Been watching a bit of the show (what's on Hulu and what bits I can get from YouTube). I've seen a few theories about the background story of the show, and I was curious if my own personal blend made any sense.

Spoiler: A dumb fan-theory of the plot
Show

The story begins with Pearl, as a decidedly competent yet unpopular member of the White Diamond court. Why unpopular? She thinks too much, making her an inattentive servant but a productive organizer. In a culture where role is paramount, not fitting the role makes you a pariah, even if a useful enough one to tolerate.

When Pink Diamond decides to make Earth her first colony, White assigns Pearl to Pink's entourage as her competence and experience would be valuable to rookie. Besides being a capable assistant, Pearl's transfer may have been a matter of matching personalities. It's suggested that Earth is Pink's first colony, but it may well be that Pink puts a priority on quality over quantity, devoting all her resources to cultivating the perfect colony rather than just planting them willy-nilly and seeing what works. Either way, as part of the court, she spends time with Pink's bodyguard, Rose Quartz (who, as many people point out, is clearly a quartz designed to be a courtier).

Pearl's time in the Pink court isn't much better than the White. She's a pearl, after all. She's not supposed to have an independent thought, much less an opinion, much less voice that opinion, much less voice that opinion in front of a freaking diamond. While others dismiss and mock her, however, Rose finds the ill-suited pearl fascinating, and the concepts of evolution and self-determination start forming in her mind. She spends an inordinate amount of time with the pearl, discussing and refining these concepts and Pearl, who by her design is utterly dependent on the approval of others, grows entirely devoted to the only gem to treat her as something new and wonderful rather than a defect to be barely tolerated. Between their conversations and their efforts on the planet, Rose becomes aware that the gems are... wrong. They are static, unchanging and in fact opposed to change, and that the Earth is a beautiful explosion of constant change, eternally evolving, never the same from one minute to the next. And that their colony would destroy this wonder to further a culture that sees anything new as an abomination. She starts to resent the colony plans and Pearl, in her hero worship, begins to follow suit.

Something happens next. The details are honestly unimportant. Possibly Pearl echoes one of Rose's sentiments to loudly in front of Pink. Possibly Pink goes just a little too far in her abuse of the "defective" pearl. Possibly Pink just stubbed her toe and called for Pearl to be shattered for the unthinkable crime of being the closest gem to her at the time. Whatever the event, Rose places herself between the two and everything she's been thinking of starts spilling out. Why do they have to destroy such a beautiful planet? Why does a gem with this pearl's talents get denigrated just because she's more than a pearl "should be"? Why are the gems, with all their beauty and power and knowledge, acting like the bad guys? Pink reacts to this challenge about as well as you might expect, and orders both of them to be shattered. They escape, and the rebellion begins.

To their amazement, Rose and Pearl find they're not alone. Other gems who don't feel they fit their designated roles join up as well. This includes Bismuth, who changes sides after Rose asks the simple question "What is it you want to build?". Questions such as that stoke fires in a number of disenchanted gems, and suddenly the rebellion isn't as one-sided as it seemed.

But there's one problem. Pink only has one planet. She has nowhere to go, and no laurels to rest on if Earth goes south. Pride and practicality won't allow her to quit. No matter how many battles she loses, she will never concede defeat. Pressed to make the hardest decision of her life, Rose shatters Pink - committing the ultimate sin in the hopes that it would be turning point to make Earth a free world, where gems could be what they are instead of what they were made to be. It didn't work out that way.

Yes, shattering a diamond had a massive impact on gem culture. It just wasn't the one she was hoping for. Rather than backing down with their bloody nose, the remaining diamonds retaliated, putting more and more of their resources into destroying Rose and her "crystal gems". Blue and Yellow Diamond personally invested themselves in the now all-out war, supported by the quartz soldiers only now arising from the Earth, too late to serve the diamond they were designed to. As the fighting grew to a frenzied pitch, so too did the fighters, transforming even generally nice gems like Bismuth into brutal warriors who were willing to cross any taboo in order to win the war.

Ultimately, the war simply wasn't worth it for the diamonds. They might have had superior numbers, but the crystal gems willing to invent and employ tactics and resources the diamonds weren't equipped to deal with. Including, with the creation of Garnet, the acceptance and use of heterotype fusions. They'd burnt too many resources on the war without satisfactory results. Once they came to this conclusion, they implemented a last-ditch tactic. Withdraw any valuable assets, use a corruption attack to render all remaining gems on the planet into animalistic monsters, and basically disavow the war had even happened. Earth just wasn't a suitable colony site after all. No, of course Pink Diamond wasn't shattered, there was no such gem to begin with. There's only ever been the three of us. You're not going to correct your diamond, are you? Rose only had time to shield the two gems closest to her and together they watched as every last gem around them, friend and foe alike, were corrupted.

After that, the story is pretty much transparent. The remaining gems take it upon themselves to capture and secure as many corrupted gems as possible, working to neutralize a threat they themselves were responsible for. Meanwhile, Rose's obsession with evolution and self-determination continues to grow, with her fascination ultimately expanding beyond the natural world and into humanity. And yet, despite being unnaturally open-minded for a gem, she is still unable to bridge the mental divide between gems and humans, viewing them as beloved pets rather than people. It's only when Greg, her latest dalliance with humanity, calls her out on the attitude that she starts to look at humanity in a new light. Not only were they living examples of her philosophy, they were exmplars of what she hoped gems could become: living, growing creatures that were free to define their own identities.

The end result is Steven. Not some legendary warrior destined to save the universe, not some secret weapon, but a proof of concept: an example of what gems were capable of, whose role and nature were things of his own choosing.

And at his side is the very pearl that inspired it all.


I know a lot of it is old ideas, but I haven't seen it fit together this way. Just curious if it makes sense.