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Steven and his friends get stuck on an island, but the reason why might piss people off.
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Actually. I am pretty sure Sadie wanted to try to help Lars not be a dick and maybe a vacation would do that. It just evolved into a romance between them. You can tell this by Lars saying “You just brought me here to make out with me” and Sadie getting angry at that. Now it could be she got angry because she got found out, but I kinda doubt that. If anything shes one of those people that wants to fix someone, because she sees something good in Lars.
here is the thing with that, though. The kiss happened because Sadie was manipulating Lars. He kissed her as a response to an artificial situation Sadie had created, and she wasn’t unhappy with that result, either.
it was non-consensual.
Bullshit. it’s not nonconsensual. She didn’t force him to kiss her against his will. she encouraged it is all.
‘Not consensual’ and ‘under false pretences’ are not the same thing in the context of agreements and the choices people make.
There’s actually an interesting parallel between Sadie and Sayaka from Madoka Magica. Both do something extreme to help someone they care about, and while they truly do want to help them, a part of them also has ulterior motives that lead them down a bad path.
The point is that he didn’t want to be there. Yeah, he had some fun, but only because he thought there was no escape. Sadie hid the only escape. Lars wanted to go back, but because of Sadie trapping them, he couldn’t.
That basically means she was just holding them hostage there because “I wanted you to have fun”
I think the “point” of this episode and the Lars and Sadie relationship/dynamic in general is because they’re trying to portray of all the dysfunctional/messed stuff that make Doug and Rob dislike this episode in a realistic manner, that they have a dysfunctional/messed up relationship but not to the extent that it’s a tragedy or played as a comedy of errors. I think the uncomfortableness is an intended feeling, and it’s just the shows way of fleshing out their human characters. As for it’s function in terms of an overall arc for their characters I just assume it’s part of things get worse before they can get better type of deal.
Was waiting for this one after all the shit you had to say about Lars, was not disappointed
Lars plays in one league with Robbie from Gravity Falls.
Both are pretty unlikeable and have some real dick moves.
This was the episode that made me see Sadie as something other then a default “nice girl” character. Her doing something really messed up with good intentions, thinking it would be good for Lars, makes her seem more human to me.
This is the one episode of Steven Universe I have a legit issue with, it’s not that Sadie messed up and assumed she knew best, it’s the fact that Lars apologizes at the end.
I’m sorry, but f*ck off.
Lars is a dick but he had every right to be by the end of this ep and although Sadie went all commando and saved their lives, she was the one who put them there in the first place.
@Punkrex I agree completely. I doubt I’m the first to mention this, but switch the genders and it becomes really, really creepy that Lars has to apologize.
I think the point they were trying to make with this episode–the ‘moral’ as you will–is that even the nicest of people have feet of clay.. They screw up, do bad things despite good intentions, and so on. Actually that IS something that has relevance later on in the series, but I’m not necessarily sure its supposed to tie back into this episode as a precursor to that.
The show is also doing a MLP:FiM thing, where every main character has at least one episode per season where they’re the designated asshole. Pinkie showing psychic powers? Time for Twilight’s OCD! Fluttershy dealing with performance issues? Time for Pinkie to spout off random hurtful things! And so on. Its all an effort to show they aren’t perfect and keep them relatable long-term. Sometimes it works, and sometimes it doesn’t.
SU does the same thing a lot. Greg (as we see throughout the series) is actually a great dad, but he can’t be prefect, so here’s his designated asshole episode where he lies to stay in the house. Sadie in general is helpful and nice, but here’s her designated asshole episode so she can’t seem too much so. the Gems do individual duty as the DA too, but I don’t want to spoil too much.
Hm, I don’t know if I would agree entirely with that interpretation. I haven’t seen more than a few episodes of MLP, so I can’t speak to that comparison, but I’ve never felt that Steven Universe simply grafts new negative personality traits onto its characters for the purpose of a quick moral. Generally, their screw-ups reflect aspects of their personalities that we’ve already seen in some form or another, and in a lot of cases—especially with the Gems—it could be seen as Steven learning to accept that people he loves aren’t always perfect, since the entire show is to a certain extent colored by his perspective.
If you’re referring to a certain character who’s been facing criticism by the fandom lately, I definitely wouldn’t consider the beginning of Stevenbomb 2 or 3 (or 1, for that matter) to be a “designated asshole” episode—we’ve seen before that this character is still dealing with trauma from both the distant and the recent past, and even if it wasn’t immediately apparent in much of Season 1, that psychological damage has clearly influenced their behavior and decisions from the beginning.
You’re talking about the character that screwed up in “A Cry For Help”, right?
Yeah, I definitely agree with you. The type of flaws the characters display (especially the one you mention) are well set up from the beginning
I actually like this episode a lot, but a lot of what Doug and Rob say here are really true. I do, however, have my doubts about whether Sadie actually kept them on the island so she could “come on to [Lars]”, since I got the impression that that’s actually not what she wanted to do, at least originally.
The reasoning she gave, if I remember correctly, is that she wanted to help Lars relax and maybe lighten up a bit (which he did, until having his emotional breakdown). However, stranding them on an island for days does still seem a little extreme and hard to justify.
Again, I do still like the episode, which is weird to me because their relationship really is terrible and you’re really hard pressed to understand how or why it “works”. Maybe it is just because it somehow feels realistic and so I can buy into it. And Doug talks about how realism isn’t really inherently valuable which I TOTALLY agree with (I don’t like it when people use “but it’s realistic” to justify why something is good in a story), but I think it might work here because the emotion and the atmosphere are so well executed?
I don’t know, maybe I’m just a sucker for sentimental romantic gobbledy gook.
I think it’s pretty important that Doug and Rob understand what these episodes are trying to do and the type of teenager (who is pretty common today) that the show is trying to portray. They should definitely read this: https://www.reddit.com/r/stevenuniverse/comments/35qgh0/the_larssadie_relationship/ …
At the beginning I really thought that Steven HAD messed up Amethyst’s face. I didn’t see the twist coming. Sadie probably thought that “All’s fair in love and war.” You think that Sadie would be a little too old to be falling for the “bad” boy. She looks to be about 16 years old. I learned my lesson about the “bad boy” at like 14 and I’m not the brightest bulb. It is really hard for me to like Lars, even if he has redeeming scenes. -_- I know I’m a bad person but I found myself feeling barely any sympathy for this douchebag. Ooh, the anger! Also, I thought that this ending was really abrupt.
The way I understand it Sadie really wanted to help Lars but she got drunk on affection wich is why she kept the whole thing going as long as she could. Shes a nice person but also seems to act alot based on her emotions wich backfired in this episode. I also have to disagree on you calling it mean spirited since it was more a good intend that turned into selfishness.
The episode also deals with two of the many relationship related themes of the show: “you can’t force relationships” (wich relates to Sadie not Steven) and “trust and consens are really important and abusing them is bad” (Lars felt justifably betrayed by Sadie when she revealed that she hid the warp pad). The same themes will be important in two seperate episode later down the line. I’m also pretty sure the episode introduced the fact that regular humans are able to poof Gems.
And yes Doug, everything having to do with relationships is treated with outmost seriousness in this show. And thats a good thing because it teaches the kids watching that relationships are important and should not be abused or ridiciouled. It also makes everything feel more realistic wich I, and the majority of the audience it seems, appreciate.
Also, you believe that this kind of story was a detour for the show? Boy are you two gonna be surprised 😀
I feel they both appreciate the realism and seriousness that relationships are given in the show, they just didn’t understand the point of having it with these two characters in this way outside of showing it unpleasant uncomfortable-ness of these kind of relationships.
To be honest, I also wonder where the Crewniverse is going with their relationship
The current season has had almost none of them, but in Historical Friction you can see them together in the crowd, which means their at least still on good terms. While I’m sure things are going to get worse before they get better, the creator’s emphasis on positive supervision leads me to think Lars will eventually become more self-confident and considerate, and as for Sadie, we still haven’t seen enough of her dark-side to guess what her arc will be like. On the 17th this month is an episode called Sadie’s Song so I’m sure we’ll get more from her to work with.
Maybe it’s just me, but this felt like a padding episode for the series. They were just like “We need to put some more distance between Space Race and Keep Beach City Weird to try and keep things from becoming too serious” or something and I think they might have rushed this episode out. I mean, it’s an episode that furthers pretty much nothing, slightly goes against the established rules of the series (seriously? Sadie kills a freaking gem with a sharpened stick?!?!), takes place in a remote location, and features two side characters with Steven just shoved in for pretty much no reason whatsoever. And, personally, I feel like this is pretty much the weakest episode of the series so far.
I feel like the episodes post Ocean Gem aren’t that strong in general until this episode ends for some reason with the exception of maybe Space Race. But, after this episode, there’s just a solid stream of great episodes and I don’t think the show really loses momentum like that ever again. I mean, the next weak episode, in my opinion, is Winter Forecast, which is like 12 episodes away from this and then the show immediately picks up again afterwards, so that’s pretty good.
This episode does introduce Mask Island, and considering how it was important enough to reapear, get a name, and have a warp pad on it, I’m sure we’ll see more of it. Also, Sadie poofing a Gem with a sharp stick isn’t too crazy. We’ve seen Gems get poofed by less, and Sadie was putting all of her weight into a single point and had leverage on her side. It also was important for showing how flawed Sadie can be, since she stood out as being one of the more reoccurring characters, yet the only big mistake she had shown before was going too far with her revenge in Joking Victim. This episode showed how someone with truly good intentions can do something cruel and selfish.
Yeah, this episode was pure filler. Don’t worry, everything picks right back up and starts getting even better.
There is no such thing as a “Filler Episode” in Steven Universe, with the possible exception of “Say Uncle”. All episodes either has character development (In which this one works of the development of Sadie and Lars) or references something that will be important later (Perhaps they will come back to this area later on)
They do, In Marble Madness. And considering how this island was important enough to have a name and a Warp Pad, I’m sure we’ll see more of it later.
First of all how did you get that they are already in a sexual relationship. Nothing so far has pointed to this. If anything this comes off as the legit first kiss. I also think the whole point as well was to show lars isint the only one kinda messed up. It shows sadie isint this perfect person. she as well doesint pull off every single thing right. Maybe down the line they can both help each other out. Oh also this is the first full blown human to take down a corrupt gem by themselves cementing sadie as the most badass human character so far.
“Joking Victim” had innuendo which implied that they may have slept together. It’s open to interpretation.
If they’ve already slept together I don’t see why the kiss in this episode would be made into such a big deal. It makes more sense to me that it was showing their relationship going further then ever before only to immediately fall apart after the deception was discovered.
Joking Victim made it seem like it was a one-time thing, and that they had wanted to keep things casual, but Sadie seems to want something more. So for them to openly kiss like a real couple was big for them, and who’s to say that was only the beginning and things wouldn’t have gone further?
Is it weird to say that I no longer watch these for their opinions but just to see them interrupt each other. I’m not sure if that’s a familial trait or if it has to do with location, because I can’t recall where they live right now, but the closer someone is to New York (The region more specifically) the more likely it is for them to interrupt someone’s dialogue to insert their own opinion.
It’s interesting from a linguistic standpoint because in The South it is considered extremely rude to continually interrupt one another in such a way.
They’re Chicagoans, born and raised.
I think the playground is where they spent most of their days.
This episode was fine and the song wasn’t bad ^_^
Besides, Sadie became the first Human being to defeat a corrupted gem on-screen 🙂
Interesting that they’ve picked up on the leitmotifs but have yet to talk about any of the songs. “Be Wherever You Are” is one of my favorites, at least in the non-plot-relevant episodes.
Taking bets now that they’ll get through the entire “Jailbreak” vlog without even talking about the crowning moment of musical awesomeness that takes up a third of its running time…
Also I think the point of lars and sadie is to show not every relationship is 100% perfect when building it. Steven and connie are the examples of a relationship building with no real big problems at least as of now. Lars and sadie is the exact opposite and I guess down the line we will see how it all works out.
I think you hit the mark when you both said you know people like this – the show has a few more moments later on when Steven sees or overhears things that are a little too uncomfortably real to sit in a cartoon where super-powered people fight monsters. Before the first Sadie & Lars episode I thought the show was completely sweet and saccharine, then after the “player two” subtext and other elements like this, I realised the sweetness is just how Steven everything, and underneath that it’s a very real world where adults have recognisable problems and where kids overhear things that maybe they shouldn’t (like all kids have). I think that we’re meant to recognise that their relationship is unhealthy so that we see the show as a more of a real place.
My theory on Sadie is that she lost her virginity with Lars (“playing video games”), which made her obsess over him.
I doubt they have had sex yet. Sadie just has strong feelings for lars while lars didint.This is why player 2 meant to so much to her.This is also why she super happy when he was getting closer to her in thie episode.
It’s not meant to be funny, it’s meant to be real.
I don’t think you guys are getting that this is Rebecca Sugar, the series has funny elements, the series has epic elements, the series has a lore, etc. But the MAIN focus is relationships, don’t try to find lessons, just explore the relationships of the characters.
There’s no “right” way to do it Doug, this was meant to be mean, not every cartoon is meant to entertain you, other emotions are involved in this series besides dumb or even smart fun, stop thinking of this as just a cartoon. This is not a detour, there will be more of this, so strap on.
I’m sorry but I have to call bullshit on that. The point of a TV show is to entertain. There are secondary elements like educate and scare, but if at the end result is not entertaining it has failed in it’s purpose. This applies to all shows in the ENTERTAINMENT business.
Honestly I have no idea where they are going with the whole Lars and Sadie relationship. I mean I know they are dysfunctional, but I wonder what kind of message or result they are going with it. This is a very touchy subject and if done wrong it could send the wrong message for those who are in similar situations. I kind of want them to have Sadie and Lars decide to not be together and find someone else since they are too toxic for eachother, but at the same time it would be a bit depressing if they have to do that instead of find a way for it to work. But if they just have them together still it might give off the impression that toxic relationships are ok. This isn’t easy
But based off of what they’ve done so far, I have trust in them
The next episodes in terms of “Brand New Ones” that are about Lars and Sadie is “Sadie’s Song” and “The New Lars”… Hopefully that will give more clues
I wouldint call them to toxic for one another.They are just not perfect people. They show no hatred to one another and they arent constantly yelling at each other.Though going by these two episodes they can get into spats which is normal. When you see them at work or hanging outside they seem just fine.
Hang on, is Doug complaining that the dynamic between Sadie and Lars is too challenging?
Why would you want another simplistic ‘good person meets bad person eventually concluding with he bad person getting his/her cumuffins and the good person coming out of the relationship ahead’ relationship arc crammed down kids throats?
Lars is obviously designed to be hated, what with being an obnoxious, thoroughly insecure twat, and Sadie clearly has her own problems, it might not be funny but I am interested to see where the creator is going to take this plot point…
Did you just write “cumuffins”?! I’m dying! Even if that was a mistaken voice-to-text transcription, and can’t imaging how it would come up with that word! The word is “comeuppance”. Sort of like “their bad actions came up again to bite them”, like Karma.
Seriously, thanks for the laugh. Now I’m trying not to picture “cumuffins” being crammed down kids’ throats. Nothing else wrong with your post, though. Your point is a good one.
Damn you Urban Dictionary!
You have deceived me for the last time…
Rumble on Mask Isle!
Just be whoever you are,
Sadie’s got a spear.
Lars and Sadie are the show’s heat sink for commenting on unhealthy relationships. It can be uncomfortable or painful to watch at times, but these are lessons that a lot of people could stand to learn and take to heart, particularly the show’s target audience. And not to be cruel, but I’d much rather see these things happen to someone like Lars as opposed to Greg or Steven, even if Sadie gets caught in the crossfire. Steven and Connie’s friendship/quasi-romance is incredibly sweet and low-key, while Greg and Rose’s romance was positively fairy tale. Plus, I like Sadie in general and seeing her take out a Predator was awesome, and Steven’s song is as soothing as it is catchy.
I actually like this episode, mostly due to it’s atmosphere and look and just having some nice beats. But then then I get why the subject matter would piss people off. Honestly I’m not sure what to think of Sadie and Lars’s relationship.
I am kind of amused that despite being the most obvious a-hole character, Lars’s tends to be on the receiving end of the abuse stick when it comes to his relationships. I get the feeling Doug and Rob won’t like Horror Club…
There’s a lot of little inconsistencies in the SU universe that I don’t understand, which would be big inconsistencies if they were a bigger focus, but can be ignored because KID’S SHOW. Like how the gems clearly had a hand in raising Steven since he was very young, and sometimes completely defer to his needs and indulge his silly childish wishes or hobbies, yet at other times seem completely clueless about how he acts, leave him alone to go on missions on a regular basis, and have literally never heard the word “school” before. (But they know the word kindergarten?) And I’ve brushed all that off for the most part. But i gotta say I was very confused by the end of this episode that these kids were clearly on this island for at least days, maybe weeks (I do like that they illustrated Sadie’s unshaven legs), and Steven was clearly expecting the Gems to come find them, so WHY DIDN’T THEY? They care so very much about Steven’s wellbeing and safety (most of the time) that even if they didn’t know where he’d gone, they should at least have warped around to check. And if not, why would Steven have left without telling them where he went? That boggles my mind. It was clearly stated that this is a place they’d all been before, so he could have easily said where he was going and they would have remembered it.
That’s some serious and reckless child endangerment there. Even in the spaceship episode, when Pearl let her obsessiveness and homesickness overrule her logic and protective instinct, she was at least THERE with Steven, making a show of being a guardian. The island in this episode was home to a rogue gem monster! I think if the episode had been about characters I cared about, or a more satisfying storyline, I would have forgiven it, but as is, I was seeing the puppet strings, and not getting lost in the story.
What about the songs??? Talk about the songs!!!
Why do so many people insist that they mention the songs? Don’t get me wrong, I like them too, but many of them are not inherently catchy or mind-blowing enough to be deeply analyzed. They’re rarely ever the highlight of a single episode (except for Stronger Than You, because that was incorporated into an insanely dramatic climax and is the only musical number I thought was amazing from the start).
I agree. Especially since out of all the songs they’ve done on the show thus far, the only two anyone really remembers are “Stronger than You” and “Giant Woman”. And honestly the only reason anyone remembers the latter is memetic mutation.
While it’s still a ways off, I imagine they’ll comment on Do It for Her, since that reveals a lot about Pearl’s attitude, and expands on Connie’s character and a flashback from the war.
to be honest I could care less. Alot of SU songs are not that entertaining imo with only the upcoming one with garnet being catchy and proboly the duet with greg and rose.
I totally thought you guys missed the point entirely but I’m glad you don’t not like Metallica since in the shark jumping episode for glee you said you didn’t like them so glad to here that!!!
Ooh!! I can’t wait to see how rob will react to this next one keep beach city weird! Since Renaldo is a lot like rob(or am I the only one that thinks that)!!
Renaldo cant be like rob because that would mean I would have to dislike rob and I have nothing against the guy.
The only part that stood out to me was Sadie poofing a Gem. I didn’t see her as any less, despite the whole lying thing, as I can kinda see where she’s coming from. Even some of Lars reactions, I understood them. He’s still my least favourite character in the series though.