Steven Universe S02E26, "Log Date 7 15 2"

[kate_nepveu]

Well, that was adorable, but it kind of feels like a cheat that it didn't come before yesterday's episode.

I saw someone mention that Garnet's visor reflects more blue or more red in particular circumstances, and when she catches Greg off the roof, it definitely looks more blue.

Also Garnet is the BEST, period. (And the shipping stuff in the VHS tape was redeemed by her being able to use that as shorthand at the end, because otherwise it felt a little on-the-nose. Also the dude in the clip had yellow diamonds on his camp uniform.)

It was really nice to see Pearl and Amethyst continuing to get along well, Amethyst not being upset when Pearl suggested more precision was needed and them fusing so neatly.

In sum: cute; still not convinced it was optimal structurally.

Comments

[snarp]

Peridot's shipping diagram is partly a call-out to Homestuck, which prominently features a constantly-yelling alien kid doing exactly that, similarly to the weariness of his human ex-enemies. Lauren Zuke and like a third of the other animators are in the fandom, and at least one person apparently got hired partly on the basis of her Homestuck fanart.

[kate_nepveu]

Cool, thanks for the information!

[rushthatspeaks]

The only good point of analysis in the A.V. Club review of this ep was that the writer pointed out that structuring this episode the way it is gives Steven control of time, as otherwise things like fast-forwarding aren't possible. Their theory then becomes that the reason the flashback ep is after It Could Have Been Great is that it would remove the suspense. I see where that comes from, but I am not certain I'm entirely convinced.

[kate_nepveu]

I think the suspense would have been _more_ meaningful if we had a sense of what was really at stake--Diamond-worship versus a deeper affection than we'd seen, and if Peridot said she was going to try to bridge those with the proposal to Yellow Diamond, then when Y.D. said no, which way was Peridot going to jump, because that's genuinely a hard choice? As opposed to "no, she's going to betray them, chase scene, wait, where did this 'the Cluster is inefficient' argument come from, suddenly Y.D. is a clod?"

[skygiants]

I'm still a little confused about the timeline of Log Date -- how does it fit in around the past couple episodes? I don't really have complaints, I thought it was deeply charming, but I frequently feel kind of temporally displaced with SU.