might want to get in their own things, together, neither of them would want to mess up what the other one has going on in front of Garnet.
I’m glad they didn’t notice those frames. Should make for a great surprise.
Shhhht…
One of the things I love about this show is the dedication of continuity.
From this episode on into Season 2, they frequently call back to the fact that Steven is grounded from tv for 1,000 years.
glad you guys liked the episode
and yes they do dive more in to Connie’s family relation
Agreed completely about Family Circus. It seems so simple, but always leaves me confused. About why the hell I read Family Circus again.
I love that phone call!
Hello. This is…Mom Universe.
The children are playing swords. No, their playing WITH swords. Oh no, they are bleeding. They are dead. Please don’t call here again. (hags up) I panicked.
The only evidence you two have for all comedy needing to be based on misery is that I sure would get some glee out of you guys getting some the wind knocked out of your sails. You guys are just so obnoxious and shameless that you’re trying to use a line from Steven Universe of all things to try to support your arguments from a completely unrelated video, and that is the only real argument you even gave. Being ridiculous is something that should be funny, but it was just painful listening to you two trying to bend everything and make up arguments for your own claims but it wasn’t funny at all.
Agree. What about all the rest of the things they find hilarious in Steven Universe alone? What about Garnet’s deadpan delivery? Or physical humor?
I happen to find a good portion of Demitri Martin’s jokes funny, and a lot of them are just word play, or odd things in life that you never thought about a certain way. I pulled up his special on Netflix and it took me less than a minute to find an example. “One type of restaurant that really should deliver, but doesn’t… is a food truck.” Is someone being hurt? Humiliated? Made afraid of something? Sure, it might not tickle everyone’s funny bone, but I think silly things like that are great. He’s not making fun of food trucks, because we all know what they are, and we get that food trucks actually delivering would not be a feasible business model. It’s just a funny contradiction to point out.
I agree, Shonen, sometimes the Walker bros. – for all I still enjoy them the majority of the time – can be really obnoxiously stubborn when they think they’re right and everyone else is wrong. Credit to Doug especially for always pointing out that just because he doesn’t like a movie, others can’t or shouldn’t. But it’s because I’m used to thinking they’re more open minded and forgiving that the arguing with the objecting fans was quite off-putting.
The misery in your example is that Food Truck is misleading and can’t deliver. Food Trucks’s pride is being hurt.
all based on misery in some way or form
for example, Garnet’s deadpan delivery implies her indifference towards someone’s plight
Aw shit, tumblr is leaking again.
gotta cleanse it while the’s still time
Okay, so, I get that puns are a “mockery” of language and in that sense it’s derived from misery, I guess? But A) Are we just conflating misery to denote anything negative, and B) Is the fact that word play indirectly causes someone who takes offense at it misery the reason why it’s funny? Because if the comedy CAUSES someone misery, that’s different from the humor being DERIVED from it.
And I’m operating under the assumption that the pun in question is actually found funny and not for the schadenfreude of making everyone groan.
Next one up is ‘Garnet’s Universe’, isn’t it? Rob at least will probably get a big kick out of that one.
Doug and Rob, whenever you ask yourself if they’re gonna dive deeper into a particular elements that was brought up, then the answer is always “YES”. Sooner or later everything will be brought up again and explained wich is why this show has a huge rewatchability.
For the last fucking time: comedy is primarily derived from exaggeration, timing and reaction. At no point does misery enter the picture as a primary element. Also, how petty are you completly ditching discussing over the matter at hand and instead trying to justify the content of an completly different video?
And is it just me or aren’t they paying any attention to the episodes outside of the basics. They at least don’t seem to be as invested as they where with ATLA, Gravity Falls, Adventure Time and LoK. Granted the episodes are only 11 minutes long but Doug could usually talk alot about Adventure Time wich has the same lenght. Could it be that they just choose to vlog Steven Universe because it’s popular right now and they hope to rekindle the interest in the site by featuring it? It sure seems like it given the, compared to their other vlogs, low quality of this series.
It may not be the primary element all the time, but it IS an element.
Yes, but even if it is used as an element of comedy it’s still highly debatable if its actually necessary. I consider it to be an optional tertiary element wich can work in certain situations but is usually not needed to actually create good comedy. Consider it to be the package of spare screws that come with your IKEA shelf. Also, it’s actual contribution to comedy is rather ambigious in most cases since good comed has layers. For example: Cpt. Hook in the Disney adaptation of Peter Pan ends up being chased by the crocodile and presumably eaten. That’s funny but what is it the audience actually laughs at? That the villain gets eaten? That someone suffers? Or just at the simple absurdity (wich ties in with exaggeration) of a flamboyantly dressed pirate captain being chased by a crocodile with a clock in it’s stomach (I mean really that’s a ridiciulous set up to begin with)? Wordplay is another thing. Is it funny because it mocks language or is it funny because the way the words are used is unconventional and clever? I should also point out that saying that language is “mocked” by wordplay is utter bullshit. You can only mock people but not things like languages or situations. You can parody them though but that’s not mocking but along the lines of exaggeration. And while we’re at the subject of layers, let’s look at the onion scene from Shrek: does the audience laugh at it because the donkey implied that Shrek smells awful (mocking Shrek) or do they laugh because of him missunderstanding the analogy (his reaction)? We also have the black knight scene from Monty Python and the holy Grail. Is it funny because a guy is cut into pieces (him getting harmed) or is it funny how he just doesn’t gives a shit and obviously doesn’t know when to stop (his reaction)? As you can see with all those examples of ambiguity, saying that all comedy is derived from misery is like saying Cola is just water: it cuts out huge chunks of the bigger picture in favor of a narrow and incomplete interpretation.
I generally consider comedy based on misery and comedy that aims to purposfully insult anything or anyone to be the Steven Segal of comedy. Cheap, lazy and not even close to cerebral aswell as the poor mans Chuck Norris.
I’m also having a bit of a problem with them using a SU vlog to actually bring up any justification for that since this show is the least mean spirited thing ever created, it’s even the official credo of Rebecca Sugar (and by extension the rest of the production staff) to never put anything mean spirited or cynical in the show, and misery comedy relies heavily on mean spiritedness.
Didn’t RS say in an interview that she tries to not have that type of humor? So that’s kinda ironic. :/
Again as Ian M. said in all those cases misery is something they ALL share, whether that’s the primary reason it’s funny doesn’t matter it’s still a piece in the puzzle. When trying to think of something that’s funny it’s incredibly hard for misery not to be part of the joke, and whether the humour is directly correlated with misery doesn’t really matter because it’s shared by basically all funny jokes you can think of.
But the Walkers basicly say that the single source of comedy is misery ignoring all the other aspects that contribute to it. By their logic watching an old lady getting brutally beaten to death by steroid abusing bodybuilders should be genuinly funny and not upsetting. Or for that matter they should laugh their asses off at certain later episodes of SU.
Or maybe it’s an American thing that I simply don’t get (after all I never got what’s meant to be funny about Malcom in the Middle). Point is, misery alone does not make good comedy (wich is what they say) and it ALWAYS requires many extra elements that either equally contribute to the comedy or ultimately outweight the misery in order to make it work. They’re putting so much focus on misery that I actually start to think that they’re terribly mean spirited and hateful people in real life. I mean, no one ever laughed at James Rolfe because he is miserable but because of his exaggerated and ridiciulous reactions to the games he featured as the AVGN. Even South Parks main focus is ultimately exaggeration (covered in layers upon layers of obscenity) and not misery.
That just isn’t what they said or meant really. The idea is that all comedy derives from comedy NOT all misery is comedy. Try thinking of a funny joke that doesn’t involve misery, if you can think of one I’ll genuinely want to hear it because I personally can’t think of even ONE.
I meant to say all comedy derives from *misery
AGREE! And you put it a bit better than I. I prefer to analyze storytelling, and haven’t every bothered with the building blocks of comedy, but you handily provided several examples in which misery (or “fear”, as stated oddly by Garnet) are not actually what we’re laughing at. I am baffled by the people digging their heels in and making huge stretches to link things back to misery. Is it so hard to admit we’re not all psychopaths who are laughing at other people’s pain?
I’ll jump off the argument now, but really it is irksome.
I just knew you wouldn’t ignore Garnet’s line at the end. I feel your love of Garnet will only grow.
Also, pay close attention to Garnet when the jumbo fusion splits apart.
This my LEAST favorite Steven Universe episode. It just makes no sense- everybody is out of character. Garnet acts like a dick to Connie’s parents for no reason; the Gems think it’s a good idea to merge into a giant freak to attend the dinner (and it works!?) and worst of all, Connie and Steven RUN AWAY FROM HOME over a minor embarrassment. What kind of message for kid’s show is that? I would accept it in nonsense shows like say, Spongebob, but SU is usually better than this.
Garnet has always acted cold and abrupt around anyone that Steven is not super close to. And all she said was how comedy is derived from fear. The Gems didn’t want to become Alexandrite, but Steven convinced them because they know his relationship with Connie is important. And as for them running away, both of their comments made it hilariously clear that neither knew what they were doing and were acting spontaneously, so it sends the message that running away for something petty is silly and a bad idea.
Cats getting high on catnip is extremely comedic, and far from involving misery the cats are having a very good time.
“All comedy is derived from fear.”
This is probably the weakest episode to feature Connie, but that’s not really a huge knock against it since those are usually really good. It’s good to see they picked up on why Connie removed her lenses. Having the Gems all fuse together over a relatively petty matter instead of a dangerous situation was a nice subversion of the audience’s expectations.
Pretty good episode. Though I wonder why they never bothered to use this form in combat. Also the most funny part in the episode was pearl crawling to steven and saying thank you for making them eat a certain piece of food. The delivery was spot on.
They probably don’t use Alexandrite because she is very unstable, and any big decision would cause her to fall apart.
My God. As if Connie didn’t already remind me of myself as a kid, this episode did it even more. My family was very strict with friends so I would always have to coach them into a fake story and how to act. I found a lot of humor in that. Thankfully, once I became a teen, my family was just the right amount of strict. 🙂 Off topic, I know. Although, hey, What about situational humor where someone is telling a story and other people add funny stuff onto the story that didn’t really happen? Oh, also, I’ve never heard of Family Circus.
Steven’s apple farm,
trees tall as Alexandrite.
Don’t talk about pie.
I probably would have gone with Pearl as the most mother-like of the the Gems, but even if she had absolutely no drawbacks to her posing as Steven’s mom, the point of the episode was that Steven wanted to show off his entire family. Choosing any one of the Gems would have defeated that purpose.
Connie’s insistence on wearing her glasses is actually one of her more interesting character traits. As we saw in this episode, she discards them when she’s around Steven but puts them on when dealing with anyone else, even if it’s just over the phone. It’s like a character she’s playing. Watching her develop this double life the more she gets to know Steven is just one reason I love her character so much.
As for the nuclear family bit, I didn’t catch any specific commentary on Steven having more than one mommy, just Connie trying to pass off Steven as more normal than he is. If anything, she could have just claimed that Steven’s mom died in childbirth. But she panicked because of the possibility of her parents preventing her from seeing Steven anymore, despite how remote the chances are. Mistakes were made and Steven and Connie survived their first fight. And finally, Alexandrite’s peel-away face mask design is very cool, and watching her devolve into a one-person Three Stooges routine was very funny.
Gotta love Greg, rockin’ that turtleneck and cutoff jeans.
I wonder if Rob recognized Motoko Kusanagi and Togusa’s voices. (if not for them, for one of the many other anime those actors have bee in)
I just imagined that in Lemongrab’s voice. Goddamnit.
“UNACCEPTABLE! THOUSAND YEARS FAMILY CIRCUS! TWO THOUSAND YEARS DUNGEON!”
I don’t really know if this was intentional, but there is a theory that laughter in humans began as a reaction to coming down from the adrenaline rush caused by fear, and that this response eventually evolved to include a social aspect as well. Essentially, it started as a shared experience based off of escaping dangerous situations in your group, and became more of a litmus for determining in-group and out-group based on who shares in your laughter. Which is why a lot of people will laugh at anything, as long as other people are laughing, due to the very primal fear of social ostracization.
Now, is that what Garnet meant when she said that? I choose to believe so. Does that mean that the Walker’s pet theory is true? ehhhhhh…. I don’t really see it. But that’s fine, really.
Honestly, my only problem is that they talk about it like it’s patently obvious, and are pretty disrespectful to the opposing view, to the point that it’s like they’re saying those of us who disagree are idiots. C’mon, guys, just because some of us don’t think that wordplay is related to misery doesn’t make us dumb, we just have a different perspective. (which is incidentally what I believe is at the root of all comedy)
Geez, what’s with all the Family Circus hate all of a sudden? It’s a cute little comic, I don’t see why it would be so deserving of any scorn.
Also, what about really simplistic humor? Like making silly faces to make a baby laugh without feeling embarrassed or ashamed of looking silly to others? What about seeing a cloud that looks like something funny and you laugh at that? What about straight up tickling someone? I can understand how a negative concept of “misery” can contribute to most forms of comedy, but how can it contribute to ALL comedy, even the kinds that don’t even directly involve anyone’s feelings or your own? How can there be any form of misery involved in every single kind of funny, comedic, or entertaining kind of stimuli? I’m not trying to say you’re wrong, I’m honestly trying to understand. I’m asking you, BEGGING YOU, to explain this to me, because I feel like I’m really missing something here.
Oh yeah, also Reynoldo at the end of the last episode pretty much summarized the entire series with his ending conspiracy theory. Just felt like putting that out there.
Also, it’s fine that you guys have an opinion on comedy, but you didn’t have to make over half the video about something that you already made a video about. And there’s no need to make everyone who doesn’t agree with you or tries to bring up examples sound like idiots. People have different opinions on EVERYTHING, including comedy. Just because you’re sure about something doesn’t guarantee it to be true all across the board in every situation. Could you relate misery to most forms of comedy? Sure, if your definition of misery is broad enough. But does that mean it applies to EVERY form of comedy? Not necessarily. A think a tree outside looks funny. Not a tree somebody planted, just a wild natural tree. Nobody had any responsibility towards the tree (no growing, no watering, no pruning, no triming, etc.), the tree isn’t sentient and cant feel any misery from being viewed as “funny”, the tree doesn’t particularly resemble anyone who would feel miserable from being related to a tree. The tree doesn’t even remind me of anything, something about it just feels funny. And I feel no misery for finding humor from a tree. So how does that work with misery exactly?
My dad disagreed with the ‘comedy derived from misery’, and I used Doug’s argument.
After a few minutes of silence he said “alright, you win.”
I get the sense that Doug wasn’t pleased w/ the people that disagreed w/ his last editorial. Had nothing to do w/ the episode of Steven Universe, but there it is. To be fair to him, he was right about comedy coming from some kind of misery. For me the disagreement wasn’t w/ that idea as it was w/ the idea that we should just give a comedian a pass for being a bully just because their bullying wears the mask of “humor”. Comedy should punch up, it shouldn’t punch down.
But back to the episode. I really like how the show develops the relationship between Steven and Connie (I can’t wait for you guys to get to Alone Together). I also like how the Gems, as alien and disconnected as they can be, still go out of their way to care for Steven. They can sometimes be good parental figures. And I love Garnet’s “I panicked” moment. So funny.
As for the fusion; watch the episode again and pay close attention to when they de-fuse at the dinner table.
You must have missed the part where he said the exact same thing you just said; that comedy shouldn’t be used with the intention of mocking someone for the sole sake of being negative.
This episode is basically cringe comedy at its finest, it’s just so incredibly awkward its almost hard to watch, and yet I also think the episode is absolutely hilarious mostly because of the aforementioned cringe comedy.
But also because Garnet is an absolute riot in this episode, honestly I pretty much consider this episode Garnet at her funniest.
It’s a minor point but I do like how Steven getting banned from television actually sticks, considering how often characters in cartoons get grounded without it actually affecting any future episode’s, it’s kind of refreshing.
Next up: The show goes full anime.
Fun episode
I don’t get why Steven or his dad didn’t tell to Connie parents that the mom died by giving births it happens Connie mom is a doctor she should know that it happens
*my mom works on an apple farm*
Yeah I liked this episode and liked the fusion too(though I thought you would go crazy for it but guess that’s just me)!!!
“ALL COMEDY IS BASED ON MISERY LOL” Again with this asinine crap.
George Carlin had entire routines based on wordplay.
Misery did not enter the equation.
End.
I think the way he words it throws off the argument. I think the word that makes the argument more agreeable is “mockery,” to an extent.
I think Alexandrite coming to dinner is funny. Because Steven and Connie being kids don’t really realize it’s a bad idea, and the gems aren’t familiar enough with human society to know it’s a bad idea and Greg is too nice and hoping to please to say no and it all culminates into this nice awkward scene. Also the ending is great. Steven is grounded for a thousand years.
This episode provided the best and most subtle joke in the entire show: The fact that a gigantic, multicolored demonic alien wargoddess with two mouths and multiple arms being married to a human man is easier to cope with than two women being married because it’s still a heterosexual relationship.