Peridot: Lapis, you can be Amethyst!
Lapis: Which one is she?
Peridot: D:
Peridot: Lapis, you can be Amethyst!
Lapis: Which one is she?
Peridot: D:
The New Crystal Gems
Anonymous asked
hi this thing has been stuck in my mind: on your post about how it struck u that peri acts differently around lapis, i saw some people saying they believe it was just the writers f-ing up their characters & fixing it with rtb making it SEEM intentional instead of it BEING intentional itfp. i want to believe that peridot's change in personality was intentional, but its rlly bugging me bc wht if what those ppl said rlly was the case? sorry im just a rlly paranoid person who overthinks a lot hhh
Hey!! So, so, so sorry for replying so late. I had to rewatch and rewatch episodes and really think about this one. When I first made that post, I was only pointing out differences, and never gave much thought as to whether it was intentional or not. I teetered around until I noticed a lot of stuff, which I’ll have to write in another post. I felt almost like Blue Zircon, piecing a story together.
In short, I’ve noticed a bunch of trends in Lapis and Peridot episodes. I’ve noticed something concerning Lapis and Peridot and a theme of the show, coming together for something bigger, and there’s too many little details for me to think they weren’t put there on purpose. There’s a why to Peridot’s behavior, and I think it’s essential to the story.
Lapis still has some major development coming. I don’t think the Crewniverse can mess up so bad as to forget entire character arcs, and neglect characters except just for comic relief, given the care they’ve shown into the latest Homeworld plot.
The story is planned by the creators of the show, episodes are written in outline forms by the writers, with mostly the main idea told briefly, and all these probably took place months before even making the script. So unless they completely revised their vision for the show, and have doubled, tripled the labor, I don’t think they can so quickly make one episode to fix everything, without it seeming disjointed from the rest of the story. Especially since Raising the Barn just set the story in a new course, and Back to the Kindergarten explicitly referred back to its events.
So don’t worry, anon! I think the change was intentional. Obviously there will also be unforeseen circumstances and minor revisions during the long journey from paper to screen, but nothing drastic.
The gem Lapis Lazuli symbolizes royalty, power, and truth.
From a previous text post of mine:
To convey what one had seen exactly as one has seen it, that is to tell the truth. As for the water powers - she uses that to share her records. Truth should be as clear as water, after all. A reflective surface, like a mirror, that shows only what it is.
Lapis Lazuli might very well be a Gem historian. Valued, and a lot more common than future-vision Sapphire. A historian can offer advice and past accounts of battles and war. A historian can be sent to a war zone to capture events and report them back home.
all speculation, but.
Steven’s gifts to Peridot.
The War
Memories from Pearl and Lapis
You can see Homeworld’s galaxy from here.
You’re right.
I love this part, it’s beautiful and heartbreaking. Peridot looks so unguarded here; you can see the yearning.
Now she can’t ever go home.
We all saw this cute scene in “Can’t Go Back”:
I think by now we know how much the Crewniverse loves putting really minor hints/foreshadowing in the show, so this scene caught my eye. It’s the first time we see Peridot sleeping (!), but also that there’s a small leak that drips onto her gem.
Water is undoubtedly used to represent Lapis, so I’ve seen people understandably saying that maybe this represents Lapis’s continued presence on Peridot’s mind. Maybe it’s “water kisses”. Very cutesy stuff.
They animated it to show two drops falling onto Peridot’s gem (her actual ‘body’), steadily, in a way to allow us to imagine that it’s constant; the leak is gonna keep dripping.
It’s not a comfortable way to sleep. In fact, it reminds me of the Chinese Water Torture.
Chinese water torture is a process in which water is slowly dripped onto a person’s forehead, allegedly making the restrained victim insane.
Mythbusters actually took it on to see if it could be harrowing to someone. Their conclusion was that it’s plausible. Here’s a video of the episode, where one of the Mythbusters suffered intense panic after two hours.
The symbolism of this, if it’s what the creators intended, is pretty huge. And ominous. We already know that Peridot and Lapis’s relationship while at the barn wasn’t as hippie fun as it seemed, that there were communication issues and unreciprocated emotional labor that had been going on for a long time.
Well, there are many things I should say, but they would upset you, so in general… I don’t say those things?
The Roman poet Ovid once said, “Dripping water hollows out stone, not through force, but through persistence.” For a Gem, that’s lethal.
So is this water drip scene meant to symbolize how Peridot had began to wear down from her days at the barn? Or maybe that when Lapis returns - and she has to, her arc isn’t finished yet - she and Peridot might have a meeting where emotional wounds are opened again?
*Of course, this is primarily a shipping blog for Amedot so I’m very biased; but when I saw that scene, I really did think, man, that’s gotta be uncomfortable for Peridot and bad for her Gem.
Amethyst and Peridot, on being ‘born’.
Anonymous asked
i really hope that we won't have to forgive lapis on the spot when she comes back. i just don't believe she deserves it
Ultimately, the one Lapis needs to ask forgiveness from is Peridot, and I don’t think Peridot will forgive her *on the spot*. Peridot will have a while to adjust to being with the Crystal Gems, and she’s already coming to terms with Lapis leaving, that sometimes her best won’t give the results she wanted, that sometimes, you need a break from pursuing something that seems hopeless to re-focus and re-energy on something else.
Being away from Lapis - and the need to ‘bend over backwards’ to please her - will probably allow her to have a clearer idea of what a friend/relationship should ideally look like. Have her find the middle way between getting angry and being a doormat. At the very least be able to have a conversation and negotiate something as life-changing as “We’re leaving Earth immediately”.
Steven and Amethyst get into some gem gossip from Peridot while looking for parts for the drill over at the Kindergarten but Peridot’s big mouth gets her in trouble again, this time, creating friction between her and Amethyst. “Too Far” premiered on this day, 8 Years Ago.