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i've said before and i'll say it again, the real reason steven universe "fell from grace" in the eyes of exceedingly boring people is because it said and continues to say that you can be as monstrous as anyone else and refused to be a revenge fantasy cartoon bros got used to,
there is no power fantasy where you finally defeat the greatest evil and is validated for being better than them. the goal is not for you, the "good" person, to defeat monsters, it is to acknowledge the inherent monsterhood of anyone & wrongness of putting people on pedestals.
this is why the SU crit environment really "started" with pearl being an interesting character in s2, why it got ramped up further with "bad" characters you didn't personally relate to (the only real measure most people care about) got humanized, why it went wild with rose not
being a perfect person, and why they hate that steven got to be a flawed character who makes others and himself uncomfortable in future. they have never once been able to process gray areas or intentional discomfort on the part of the writing, and most cartoons validated this.
