I was thinking about why Rose Quartz/Pink Diamond is so hated.
The obvious answer is because of the horrible things she did.
But the other diamonds did horrible things too…worse things even.
Pink abandoned Spinel, which is wrong, but Spinel was planning to kill every living thing on Earth to spite the son of a person who was no longer even alive. Yet, no one talks about what a monster Spinel is.
So many Steven Universe characters have hurt people, but we forgive them and are happy to see them redeemed.
So why not Rose?
Then, it hit me: because Rose’s redemption arc is told to us in reverse.
The first time we see Rose is toward the end of her life when she is pregnant with Steven. We see her appreciation for life and how full of love she is for Greg and her future child. She’s willingly sacrificing herself to bring a new life into the world.
But then, we start learning who Rose used to be, all her mistakes, all the people she hurt.
The loving mother in Steven’s video becomes a distant memory.
For those of you who hate Rose, imagine her backstory unfolded a little differently for us.
We’re introduced to Pink Diamond: she’s spoiled, bratty, immature, irresponsible, and inconsiderate.
She throws temper tantrums when she doesn’t get her way.
Not exactly an endearing character, right?
But one day, her tantrum injure Pink Pearl, her best friend. From that day on, she keeps everything to herself. Now we see her dealing with a consequence of her bad behavior.
Then we see how she’s abused by the other diamonds. We start to sympathize with her.
We see her try to save Earth. We see her trying to do the right thing for once.
But it backfires horribly.
She spends the rest of her life trying to fix it, but she can’t.
She meets Greg. Here is where Rose has the most emotional growth as a character. She learns what is truly means to be a “real person.”
Finally, she grows such an appreciation for human life, that she decides to sacrifice her form to bring her son into the world.
The reason Rose is so much more controversial than other characters who have done problematic things is because her story is told in reverse, her redemption comes across as a fall from grace.
But there are plenty of characters who have a fall from grace who are still not as controversial as Rose. The reason why many people are less sympathetic to Rose is because we never see how Rose reacts to her mistakes. We never get much insight into how Rose feels about herself and the things she’s done. We get small hints:
For everyone who hates Rose, I get why. But I think we need to remember who she became instead of who she was.
rawr
plane spotting with the doctor <3
posting in gif format because tumblr hates videos for some reason :( so sorry for low quality
A few drawings of Magnus archives quotes in a children’s book format because it wasn’t scary enough the first time
𝑦𝑜𝑢’𝑟𝑒 𝑙𝑜𝑠𝑡, 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑦𝑜𝑢’𝑣𝑒 𝑎𝑙𝑠𝑜 𝑒𝑠𝑐𝑎𝑝𝑒𝑑
By Bao Tran Trung
Jon,,,Jonathan sims,,,,,
thinking about Jonathan Sims and Samama Khalid.
Thinking about how, by all laws of Horror Story Trope, Jon should not be the protagonist. If I'd never heard of tma and you showed me a lineup of the archives crew and asked me to guess who died first I would have pointed to Jon. He's the paranoid professor archetype. The one who dies discovering some crucial bit of information at the beginning to push the plot forward. He's unfriendly, cowardly, insecure, and makes other people do his investigation for him for all of season 1. He doesn't do anything even remotely heroic until the second half of the show. He has no interest in romance for the first half of the show. The audience wasn't even aware Jon had a dark past until he starts telling us about A Guest for Mr. Spider. But he is *Chosen.* Despite the fact that he has no actual qualities of a hero, he's chosen as the eyes special boy. Over the course of the show he starts to become more and more like an actual protagonist. He starts trying to save the world, resist the eye, all that jazz. For one reason or another, being the Archivist turns Jonathan "definition of a side character" Sims into the main character.
Then we have Sam. Sam starts acting like a horror/mystery protagonist almost immediately. He is young, charming, has a mysterious past (that we are made aware of pretty much right away) and a curiosity that causes him to frequently put himself personally in the path of The Horrors. He pokes around where he doesn't belong and looks for clues. He's the center of an office love triangle for goodness sake. He has a strong sense of duty to others and will put himself in harms way to protect those he loves. He exudes main character energy. He has everything a horror protagonist needs to push the plot along. But Sam wasn't *Chosen.* Despite being exactly the person you'd expect the plot to follow. And I can't help but wonder if, in the same way that the narrative made Jon important, it's going to make Sam unimportant. Irrelevant. If, with his rejection from The Magnus Institute, Sam is going to disappear completely. Become a mystery.
Because at the end of the day, so much of your life, your impact on the world, your relevance, has absolutely nothing to do with you. So much of it has everything to do with those in power, and whether they decide you're important.
It all comes down to your own rotten luck.
Harvey, beloved waited all night for you to come back home from the mines.
it ends, as it started, in a garden
Deep in the night we are waiting / holding our breath, letting go
~ Aspirer of many things ~ ~ Lover of another many things ~
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