Steven Universe Podcast: Volume 2, Episode 7: Earth Gems

Season 2, Episode 7 of the Steven Universe Podcast, released March 8, 2018, is about the so-called Earth Gems, and it covers Jasper, Bismuth, and Rose Quartz. The official description:

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Rose Quartz, Bismuth, and Jasper are the focus of this episode of the Steven Universe Podcast as take a closer look at Earth Gems! Steven Universe creator Rebecca Sugar, former EP, Ian Jones-Quartey, Director Joe Johnston, and Supervising Director Kat Morris detail Bismuth’s origins (including how she came to be in Lion’s mane), Jasper’s personality development, and Steven’s complicated view of his mother, Rose Quartz. Discover which characters have been around since the pilot days, who was added as the series developed, and how Rose’s storyline gets factored into each episode’s planning.

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Since as usual my summary is long, I will provide a highlights list followed by a more in-depth narrative. Enjoy!

Highlights:

• Jasper’s main root as a character is her identity as a decorated soldier from humble origins.

• Jasper, a so-called “perfect” Quartz from a Kindergarten known to produce flawed Gems, won’t accept help from others because she’s so determined to prove she’s capable. She may be the best Gem from Earth, but she’s still from Earth.

• Joe Johnston was the artist who drew Bismuth’s Gem bubbled in Lion’s mane, but at that point they did not yet have the story of who she was figured out, though they did know there would be a “lost Crystal Gem.”

• Steven Sugar’s tendency to add Gem artifacts into the world, most notably weapons, gave rise to the writers’ need to give the Crystal Gems a weaponsmith, so Bismuth as a character grew out of that hole needing to be filled.

• Bismuth adored Rose Quartz and was never allowed to understand why her leader rejected her contribution, which Rebecca and Ian compare to the trope of a villain mistreating her subordinates. Bismuth, in Rebecca Sugar’s words, was “screwed over” epically by Rose Quartz.

• Rebecca and Ian specify that Rose was wrong to do what she did to Bismuth, and that it was significant because it’s so clear for the first time that Rose could have made such a clear mistake.

• Rebecca makes a lot of charts to help understand what story elements need to be doled out when.

• Ian loves that Pearl tells us Rose has LOTS of secrets.

• Rebecca loves that all of Steven’s comion actually comes from Greg. Steven is described as a comionate warrior, with “comionate” coming from Greg and “warrior” coming from Rose.

• Jasper is a corny anime villain at first, and we can credit Paul Villeco’s love of shonen anime and manga for this.

• Joe Johnston finds it refreshing that Steven couldn’t turn Jasper’s alignment around, and says it’s because Jasper held onto her anger and couldn’t be forced to be someone else.

• Jasper’s tendency toward bullying is rooted in feeling heartbroken over the loss of Pink Diamond. She identified very strongly as a servant of her Diamond.

• Joe and Kat are pretty sure that Lapis was Jasper’s first fusion experience ever.

• Joe Johnston often puts “breadcrumbs” in his episodes; he puts in stuff he doesn’t have plans for and figures maybe it will be something later. Bismuth’s Gem in Lion’s Mane was not dictated by Rebecca Sugar like the tee shirt or Rose’s flag; it was a Joe breadcrumb.

• Twenty-two-minute episodes were the network’s idea, not something the Crew specifically wanted to do.

• Joe Johnston can’t say enough good things about Uzo Aduba’s voice acting as Bismuth; every read was “perfect,” according to him.

• Early character designs of Bismuth included black eyes (to indicate her Gem’s inverted state) and some early designs had her with very skinny legs. She always had dreadlocks.

• Kat emphasizes that Bismuth is not and was never intended to be “a bad guy.” She has different ideology, and her episode shows a situation where the audience is meant to see the value of her point and nobody’s 100% right.

• Jasper and Bismuth are more different than similar, despite both being big and strong and partial to bludgeoning weapons. Jasper is highly respected and wants to preserve the order of the Diamonds, while Bismuth is a low-class blue-collar worker who has realized things don’t have to be this way and dedicates herself to destroying that order.

You can read the detailed summary below!

McKenzie Atwood opens the podcast by explaining this episode’s title: “Earth Gems” refers to three very different characters who are connected through the Gem War on Earth.

Rebecca Sugar and Ian Jones-Quartey on Jasper:

McKenzie asks Rebecca and Ian what effect they intended Jasper’s arc to have on the audience. Rebecca says she really wanted Jasper to SEEM one-dimensional even though she isn’t; her behavior has a “root” and we at first only get the foliage. We don’t realize at first that Jasper has become involved in this plot due to her connection to Rose Quartz, feeling that she has unfinished business on Earth. Obviously her connection is quite personal even though she really doesn’t show anyone those feelings.

McKenzie mentions Jasper being described on a previous podcast as a decorated soldier with humble origins, and Rebecca claims that description is Jasper’s “everything.” She’s from Earth, but very different from Amethyst–Amethyst was from a pretty successful Kindergarten, while Jasper is from the worst Kindergarten on this awful failure of a planet. Jasper burns to prove her worth because everyone around her knows she’s from Earth’s Beta Kindergarten and therefore must be flawed on some level. Jasper feels she can never escape being associated with Rose Quartz even though she was supposedly the best thing that came out of Earth.

Ian remarks that Jasper chooses her words to show off pride and bravado, with no hint of the emotions beneath–that she feels she’s fundamentally wrong and that she doesn’t deserve the reputation she has. She thinks she’s horrible, but Rebecca and Ian say they love her. Ian says Jasper is an example of how the system on Homeworld can fail Gems who don’t quite fit the mold; externally she is a model Gem, but she never internally feels she deserves her reputation.

Rebecca Sugar and Ian Jones-Quartey on Bismuth:

McKenzie asks her guests to discuss when they started talking about introducing Bismuth. She mentions seeing the bubbled Gem in Season 1 (in “Lion 3: Straight to Video”) and how fans recall that first exposure. Joe Johnston was the one who drew that in, knowing later they’d do SOMETHING with it, and then also there were early talks about a lost Crystal Gem. An early idea included Bismuth being not fully conscious, but they decided not to use it. They did figure out Bismuth pretty early on. Ian says Steven Sugar was always dropping weapons around the backgrounds, and they figured they needed a weaponsmith to explain where these things came from. From there, Bismuth was easy to develop. She’s described as a “gooey center of the team.”

McKenzie wants to know why they decided to unbubble Bismuth in Season 3. Rebecca says everyone’s feelings about Rose Quartz were being examined at that point, and a turning point included the perspective that Rose could be a “really awful person.” Ian likes the trope about a villain mistreating their subordinates, and wanted to show Rose as the person who was bad to Bismuth. Rebecca says Rose did such wrong to Bismuth–that Bismuth would have done anything for Rose, and when she came up with a weapon that supposedly served her agenda, she rejected it and rejected Bismuth for reasons she never understood.

Unlike Jasper’s history with Rose being built on their being enemies from the start, Bismuth IDOLIZED Rose and was, as Rebecca says, totally “screwed over” by her. It breaks Rebecca’s heart that Bismuth still speaks of Rose with such love, still crediting her for changing her life in such a positive way. Rebecca loves giving Bismuth “little triangular eyelashes” during the scene when she talks about what a difference Rose made for her.

Ian says Season 3 was the best time to include Bismuth’s arc representing a break from the lore they’ve been establishing regarding the Crystal Gems’ mission. From a writing standpoint, you have to build up the status quo for a while before you break from it. It would have had no meaning to reveal Bismuth earlier if you didn’t already have an understanding of what it would mean to be a lost Crystal Gem and didn’t already have some feelings about who Rose has been drawn up to be. Ian thinks of it as being one of the first “Rose wasn’t perfect at all” stories. Rose was WRONG.

Rebecca also feels that this is a huge turning point for Steven because he is so confused and guilty over Bismuth, balanced against what he’s been taught about his mother by his family. In “Mindful Education,” he’s shown to still be devastated by how he’s failed Bismuth–he isn’t afraid of her attacking him, he’s disappointed in himself for being unable to help her. He knows he needs to carry baggage from a former life he didn’t really live, but Bismuth was the first indication that he has inherited something “wrong with the Crystal Gems.” McKenzie thinks it’s interesting for a character who isn’t present to have a character arc.

Rebecca Sugar and Ian Jones-Quartey on Rose Quartz:

When discussing pacing of all these story elements attached to who Rose Quartz was, Rebecca describes writing it like building a tower; they have to have given you all the pieces when they decide to reveal something so it will make sense when they tell that story, so they have to be very careful about the order in which they reveal the pieces. Rebecca makes a lot of charts. General ideas had to be developed into specific pieces of information they have to show us. The viewer doesn’t get the story about Rose in order, either. Steven is told what he is “supposed to” think, but he slowly realizes how many revelations there are out there that revise his perceptions. This is complicated, Rebecca says, by the fact that half the people giving him information think he IS his mother.

Rebecca loves that everyone is SINCERE about how they talk to Steven about Rose, too; no one is actively trying to trick him, even though they may have incomplete information. Ian specifies that he loves that Pearl reveals Rose has a LOT of secrets. Rebecca specifies that Steven’s comion is all coming from GREG. Rose was interested in that; she knows she didn’t understand it, but you see how she fails at comion during “We Need to Talk.” Steven is a comionate warrior. The comion is Greg’s. The warrior is Rose.

Joe Johnston and Kat Morris on Jasper:

McKenzie was wondering about how animation is like acting with regards to writing dialogue or choosing expressions, and asks Joe and Kat to discuss this in relation to Jasper. Joe says they’d never had a traditional villain before Jasper, and despite that she is NOT really a traditional villain, she comes off as “menacing” and “corny” at the beginning. This is credited to Paul Villeco’s love of shonen manga and anime–she’s sort of a JoJo-inspired bad guy. (This refers to JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure.)

McKenzie thinks it’s interesting that Jasper is the first antagonist who has not been traditionally redeemed and converted to the other side. Joe thinks it’s refreshing to have someone Steven wasn’t able to recruit in his traditional way, and suggests it’s because Jasper wanted to hold onto her anger. She didn’t want to change, and couldn’t be forced. Jasper has been told since she emerged that she was perfect, and that’s what she wants to be–not Steven’s band of uplifted flawed Gems. McKenzie asks if it was impactful for Steven to see Jasper refuse to be reached, and Paul thinks he didn’t really get to process that since he also had a Pink Diamond-related reveal to deal with. Joe points out that Lars also stubbornly resisted Steven’s influence for a very long time, though at least Lars hasn’t tried to kill Steven. (Yet! No, that was a joke.)

McKenzie brings up how Jasper gets a lot of love from fans because she has so much beneath the surface, even though she isn’t onscreen often. Kat says that’s done by treating her like a person; no one is 100% evil all the time, and Jasper isn’t evil so much as having a set of values that are not shared by the protagonists. Jasper bullies others because of her pent-up feelings, and she expresses her heartbreak over Pink Diamond’s shattering through acting aggressively toward others. It made her relationship with Lapis really complicated, too.

McKenzie brings up “Jailbreak” and asks Joe to discuss his first time drawing Jasper in action. Joe says he was really ready to do it; there had been no “main antagonist” until Jasper and he really looked forward to it. He thinks they started boarding “Jailbreak” before “The Return.” Kat thinks Jasper had been written some before they began work on “Jailbreak,” but since Rebecca had pretty clear ideas about who she was, it was possible to board out of order. Some work had been done on Jasper before Paul had to board her introduction in “The Return.” Rebecca sometimes writes a sheet with some character points and drawings for each new character.

McKenzie then brings up “Alone at Sea,” asking Kat to discuss how different that was from “Jailbreak” where Jasper was a physical threat versus how she presented more as an emotional threat to Lapis in this later episode. Kat says she consulted with Rebecca and Hilary a lot to push this story out. Jasper has had a lot of time to think since hanging out in the ocean after her Fusion broke up, and now she’s concluded she has a different perspective than she used to about fusion. Jasper realized she could become more powerful through fusion and became “addicted to it.” In “Jailbreak” they just needed her to present as an uncomplicated villain (and they didn’t have room for much more), but in “Alone at Sea” they could show the why, the how, of her actions.

Kat boarded acts 1 and 3–“the boat stuff,” she says. She says there were many versions of the episode. They initially called the episode “Boat Murderer.” The boat was supposed to keep breaking down and eventually you find out Jasper was doing it. The episode kept shifting until it became what it finally was. Kat usually doesn’t board–“Alone at Sea” was, as she describes it, her stepping in as a pinch hitter. McKenzie asks about whether she had any issues with drawing Jasper, and she says she draws on every episode so it wasn’t really anything new for her, especially since she was in charge of the arc associated with Amethyst’s season 3 arc. Kat felt that Amethyst was due for some development after they’d already tackled some Pearl and Garnet stuff in the Sardonyx arc. Jasper was a great opposite to Amethyst in that arc because Jasper was big, strong, and a soldier–what Amethyst was supposed to be. She thought she was okay with not being what she was made to be, but then she gets “annihilated” in “Crack the Whip” and realizes maybe she’s not okay with any of it. Steven helps bring her through that rough personal place.

Joe Johnston and Kat Morris on Bismuth:

Everyone agrees that they loved Bismuth on first sight. Joe brings up throwing Bismuth’s bubble into Lion’s mane in “Lion 3: Straight to Video.” He had no plan at that point. Kat says Joe LOVES to do stuff like that, and calls them “breadcrumbs.” He initially thought maybe it would have been a Gem device or a portable warp. They agree he didn’t need such a thing because Steven is pretty OP actually. Rebecca wanted “pieces of lore thrown about the living room,” so this was part of it. Rebecca then developed who Bismuth would be. McKenzie loves how before Bismuth’s reveal, fans would wonder about who Bismuth might be whenever they’d see her Gem in Lion.

When prompted to discuss what they love about Bismuth, Kat says she loves how much Bismuth loves the Crystal Gems, and Joe loves how Bismuth and Jasper are both “patriotic” for their side. Joe likes to play with how Jasper and Bismuth are both so dedicated to their cause. (It is agreed that a shouting match between them would be very loud and not end well.) McKenzie wonders how difficult it is to develop such a big character, and Joe describes having a chance to all have a at the character to finalize new characters. They credit Lamar with her humor and how her voice is delivered, and Kat thinks it’s really cute when Bismuth was getting emotional.

McKenzie brings up “Bismuth” being the first 22-minute episode and the 99th/100th episode, and asks how that’s different from the usual 11-minute episodes. Kat says there’s more post to do. Joe thinks it’s twice as hard. Kat says there are more board artists to “wrangle” and more picture to lock, sound effects to add, etc. Joe felt it was harder to adjust to the flow of 22 minutes after being used to squeezing for 11 minutes, and that sometimes it almost seemed like too much time, but Kat also likes that it could “breathe” a little and have some important quiet moments. They think the little bumpers were Joe’s idea, but he says he won’t take credit for the idea–just for drawing them.

McKenzie wants to know about the decision to do a 22-minute episode, and Joe and Kat said it was the network’s idea; they wanted at least two half-hour specials, maybe three but they only got to do two. (The other was “Gem Harvest.”) They then discuss having a special guest voice actor for an episode like this. Joe heaps praise on Bismuth’s voice actor Uzo Aduba, saying every read she gave was perfect. Kat says it’s disappointing when they can’t meet great voice actors like her because their involvement is so brief.

Kat re Bismuth’s initial character design having black eyes, intending to reflect the style of her inverted Gem, but they scrapped the design because it looked too suspicious. Joe says Bismuth was written to be very aggressive and gung-ho and got “put away” for how she expressed that. They recall Bismuth always having dreadlocks (they may not have always been rainbow), but some designs having very skinny legs early on. (Same with Smoky Quartz.)

Kat wants to specify that Bismuth is NOT a bad guy whatsoever; she just has a different ideology. Her ideology is relatable, actually; she thinks half the audience probably agrees with Bismuth. Rose, being a “gray” character, punished Bismuth for not aligning with her own philosophy, but Kat and Joe think nobody was clearly right or wrong in the episode and that was the point of telling that story in the first place. Moral ambiguity is very important, and Rose isn’t All Things Pure. Joe thinks Steven believed there was one “right” way to see the situation, but wasn’t willing to fight Bismuth over it.

McKenzie asks Kat and Joe to say what is similar between Bismuth and Jasper. “Size,” says Kat. Joe adds, “Muscles. Bludgeoning weapons.” They’re more different than the same; Bismuth is basically a blue-collar construction worker, in the dirt, while Jasper is a super-respected warrior. Bismuth rebelled when she found out she didn’t have to be that way and wants anarchy, while Jasper wants the order to remain forever. Joe expresses that Bismuth’s anarchist tendencies are cool, and Kat jokingly scolds him for inciting anarchy. But the Rule of Cool indicates that if something’s cool, it’s just cool, and it stays.