Spoilers ahead!
With five new episodes and a van-load of surprises, last week was a doozy for Steven Universe fans. After learning that Rose Quartz was actually Pink Diamond, the normally composed Garnet—feeling shocked and betrayed—unfuses.
Ruby and Sapphire spend some time soul-searching, but ultimately find their way back to each other in "The Question." To create a future that's purely theirs, Ruby takes destiny in her own hands and gets down on one knee and proposes.
"Sapphire, will you marry me?"
"What?" replies Sapphire. "Marry you?"
"This way we can be together even when we're apart! This time being Garnet will be our decision. What do you say?"
Sapphire smiles, "Of course."
The episode is the first time a same-sex proposal has been seen on a mainstream children's show. And if that weren't enough, Friday's 22-minute episode, "Reunion," features a kid's show's first same-sex wedding.
Despite the potentially Earth-shattering reveal that Rose is Pink Diamond, the latent gem cluster buried in the center of the Earth that could destroy everything, and the imminent threat of revenge from Blue and Yellow Diamond, Steven propositions the Crystal Gems, for just one day, to only think about love.
The day couldn't be any cuter as the gang prepares for the wedding ceremony. Pearl and Amythest don sleek black tuxes. Bismuth wears her best armor. Peridot takes her flower girl duty a bit too seriously. The usually feminine Sapphire wears a navy blue suit and the casually butch Ruby wears a wedding dress complete with flowers in her hair.
"We are here today to celebrate Ruby and Sapphire, two of my favorite people who combine into one of my other favorite people," begins Steven. "You all probably know her as Garnet. She is their love, given form. Now it’s your turn to talk about that."
Ruby blushes, "I know this is all kind of silly. I mean, we’ve been together for 5,750 years."
"And eight months," chimes in Sapphire.
"I used to think I wasn’t much good, just one of me on my own," Ruby continues. "But when we’re together, it feels like it’s okay to just be me. So I just want to be me, with you—and not even the Diamonds will come between us! And if they try, we’ll beat ’em up!"
Sapphire chuckles as she begins, "Ruby, my future used to look like one single obvious stream, unbending until the end of time. In an instant, you pulled me from that destiny and opened my eye to an explosion of infinite possible futures, streaking across space and time, altered and obliterated by the smallest force of will. What I mean is, you changed my life, and then I changed your life, and now, we change our lives."
Bismuth passes the duo their wedding rings, Ruby and Sapphire say their "I do's" and Steven pronounces them as Garnet—and queer hearts everywhere exploded from a cuteness overload as the two gems kiss and fuse to become one once more.
Series Creator Rebecca Sugar understood how important this moment would be, not only for the show, but for queer representation and visibility.
"I wanted to really create an image of a queer couple that makes sense together," she told Variety. "Usually the couple is a man and a woman. But you don’t show that love can exist between two men or two women. I wanted to create equal-opportunity love stories for children."
"[The show’s crew] all wanted to tell stories from our own childhoods that we hadn’t seen reflected onscreen before. And we didn’t want to hold back showing things that were very specific to us...I’m fascinated by animation as a medium because it gives this illusion of simplicity but it’s very difficult to create. It allows us to create iconography that has an amazing power to normalize things."
Watch Steven Universe on Cartoon Network.
