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[echobeartheorist]

Star vs the Forces of Evil - Toffee’s Plans

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 3 Episode 7 “Toffee” July 15 2017, the most recent episodes released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Star vs. the Forces of Evil please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

Well, it’s been a long time since I put one of these out, the avalanche of episodes second half of season 2 was good for binge watching but not so much for having enough time to write out a well thought out theory.  Now we have enough extra lore to really do it, and for better or worse plenty of time before the next episode so I can write this out in peace. Even better, I think I have enough pieced together for one of the more interesting and mysterious things so far on the show: what Toffee was planning.

His Original Plans

From the episode “Moon the Undaunted” we find most of the clues of what Toffee was originally trying to do. There used to be an official king and queen of the monsters and they were planning to sign a peace treaty with the mewmens. Toffee was a general of the monster army, and using his charm and strength as an indestructible creature he lead them in a secret plot to take the land of Mewni. 

All in all it seems like a simple plan, as it didn’t need to be complicated. With the lizards not being kill-able by normal means just a handful of them supporting a regular troop could overtake quite a lot. They killed the ruling queen, leaving a teenage daughter behind. With the head of the Mewmens gone taking over the rest of the kingdom would probably be easy, and Toffee leading the charge would probably claim it for himself instead of the monster king. The monsters get their original land back and Toffee gets in even higher power than the great general he once was.

Even though occasionally he and the lizards are called immortal I feel it’s more of a statement about their regeneration and not length of living, since the lizards themselves refereed to it as being indestructible. Toffee’s at the very least not been around since Eclipsa’s time since he and the other lizards didn’t seem to know anything about the immortal-killing spell Moon learned from Eclipsa until it permanently took away Toffee’s finger. Terrifying all the others, scatting the army and then Moon continuing to scatter monster civilization apart as much as she could so another uprising like that couldn’t happen again, which is probably why by the time of the show proper the closest thing to a king was Ludo in his castle with his underlings. Toffee had been set back quite a bit.

His Reworked Plans

Toffee had years now to figure out new plans to take Mewni for himself/monsters and to avoid being murdered by Eclipsa’s spell. It would be a bad idea to take on Moon directly. So he waited for another. Moon’s daughter, Star Butterfly would be the target. Taking over Ludo’s group who already went after her, enacting his plan to bring her to the castle before she even knows who he is or how big of danger he is. 

He certainly read up on Mewni wands as he was able to get all he needed from making Star cast the whispering spell. As of seeing her use the spell with Ludo’s wand hand we can tell that the spell not only is a ‘self destruct’ for the wand in dire situations but anyone that doesn’t get to safety afterwards is pulled into the wand. Ludo probably wasn’t brought into it since he ‘was’ the wand in this situation. 

Making Ludo take over the kingdom, Toffee probably bet on Star coming to save the day, and using the whispering spell on the wand. Using her as a bargaining chip to get his finger back, and become whole again. At the same time, corrupting all the magic in the wand so the magic would die and the spell could never be used against him again. That would re-establish his place as an indestructible person who could go out and whip up an army to take down the magicless mewmens. Leaving Star to die in a sea of powerless magic goop as a bonus so there’s one less Butterfly to stand in his way.

As usual his plans get ruined at the last second it seems, as Star rescued herself and blasted him into a pile of melting goop and bones. Then Ludo crushed him under a pillar. I’m not convinced he’s dead though.  

“You don’t make the plans, I do! Me! Only I know how this all turns out.”

His Future Plans

As strong of a hit it was, I feel like he won’t die until he gets hit with Eclipsa’s spell through the heart. With how important and dangerous Toffee is I feel like his death will be a much bigger event than this. 

Until then, he’ll probably reform and slink off somewhere. Probably start building an army, maybe getting some of the other lizards back and recruiting Star’s gallery of enemies. He’ll probably make some strategic attack against Mewni around the end of the season. If we’re luckier than season 2 we’ll actually get to see a good amount of him this season. 

I especially am crossing my fingers for more Toffee screen time since I have a gut feeling that the season finale will be something along the lines of Moon finally successfully using the spell against Toffee and killing him. Then the contract of the spell will free Eclipsa and she’ll become the next big bad of the show and things get even worse. Even if it’s not at the end of this season it feels like the general direction this show’s story will go. It’s a little sad since I’ve wanted to see more of Toffee since the end of season one, and season two as I said felt like it pulled back from Toffee being present at all until the end, so killing him off entirely at some point is going to suck. I’m hoping it’ll at least be a fantastic ride. 

[echobeartheorist]

Star vs. the Forces of Evil - How Wands Work (with what we know so far)

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 2 Episode 12 “Into The Wand/Pizza Thing” July 25 2016, the most recent episodes released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Star vs. the Forces of Evil please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

I enjoy magic in many series, and while it’s nice to see it follow some sort of mechanical logic it’s also nice when it’s just ‘magic’. Star vs seems to tread this line and I feel it is better for it, it makes it feel special still without making it random. In recent episodes we’ve been given even more of a look into how it works than I expected this show to give us and I think there’s enough for us to start piecing together some general rules for how the artifacts known as wands work.

I’ll try and list out my understanding of wands in Star Vs by category.

MAGIC

Even in light of recent episodes (up to “Into the Wand”) the exact workings of magic is left vague enough to be, well, magical. Still, there seems to be logic to how it is able to be used. 

Most of the ways magic is performed will be brought up in their own sections later, except for dipping down since it does not require a wand to use. It’s possible that dipping down can be used in combination with the wand, but it is not clear if this would increase the magic used or not. Dipping down seems to be the the action of directly using your own reserves of magic and ability to manipulate the world around you, and is implied if you master it that it’ll be even stronger than using the wand for your magic.

The things spells are able to do seem to vary. With “Spider with a Top Hat” we see that most if not all sentient beings are not created with magic but summoned by it. Star teleported once, which might be a variation of the summoning spell but in reverse. Dimensional scissors are also possibly a variation of this, at least in mechanical terms.

We also see it has the ability to transform objects, such as turning plants into arms, or broken arms into healed arms, or broken arms into sentient tentacle monster which brings up a question of if that was summoning or creation.

Magic also comes in the form of general energy blasts, both from Star and Ludo’s wands. I’m not sure if this is pure magic energy or elemental blasts created with magic.

Lastly magic in general seems to be potentially dangerous as a standalone substance. As Star’s mom warns her against sleeping with the wand under her pillow for fear of magical radiation. Star also mentions having to ‘stop using magic on my face’.

SPELL METHOD

Most spells from Star’s wand seem to require specific words combined with an effort to exert magic (like an incantation). It appears how the magic is cast doesn’t effect it as long as she uses magic with the wand in combination of the words, with the possible exception of high levels of negative emotion effecting the spells negatively. It’s also possible that the negative emotions didn’t cause the spells to change but rather the ‘contamination’ in “Into the Wand” showing early signs of altering spells, but it doesn’t rule out the possibility of both being able to cause the same effect. 

While it seems who wields the wand effects the wand itself, information of specific spells are passed down through a book for generations implying that the outcome of spells while using the exact ‘magic words’ produces similar if not the same outcome no matter who has the wand. 

It seems spells come in lesser and greater amounts as well, if you do a specific dance along with the magic words. Doing the proper dance will increase the power/amount of summons drastically. 

Some generic magical blasts seem to not require any words at all, just magical effort.

Magical shields seem possible to, since there’s a constant shield around the royal corn field.

Ludo’s wand seems to not require words but rather emotion to use the blasts. At this time it’s uncertain if the wands are fundamentally different in how they function, or if they’re practically the same. Also is the difference between the wands enough to make the spells in the spell book un-castable by Ludo’s wand or will he be able to use them the same? Time will hopefully tell.

Dipping down seems to not need words to use spells so far at all, but might require more direct effort and energy into casting.

POWER SOURCE

The exact power source for the wand is uncertain, and possibly multiple sources instead of singular. 

The most obvious source seems to be the Unicorn on a treadmill. Star stated when she needed to recharge the wand that if it wasn’t recharged the wand would die forever. This turned out to be untrue since even after the unicorn died in “Storm the Castle” that as long as a replacement unicorn is available it can be restored. Perhaps the species is rare enough to warrant belief that it would not be salvageable, or maybe she thought of the unicorn itself as the wand and a replacement would not really be the ‘same’ wand.

Another source might be the universe itself. Glossaryck described how the wand interacts with the magic of the universe, but only skimming the surface. So maybe in addition to interacting with the magic of reality to facilitate spells, it also uses that same magic as a secondary power source.

The final possible source might be Star herself. The unicorn ghost, previously the first wand’s unicorn, whispered to star and part of what people have thought they heard it say was ‘I was never your wand’ implying that it was not the true power source. It’s possible that the unicorn only made it easier to initiate spells but the magic itself came from Star, and that dipping down allows someone to not need a ‘kick start’ of a wand’s influence to use magic. 

Further insight into Star being a possible power source comes from “Into the Wand”. It’s said pretty plainly that the “wand is an extension of your memories”. Interesting that it’s not her mind but specifically her memories, and this could be just Glossaryck stating things in a weird manner but his wisdom could mean that he is being exactly literal. I’m not sure how much the wand being an extension of her memories means her own personal magic is powering it, if the memories power it or if the memories guide her brand of magic. If the memories do change how the spells work then how much does it effect that since the incantations work the same with different spell users. Even if it’s not the memories fueling it, her personal magic might still be the source of magic, with the unicorn only as a jump starter for the spells, and the wand a facilitator of using certain kinds of spells. 

SUMMONING ROOM

Most if not all of the sentient beings Star summons seem to exist already in a physical space of some sort. 

There are more unanswered questions with this than there are certainties. Did they exist before or are they created by Star wielding the wand and unable to be uncreated? Is the summoning room in a dimension of some sort or is it in some sort of magical realm inside the wand itself, even possibly inside of her ‘memories’? Is the summoning pad that looks like the wand’s face just a look alike or is it directly the other side of her wand’s face? Do different wand wielders (the past queens) have different summoning rooms from each other or is the same used for each queen?

STAR’S MEMORIES

“Into the Wand” brings about another portion of the wand into light. On top of the unicorn’s treadmill inside the wand, and the summoning room that seems to be connected if not inside of it, her memories are connected to the wand whenever it’s in use. 

It’s interesting that Glossaryck says they’re going into the wand, but go into her memories, as if using the wand makes it so there’s no difference between the two, or maybe there’s a copy of her memories stored inside the wand whenever it’s in use. He says when they teleport into the memories that specifically “they’re inside the memory of her room, inside of her wand.”

When confronted with the memory of the school, there is the half star gem of her wand visible in the sky, implying she’s physically inside the wand inside her memory. 

The way locations and objects intersect where they wouldn’t regularly is a nice way to represent memory, acting like a strange dream where things mesh but not naturally. Things seem to pop up without Star realizing what it is at first or possibly her consciously thinking about it so it might not be working off her immediate memory but whatever’s stored in her head. (Side note I wonder if the writers intended to have the parallel with putting the Mewmen castle on the football field where Star went war crazy that season 1 episode.)

Disturbingly next is the ‘Star Memory Time Clone’ phenomenon. As one of the memory time clones states, that apparently Glossaryck told her and is later implied to be true due to his reactions of the situation “If you’re inside your wand too long all your new memories become your old memories, until eventually your current timeline is overwritten by future versions of yourself. Like me, Star Butterfly.” 

Does this mean that current star inside the wand becomes a memory herself that a future star inside the wand overwrites? The way it’s stated and the setup of multiple stars in the episode implies a struggle to keep old memories from overwriting her but how are old memories the same as future versions? 

To add to the confusion and creepiness of this, when she first enters the school we see another Star Butterfy in the same getup she has later in the episode when she learns of the time clones, implying if overwriting is a thing that actually happens and it’s not just different viewpoints of the same Star, then it was one of her future selves that overwrites the first timeline’s Star that we follow to the end of the episode and outside of the wand.

The end of the episode even has Marco coming in like Star remembers as the first memory going into her wand, which may be explained by her being replaced by a future self, and as her time clone said about them being replaced “you won’t even notice the difference”.

TOFFEE’S INTERFERENCE

We know Toffee managed to get his severed finger inside of the wand somehow. Otherwise it just raises questions instead of answering them. 

We can reasonably guess at least that he must have done it while the wand was in the middle of being ‘cleaved’ at the end of storm the castle. If that was possible he probably would have known he could do it ahead of time and planned to do it. 

Was it in her actual memories or the wand’s memories of her memories, if there’s even a difference? How long did it take for it to effect her spells? Now that it is outside of her memories is he able to regenerate into a full body again? Would regeneration be impossible due to the spell Moon used against Toffee? 

Not to even start on the questions and/or theories that can be brought forth like rivers and waterfalls about the ‘Grandma Room’ in general, with plenty of general and vague history of Mewni. 

WAND CRAFTING

Wands of course are a crafted artifact and probably not found naturally. Mewmens are not the only one with wands as Questbuy has countless wand chargers that are not all compatible with Mewni wands. 

Ignoring the possible countless wands in other dimensions, we are not sure who created the wand of the Mewni royal family. Possibly the Mewmen themselves. Possibly the species Glossaryck belongs to or Glossaryck himself as we see him with the wand bearers all the way back into known Mewmen history, and is practically immortal and/or godlike. The implications of him always helping the wand bearer brings into question everything about him, his role, his purpose in life. 

Ludo’s wand is another good question, who crafted it? Unless somehow it formed by itself by some twisted magic, someone took the time to take Toffee’s skeletal hand and bind the half star gem into it so it would function as a wand. There is probably no unicorn inside of it to help facilitate spells so it probably dips into Ludo’s magical energy directly. This is probably why it took him so long to figure out how to use it at all, and why he currently can’t do anything but raw energy blasts.

I’m not sure how much, if any we’ll learn about wand crafting in the series, but I’m curious how hard it is to make them and how different designs, such as the inclusion or lack of unicorns effects their usability. I can respect a show that makes these sentences exist and yet make perfect mechanical sense. 

I hope I didn’t accidentally leave any segments out of this theory, or information in the segments I’ve written, it’s already become a lot more writing than I expected, which shows the depths of information that we’ve been revealed already. Star’s wand, and possibly Ludo’s are central items to the series and it’s definite that we’ll learn more about them as the series continues, possibly warranting updated versions of this ‘theory’/’information compilation’. Hope this is helpful to any fellow Star Vs fans, or at least enjoyable. 

[echobeartheorist]

Star vs. the Forces of Evil - The Role That Earth Plays

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 2 Episode 8 “Game of Flags/Girl’s Day Out” July 25 2016, the most recent episodes released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Star vs. the Forces of Evil please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

A couple of weeks ago I started thinking about the interesting position of the earth and humans in this series and wanted to talk about it and I think I’ve finally got enough figured out to post something here.

So let’s start from the beginning, the pilot episode even called ‘Star comes to earth’. They send her to earth as an alternative to sending her to Saint O’s princess boarding school. They don’t really go into detail why earth besides ‘training in a safer dimension’. There are probably plenty of dimensions to choose from if they just want to have her not be destroying stuff, or in danger of Mewnian monster attacks. Earth does seem to be the only ‘dimension’ shown without widespread explicit knowledge of the other dimensions or the scissors with which she could use to return (since her pair she uses was a gift from Ponyhead.).

They supposedly didn’t have a plan of where she would stay before coming or were secretive about it, but considering the principal was the one who called on Marco to be her guide it’s questionable how much thought beyond ‘no monsters and no dimensional scissors’ they put into her move. How much thought did they put into which dimension even? Well, I realized they never seemed to directly say how many universes there are in this show. There is one time there is a list though.

Yep, this book. Saint Olga used it to determine which universe the rebels  originated from. The book has a pretty short list. 

5 Dimensions. It’s possible that this is only a partial list and there’s continued pages of color to metal match ups, but for the time being let’s assume they could have altered this to have more or less listed on the same page and intentionally showed us the entire list. This could mean that every different area in the show is part of one of these 5 dimensions, and not an infinite universes situation. (Maybe there are more universes but for the sake of Star Vs lore we can assume these are the only ones that any of the characters go to/come from and any others are not accessible or known.) 

While the 5 Dimension concept could be a theory on it’s own, figuring out which places are where etc (in fact I may or may not look into that later) this theory will try to focus on the Earth. 

So, beyond why she was sent there why is earth important? It isn’t protecting Star, since not only Ludo and the other monsters chased her down there, but non-monsters have found her and attacked. What about helping her train? Well she is learning to use magic, and she’s not as out of control as she used to be. Marco’s been a good influence on her.

Marco has a very specific part in helping Star become a better person and being her friend. Either that counts since he’s an earthling, or if we’re trying to look at this ‘theory/thought process’ as seperate from his personal contribution makes this a little harder to say for certain. We have seen hinted as early as ‘School Spirit’  just how militaristic and violent Mewni is. Most people from earth would be a better influence on Star than that. ‘Game of Flags’ is another good look at Mewni brutality and Earth’s/Marco’s gentler influence on Star.

In fact the entire setup of earth is really nice in this show. Normally in stories with a ‘monster’ and ‘human’ faction one or both sides usually end up being super violent towards the other. Sometimes the classic ‘anything that isn’t a human is our enemy’ malarkey, sometimes the ‘humans are taking things too far/were the original attackers’ twist. Star Vs uses Mewmens as a substitute for humans in this equation and seems to be going for a ‘monsters aren’t the only bad guys/as bad as you thought’ scenario. What I really love about this is that humans still exist in this situation, but are shown more realistically/neutral letting the Mewmens fill the metaphorical shoes for the war is bad moral without demonizing our own entire species. There’s the occasional bad human or even violent loving but the general population seems pretty chill. Not only is that really nice in general but I think it’s going to grow ever more important to Star’s future and personal development.

We’ve seen a recurring theme in episodes of Star learning to overcome easy violent solutions or taught in ‘morals’ from Mewni and instead opting for what she’s learning from Marco and from being on Earth. She’s realized maybe Mewnipendance Day isn’t as glorious as she thought once was. She teamed up with Buff Frog to save Marco, and later babysat for him without ANY hesitation at all or mention between the two about the whole monster situation. The number one solider of Mewni’s army, who Star idolized up to even this point, proved to have beliefs about the importance of monarchy that Star has lived on earth long enough to know not everyone has to live that way. 

Like I said earlier, a lot of this can be attributed to Marco. He is a product of the relatively neutral version of Earth on this show, albeit one of the more careful and moral thinking people. I can only hope that ‘Starstruck’ isn’t the last we’ll see it imply that all of Earth, and not just one person on it, is responsible for the improvement of the Mewni princess. Maybe it’ll even explicitly state it some episode in the future. 

I’m sure there’s something I missed, or more detail to go into. For now though, I’m good with having talked about how earth is a better stage for her to learn and grow, how the mewmen/human comparasion lets humans be shown a little more realistically in terms of how peaceful our society is for the most part, and looking at the stated and implied viewpoints that the royal Mewnians have of earth. 

[echobeartheorist]

Star vs. the Forces of Evil - The State of Mewni Monsters

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 2 Episode 3 “Star on Wheels/Fetch” July 25 2016, the most recent episodes released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Star vs. the Forces of Evil please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

So after that last theory I watched all of the first season again, and was going to post this sort of general thought theory before the next week but... life sometimes just keeps you busy. While watching season 1 again I noticed a lot of little details that you wouldn’t think anything about watching it for the very first time, like Glossaryck appearing several times before his official introduction, including watching star playing with the wand before being sent away to earth, or Toffee muttering Buff frog’s real name under his breath a good number of episodes before the finale, or even a certain page about what to do if you revive the dead being seen inbetween the pages of other ‘what to do if’ in the book of magic when star was looking up ‘what to do if you freeze time’. Once you realize how much continuity is kept between episodes and not just completely random, they actually did a really good job of introducing concepts an episode at a time. 

So general praise out of the way, I’d like us to think about the monsters of Mewni. Obviously they’re an important faction for the show at large. In fact the only other major source of recurring antagonism outside of lone named enemies is St. Olga’s. Why is this? Well, because it doesn’t appear Mewmens are really at war with or have been at war with other kingdoms or dimensions, or at least if they have it has not been stated and even if it will be probably will be downplayed and only effect the episodes it’s mentioned in (I mean, it’s totally possible for them to write in a new enemy faction and whole big story arcs with it but, from info we have this is not currently the case). Mewni Monsters are the ones who were attacked during the great monster massacre, and the only ones we generally see attack Star for her wand.

One good thing did come out of not getting around to this theory until now, and it is the episode ‘Fetch’, which seems to subtly introduce the concept of people not able to transform the wand into their own or even able to use magic at all from it. Considering the unicorn on a treadmill thing is canon through and through and not just a one off joke, I think the wand reacting in this way... or not reacting at all, is a crucial element. We have obviously seen the wand change when it went from queen to princess, and we have also seen the wand change when a monster had a hold of it TWICE. All transformations have occurred whenever a Mewnian has held the wand, which means if this non-Mewni dog woman could do nothing with it then maybe Mewni wands are only usable by Mewni based life forms. This might imply Mewmens are closer to ‘monsters’ than they’d like to admit but at the very least it would mean that humans getting the wand would do nothing, or any other dimension except for Mewni itself could do nothing with the royal Mewni wand. Which means only Mewni monsters would even have a use for it when it comes to antagonists.

Makes you wonder with all the different creatures between dimensions that are all sorts of different things why it seems why it’s mostly/only Mewni monsters that are called monsters. But after 3 long paragraphs let’s talk about why I set this whole thing out. Mewni monsters are in terrible living conditions. Ludo in the wild was honestly probably how a lot of monsters are living more or less. Before we go into evidence of just how bad off monsters are by looking at monsters, let’s look at their oppressors. 

The kingdom of Mewni seems to be a somewhat stereotypical magical fantasy kingdom leaning towards PG/feminine styling (which might be due to the women of the kingdom royal line possessing the wand and thus being the more powerful of the monarch pair). It follows a more traditional style of kingdom where they are violent to their enemies and apathetic or downright oppressive to the lower classes of civilization. There does seem to be a lot of ‘castle’ space and Star only claims to live in the highest level, but that doesn’t mean that there’s a bunch of higherups actually living in the lower castle areas and could be all servants and/or extra non-living areas for the royals. Even if there is secondary elite classes within Mewni, it seems aside from the royal family and their servants, the other Mewmens are mostly dirty and poor peasants. From what I’ve seen of the royal family this is probably more likely from a case of just not caring about lower class citizens rather than specifically oppressing them, but in any case it shows just how badly the ruling class of Mewni is willing to let it’s own people live in. If this is how their own kingdom, which they should care about is treated, then imagine their enemies. 

So how do the monsters on Mewni live exactly? Well, we only see a few of them in the castle and don’t really see where any others live so we’ll have to go off of little things said here and there. It’s amazing what a one off line can hint at for world building. Earliest records of monsters shown on the show heavily imply that the Mewmens drove the monsters into the wilderness and promptly set the forest on FIRE. This was the children’s book version of the story, the Mewni version of a golden book, imagine how terrible the actual events must be. We don’t see any ‘intelligent’ monsters near the forests right out the Mewmen kingdom any of the episodes, with the exception of Ludo who is the only speaking monster we see in the whole episode when he’s in running distance of seeing the kingdom. Toffee offers Ludo some swamp water during the interview, and later Ludo mentions saving Buff frog from a fate of living in a swamp. The subtext so far seems to point to the Mewmens not only driving the monsters back away from the kingdom but basically forcing them to live in the worst possible places in the country/planet. When trying to stop the rebellion Toffee starts, Ludo states that he saved pretty much all of his minions from terrible living conditions. 

Further on, living in the swamps isn’t the only thing the monsters have against them. In such kingdoms as Mewni only the rich, elite, and royal can afford to have any sort of education. This seems to spread to the Mewnian monsters. We can assume Ludo is ruler of the castle not by any sort of blood but by taking over/finding the castle and even if the monsters had any royalty that their sad state of things didn’t lend itself to teaching even the upper class, but with how childish Ludo is he probably just managed to usurp the place and assert dominance over any monster who wished to have a nicer place to live. In fact from all the monsters we’ve seen, both Ludo’s forces and the monsters that showed up for an interview, the only two who have proven themselves to have an intellect and maturity level above elementary school children seem to be Buff frog and Toffee. 

So between the lack of education, the terrible choices for living areas and the possibility that half of monsters don’t even have a house to live in, it’s almost no surprise at all that the only group of monsters attempting to take away the wand was mostly incompetent with a leader who’s only function to lead was the ability to climb the ladder over the average man. We’ve only seen Ludo and his underlings attack Star and there hasn’t been mention of any other groups of monsters doing this. Toffee infiltrating Ludo’s castle to carry out his plan makes so much sense with this line of thinking. It’s the best army the monsters have, because it’s the only army the monsters have. On a personal level I’m still rooting for Star and Marco but as for class battles I’m pretty much on the monster’s side at this point. 

[echobeartheorist]

Star vs. the Forces of Evil - Dark Wand Magic Theory

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 2 Episode 1 “My New Wand/Ludo in the Wild” July 11 2016, the most recent episodes released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Star vs. the Forces of Evil please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

So after the season 1 finale I was excited to see how Star vs. would come back and the opening episodes of season 2 were fantastic. They were a great mix of being a little bit silly again like usual episodes and reassuring that the serious story bits that elevated the show during ‘Storm the Castle’ were going to stay with the series. I’m sure exactly what’s going on and going to go down will become more clear as season 2 marches on, but there’s enough already that my mind was swimming with ideas so let’s get the theorizing started now.

Let’s start back at the end of season 1. Toffee has thrown Ludo out of his own castle and kidnaps Marco. Star comes to save her friend and makes a valiant effort but unfortunately Marco is trapped in a crystal cage that only grows stronger the more you break it and regrows. Toffee then puts Marco under a time pressure death trap and forces Star to use ‘the whispering spell’ to destroy her wand. The wand’s life fades out, and the ghost of a unicorn pops out to whisper something to star, who promptly joins Marco in the crystal prison (which thankfully has stopped trying to crush the occupants to death) and closes the door before the wand blows the whole castle up. Toffee smiles as it does. The wand crashes back down after being broken, and a tiny horse/unicorn comes out of nowhere to climb into it and power it back up. The wand is ‘cleaved’ now and half of the star gem is nowhere to be seen.

Now to season 2, the first episode ‘my new wand’ has the wand go haywire and fly into the closet along with the magic book and Marco. Glossaryck tells Marco to find the secret in the secret closet to get out, and tells Star that to open the closet she needs to ‘dip down’. While the children are distracted he inspects the wand. The page the wand lands is titled “what to do when you raise the dead?” and the page is consistent throughout the episode. Marco finds Star’s diary, Star learns how to use magic without her wand and Glossaryck notices the unicorn inside the wand is not quite right. It ends with a wand blast that leaves the place covered in green goo, a new tower, and shoots a menacing spell blast into space.

Anyone that I’ve heard mention the horse at the end of Storm the castle seems to feel it’s really convenient that her wand just happened to get fixed right away. Now that the Unicorn seems to be less than purehearted, and there’s stuff concerning the undead right next to the wand, I feel that we can assume that Toffee planned further ahead than just breaking the wand. He planted a replacement unicorn in place that would help to further his goals by powering Star’s wand with dark magic. This isn’t the only instance I think dark magic wands show up in season 2 so far though. 

Ludo in the Wild was a good episode. We got to see Ludo abused by nature. He somehow managed to lay in the snow for many weeks without food and survived meaning he must be resilient. Mistreated at first by the animals of the forest he eventually overcomes and becomes master over them showing off how he became a leader of a castle with a small army in the first place. He might be a bit goofy and simple minded but he does have leadership qualities. Then Star shows up out of no where and Ludo chases after her to get the wand again. When he thinks he gets her, she’s nowhere to be found, but a new wand is, and also the discovery he was on Mewni the whole time.

The wand Ludo finds has the other half of the star gem, which is now green, set into a jagged rock held by a skeleton hand. It wasn’t this way immediately after it split from the original wand since we see it laying on the ground at the end of storm the castle. We do see the jagged rock nearby but they aren’t even touching, and no skeleton hand to be seen. Someone had to have put the wand together and left it there, if it was the same person that did both of these actions is unclear. 

Unless another major villain comes into play we can guess that Toffee is behind the ‘monster wand’, possibly having regenerated with his missing finger after the explosion that destroyed the castle. If he used it or not before leaving it in the forest for Ludo to find is unknown as well. We can also reasonably assume that if the wand was left for someone to find it was specifically for Ludo since Mewni castle is right within sight of where the wand is buried in the snow and it would be careless to leave it so far out of monster territory hoping a monster finds it unless you knew Ludo would be running that way to try to catch Star. Also why was Star in the forest in the first place? Was it a fake Star Butterfly to lead Ludo to the wand?

So now there’s two wands with dark energies. One that inherently seems to hold dark magic just by it’s changed gem color and the rest of what it’s made up of and another which is a regular Mewni wand powered by a dark magic unicorn that is possibly undead. Even without any other interference this is already a great move on Toffee’s part if he wants to bring about destruction and chaos, but I’m sure there’s other things in the works as well especially if he did regenerate. 

During Ludo in the Wild was another important thing to note, the weather. When Ludo lands on Mewni (which is after Star tosses him through a random Dimension Scissor warp, and he gets blasted by a magic spell into a different Dimension warp) it seems to be dreary and begins to snow the very same day. The days are marked at different points of the episode, the final day where Ludo gets the monster wand being “Day 90″ and then being changed soon after to “Day 1″. While not exact 90 days is approximately 3 months time and ‘classical’ seasons according to weather happen over 3 months. If Mewni weather follows this pattern then the beginning of season 2 and the point at which Ludo gets the wand (which could be near the end of season 2 or part way into it, who knows) spans the winter season. I’m not sure if the seasons in Mewni and earth match up, but it seems like an intentional countdown towards something big happening so I’m going to hazard a guess that they do and we’ll see the series going through winter times leading up to Ludo’s return. 

I’m curious to see if Star vs. is going to go back to goofy episodes for the most part until this event or if we’ll see the mixture of silly and serious in pretty much every episode from now on. Season 1 wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows either, there was the school for wayward princesses episode. So, I guess either possibility is likely. No matter what, things are going to get a little weird, they’re going to get a little wild. 

[echobeartheorist]

Steven Universe - Rock Person Theory

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 3 Episode 5 “Hit The Diamond” June 2 2016, the most recent episode released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Steven Universe please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

So there’s a blog called “Keep beach city weird” and it is made by the creators of the show, written from the view point of Ronaldo Fryman. Ronaldo has had enough partial understandings of overall workings of the world in Steven Universe that he could possibly be categorized as a “crazy but right” character. So a blog written by him is even further possible hints at things that might actually be happening. That makes the following GIF interesting.

http://keepbeachcityweird.tumblr.com/post/136780963301/a-few-months-ago-i-had-the-honor-of-doing-a

So what I take away from this post, is that gem shape shifting can be counteracted with water. They can probably still do other things while in water, considering what Lapis has done. Malachite was even in the bottom of the ocean for months so it doesn’t mess with any of their other functions it seems. 

Let’s think back to another major shape shifting event though. The episode that introduced it and it’s mechanics actually. 

Cat fingers. Steven learns to change his finger into a little cat thing. Then turns more of his fingers into cats. Then his other hand’s fingers into cats. Then things start going out of control. Then Steven uses the fact that cats hate water to change back to normal.

Or maybe the fact that it was cats and the cat and water connection was a misdirection? So not only did they introduce mechanics of shape shifting into the show with this episode, but also introduced a counter action against shape shifting but also hid the fact behind the accepted “cats hate water” mechanic. This was episode 6, bravo crewniverse. 

I haven’t re-watched the entirety of the show just for this theory but I don’t recall too many instances of shape shifting and the gem getting wet/submerged in the show. There was one mention I can think of though...

“I can play the Crocodilllllle! Jazz hands.” “You always say you’ll be the crocodile but you never commit.”

Maybe she is trying to commit, but water shorting out a shape shifting ability would keep her from keeping a form of a water inhabiting creature. Regardless of the correctness of the theory I do like how you can see scenes in completely new light when you see it from a different angle like this. Have a good day folks. 

[echobeartheorist]

Steven Universe - Harvest Theory

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well.

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 2 Episode 26 “Log Date 7 15 2” January 8 2016, the most recent episode released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Steven Universe please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

My first posted theory kind of was about big concepts and overall backstory stuff, this one is a little smaller but potentially interesting faucet of the world of SU. I was sharing this show with a family member when I noticed Peridot saying something that I haven’t heard anyone actually talk about. 

“Oh my stars. You’re going to harvest me?”

I noticed it the original time I watched it but was too caught up in what was going on in general to worry about one previously unused term. Hearing it again I’ve noticed it’s one of those things that even if you’re paying decent attention to the fans and theorists that no one seems to say much (or at least I haven’t seen the ones who have mentioned). Sure it’s a smaller detail that the show itself will probably get around to but it hasn’t yet and I like trying to figure things out even if I turn out to be wrong. 

So first, as a reminder to anyone that forgot the context of the scene let’s go over what went on when Peridot said that. So it’s the episode catch and release, and Steven had sneaked into the bubbled gem room and released Peridot.

Peridot is freaking out. Her limb enhancers are gone. She demands to know where she is. Then she looks up. 

Dozens, Hundreds of bubbled gems. and a Chaaaaaaaaps bag. Then she says:

The audio of the VA in the episode even has a very fearful emphasis on the word ‘harvest’. The whole sentence is spoken and physically acted that it’s obvious it’s terrifying for her to even think of. Gems usually don’t show this level of fear, even when she talks of being shattered or the cluster in the same episode it seems the thought of being ‘harvested’ is a step worse. Why?

Well, there’s a few things that crossed my mind for what ‘harvest’ could mean in SU gem terms and I’ll list them in the order of what I personally think is least to most likely, the best for last after all. 

First possibility is that to ‘harvest’ a gem is to shatter it and recombine it in a fusion experiment way. While this is something Peridot has a wealth of knowledge on the subject, it feels unlikely that it’d be a widely used enough thing since the earth experiments seem like the earliest and possible only cases of fusion experiments and in terms of controllable weapons are almost useless. If true it would be unpleasant to think you’d be killed and painfully reanimated with a bunch of other gems into a mishmash of arms and legs.

Second possibility is that ‘harvesting’ a gem is part of the process of changing a gem from the bipedal feminine genderless aliens we know and love into the random monsterous forms we see with gem monsters. We know for sure that the gem monsters were regular gem people at one point, and also that it is hoped that one day they will be returned to their original forms. Some missing information about the monsters is how did they become monsters? I personally haven’t noticed the gems mention directly or indirectly any sort of process or even who was responsible for it. It might be possible that gem monsters are an older more successful experiment of recycling rebellious or defect gems into fighting machines that was and still is commonly used, and that fusion experiments were a try at an alternative for smashed gems. Harvesting would be in this case taking the gems of a poofed gem and putting it through the monster-izing process. Even if this process itself isn’t agonizing you’d still come back as a violent creature with just enough memories and conscious thought to make you aware of how much humanity you have lost and what you wish you could regain but may never have back.

Third and what I think might be most likely possibility is that ‘harvesting’ a gem is to put it to use in some sort of device. Unless you’re reading this before seeing the show and getting tons of spoilers you should be familiar with a gem powered mirror that Steven is given by Pearl in episode 25. Pearl uses the exact words “gem powered mirror” and goes on to tell him that it’s used to capture whatever it sees and is able to play it back on command. 

As useful as the mirror (and probably whatever other similar gem powered tools that might exist) is it’s more than a little messed up that it’s basically a person trapped inside. What we know of gem culture to the point of Steven Bomb 4 is very much on the side of hierarchy class systems with lower gems being used as things and little being put into individuals but this is straight up using people as things, objects, tools. Lapis seems very unhappy about having been a mirror. The crystal gems are shocked and terrified and even a little angry about finding out the mirror could talk to Steven like a person and what they say about it supposed to only be following orders means that gem powered tools are supposed to only use what it needs from the gem to make it work and ignore it’s consciousness or intentionally suppress the gem’s consciousness while using it’s mind. A prison where you’re aware of what’s going on and can’t move or control yourself, only purely obey orders, Lapis wasn’t meant to ever have enough control to even choose what she showed. No wonder Peridot was scared of sharing a similar fate. Then again we’re talking about the crystal gems, protagonists/good guys, doing such a thing.

Then again they’re not protagonists from Peri’s point of view at the time of catch and release. Besides them interfering with her assignment to check on the earth’s and the cluster’s progress, she probably questioned Lapis about her interaction with the crystal gems. Lapis probably at minimum told her that she was imprisoned in a mirror and kept by the gems, possibly even used before she was freed and came back to homeworld. So Peridot knows the crystal gems use gem powered tools and seeing hundreds of other gems stored in bubbles thought that they would be making gem powered tools to use the gems for, or even swapping out gems like batteries if any of the tools were broken. Lapis is a bit of a mystery so it’s hard to tell if her anger at the crystal gems not setting her free is a sign of gem tools being inhumane and unthinkable even by gem society standards or her being high enough on the social standing that being used in such a way is next to unthinkable, but re-listening to that part of mirror gem makes me think it’s most likely the former. 

It is entirely possible that it’s another unexplored thing that gems are able to do to one another but I’m glad to have gotten this out of my head and into the world, at least the virtual one. I’m sure they’ll get to explaining what it really is when the pacing and story calls for it and I’m sure even if it’s something I guessed it’ll still be horrifying and disturbing. I look forward to it. 

[echobeartheorist]

Steven Universe - Interstellar War Theory

This is a fan theory and meant to be for fun to share with other fans. Theories can be proven right or wrong easily even as early as an episode after the theory is posted.  I respect the creators of the show and whatever they deem to be canon. Making a theory is meant as a compliment of how much thought and care is put into the series and to show that I care about it as well. 

SPOILERS

This theory is made up of evidence from various episodes ranging all the way up to Season 2 Episode 21 “Too far” October 15 2015, the most recent episode released before the theory was posted. If you wish to not be spoiled on any plot points of Steven Universe please go and watch the show before reading any further in the blog.

SPOILERS

So, anyone that’s up to date on Steven Universe (as of Oct 15, 2015) should be well aware of the civil war between homeworld and the cyrstal gems. One of various things that were always part of the lore but not explicitly said until quite a ways in. I believe there’s something much bigger, even bigger than the cluster, that already has been hinted towards enough to get a general idea of where the story might go, at least in terms of backstory. 

First thing’s first, let’s take a look at something that’s the basis of plenty of other theories. 

Bismuth. Due to it’s unique structure, fans are convinced to a strong degree that this bubbled object is based on what is known as Bismuth. It is considered both a crystal and a metal. I personally believe that this is one of the major hints of a second space fairing race in SU. One that is similar to the gems in which they can be poofed and bubbled. If this is the case I’d personally guess that being considered both metal and crystal would mean symbolically Bismuth as a character would be a metal who’d also be considered a crystal gem. We’ve seen non living things bubbled before so anything that is small enough could be, so this alone is not definitive proof even though lion’s initial storage all seems to have significance. 

To continue I’d like to mention one thing that I love about Steven Universe is how it seems to slip in little hints here and there where you least expect it and might not notice what the meaning truly is until the twist is revealed. 

“A refuge of an interstellar war. But now he’s at your local grocery store. Cookie Cat”

“The galaxy warps have all been inactive for thousands of years” “Can’t we fix them?” “No.”

“Quarters!”

Huh, that’s strange. The quarter on the beach he was picking up was in the same spot where the monster from earlier in the episode grabbed onto his hand. I believe this is not a coincidence. In fact later in the episode the monster and the ‘quarter’ are seen in close proximity again.

Here Garnet is poofing some of the smaller monsters.

“A quarter!” Steven finds another quarter. It seems very likely if not certain that these ‘quarters’ are the central part of the monsters and are left behind when poofed. In the earlier scene it is proven that these are indeed metals and not just coin shaped gems because Steven finds one with a metal detector. Bismuth alone could be considered a gem, or maybe even something else entirely, but this episode with the swarm of ‘quarter’ monsters almost definitively proves that there is a metal equivalent to gems. The quarters give more current proof to how similar they are because it shows the metals are indeed a living species like gems and can be corrupted, poofed, and bubbled just the same as gems. 

Well, there being a second race with similar properties isn’t that huge is it? We already got homeworld being very advanced and a monster inside of the earth. It could be depending how you interpreted that earlier line from cookie cat. ”A refuge of an interstellar war.” Seems like it was hinting about the crystal gem’s fight against homeworld in hindsight.... but maybe that’s only one parallel. Maybe the interstellar war that the crystal gems were originally refuges of before the rebellion was a war against another space fairing race. If the metals truly are a whole separate race they would fit perfectly as an opposite side to fight against gems.  Even if there is a confirmed second race that doesn’t mean the gems are at war with them. To say that there’s a huge war of intergalactic aliens would at least need some proof of a war being fought before/besides the gem civil war on earth.

Amethyst was one of many mass produced gems on earth. Since gems pop out at the size they’re supposed to be and don’t grow over time (with Steven as an exception) we can assume that if the gem holes are about the same size it’s likely that the same type of gem was being made. Hundreds if not thousands of Amethysts. What does that have to do with war? Peridot helps us out with understanding Gem’s purposes (and the fact that gems are indeed made with a specific purpose in mind). Peridot tells Amethyst “You’re a strong, singular, fully functional solider. Despite the fact that you’re defective.” The Amethyst we know is a bit smaller than the others that were made and came out way after the rest, but the fact she’s meant to be a solider means they were cultivating an army. Sure, maybe it could be meant to be preventative, but the scale implied in the gem production seems more akin to ‘drafting’ than just being careful. 

There being a war could explain other things, such as why when Peridot needed help with several gems stopping her assignment on earth she only got a single warrior gem as backup. Sure Jasper dismissed them when she saw them initially, but you’d think they’d send more than one fighter in the first place. Unless of course they can’t spare any fighters, there’s bigger battles elsewhere and earth isn’t as important compared to a war. 

More importantly a war with another species would make the whole gem civil war on earth make more sense. Surely building up war ranks during peace time wouldn’t be so important that halting progress on one planet and moving to another wouldn’t be grounds for too much argument, especially not a war with many gem deaths. If homeworld was in the middle of a war with a race of metals and needed soldiers, and the people running the kindergarden tried to shut things down that would be a much bigger issue. 

I had this theory in mind for a while and am glad to post it, by the time I am I realize there is another Steven bomb approaching and I have no idea if it’ll touch on the metal race or the bigger interstellar war or not, but at least I’m getting the theory out. I look forward to the new episodes wither or not I’m right about Bismuth and the quarters. I also look forward to putting up more theories when I have them/gather information to back them up.