{"id":6063,"date":"2016-12-26T08:00:15","date_gmt":"2016-12-26T16:00:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/?p=6063"},"modified":"2016-12-19T09:14:44","modified_gmt":"2016-12-19T17:14:44","slug":"mark-watches-steven-universe-s02e18-catch-and-release","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2016\/12\/mark-watches-steven-universe-s02e18-catch-and-release\/","title":{"rendered":"Mark Watches &#8216;Steven Universe&#8217;: S02E18 &#8211; Catch and Release"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In the eighteenth episode of the second season of <i>Steven Universe<\/i>, Steven tries a different tactic with Peridot and has surprising results. Intrigued? Then it&#8217;s time for Mark to watch <i>Steven Universe<\/i>.\u00c2\u00a0<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>I am just in awe of Steven.<\/p>\n<p>Violence is inherently a part of this show, and yet I&#8217;m surprised at how frequently the show presents its characters with other options. That&#8217;s not to say that violence is <i>never<\/i> the answer, and I definitely don&#8217;t think the show is trying to say it&#8217;s bad for the Crystal Gems to defend themselves. Yet I can&#8217;t deny what a huge fan I am of solutions like this one, where Steven offers Peridot understanding, sympathy, and a willing ear. Over the course of this show, Steven has kept an open mind; it&#8217;s like his default setting, you know? Whenever he meets someone new, he accepts them in good faith.<\/p>\n<p>In the case of Peridot, he&#8217;s never quite been on board with viewing her as an enemy or even an antagonist, for that matter. He just wants to <i>understand <\/i>her. Look, she kidnaps him at the start of the episode, threatens him so he&#8217;ll attempt to repair the Homeworld warp pad, and Steven STILL just tries to be friendly with her. I am a pretty patient person, and even <i>I <\/i>cannot say that I&#8217;d react the same way. He is just so PURE, y&#8217;all! SO PURE AND ACCEPTING.<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;d like to say that this is intentional, that the writers understand what a uniquely human thing this is. From what I know of the Gems, it doesn&#8217;t seem in their nature to sympathize and empathize with others, though all three of them have learned to do so after spending so much time recently alongside humans. It&#8217;s <i>Steven<\/i> who gets all of them to realize that maybe treating Peridot like a corrupt Gem is a bad idea. Sure, it&#8217;s framed in terms of tactical advantages \u00e2\u20ac\u201c keeping Peridot around to talk to them about what the Homeworld is planning is smart \u00e2\u20ac\u201c but I can&#8217;t ignore how Steven treats Peridot. He&#8217;s curious, yes; he wants to know what she was going to say. But he doesn&#8217;t exploit her. He answers <i>her<\/i> questions, too, and he does his best to behave in a way to prove to her that he isn&#8217;t going to hurt her and that he&#8217;s sorry for doing so in the past.<\/p>\n<p>I just love Steven a great deal. I&#8217;m also <i>terrified<\/i> of whatever the cluster is. Something <i>hatching<\/i> that no one can stop? NO THANK YOU. But I&#8217;m gonna figure out what it is sooner rather than later; this season is not as long as the first one. Is it an attack force? Maybe something to cleanse the planet and make it ready for gems??? I don&#8217;t know, y&#8217;all. But perhaps Steven&#8217;s growing friendship with Peridot \u00e2\u20ac\u201c it&#8217;s totally becoming one!!! \u00e2\u20ac\u201c will give us some more information. In the meantime&#8230; y&#8217;all, there&#8217;s a new Gem living in Steven&#8217;s bathroom. This is such a cool turn of events!<\/p>\n<p>The video for &#8220;Catch and Release&#8221; can be downloaded <a href=\"https:\/\/markdoesstuff.com\/products\/mark-watches-steven-universe-season-2\">here for $0.99<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><b>Mark Links Stuff<\/b><\/p>\n<p>&#8211; <b><a href=\"https:\/\/www.patreon.com\/markdoesstuff?ty=h\" target=\"_blank\">I am now on Patreon<\/a>! There are various levels of support, from $1 up to whatever you want! You&#8217;ll get to read a private blog, extra reviews, and other such rewards. I POST A LOT OF CUTE PHOTOS, OKAY. Think of it like a private Tumblr blog that only SPECIAL PEOPLE get to read.<\/b><br \/>\n&#8211; I have updated my list of conventions and events for the remainder of the year and much of next year.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/markreads.net\/reviews\/tour-dates-appearances\/\" target=\"_blank\">Check the full list of events on my Tour Dates \/ Appearances page.<\/a><br \/>\n&#8211; My <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/calendar\/embed?src=815s3sbr8clhdi9tn8k7r3tim4%40group.calendar.google.com&amp;ctz=America\/Los_Angeles\">Master Schedule<\/a> is updated for the near and distant future for most projects, so please check it often.\u00c2\u00a0<b>My next Double Features for Mark Watches have been announced <a href=\"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/2016\/06\/here-is-the-updated-mw-double-features-schedule\/\">here.<\/a><br \/>\n<\/b>-\u00c2\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/markdoesstuff\">Mark Does Stuff is on Facebook!<\/a>\u00c2\u00a0I&#8217;ve got a community page up that I&#8217;m running. Guaranteed shenanigans!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the eighteenth episode of the second season of Steven Universe, Steven tries a different tactic with Peridot and has surprising results. Intrigued? Then it&#8217;s time for Mark to watch Steven Universe.\u00c2\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[665],"tags":[666],"class_list":["post-6063","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-steven-universe","tag-mark-watches-steven-universe"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6063","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6063"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6063\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6063"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6063"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/markwatches.net\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6063"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}<!-- WP Super Cache is installed but broken. 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