Ingrid and I are re-watching the entire Steven Universe series — yet again — and I thought I’d blog some of my observations. Please note: I’m not writing these as a series summary or recap. I’m just writing down some of my observations and reactions, about individual episodes and the show as a whole. These posts will probably make more sense if you’ve already seen the show, but I hope they inspire the rest of you to check it out, as it really is one of the richest and most emotionally intense things I’ve seen on TV. This post contains spoilers about Steven Universe: the show as a whole, and/or about Episode 8: Serious Steven.

“This is just like the teacups!”

I’ve never been a parent, but I’ve been a kid. And I think one of the hardest things about being a parent has got to be deciding when kids are old enough for what kind of danger.

As a parent, it’s your job to keep your kids safe. But you can’t protect kids from every danger forever. Someday they’re going to have to do things like cross the street without holding your hand, use the stove, walk to school alone, drive, find their way around a strange city. If your three-year-old is behind the wheel of a car, you’re not doing your job: if your sixteen-year-old can’t cross the street alone, you’re not doing your job, either.

These decisions aren’t just going to be different for different ages. They’re going to be different for different kids. And they’re going to be different in different cultures and situations. If you’re growing up on a farm, you’ll have to learn to face different dangers earlier than if you grow up in a city, and vice versa. If you’re being brought up in a family of acrobats, if you’re the child of hard-core wilderness explorers, if you’re growing up in a war zone… you get the drift. And of course, these decisions are going to be different if the kid you’re bringing up is a magical half-human living in an uneasy temporary peace in a war between humans and aliens.

Because the show is often so cute and sweet and funny, especially in the earlier episodes, it’s easy to forget that the stakes in the Stevenverse are very high. Steven doesn’t just have to learn to cook and drive and find his way around a city. He has to learn to control his magical gem power so he can protect the Earth, from the living mutant remains of a terrible war, and from the return of the war that’s very likely coming. (I’ll get into this more later on, but I think this show isn’t just about childhood and kids’ relationships with adults — I think it’s about being a child in wartime.)

It’s telling that at the beginning of this episode, Garnet tells Steven, “This is your first serious mission.” Steven’s been on missions before this, in “Cheeseburger Backpack” and “Laser Light Cannon.” So I think the emphasis here is on “serious.” Steven isn’t being taken on the mission for the missions’ sake, or even to hone his gem skills. He’s being taken to learn seriousness itself. He’s being taken to learn that there are times when you march around like a robot, touch things because they look cool, or bring your ukulele along because you’re excited and it’s yours and you like it — and times when you don’t. There are times when you have to stay alert and think carefully. There are times when you really need to keep your balance because falling could hurt or kill you, so you don’t do a little happy-dance. And the exact same act — like jumping off the spinning thing — can be smart or foolish, depending on the situation, and depending on whether you’re reacting impulsively or are acting thoughtfully, making a plan, and taking a calculated risk.

That’s a hard balance even for adults to get right. I think it’s even harder for kids. And I imagine it’s one of the hardest things to teach kids — what to worry about and what not to. This balance isn’t just about figuring out what to worry about, either — it’s figuring out what not to worry about. Steven doesn’t yet understand this: he goofballs his way through the whole first part of this mission, he’s sucked out of the warp stream and gets dropped from a great height and is fine with it, but he freaks out about butterflies getting in his eyes. I also think it’s interesting that in “Serious Steven,” Pearl errs on the side of overprotection and caution, not wanting to let Steven do anything dangerous; Amethyst errs on the side of “Whatever, dude”; and Garnet, as is often the case, is the one to get the balance closer to right. She knows Steven needs to be exposed to some dangerous situations — and she also knows that he needs to be carefully monitored when he is. It’s a hard balance to strike, but her wisdom is in knowing that it is a balance.

Side notes: I do think the teacup incident is a little unfair. That was not even remotely Steven’s fault. When you get on an amusement park ride, it’s reasonable to assume that you will not be able to jump off the ride when you get sick, or that the ride will fly into pieces when you do.

If you’re planning to become a hard-core fan who comes up with complicated fan theories about Gem origins, pay attention to the murals inside the upside-down pyramid.

And my inner archaeologist is dying a thousand deaths at the casual destruction of the pyramid.