the steven; SU spoilers
Just saw the Steven Universe movie and my feelings about it are... very mixed.
At this point in the series, I can't exactly expect Steven to just pummel an enemy into submission, so converting YET ANOTHER villain is fine, I guess.
And I did like Spinel and how they set up and dealt with her trauma.
But man, it felt like they couldn't put her on a bus fast enough at the end. And Steven just kept LEAVING this poor traumatized thing at the margins. Rang so hollow. :(
the steven; SU spoilers
It was hard not to identify with Spinel. She brought back a whole lot of bad feelings about Transliminal: feeling like I was expected to wait forever for anyone to notice or care about me, because people were too "polite" to just tell me outright they were done with me, then treated like a monster when I finally had enough of it. And... well... suspecting deep down that I was probably really annoying and everyone had good reason to be sick of me and my needs.
the steven; SU spoilers
Ultimately, I enjoyed it and look forward to season six—but it all just reinforced my suspicion about "magic of friendship" shows, where every conflict can just be resolved by sitting down and opening your heart. I did. I bared myself and bled for that place, and so did they, and we all still ended up hating and mistrusting each other despite our best efforts. It just doesn't work, and I feel less and less good about teaching kids that it does.
the steven; SU spoilers
@zebratron2084 but, uhhh, don’t we kinda have to because the biggest alternative out there is Boomer egomania?
the steven; SU spoilers
@Leucrotta I don't think those are the only two options, though. The thing that bothers me most about these shows is the attitude that if you have an abusive person in your life, the problem is that you haven't Shown Them The Way and made nice to them hard enough. If anything, "you have to stick with your family, workmates, and culture even if they're hurting you, because blood is thicker than water" seems like a Boomer value to me.
the steven; SU spoilers
@Leucrotta OTOH, I won't deny that "bombard them with love and understanding"—even when, as with the SU movie, I find that "understanding" to be rather superficial and insincere—is a far better principle than "demonize the shit out of them and smile them with the (curiously non-lethal) Swords And Blue Lasers Of Righteousness" that we got fed during the Rambo/GI Joe Era... Not treating antagonists as Pure Elemental Evil *is* a huge cultural advance—it's just not enough.
the steven; SU spoilers
@zebratron2084 like how do we successfully communicate “you don’t need to understand everyone, but you don’t know the whole story so you might want to accept them” without going right over into “you need to *like* everyone”? And how do we phrase that at a kid level while still giving them a fun story (okay again that gets into storytelling as well as ethics)?
the steven; SU spoilers
@zebratron2084 and then of course you run into this Buddhist/leftist problem where at some point the *most* kind option involves beating heads, but then how do you keep a space in your thinking for compassion and fairness for your enemy rather than just going full on beserkir, which is *really tempting* (and also slightly too easy storytelling)?
