#showing off amethyst in a long and hero-like format though...

[shiningstages]

@aaetherius | starter call!

          Amethyst was strong. She prided herself on her strengths, both physical and mental, and thought herself a great leader when she needed to be one. Her training had certainly helped her pull her weight in the crew, and being with them just made her stronger, feeling the best she ever had. And yet she knew she still had her weaknesses, or that one slip up could negate all of her strengths entirely. So she tried her best to prepare herself for any situation that she could face, even against foes or monsters she had never met before, just to make sure to slim the chances of failure.

          Yet failure was also a part of learning. And she could be a strong leader while facing failure as well.

          Perhaps she was maybe too impulsive as the windstorm bore down on them, Prunella working both support and protection duty while caring for an injured woman, and Amethyst having to switch between both offense and defense because of that. If Prunella got hit badly with any attacks, it was simply game over for everything they were trying to accomplish at the current moment, but Amethyst was starting to get worse for wear when taking so many hits and near misses from this Rock Winger. The thought of a full retreat crossed her mind, yet that would mean leading it straight towards the village below, and they were tasked to stop this thing’s kidnapping of the people. But if they both went on the offensive, one slip up could mean the end of the villager’s life. Too many thoughts flashed across the young woman’s mind before she finally came to the first decision that made the most sense. Whether it was a smart decision or not...She’d never know, if she slipped up.

          A fire arrow soared true and landed on a clump of the massive bird’s feathers, briefly setting part of it ablaze as Amethyst screamed at Prunella to run. That they couldn’t just wait for the crew to find the strongest part of the storm where they were at; that Prunella had to both get the villager to complete safety and point all the crew members she could find in the right direction towards the fight. She didn’t mention the fearful thought that that meant she would be fighting on her own; that she was basically just a worn out distraction until reinforcements arrived, and that if something drastic happened that she could be as good as dead. Even if she thought it, and even if Prunella thought it, neither of them spoke a word on it. They both knew she was strong enough to last, or they at least believed and prayed in the belief that she was. And while Prunella did hesitate, visibly distraught by this order, barked out with fake confidence and forced smile by her best friend, she stated a simple “Stay safe.” before she bolted down the mountain. Amethyst couldn’t help but feel relieved by her quick acceptance, but she couldn’t relax if she didn’t want her potentially last exchange with her to be so laced with sad undertones, gaining the giant bird’s full attention with a couple more fire arrows, smelling the scorched feathers and flesh on the wind. What felt like forever was probably only a few moments, playing a cat and mouse game by hiding behind trees or rocks so as to not get clawed or forced over the edge, shooting arrow after arrow to hopefully weaken or blind it. Going for close-range attacks was just far too dangerous with the winds this thing could pick up, but Amethyst also only had so much ammo, so it was just a matter of time before ---

          Her last arrow. She felt the empty air in her quiver with one hand, while the other shook as it gripped her bow and last fateful tool. Her free hand went to steady herself against the tree she crouched behind, before a terrible cut of wind made the towering plant quiver and snap in multiple places, getting pierced and scratched up by little splinters while narrowly avoiding life-threatening impalement. She was already littered with slices across her skin; what was a couple more to add onto it? Not much in her mind, but she knew her body was lagging, and she wheezed while she ran for more cover, coughing up whatever pain her body wanted to reject. And yet there’s that fateful slip when she does it, this battle of time finally reaching the end as a glacial gust caught Amethyst before she could dive behind a protruding rock formation. Her weightlessness in the moment was both breathtaking yet awakening, not wanting to go out without a bang, quick-scoping the fearsome beast with that last arrow and firing. She wonders if it was her newfound height, or maybe Tiamat or any other primal of wind had her side, that made the arrow pierce one of the rock winger’s eyes, it’s terrible screech in pain popping her eardrums. Though, if Amethyst was to be a little cocky for the last time, then she’d admit she was great with chance shots like that.

          Then, as quickly as that little moment of celebration filled her, the winds sent her over the cliff and plummeting to the ground. Her mind screamed at her to try and grab a ledge or a tree if she could attempt it; even if her arm popped out of it’s socket or got broken or impaled, that was better than going splat or getting impaled in the chest. Her instincts at least told her to look for water, or to flatten herself out, or to just find anything that would cushion or slow her fall. But her thoughts were clouded with her little victory, and with fatigue in the face of her demise. If anything, she went out being as strong as she could be, and doing her duty of helping those in need. Even if regrets rose up in her, at least there was that...

          Then darkness fell over her as she shut her eyes. 

          By the time she was finally roused to consciousness, she was greeted with a warmth unlike any other. The gentle nature of the presence could almost lull her back to sleep, save for the aching pain she felt in her body, and the nagging sensation in the back of her mind that there was something wrong with feeling so comforted in this moment. Almost immediately, that thought mixes both with reborn regret and fear, eyebrows furrowing as her eyes shot open, needing to know her surroundings before she could confirm any sour suspicions. Yet she’s neither put off nor eased to find herself in unfamiliar territory, squinting as rain sounds protruded her mind, while the presence of cloth draped over her is registered, as well as her head resting on the lap of…

          Captain had said his name once. She felt herself finally ease under his presence, his brief biography flashing through her mind and making her wonder how exactly he had gotten here. Or, rather, how he got them both here; to wherever they were now, for now his being was the only thing that caught her eye. “Sir,” her voice is extremely hoarse, coughing into his chest before continuing, hands clutching at her chest, “how did...what...where are we?” There’s this heaving in her chest and breathless defeat in her voice when she finally gets out a question, a wave of fatigue riding on the growing ache through her body, eyes instinctively shutting tight before she forced them open again, though now in a groggy, half-lidded form.

[osrasaskblog]

Well, guys.

I really hoped that I wasn't going to make this post, but I'm afraid it needs to be done.

I started writing Opal, Sapphire, Ruby, and STEVEN! in 2016, when I was in high school. I loved the characters of Opal and Ruby and Sapphire and I wanted to see more of them than what was in the show. I was curious, what would it be like if they had swapped places with Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl? How would those different personalities work together? How different would things be if they were the characters that we followed? I would have loved to read a fic of it.

And then I figured, well, hey, why don’t I write a fic of it?

So I took to my little writing tablet and started up my new story. And I had so much fun doing it. I loved writing Ruby, who was a spitfire but also had a gentle heart. I loved writing Sapphire, who was cool and composed but always warmed up to her friends, especially Steven. I loved writing Opal, who was just so many things at once—a calm leader, but also a goofball, a wise war hero but also a cool aunt-like figure. Most of all I loved to write Steven, who was just so funny, a goofy and adorable kid who was also shouldering the responsibility of a world on his shoulders.

It was so relaxing to write these little episodic chapters, especially as the quiet kid in class who could never stay too far from her works-in-progress. I knew back then that I was going to be a writer someday, because I had this deep, passionate need to create stories and characters. But without an original idea of my own yet, I loved writing fanfiction. I think why I love to write fanfiction so much is because even though there’s something already there, I’m taking it and reforming it. I guess it’s kind of like those “finish this picture” pages in coloring books. There’s something already there, but you finish it—you decide what it will be. Is this pretentious? Maybe. I’m not always great with words, ironically.

So I wrote all these short chapters with this new set of characters, and I thought, I’m going to change things up. I didn’t just want it to be different characters saying and doing the exact same thing as the original story—I didn’t want to copy-paste the episodes scripts and use the “replace” tool to change the names. I came up with new backstories for the Crystal Gems. I looked at the original episodes and thought of how I could tweak them, mix them up a little bit.

The chapters started to get longer and longer because of this, and my own writing style developing a lot. Instead of just no-beta keyboard smashing between my classes, I actually sat down and wrote things out, put in more descriptions, more dialogue, etc. And for a really long time I thought that the same-but-different format of the story was a good thing. I thought it was fun to write new characters in new situations, while also having that familiarity—many reviewers would comment things like “I can’t wait to see how they’ll react to X!” or “I can’t wait until we get to [insert episode here]!” That was originally the whole point of the story—different situations, same characters.

I enjoy reading through my work sometimes. Though, I’ve said to several people that I avoid the first chapters of OSRAS because I just think my work was so subpar back then. And again, I liked the same-but-different story I had written. It was fun, it was simple.

Then things started to get different. When? Well, I can’t really pinpoint it, but if I had to guess:

I recall, though, as I was writing “The Ocean” (which was posted around the same time as the “Bismuth” episode) that something was off. Even though I enjoyed writing the fic, this chapter was my first curveball—because in the show, “Mirror Gem/Ocean Gem” is a gamechanger. It changes everything that had been established already, introduced a new character, and set a different tone from the series so far. And in writing this arc for OSRAS, I realized that I…didn’t really have much to offer.

The episodes were very Steven-and-Lapis centric. The Crystal Gems weren’t involved very much. So…what was really the point of writing it? Because the readers already know what’s going to happen. Even back then I looked at the chapters I wrote and thought, this doesn’t have that same-but-different appeal. It’s just the same. What about Steven talking to Lapis in the whirlpool was different from him talking to her atop the pillar of water?

Afterwards, the show started getting into its “everything is changing” point in Season 3. Soon after “Bismuth” came “Back to the Moon,” where we find out Rose shattered Pink Diamond. This was a big “oh crap” moment. Finding out that there was a Pink Diamond was a big “oh crap” moment, because this was when the fandom was at its peak of theorizing.

And even though I kept writing the fic, I was trying to figure out how I was going to tackle this. Because there was no way to get that shock into the fic. It would just be Steven reacting to something the readers already knew. No shock. No drama. Just marking stuff off the checklist. It happened in the show, so it would happen in the fic.

The same-but-different appeal didn’t seem like that anymore. It seemed more like a problem than anything. Like I said, reviewers often said stuff like “I can’t wait for this episode!” But one or two did say that they just didn’t feel the same way—that they couldn’t really see a point in writing a fic that was basically just the original series with a few minor tweaks. I don’t like brushing off criticism, in fact I love criticism, but to this I originally just shrugged and said, “Well, that’s what the fic is. Don’t like, don’t read, I guess.”

Now the problem was that I didn’t like it. I found some reprieve when I wrote chapters like “The Common Soldier,” which delved into the entirely-different backstory of Ruby, but then there was “The Test,” “The Invasion,” and “The Jailbreak.” And “The Jailbreak” was like…the point of the whole fic. The big thing that the chapters were leading up to, where Opal would be “revealed” as a fusion and Pearl and Amethyst would make their debut. And again, same-but-different. The readers were seeing what it would be like if they were the fusion instead of Ruby and Sapphire, and it’s fun, right? They’re not expecting to be shocked, they were reading for the “what if”, right? The biggest curveball I threw in that chapter was having Peridot fuse with Lapis instead of Jasper…which I decided to do when I began writing the chapter, so I scurried to figure out where I was going to go with it.

I decided that in the next fic (Twists & Turns) I would decide to amp up the differences. But I stumbled. “The Shock”, ironically, was not a shock. Opal and Steven find the Cluster just like how he and Garnet did. Then “The Mistake”, where even though the reason for Opal and Ruby’s fight was different, there was always going to be a fight. I struggled to find this balance between the familiarity and the need for something different. I figured, yeah, there’s still the desire to see new characters react to the same situations, but what else? That was it.

To try and remedy this problem, I started planning my chapters ahead instead of writing by the seat of my pants like I was. I started getting more and more into making things different. I tried to figure out how to make Chrysocolla different than Malachite, and came up with a “peaceful” resolution as opposed to the action-packed one. I would hit the same story beats, but I thought, the pull will be the different context and motivations.

But…the original series kept going, and we all know how it went. Rose turned out to be Pink Diamond. The Crystal Gems go to Homeworld to confront White Diamond. Steven finally changes her mind. And more than that, all the character arcs are wrapped up. Garnet embraces herself as a fusion, Amethyst finds her self-worth, Pearl decides to fight for herself rather than anyone else, etc, etc. A lot of stuff that just would not carry over to OSRAS. Like, how would I even try to recreate Change Your Mind??? How on earth would I find a way to write the Rose-is-Pink reveal without the readers going yeah, yeah, we know?

So I started to come up with a whole new thing. Or at least, I tried. This is where Star came from. Something completely new, completely original, to set the fic apart from the original series. I knew that I needed to create an ending for the story—and more than that, the characters. Opal, Sapphire, and Ruby all have their own individual stories that would need to be wrapped up.

But all the ideas that I had for the finale of the fic were vague and blurry. Which was really bad, because writing a story when you don’t know how it’s going to end is…very stressful. I realized eventually that I had made a very hellish situation for myself.

I wanted to write a new, original story. But the first ~36 chapters were just an adaptation of the original series.

I feel so awful right now because I feel like I lied to so many of my followers so many times. Some asked if Spinel was going to appear, and I said I think I found a way for her to fit in just fine…and then I dropped that whole idea, and thus lost a place for Spinel. Sometimes I said “I have a plan for how this will work out” when what I meant was “I plan to have a plan for how this will work out.”

So, to summarize:

1.       The original series started to become so lore-heavy that a “same story, different characters” fic was just not going to work.

2.       Even so, that was what the fic had been for a very large time. To write a new and original story, I would still have to work with what I had already done. Like the “finish the picture” page in the coloring book was like 99% done and I had very little space to make something creative.

3.       Because I no longer wanted to do a same-but-different story, I had to let go of the show’s original storyline and come up with my own…while I was already writing the story. Again, I had no ending for the story even though I was posting chapters for it as often as I could.

And I kept doing this for…years. Because I refused to let this fic go. I felt such an attachment to Opal, Ruby, and Sapphire and their stories that I had come up for them. The first fic was 259,004 words long. And Twists & Turns? 305,428. I couldn’t just throw that much work away, I had to salvage it. And more than anything, I still had so many follows, favorites, and bookmarks, readers leaving me reviews, people sending me asks into my inbox. When I went through rough times in my life and was slow on updates, so many readers comforted me, telling me it was okay. And I had people tell me that this fic was…important to them. That it made them happy when they were in rough times.

But the truth was…I just didn’t like this fic anymore.

Sometimes I found myself enjoying it still. Writing Jasper’s redemption arc was truly fun for me, one of my favorite things I’ve ever written. I love writing the comedy style of Steven Universe. I loved writing these characters and their interactions. And yeah, sometimes I would still re-read some of the earlier chapters and enjoy doing so.

But…

Every time I post up a new chapter, I just wish it was something else. Even if I loved Jasper’s redemption arc, Lapis and Peridot’s unique relationship, the fight between Steven and the Crystal Gems, it was like watching good scenes from a bad movie for me. Like yeah, this is nice, and I like it, but when I looked at the bigger picture, I was just disappointed. It felt like the original vision, a very simple and straightforward SU but Opal, Ruby, and Sapphire instead, had just…chained it down. I wanted to be creative, make a story that was original, but each chapter I’ve been posting lately just feels like that 99%-done picture.

And all those ideas for the finale just—never came together. Some became pretty clear. There were things that I came up with that I thought, Oh, that’d be so COOL! But because of what the fic already was, it would have never worked. It would’ve broken the rules of the setting, or it would have come out of nowhere with no buildup. I had a whole lot of puzzle pieces that wouldn’t fit together. The time that I put aside to try and figure this out were just hellish. I have spent hours staring up at the ceiling, trying to figure out how to end this story, and each and every time I’ve walked away with no progress and more stress than I can handle.

I can’t recall what all detail I’ve gone into, but I know I’ve told readers before that life has been stressful for me as of late. Not just with work and school, which are taking huge bites out of my time, but health issues and family issues, too. And it feels so stupid, to say that writing a fic for a children’s TV show was another problem, but the truth was that it was. I already had/have so many things weighing me down and causing me anxiety, and on top of all of them I’ve been putting time aside almost every day to worry about this story.

I’m writing this now after three hours trying to find a way to wrap up this fic and coming up with nothing. The only solution that I can find now, to just stick with the original storyline set up by the show, doesn’t feel like a solution at all. It would still have that huge, glaring problem: I have already seen this, so why should I read it? And probably a large part of that has to do with Steven being the protagonist, and already establishing that he’s going through an arc dealing with trauma and identity issues…just like the show did. Not adding anything new.

On top of the lack of a proper solution, though, the idea of writing three more seasons’ worth of OSRAS fills me with dread. This story, which has no set ending or resolution to its plot (let alone its character arcs), could take me years to finish in that absolutely unsatisfying manner I mentioned. That’s years of writing a story that I only find occasional joy in. Years of dedication to something that I just regret at this point.

So, I guess you figure by now that this is a bit of a farewell. And just writing that makes me feel so shitty. I feel like I’m about to cry now, because even though I’m committing to this decision, and even though I’m feeling relief already, I am wracked with guilt. I feel as though I’m letting so many people down. After months and months of “Sorry for the wait, promise more chapters are coming!” and months and months of “I promise we’re getting to X soon!” now I’m taking that all back. And again, I’ve had people tell me how much this fic means to them. I imagine that some people are going to be reading this, and they’re going to be hurt and angry and betrayed, and I honestly can’t blame them. Not just because I know firsthand how frustrating it is to have a story I really love be discontinued, but because I feel as though I’ve lied to my readers.

Unfortunately, as I said, I’m committing to this. This is just the only solution that I can find to this problem that’s been weighing down on me for years now. OSRAS is always going to mean something to me, because like I said, I did find joy in the characters and the interactions, the dialogue that I came up with. I wrote this story for five years. But the little joys weren’t enough to outweigh the stress. Ideally I want to say something like But maybe one day I’ll figure out a proper ending, but I can’t promise something like that.

WITH ALL THAT BEING SAID...

I’m attempting to work on a revamp at the moment. I still very much like the idea of a swapfic, but I’m going to need to make it from the ground-up. Maybe I’ll make Connie the same character; maybe I’ll put it in a different setting. I still have ideas for Ruby’s story as the last of her kind, and Opal’s unique situation of a fusion by necessity. Like I said, I did have some thoughts for how these could have been resolved, but with the current state of the fic, they wouldn’t be possible.

I’m going to leave the fics up, promise I won’t be deleting them. If anyone wants to ask questions, my inbox is open, but I can’t promise immediate answers. And if anyone wants to message me about plans I did have for the fic, feel free to do so, but I won’t be posting them publicly on the blog. I may revisit them if I ever go for a revamp. And some things I’m going to keep to myself, because they’re ideas that have a stronger chance of being revisited and I’d rather keep them secret.

So this is coming to be about 3,000 words now. And maybe 3,000 words is way too much for a “I’m discontinuing the fic” post, and maybe this is 3,000 words of pure overdramatic whining, but I wanted to give a full explanation here for why I’ve made this decision.

The second-to-last thing I wanted to say is that I’m sincerely sorry to anyone who feels hurt by this. Like I said, maybe one day I’ll try this again after all, but as-is, the state of OSRAS feels like a mess that I can’t fix. Plus I’m going to be a little selfish and do what’s going to relieve me of this stress. All I can say is that I am positive that if I decided to continue this fic, it would have been obvious in the writing that I’d lost my passion for it.

The last thing I wanted to say is a giant THANK YOU to all my readers and followers over the years. Even if OSRAS is over, I want each and every one of you to know that all your reviews, favorites, and bookmarks always made my day a little better. I only hope that if/when I get around to the revamp, it will be so much better than OSRAS was.

So, this is goodbye to OSRAS for now. Again, my sincerest apologies, and my sincerest thanks.

Sincerely, myself, Opal, Sapphire, Ruby, and Steven

[shinneth]

Gem Ascension Tropes (General: A - B)

Full, Superior Alternative on Google Docs.

So, I’ve been on the fence as to whether or not to publicly share this. In the end, it’s really nothing more than a project of self-indulgence. However, it is 100k+ words of self-indulgence and it does involve a story at least a decent number of my followers have read and liked. I also talk about a lot about Stevidot and all the characters in general for this project. Considering I haven’t written anything since the end of August (and real life interference is finally affecting my ability to reliably produce anything of substance since then), I figured it was only fair to offer something. I do still have the itch to write; I just really don’t feel comfortable doing it if I myself am not in a good state mentally or emotionally.

Why did I make this? Well, I’ve mentioned in the past that my other super-huge, much-more-popular story Travels of the Trifecta! eventually gained enough notoriety to not only make it to the Fanfic Rec list on TV Tropes, but a few readers were even gracious enough to make an actual trope page for the story itself. However, despite great temptations, I never once contributed to the page myself, for fear I’d never get the story done because of how addictive and time-consuming that site is. 

I was naively hoping Gem Ascension (or at least Bottled Up, which is easily my most popular story outside the main GA series) might get the same honors. But back then, I was also new to the fanbase and didn’t realize just how badly Stevidot as a ship was wrongfully considered an immoral ship... and still is. So that’ll probably never happen for real. 

That said, so long as I completed my initial 3-act series for GA, I considered it fair game to play around with tropes that I could associate with it. And I finished that sucker in record time. So, since the early months of Summer, I’ve slowly compiled a list of tropes for my GA continuity - so far for general coverage and character-specifics only. 

They’re similar to my GA Reference Tour posts in that aspect. Like I said, though, the entire document is over 100k in length, so no way is that all going up at once. The general listing is big enough to make me think it won’t fit in one post, either (especially as I continue to waste space rambling here). As the length alone proves, I was right to avoid doing this for Trifecta.

I wouldn’t consider it a complete (or even entirely accurate) listing; the character sections are very lop-sided in terms of content, but that’s a little justified, at least. Anyway, I did make some new art for certain character sections in future posts, so I figured this would at least be a neat way to share them. I’ve linked said tropes and everything. It’s really only worth a read if you’re that interested in getting some more in-depth details to the GAverse that I haven’t really covered here properly yet. But it does technically count as Stevidot content, so there’s the grab.

Beyond the spoiler cut, there are no marked spoilers. I’m not savvy enough to go THAT far with the style... plus, the main series has been complete since early March and it’s now October. Just... if you recently found the story, haven’t finished it, but actually intend to do so, look on at your own risk, I guess. 

Well, let’s see how much I can actually fit in here. And whether or not it’ll format properly. 

Edit: Turns out, only up to the K Tropes. Loooooovely~. Looks like I’m gonna play it safe and cut this after the Bs.

Edit II: As a bonus, I see the links being retained when I edit this post, but they won’t appear on the post itself. Just. Awesome. I may just put this up on Google Docs as an alternative if anyone cares that much about having the hyperlink access. That link is up. I’ll need to neuter these things something fierce so the hyperlinks will appear again.

GEM ASCENSION CONTINUITY TROPES

 GENERAL

 A Day in the Limelight: Act II as a whole functions somewhat like this; Hero Protagonist Peridot, save for the short final scene at the end of the act, is completely absent. She is frequently talked about and is featured in prerecorded Video Wills, but the 8 chapters Act II is comprised of are dedicated to the 8 remaining members of the main cast. Garnet, Pearl, Amethyst, Connie, and Steven – characters who had much less time to feature in Act I due to being captured during the first half – all have chapters entirely dedicated to them. Greg, despite being part of GA from the start, also had limited time to feature in Act I past Chapter 3 due to being a Non-Action Guy. His chapter is one of the longest; Greg is also involved in a subplot with Bismuth and Lapis, and as of Chapter 7, he receives a Rank Up and officially becomes a legit member of the Crystal Gems.

A Fate Worse than Death: Pallification. Not only worse than a gem’s shattering, but even corruption. It’s similar to corruption in that a gem is technically still alive, but their consciousnesses are greatly compromised. While a corrupted gem is more akin to a mutated rabid animal until a cure is found, a pallified gem’s body – while usually maintaining the integrity of its physical form – has been rendered soulless. Once White Diamond supplants their conscious minds with her own, she boots them out to parts unknown (she doesn��t even care enough for her own subjects to figure out what exactly she’s doing to their conscious minds) with no way for them to find their way back to their original body. It’s not even made clear whether or not a gem’s consciousness is killed off outright the moment White infects them. So, a pallified gem is basically condemned to eternal purgatory. Naturally, even after the events of GA, there are still millions of gems afflicted with this condition with no known cure to ail them. With White Diamond herself shattered at this point, these victims are little more than vegetables at best.

A Friend in Need: It must be stressed that the objective from the start of Gem Ascension was not to overthrow the Diamond Authority (and certainly not to destroy Homeworld itself): it was to rescue friends who were in trouble. Steven, Garnet, Amethyst, Pearl, and Connie were all imprisoned on Homeworld with no means to truly escape, so Steven resorted to sending an SOS to the Crystal Gems on standby on Earth. After taking charge of this mission, Peridot greatly emphasized their objective being a quick in-and-out after rescuing their friends as quietly as possible. Then the mission escalated with much higher stakes, but the objective remained the same. Act I concluded with all of the Crystal Gems safely escaping Homeworld and returning to Earth… save for Peridot. The follow-up mission, consequently, had the same objective: rescue Peridot, then escape. It was later amended to rescue all of Homeworld’s native gems once it was discovered that Homeworld itself was going to fall apart very soon. The revolution that came about with Homeworld’s destruction and the fall of the Diamonds were merely byproducts of the rescue mission. Only Pearl seemed to anticipate this kind of result, but none of the Crystal Gems were prepared to be responsible for keeping Era 3 going on Earth in Homeworld’s absence (as well as the Diamonds’). 

Acceptable Targets: In-Universe, the lower you are in the caste system on Homeworld, the more you’re expected to take abuse of any kind from any gem of a higher class. This is Who I Am goes further into depth on this topic; it’s revealed Peridots have no rights when it comes to being mistreated by gems above their class. Even worse, it’s illegal for a Peridot to antagonize a gem of a higher caste for any reason – yet it’s perfectly legal for elite gems, such as quartzes, to do whatever they wish to a Peridot so long as it doesn’t permanently damage them or compromise whatever mission they’re assigned together on. Yes, even if a low-caste gem is raped (like Peridot almost was), it’s legal and the victimized gem is fully expected to suck it up and deal with it.

Adaptation Expansion: Not only does the GA series serve as an alternative to Change Your Mind, but it frequently brings up events from past canon episodes. This isn’t done for nostalgia’s sake, but rather to expand on said scenes and observe them with a different lens. Through this, scenes in the show readers have seen multiple times can yield some new discoveries with the additional details and questions posed within the GA narrative.

Adaptational Alternate Ending: Takes place shortly after Escapism in the show. The first few minutes of Change Your Mind are canon to the fic (mainly Blue Diamond’s Heel-Face Turn), but it’s completely off the rails from there on out. So, it’s basically an alternative ending to Season 5.

After-Action Healing Drama: In Chapter 5 of Act I, after Peridot got caught in a No-Holds-Barred Beatdown with 9FC and sustained severe injuries in the previous chapter, the recently-rescued Steven uses Lion to take himself and Peridot somewhere private so he can heal her many injuries.

All For Nothing: The battle with White Diamond in Chapter 6 of Act III is this, as that wasn’t the real White Diamond to begin with. The Crystal Gems just wasted a load of time and energy on a proxy, and it’s the realization of this trope that causes said battle to abruptly turn in White’s favor, ending in a Curb-Stomp Battle with the Crystal Gems on the losing end.

Due to this aspect of the battle, it means Rainbow Quartz 2.0’s scheme to siphon off some of White Diamond’s essence (to later use for a cure for corruption and pallification when they return to Earth, knowing White’s never going to help willfully) was also a waste, and what Pearl and Steven gained was just the essence of a bunch of dead gems. Pearl has a bit of a minor Heroic BSoD in Chapter 7 over this, but Garnet pulls her out of it and encourages her to not give up on the endeavor.

All Up to You: The premise of Gem Ascension: Peridot, Lapis, Bismuth, and Greg step up to rescue their A-Team friends against all odds. 

Alternate Continuity: This story takes place shortly after Escapism. Beyond the first few minutes of Change Your Mind, it becomes canon divergent from there.

Anachronic Order: After Gem Ascension’s completion, a set of stories was released throughout the month of May that all took place in Gem Asension’s continuity (save for one, technically, which took place a while before GA starts and has no connections to said continuity outside of being referenced in a few of the other stories) for Stevidot Month. Justified, somewhat, as they were only released out of order due to representing at least one of three prompts assigned for the five weeks of Stevidot Month, and Word of God planned much of this on the fly. A couple of stories were pre-prepared (Plans Change and This is Who I Am’s first chapter), but didn’t fit any prompts other than the ones assigned to the final two weeks. Since May’s conclusion, all stories (in their AO3 incarnations) have been put in a collection and are arranged in chronological order.

Bottled Up is the only story that averts this, as it chronologically occurs before all the others listed here and was also the first one released in May. However, since it does take place a good amount of time before GA’s starting point, it can easily be read as a standalone. The same cannot be said for the stories following it.

My Time is Now, which properly introduces Sphalerite (who only got an unnamed, featureless cameo in Act III and spoke the very last lines of the story), takes place no more than half an hour after Act III’s conclusion, but it was also the last story released in May. 

Second-to-last was Plans Change, which took place only a few hours after the aforementioned story. 

This is Who I Am chronologically falls roughly half a week after that, but its first chapter was released in the middle of the month.

Peri-dise: The Capitalist Anarchy takes place about 1-2 months after GA Act III, making it currently second-to-last in GA’s overall continuity, but was the third story released overall during May’s second week.

It’s a Birthday, Yes It Is takes place in late August, making it the furthest-removed from GA’s timeline by 3-4 months (until the release of Our Tomorrow – a direct sequel to this story taking place exactly one year later, but won’t be listed here as it was made long after Stevidot Month ended). It was the second story released for Stevidot Month. 

Anyone Can Die: The moment White Pearl and Blue Diamond die (relatively close to the same time) by Chapter 6 of Act I makes it apparent no punches will be pulled in this story; especially after it’s made clear how much of a Complete Monster White Diamond is in this continuity. Yellow Diamond falls two chapters later, and at least for a short while it’s presumed Peridot met a similar fate. There’s also the concept of pallification, which renders several hundred gems functionally dead in Act I alone. The majority of the gems left on the planet end up pallified by the time the Crystal Gems return to Homeworld in Act III. By the climax of said act, White Diamond self-destructs. On a smaller scale, almost every original character introduced in GA either dies or is already dead upon introduction. 5XF is the only one so far who averts this.

Astral Projection: An aspect of Steven’s developing powers in Act III. During Chapter 4, an all-pink astral projection of Steven travels into Peridot’s subconscious to find out what White Diamond did to fragment her mind. A bit later in Chapter 8, astral projections of Steven and Peridot are seen superimposed over the corporeal forms of Pink Diamond 2.0 and Chartreuse Diamond to signify both coming to terms with their Alter Egos becoming part of them and becoming whole.

Autodoc: The restoration machines that are abundant and scattered across Homeworld, which the Crystal Gems use to speed up the recovery process for Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl at the end of Chapter 6 of Act I.

Badasses in Distress: All of the imperiled Crystal Gems at the start of the story qualify. After Act I, Peridot takes their place.\

The Big Damn Kiss: Steven gives Peridot a pretty significant one in Act I’s final chapter right in the middle of a large and busy battlefield before they split ways to help their friends. Punctuated with a deliberate Shout-Out to Gem Drill.

Big Damn Reunion: Chapters 6 and 7 of Act I is this, as is Chapter 5 of Act III for the follow-up rescue mission.

Birthday Episode: It’s a Birthday, Yes It Is serves as one for Peridot. It also loosely applies to Steven, as his birthday is less than two weeks before hers and is frequently referenced (the pair’s chronological ages are 14 and 15 respectively by this point). Our Tomorrow is a direct sequel to the aforementioned story taking place exactly a year later, making Peridot 15 and Steven 16.

Bittersweet Ending: GA’s conclusion in a nutshell. The Diamond Authority is no longer a threat to anyone, but Homeworld is destroyed, meaning the Crystal Gems have to directly deal with the fallout of this particular revolution while ensuring Earth’s safety. Now they have thousands, if not millions of gems to help adapt to life on Earth and teach the concept of independence and free thought. Homeworld’s colony planets are doomed to civil disorder and collapse unless the heroes directly help, but that also presents a risk if they don’t play their cards right. Peridot and Steven’s lives are irrevocably shaken in their own right, and they’re the ones who’ll have to be the most involved in helping the Homeworld refugees. And there’s still the matter of curing not only the corrupted gems, but now the pallids as well. While GA ended the best way it possibly could, given the circumstances, there’s still a lot of work ahead for the Crystal Gems… and a lot of it will be unpleasant/awkward at best and outright life-threatening at worst. 

Blank White Void: The nature of the Pocket Dimensions featured in Act III, save for the one Steven is initially imprisoned in at the end of Chapter 3.

[stevenuniversallyreviews]

Episode 63: Cry for Help

“I don’t understand.”

Pearl has done some awful things in Steven Universe. She nearly kills Steven in Space Race, and even if we ignore the rocket malfunction, her plan was to steal him from Earth for fifty years under false pretenses. She nearly kills Steven again in Rose’s Scabbard through inaction during a fit of furious sorrow. She indoctrinates Connie to see herself as fodder to be sacrificed at a moment’s notice. And she only apologizes in one of these cases.

Before Cry for Help, the show seemed pretty lax with Pearl’s tendency to lash out at others when in pain. While her grief explains her harmful decisions, it also appears to excuse them: most of our focus is on the suffering leading to her actions, not the victims of these actions. Steven comforts her every time she endangers him or his friends, which is nice of him, but suggests that his own feelings are secondary to hers. 

It’s honestly reminiscent of Island Adventure, where the show refused to acknowledge the severity of Sadie’s physical and mental abuse. The difference is that Pearl is shown to be in the wrong, while Sadie is portrayed as a hero despite abusing Lars, but it’s still troubling to see Pearl more or less get away with hurting people on a recurring basis. 

But it was all a glorious ruse. The Week of Sardonyx is here, groundbreaking for its depiction of a brutal rift that has almost nothing to do with the show’s title character, taking full advantage of the Steven Bomb format to tell a long-term self-contained story about what happens when Pearl finally gets called out for her toxic behavior.

If this story arc was condensed to a single episode, we would certainly spend it watching Pearl and Garnet. But with extra time to set the tone and understand the stakes, we instead see Pearl’s instigating betrayal from Amethyst’s point of view as the latter faces similar fusion woes. The focus on Amethyst is absolute (she even gets a song!), and it makes Pearl’s actions sting so much harder when her perennial rival’s reaction isn’t anger, or glee at the opportunity to tattle, but a deep and heretofore unseen discomfort. 

Amethyst, who uses motor oil as a condiment and hoards literal garbage, is ashamed of Pearl. But even so, she comes to Pearl’s defense after outing her deception, because unlike Garnet she can understand the rationale behind Pearl’s actions: Amethyst and Pearl both see Garnet as strong, and themselves as weak. Amethyst misses being Sugilite, conflating fusing with Garnet as a means to share her strength, so she gets why Pearl misses being Sardonyx.

In a conflict between Pearl and Garnet, the most obvious approach is to have our third Gem act as a mediator, but I’m so glad the show developed Amethyst to fit organically into that role. Not just because she’s secretly the most sensitive Gem, or because she understands Pearl without condoning her behavior, but because she’s spent Steven’s whole life as a bridge between him and the other Gems. When you’ve got two close friends coming to a head, there’s nobody better to have in your corner than a middle child.

Amethyst's other big role is as a counterpoint to the notion that being sad excuses selfishness or cruelty. Cry for Help encapsulates the series-wide reactions that Pearl and Amethyst have had to sorrow, and seeing both at the same time removes any doubt that Pearl's approach is unhealthy, even if Amethyst’s is far from perfect.

When Pearl gets especially sad, her self-loathing fuels her self-centeredness until she stops caring about how anybody else feels. This is obviously bad news for the people around her, but eventual remorse over her actions fuels her self-loathing even further, and the fire just keeps burning. Everybody loses when Pearl is sad.

But look at what happens when Amethyst is sad in Tiger Millionaire, On the Run, Maximum Capacity, and Reformed: her first response is to show off, usually to Steven. She longs to be included, to be looked up to, so she becomes hyper-aware of how she’s perceived. She plays up the attributes she desires in herself (respective to those episodes: strength, belonging, the ability to chill out without thinking about sad stuff, and a better sense of self) in hopes of hiding her vulnerabilities. Or perhaps just to cope? I wouldn’t want to get all psy-cho-logical on her.

Amethyst and Pearl both struggle with self-esteem. And their actions have some overlap: Pearl taking Steven with her in Space Race sounds like something Amethyst might do, and Amethyst ignoring Steven to hang out with Greg in Maximum Capacity sounds like something Pearl might do (minus Greg, of course). But the intents that prompt these actions are night and day. Pearl wants to punish herself and Amethyst wants to feel comfortable with herself. Pearl is depression and Amethyst is anxiety.

And then we have Garnet, whose healthiness has always been portrayed as a universal positive. She’s strong in every sense of the word, which is great, right? It makes her the bedrock of the team, and gives her an ironclad sense of right and wrong with the conviction to back it up. 

But it can also make her oblivious to suffering.

Nothing excuses what Pearl does to Garnet (which we’ll get to, don’t worry), but Cry for Help is part of a long line of episodes displaying the downside of Garnet’s strength: an inability to understand what it’s like to be weak, leading to many moments of callousness that honestly remind me of Pearl at times.

Remember how in Serious Steven she thinks plowing through the dungeon is the best option, even though Steven is clearly rattled? Remember how in Beach Party she’s incapable of caring about wrecking the Pizzas’ sign? Remember how in Monster Buddies she can’t see that her gauntlet is what’s bothering Centy? Remember how in Warp Tour she’s more interested in humoring Steven than taking his worries seriously? Remember how in Love Letters she prefers absolute bluntness to a polite but firm rejection? Remember how in Reformed she gets aggravated with Amethyst instead of exploring the root of the problem, leaving it up to Steven to figure it out? Remember how literally one episode ago in Chille Tid she ignores Pearl’s pleas to help out? Is it really any wonder she can’t see that Pearl and Amethyst are upset in Cry for Help?

This is a huge gap for a character that’s all about understanding, and it’s the reason the Week of Sardonyx is important for Garnet beyond making her a victim. Spoiler alert for Inside Out, but sadness is critical for nurturing empathy, and Garnet's general lack of sadness can make her miss when her friends are upset without...well, without a cry for help. There’s a reason it takes defusing into Ruby and Sapphire for her to start processing what happened to her, because Ruby and Sapphire are a lovable bundle of neuroses next to Garnet’s cool calm. 

But there’s also a reason defusing into Ruby and Sapphire doesn’t directly lead to Garnet forgiving Pearl, because holy shit Pearl. Once again, fusion’s value as a multi-faceted metaphor is crucial to the tone of the show: there’s plenty of sexual innuendo to it at times, particularly in Cry for Help’s dances, but the fact that it stands in for relationships in general instead of just sex is all that prevents Pearl from being a literal rapist. Not only is consent important, but we were explicitly reminded of this only three episodes ago in Keeping It Together. It would’ve been bad enough if Pearl did this with Amethyst or Steven, but Garnet is particularly concerned with consent in regards to fusion.

Cry for Help tones down the drastic implications of Pearl’s betrayal by giving Garnet a somewhat childish initial response (“You tricked me!”), but from there it pulls no punches portraying Garnet’s righteous fury. Amethyst’s defense only makes her angrier, because it doesn’t matter if Pearl had a motive for fusing with her under false pretenses, and it doesn’t matter that Pearl feels bad about it. Even if it isn’t read as sexual assault (and I genuinely don’t think it’s meant to be, given how the situation resolves), Pearl’s actions are a violation of Garnet, their relationship, and fusion itself. It’s the dark side of the insecurity that fueled the longing hopefulness of sister episode Coach Steven, and it packs the biggest emotional wallop of the series thus far.

There’s a feeling of hopelessness to the end of Cry for Help that I deeply appreciate, because really, where do we go from here? It’s unlikely that the show would break up the Crystal Gems permanently at this point, but there’s also no real reason for Garnet to ever trust Pearl again. Garnet’s still mad (and she should be), Pearl’s a wreck (and she should be), and Amethyst and Steven have no idea what to do. Cliffhangers like this are rare on Steven Universe, but it does so well at capturing the awkward, awful aftermath of a friend wronging a friend.

Because despite all of this, Pearl is still Garnet’s friend. And I’d argue that despite all of this, Pearl is still a good person. In fact, I’d argue that Pearl being a good person is the most important thing about the Week of Sardonyx. It’s easy to tell a story about a bad person doing a bad thing, but most people see themselves as good, and most people have done at least one bad thing. If we write Pearl off as a monster and leave it at that, what room is there for us to learn? If doing one horrible action is enough to make you a villain, what hope is there for anyone?

I say this while knowing that I’m actually pretty quick to condemn people forever for certain actions: namely, try as I might, I struggle to see any reason for any rapist to be allowed to live. Like, to the point where my first wish if I ever nabbed a genie would be for every rapist on the planet to vanish and get replaced with a note that says “Don’t mourn for me, I was human garbage.” (Obviously there would be many footnotes for this wish; for instance, if a rapist is a pilot I don’t want to endanger folks on a flight, so extra magic would have to intervene. I have really thought this out, I got the footnotes all set, I am ready to find a genie.)

If that’s how I feel, how is it that I have such empathy for Pearl, even though I’m completely on Garnet’s side? It’s not that she’s fictional, because I’m not huge on fictional rapists either. And it’s not that her action isn’t actually rape, because it’s still a gigantic violation. So I honestly don’t know. But Steven Universe is capable of making me examine how I view the world in a way few shows can, and even if I don’t think the Week of Sardonyx quite sticks the landing, the opening is appropriately wrenching stuff.

(With funny weeping foodstuffs to keep the younger audience from getting too upset. Not the subtlest subtext in the world, but I’ve got no beef with kids’ shows keeping things grounded for kids.)

Future Vision!

Nothing too direct, but the Week of Sardonyx’s angst returns with a vengeance in the Breakup Arc immediately following Wanted. Multiple episodes of working through an argument? Check. A sense of betrayal involving fusion? Check (sorta). A resolution brought about by a common enemy? Check. The biggest difference (beyond the shifted focus to Steven) is that the Breakup Arc is more invested on making you miserable on an episode-by-episode basis, making it even harder to watch. Want a break from Steven and Connie not talking? Have a secondary breakup between Peridot and Lapis!

Pearl’s similarity with Spinel makes the movie’s exploration of a suffering Gem’s toxic reaction to pain a fascinating companion piece to the Week of Sardonyx. The major difference is that Pearl hurts others due to selfish thoughtlessness and Spinel’s goal is hurting others, but both have great reasons to feel terrible, neither has a great reason to inflict this pain upon others, and both need to make a change.

We’re the one, we’re the ONE! TWO! THREE! FOUR!

This is the episode in my “Love ‘em” category that I’ve watched the least, because it’s a tough one. I more appreciate Cry for Help than enjoy it, because it’s not meant to be enjoyable, but it’s still worth putting up there because man does it nail the tone.

Top Fifteen

Steven and the Stevens

Mirror Gem

Lion 3: Straight to Video

Alone Together

The Return

Jailbreak

Sworn to the Sword

Rose’s Scabbard

Coach Steven

Giant Woman

Winter Forecast

Chille Tid

Keeping It Together

On the Run

Warp Tour

Love ‘em

Laser Light Cannon

Bubble Buddies

Tiger Millionaire

Lion 2: The Movie

Rose’s Room

An Indirect Kiss

Ocean Gem

Space Race

Garnet’s Universe

The Test

Future Vision

Maximum Capacity

Marble Madness

Political Power

Full Disclosure

Joy Ride

We Need to Talk

Cry for Help

Like ‘em

Gem Glow

Frybo

Arcade Mania

So Many Birthdays

Lars and the Cool Kids

Onion Trade

Steven the Sword Fighter

Beach Party

Monster Buddies

Keep Beach City Weird

Watermelon Steven

The Message

Open Book

Story for Steven

Shirt Club

Love Letters

Reformed

Rising Tides, Crashing Tides

Enh

Cheeseburger Backpack

Together Breakfast

Cat Fingers

Serious Steven

Steven’s Lion

Joking Victim

Secret Team

Say Uncle

No Thanks!

     4. Horror Club      3. Fusion Cuisine      2. House Guest      1. Island Adventure

[aion-rsa]

Tell Me A Story: 15 Weird Superhero Comic Book Formats

Over their several decades of existence, American superhero comics have had to adapt to changing market conditions and changes in reader habits. Anthologies were more popular in the Golden Age but dwindled away as the Silver Age ended. Early Marvel superhero books incorporated continuing subplots to create super-soap operas, and DC naturally followed suit. Today, even as the individual issue with 20 story pages still dominates as the standard comic book format, many readers wait for collected editions.

RELATED: The 15 Weirdest Comic Book Swimsuit Specials

And yet, every now and then there are isolated instances of experimentation in which a publisher bends those dominant formats to either stretch storytelling possibilities or just to attract attention. Never mind the menagerie of 1990s-era cover gimmicks or the modern effects that digital and motion comics can achieve; good old-fashioned print had some surprising tricks. Today, as the “Kamandi Challenge” revives an old DC experiment, we look back (in no particular order) on some odd and unusual ways to present superhero stories.

ROCKIN’ ROUND-ROBIN

If you think creative teams don’t stick around as long as they used to, then you need to consider the round-robin format used in 1985-86’s “DC Challenge” miniseries and currently in use by the “Kamandi Challenge.” Each issue has a different creative team and the only real rule is to end on a cliffhanger for the next team to resolve. Notice that the rules don’t include “tell a coherent story,” because as much fun as the “DC Challenge” teams apparently had on each of their issues, boy-howdy was it hard to follow!

It started with Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Adam Strange and some demons in Mark Evanier and Gene Colan’s “DC Challenge” #1, but before it was over, Nazis had won World War II, Superman had a red sun for a head and the JLA Satellite was full of confused super-people. Nevertheless, the round-robin can stretch the capabilities of both readers and creators, and it truly shows off comics’ limitless potential.

A BIG DELIGHT

Likewise, we include the ubiquitous one-page Hostess Cupcake ads of the 1970s for the only rule they appeared to have: Make sure the product is the star. That was the point, of course; but for readers used to Batman and Daredevil fighting ninjas and serial murderers in their regular books, the ads were a bit jarring to read.

Although they featured even wilder plots than the regular comics (birds stealing the Statue of Liberty, for example) and used ultra-powerful characters like Green Lantern and Captain Mar-Vell, the day was always saved by the timely appearance of Twinkies, Hostess Cupcakes or Fruit Pies. Granted, who among us can resist rich chocolate taste and/or creamy filling. But the ads were so prevalent that, after a while, one got the impression that the Justice League and Avengers could have saved themselves a lot of trouble by stuffing the Anti-Monitor or Thanos full of sweet treats.

COMICS WITHIN COMICS

In the early 1980s, DC previewed new series with 16-page stories bound into the middle of selected single issues. The “Amethyst” preview was in “Legion of Super-Heroes” #294, “All-Star Squadron’s” was in “JLA” #192, and a little series called “New Teen Titans” was first seen in the middle of “DC Comics Presents” #26.

These previews didn’t have anything to do with the titles they appeared in, but later in the decade, “Bonus Book” inserts tied in more closely and featured up-and-coming talent. Today, the format is back, sort of, through “Dark Knight III’s” bound-in mini-comics. Basically they’re backup stories, but since they’re physically in the middle of the issue, you have to get around them in order to finish reading the main story, and then circle back and hope you read everything in the right order. Whatever you do, though, don’t risk your comics’ value (or its staples) by removing the inserts.

HEARD ANY GOOD PICTURES LATELY?

Another staple of the 1970s, Power Records specialized in book-and-record sets where kids could read along with an audio dramatization. Along with superheroes, the label featured sci-fi franchises like “Star Trek” and “Planet of the Apes.” While Power adapted existing issues, like September 1972’s “Fantastic Four” #126, December 1973’s “Captain America” #168 or January 1974’s “Incredible Hulk” #171, Neal Adams’ Continuity Studios also produced original stories for the label.

These included the Batman tales “Stacked Cards” and “Robin Meets Man-Bat” (reprinted in “Batman Illustrated By Neal Adams” volume 3); Superman stories by Cary Bates, Elliott S. Maggin and Ross Andru; and a 1976 Conan adventure by Len Wein, J.M. DeMatteis and John Buscema that was reprinted as November 1980’s “Conan” #116. Although the novelty comes from hearing an actor screech like Man-Bat or roar like the Hulk, we imagine “writing for the record” is a skill set all its own.

NEXUS IN STEREO

Sometimes the soundtrack is part of the main series. “Nexus” was a superhero series set 500 years in the future, initially published under Capital Comics and now owned by Dark Horse. Writer Mike Baron and artist Steve Rude’s independent sci-fi superhero classic started out as a magazine-sized black-and-white comic.

Bound into its third issue was a “flexi-disc” with the “Nexus” theme song (co-written by Baron) and an audio dramatization. An editorial explained the benefits: “The intonation of a character’s voice, background music to set the mood and electrifying sound effects all add new depth and dimension to the printed words and art.” While flexi-discs wouldn’t be in every issue, the editorial promised “next time we do this it’ll be even better.” However, there was never to be a “next time,” unfortunately, as the flexi-disc doesn’t show up in reprints and there weren’t any future issues that came accompanied with flex-discs to enjoy. However, “Nexus” turned out to be memorable enough without the audio accompaniment.

INDEPENDENT VOICES

Although it’s not really a distinct format to pair mainstream, corporate-controlled characters with comics creators from more of an independent background, anthologies like the “Bizarro Comics” and “Strange Tales” series are often both entertaining and illuminating.

“Bizarro” allowed DC to reprint Kyle Baker’s instant-classic “Letitia Lerner, Superman’s Babysitter” and “Strange Tales” gave us Kate Beaton’s take on Rogue and Kraven. Tom Scioli and John Barber’s “Transformers vs. G.I. Joe” series, which merged the superfans’ knowledge with their unique styles and filtered it through a ’70s Jack Kirby lens, is also a good example of combining the best of both worlds. Of course, with the Internet, it’s become easier than ever to find cartoonists’ “unsanctioned” takes on superheroes, but the official sanctioning of a DC or Marvel anthology may sand down some rough edges. Still, the freedom these creators normally enjoy usually transfers pretty well, and we’re all better for it.

NEXTWAVE EXTRAS

Warren Ellis and Stuart Immonen’s 12-issue cult-classic “Nextwave” (2006-07) took shots at a lot of superhero-comics targets, but it also used some memorable gimmicks to grow an audience. Mixed into Fin Fang Foom’s pants-related anger, the filthy half of the Captain’s codename and Machine Man’s contempt for fleshy ones was the “Nextwave” theme. So too were things like issue #5’s “Crayon Butchery Variant.”

Yes, quite a while before adult coloring books became a thing, “Nextwave” encouraged its readers to cast off the shackles of hues imposed from on high and color the issue themselves. Granted, this was a variant, so readers had to make an extra effort to get it. So unsurprisingly, the non-colored version of the issue hasn’t been reprinted in any “Nextwave” collection. As a further incentive, though, Marvel conducted a coloring contest, and the winner’s name (Matthew Keegan, whose entry can be seen here) was forever immortalized in said collections.

EASY LIKE SUNDAY MORNING

The 12-issue weekly “Wednesday Comics” was designed to emulate the classic comics pages of Sunday newspapers, when adventure strips like “Prince Valiant” and “The Phantom” got ample room for their Sunday-continuity installments (Feel free to ask your grandparents for more details.). Each issue of “Wednesday Comics” folded up into a standard 7″ x 10″ comic-book size, but opened into 15 gigantic 14″ x 20″ broadsheet pages.

The features included DC’s A-listers as well as Kyle Baker’s “Hawkman,” Dave Gibbons and Ryan Sook’s “Kamandi” and Paul Pope’s “Adam Strange.” Neil Gaiman and Mike Allred’s “Metamorpho” even did two pages which combined to form the Periodic Table of the Elements. “USA Today” also published John Arcudi and Lee Bermejo’s “Superman” strip. The collected edition is similarly impressive, and includes a “Plastic Man” short feature; but nothing beat the love-of-reading experience from picking up each issue as it came out.

EVENTS PUBLISHED IN REAL TIME

One series which demanded to be read as it came out was 2006-07’s sequel to “Infinite Crisis,” the year-long weekly “52.” Since all of DC’s ongoing superhero comics had gone through a one-year time-jump, only “52” chronicled the missing year. Its brain trust, which included writers Geoff Johns, Mark Waid, Grant Morrison and Greg Rucka, and layout artist Keith Giffen, further imposed a strict real-time rule that each issue would cover one week. The only cliffhanger involved one issue ending at 11:59 p.m. and the next starting at midnight.

The method was popular enough, with some fans reportedly waiting to read each day’s events as they “happened,” meaning a fan on a Tuesday would stop reading on when he or she reached the part of the issue dealing with a Wednesday. There had been real-time comics before (the “Batman: No Man’s Land” epic played out over the course of a year, for example, from January to December 1999), but with elastic timelines a staple of superhero storytelling, “52’s” adherence to its internal rules was both a clever gimmick and a steadying influence on its pacing.

TRIANGLE TIME

Some superheroes are simply too big for one book, but when a hero has multiple comics titles being published, those books don’t necessarily have to flow together. When they do, however, the results can be quite engaging. In the early 1980s, Bat-writer Gerry Conway structured issues of “Batman” and “Detective Comics” so that “Detective” continued “Batman’s” stories, and vice versa. The format ended with 1986’s “Batman” #400, but not long afterwards the three Superman books (“Action Comics,” “Adventures of Superman” and “Superman”) picked it up.

To keep everything straight, the Super-titles put the reading order in a little triangle on each issue’s cover. It lasted about 10 years, before including the addition of a new monthly series (“Man of Steel”), as well as incorporating a new quarterly book (“Man of Tomorrow”) for the months that had five Wednesdays in them. It could be overwhelming at times, but the four series combined to tell some true epics, including the “Death of Superman,” “Funeral For A Friend” and “Return of Superman” story arcs.

PAGE-HOPPING

We’ve already talked about comics within comics, but Walt Simonson’s “Fantastic Four” #352 (May 1991) presented a story within a story, and the “inner” story was out of sync with the “outer” one! The main (“outer”) story involved Doctor Doom, Ben Grimm reverting back to the Thing, and Ben’s girlfriend Sharon Ventura giving up her own career as the Thing in her absence.

Doom had captured the FF and challenged Reed Richards to a duel using time-jumping devices. Their fight, which was waged across increments of minutes and seconds, was the “inner” story, and it unfolded in out-of-sequence vertical panels that ran alongside the in-sequence main story. Readers had to follow the timecodes in both stories in order to keep everything in order, and could check their work with the occasional panel where the two timelines intersected. It was a great use of single-issue real estate and the kind of innovative technique “FF” helped pioneer.

DIAL “R” FOR READER

Created by Dave Wood and Jim Mooney for January 1966’s “House of Mystery” #156, “Dial H For HERO” was one of Silver Age DC’s crazier concepts. It involved a magic “H-Dial” which would turn its owner into a randomly-generated superhero and, more often than not, a one-off character created specifically for the story.

The feature ran until issue #173 (March-April 1968) but was revived in February 1981 via a special insert (remember those?) in “Legion of Super-Heroes” #272. (It then moved to “Adventure Comics” and was a backup in “Superboy.”) This time, writer Marv Wolfman and artist Carmine Infantino’s gimmick was using characters submitted by readers, who both received credit for the idea and had a T-shirt sent to them in exchange for their intellectual property. While it was probably a time-saver for the creative team, no doubt they also wracked their brains trying to figure out how to work Lawnmower Lass, or whomever, into the stories.

THIS COMIC CAN KILL YOU

In “Animal Man,” Grant Morrison famously broke the fourth wall to introduce himself to the main character, Buddy Baker. Over 20 years later, Morrison would revisit the idea of characters addressing the reader directly in his “Multiversity” miniseries, especially in the “Ultra Comics” one-shot, which was an installment about a character named Ultra from the “real world” of Earth-33, who was a comic book come to life.

In other words, “Ultra Comics” was about itself, and by reading the issue, readers participated in the character’s life, including his birth and (very short) career. At the end of the issue, Ultra sacrificed himself by trapping his foe within the pages of the comic, begging readers not to let it out. To that point, “Multiversity” was already pretty meta-textual, so “Ultra Comics” was over the top on a number of levels. Nevertheless, the reader-participation angle gave the miniseries an entirely new dimension.

CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE COMICS

One of the many tools in Ryan North’s utility belt is a knack for choose-your-own-adventure storytelling. Besides his great mostly-prose Shakespeare adaptations (“To Be Or Not To Be” and “Romeo And/Or Juliet”), he’s also written a couple of chooseable-path comics. In November 2012’s “Adventure Time” #10, he and artist Shelli Paroline crafted a labyrinthine tale about the Ice King putting our heroes under the control of a mysterious force (guess who) which got more and more twisted as the issue played out. The ending even depended on the sheer number of options the story eventually encompassed.

More recently, in June 2016’s “Unbeatable Squirrel Girl” #7, North and artist Erica Henderson allowed the reader to guide Squirrel Girl to victory against Quoggoth, Swarm, and/or Doctor Yes, with Galactus himself as your host. Chooseable-path comics aren’t new (see “The Unwritten” #17, for example) but North has brought them back into the limelight and made them a one-man trend.

TITANS SEPARATELY

Superhero comics of the early ’90s get well-deserved attention for the cover-enhancement craze. Therefore, to stand out from all the chromium and foil, DC promoted September 1992’s first issue of “Team Titans” with — wait for it — alternate interiors. That’s right, not only did “Team Titans” #1 feature variant covers for each of the five Titans, each variant also included the 18-page origin of its cover-featured hero.

Accordingly, if you wanted to get the whole story, you had to buy five different issues (all of which were written by Marv Wolfman). That was overkill, since the variants all shared the same 22-page main story; and on top of that, the main story was Part 3 of a Titans-franchise crossover! Those of you doing the math will realize that if you bought all five variants, you got 4 extra copies of Part 3 of the crossover. Needless to say, DC decided to keep the variants on the covers only from then on.

Got a favorite storytelling strategy or comic book gimmick? Tell us in the comments!

The post Tell Me A Story: 15 Weird Superhero Comic Book Formats appeared first on CBR.com.

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