Steven Universe Rocknaldo Video Essay
Vložit
- čas přidán 11. 09. 2024
- Hi, guys! Today I take a look at an episode most Steven Universe fans consider the worst. But is it really all that bad?
Hope you like it! This is probably my longest single episode review yet.
Don't forget to follow me on social media!
Instagram: / kitty_monk_the_youtuber
Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use.
This episode was a cinematic masterpiece that made every plot based episode seem like filler. This episode rocked my world. Also a scrappy isn't just a universally hated character. It's one solely introduced by higher ups to pander to a demographic in a poorly misguided manner.
My favourite Ronaldo scene was where the gems beat him up.
Same😅
I thought he was just supposed to be an standin for the less pleasant members of fandoms who spend all their days making incorrect theories and playing the "i'm more of a fan than you I know this about the show, give me all the attention" card those sorta people.
Edit: typos
Wasn’t Ronaldo right about most of his “theories” though?
Ronaldo isn't relatable because Ronaldo isn't a person. He's barely even semi-fleshed out - Ronaldo is a stereotype that exists purely to project undesirable tropes onto (the weeb, the conspiracy theorist, incel, etc).
exactly. but he was right about why steven let connie join the crystal gems.
Was he tho and of she even really
how is he an incel if he has a gf?
@@mizv4043 she still did training
When I first saw Ronaldo, I thought that the running gag with him would be that he goes on insane rants about alien conspiracies and other theories, while completely ignorant of the fact that a family of literal aliens not only live within walking distance of the town, but everyone else in town is aware that they are aliens. Sort of like the same running joke with Dale Gribble from King of the Hill. There's a lot of potential for gags as well as foreshadowing like you mentioned, or even red herring foreshadowing from Ronaldo.
Alternatively they could have done something with his desire for “something important finally happening to me”. That’s relatable, and makes sense given his situation: he lives in a small isolated town, works a boring/stressful fast food job, doesn’t seem to have a lot of friends who aren’t online, and aside from his obsession with conspiracies, all things considered he’s a pretty mediocre person with no exceptional skills. Under that know-it-all visage, Ronaldo is probably a very bored, lonely kid who wishes his life was more exciting and that he was more important. Maybe he hears about Steven’s exploits and wishes he could do the same, but learns the hard way that having an “exciting life” has major downsides he never considered, and instead of trying to become an important person, he just tries to be a better person overall.
Needless to say, I was very disappointed with the direction they went with him. Honestly the Beach City folks are my least favorite characters in general, but Ronaldo is definitely at the bottom for me with Onion. He's just a self-centered prick with an obnoxious voice.
Being Fair the Beach city crew is either annoying or Nice
I definetly think the ep was going for a critique of "allies" and maybe cultural appropiation.
Ronaldo reminds me of that white weeb that acts japanese, knows little about the culture and only makes actual japanese people uncomfortable. That's the vibe I get from him acting like a Crystal Gem.
I also feel like the development that matters isn't Ronaldo's, but Steven's. The episode kinda tests his patience, he has to learn to put limits and not let jerks like Ronaldo take advantage of his kindness.
Ronaldo is like opposite of connie lmao. But not like a foil.. like just the opposite one of the best characters in the show.
The Crystal Gems have this weird tendency to know next to nothing about the Earth, despite living on it for thousands of years. Pearl bemusingly asking why humans need electricity, they can just go back to being a stone age society, what's the big deal.
It honestly feels weird that they protect a planet they purposefully refuse to learn almost anything about, see how Pearl's "education! of Steven left him ignorant of basic things, like how school grades work.
Yeah, that is a major problem.
Discord's social awkwardness worked because he was trapped in stone for a 1000 years.
That didn't happen to the main trio of CGs.
I'd accept a lack of knowledge of newer human technology such as smartphones, but NOT something like you mentioned.
They protect the actual physical planet. They don't particularly care for its inhabitents.
I agree; I'm not sure if this comment is a critique of the show's writing or the characters themselves though. Personally I see it as being very consistent with the characters themselves and see it as a unique flaw.
In the early seasons, they damaged property without care and felt very detached from citizens of beach city- the only human them showing any care towards good or bad being Greg (and Steven, if he counts). I always took it as them doing what they were doing purely for Rose Quartz, and what she cared about, and not because they actually 100% understood why or cared themselves. Theoretically, it could be argued they represent a different warped view of humanity- Pearl may shun it or facets of it disgusting, Garnet is neutral and doesn't seem to care at all, and Amethyst almost seems to represent a fetishization of humans (not sexual, but just overindulgent while also being shallow)
Something that is later developed in all of them by the end seasons. Small but significant character arcs
I honestly never hated this episode. I always thought it was a good representation on the importance of gatekeeping. Gatekeeping is not inherently bad, some things need to be gatekept. Some things, places, and words are designed for or only appropriate for specific groups of people and it isn't bad to keep them that way. I actually got into a fight with a friend during high school over the importance of gatekeeping. We stopped talking for a week over it. That friend also watched this show and this episode coincidentally aired the same week we fought. I was given an apology the day after this episode aired. I can admit I was a but smug when I said "I told you so". Is it a great episode? By no means. It isn't even fun to watch, just kinda frustrating. But it gets a message across very well.
Nice essay, I agree with your thoughts on Rolando (Have him as the central focus and he's kind of a jerk, have him involved in background shenanigans: like being attacked by the Watermelons, His comments about the Dondai in Beach City Drift, or his scene with Jane (the Movie Theater Girl), or his turn as the villainous Ringo and he's more on the tolerable side.)
Thank you for bringing up Jane! I feel it's criminal they never added Jane beyond a single gag.
I love a slow descent into serialization. SU gets a lot of hate for season one being boring but I’ve been rewatching it and I actually love it! I love all the beach city towny episodes and characterization. Then in season two they a little bit rushed into the overall plot kind of thing but it was still fun. Then after that everything was SO rushed that when they try to slow it down they just completely fail! This was a bottle episode that belonged in season one if at all. Imo change your mind shouldn’t have been an episode.. it should have been a full season with all the content it had packed into under an hour.
I don't feel like allegories have to be one on one comparisons. That way you always end of with holes. Because real life issues are complicated, have layers history and media has limits to actually portrait that, specially children aimed shows with limited time. Also, there is a limit on how much you can stretch an allegory until it stops making sense, becomes problematic or just too similar to reality so it being a allegory is actually pointless. That's a problem SU has.
andy was a good character and was way better then ronaldo he was kind of in the right as lapis and peridot were kind of trespassing but, not did he let them stay but he(unlike actually ronaldo) actually helped the gems in the future
trueee! ronaldo did some bad stuff too. at least andy tried to do smtn abt it
Yooo Ronaldo and the Viking hat teen from Craig has the same VA? I can hear it now. Anyway, I like Ronaldo in his previous episodes. This in particular felt like someone who didn't like the character got stuck with writing it.
The writer was Lauren Zuke (who's Jesse Zuke now) and got all the controversy from the Lapidot stuff. I should've brought it up, but the controversy is one way people defend the episode.
Ironic that I'm watching this while drawing Gem OCs....
Lol
I’m writting a book, and If someone make a OC on my world I would be very flattered. I cant undestand this moronic way of think of “lets mock the fandom”
Im pretty sure the uncle grandpa episode was the worst
It has its moments and its meant to be non-canon. Besides, even that episode has its haters, it has its fans. Most fans hate Rocknaldo.
@@KittyMonk i know it wasn’t cannon but it was still overall awful.
Weird, I actually liked a lot of stuff about that episode even though I'm pretty indifferent toward Uncle Grandpa.
I just found the episode to be funny, like I’m pretty sure I didn’t like it at first, but afterwards I kinda love it for having an iconic joke for me(the void scene).
even if i don't particularly LIKE the uncle grandpa episode, it's at least just less.... UPSETTING to watch. whereas even thinking of rocknaldo puts me in a bad mood
One idea i think is hes one of those kind of toxic fans who is too obsesive about following a idol or group of a fandom example he would say "White diamond is the best gem ever "but then someone else would say " White diamond had some issues" then he would go and straight up attack this person with hate tweets a video etc etc
I think onion had potential to be a good character but he honestly came off as pretty insulting to ND kids :/ like the whole joke with him was that he was super “weird,” selfish, and didn’t socialize well with others. I’ve known kids who act just like Onion and it feels insulting to turn those character traits into a joke, because they never really develop him beyond that-aside from a few little moments, Steven (and the audience) never really see(s) onion as a fully formed person.
Characters like Pearl and peridot show autistic traits and are widely headcanoned to be autistic, but onion doesn’t get that same respect. Part of that is bc I think he embodies “bad” autistic traits and traits that others don’t and refuse to understand-like onion being nonverbal
It was VERY difficult for me to like Onion’s personality in the first seasons. I agree he came off as selfish and in some situations even sociopathic. Later on they did make attempts to improve his character through Steven spending more time with him 1-1, but by then we had already seen better interpretations of antisocial or autistic behavior. So it comes off as artificial.
It's sad because I don't think the writers really intended for Onion to be likeable--just as the "weird, creepy kid"--but he had potential to be a good representation of people with more "undesirable" or "ugly" autistic/ND traits. It would've been cool to see different sides of Onion portrayed in an undeniably positive light and for Steven to learn to understand, compromise with, and communicate with Onion.
You're right that bonding with Onion feels artificial, and I think it's because the writers didn't plan on making him an actual character with development, but later felt as though they should :/ disappointing,,
honestly the worst part for me is that they didn't age him up at all for the future time skip, which just..... feels really gross. they could've kept him visibly childlike, but it was jarring for this small child to have not changed at ALL, and combined with the everything else in this comment and replies, doubles down on feeling gross and ableist and infantiliazing
I kind of ironically loved this episode, mostly cause it made it clear that Ronaldo, is a gatekeeping, selfish, and entitled neckbeard and I just love watching characters like that burn. Plus this line "Wow, you truth'd him so hard that he died"
I didn't like Steven Universe it was just too much filler and I felt like it always took forever to get straight to the point of things or where the story was headed.
Some of that you can blame on executive meddling. The network wanted one off episodes, the crew wanted it to be serialized like Avatar.
SU: Future's tone is how the crew wanted the show to go: story driven with very little filler.
If you don't like the first few episodes, go to Giant Woman and then go from there. Some episodes make sense later on. I didn't like the filler in episodes like Gravity Falls, but now it's fun to watch the wax figure episode in hindsight.
I actually like Uncle Andy.
I always find fan complaint episodes in poor taste, insulting the people who watch your property which keeps it on the air is just lame.
Getting away with too much, that's a big no-no for character writing unless it's a plot point with other characters. Like one character's an enabler of said character who's always being an asshole and they both have to change. An asshole who's always excused deserves to be hated but the story loves them.
I wouldve love If they made Ronaldo become a bit More friendly and less jerk overtime, like they forgive a SPACE DICTATOR bcos they aré family...But dont forgive him? For just being a jerk? Like I kinda get it but In-Universe youre telling me being a jerk Is worse than being a SPACE DICTATOR??? Wouldve love they Made him an Gem Investigator or soemthing in Future idk
I did read it as an episode on cultural appropriation since Ronaldo is a weeaboo. But I also read it as someone who did have gemsona even though I wasn't too into the fandom as kind of laughing at their fans, which hurt.
I def prefer him to be more of a background character since he seems better in small doses. Literally the studio execs are responsible for episodes like this and it's so annoying. Part of me wonders if it was made so badly because the actual team wanted to show up the execs. I think that might be too much of a tinfoil hat though
*We don't talk about the Uncle Grandpa episode*
He woke up and chose violence.
What are your thoughts on Rocknaldo?
It’s called leather pants
Can you make a video on the issues with Onion? I didnt know people disliked him
One of the problem is like he only is weird and doesnt talk and thats the only thing going on for him
i dont remember any of the ronaldo episodes , i feel like my mind blocked them out
Every time I saw ranaldo I would just hear uncle ruckus's voice going "Awww he'll nah..." in the back of my head
I think if we got to see more of what went on with some of the Other Characters in the series instead of just having Each & Every Episode focus Solely on Steven's side of the Story(even the Flashbacks couldn't be told unless Steven was there to Listen to them), then maybe episodes like Rocknaldo could have been at least Slightly better because we'd be seeing what the rest of the cast was doing when Steven wasn't around.
Just out of curiosity, what was wrong with onion? He was never my favorite character, but unless I’m repressing my memory of a really bad episode, I don’t remember a time where I hated him or even disliked him.
*[Totally]*
I don't remember anything about Ronaldo, all I remember is Steven going off on Ronaldo and Amethyst saying "wow, you truthed him so hard he died." I like that, I liked watching Steven slowly become more assertive. Oh and also the part where he loses his fucking girlfriend because of Steven's plan in Restaurant Wars, which is NEVER addressed!
I thought the uncle grandpa steven universe episode was the worst episode
I just disliked this episode because 1-he gets a star on his clothes before peidot WHO IS AN OFFICIAL CRYSTAL GEM 2-he became an official crystal gem before Lapis
Rocknaldo isn't the worst episode, not by a long shot. Future has WAY worse episodes!
I think Future at least has a plot for every episode. Even the bad episodes that seem like “filler” like the special episode you can read that as the writers foreshadowing. This episode, you could cut it out completely and nothing would change plot wise.
I didn't watch this episode past five minutes.
Excuse me? We love onion boi
ronaldo is intersting because is the only in that planet that try to search the truth but the show try to making the a horrible person in any oportunity . yes try to make to be popular but
there is no one in that planet that found weird that gigants hands are closing to the earth , the water in the planet is gone and make a pillar and all the bad things happen when garnet , pearl and amathys are in the zone.
but you right about all you say about ronaldo
and i goint to that opcion , is more like the writter made ronaldo base in all the guys that make theory oh fanboys of the show and say.-´´ you don´t want to be this guy just enjoy the show''
i refuse to tolerate onion slander 😪
if you look at steven universe all the characters they paint as incapable of redemption are male. all of them.
Hum... Patterns
Peedee & Greg: 🤔
Episodes where the writters respond to the fandom are always bad
It's the always petty response
This episode (along with most other Ronaldo or Onion episodes) is a train wreck but it's still better than Change Your Mind & Escapism.
I hate this episode
Wow I didn’t know kitty monk used to make su videos. Cool
I wouldn't classify Onion as the other "Scrappy" of this show (btw Scrappy is not a bad character, it's just a few vocal haters spreading their hate of him online to the point where people just automatically follow the bandwagon on him being bad, even if they haven't seen any of the episodes he's in) as that would be Lars. Not only was he being terrible to Sadie (her trapping them on an island for days to force him to love her notwithstanding, cause what the hell) but even when he has his own spaceship, he goes into a temper tantrum that his ex GF gets to hang out with a bunch of teens in the middle of nowhere backwater of Beach City.
As he is sitting inside the LITERAL SPACE SHIP HE IS THE CAPTAIN OF.
Kitty Monk: (Understandably makes a video to critique Rocknaldo)
Me: (Critiques Rocknaldo by making Ronaldo into General Bloodstone and play a major antagonist role in my fic.)
Also me: Yeah, I'm not gonna pretend I'm reasonable. Great video.
Suggestion Ronaldo's bravado is mean-stricken but unintentional is like defending Bopisa for devouring babies or Bin Laden using his daughter to shield himself. There shouldn't be any reason to defend this loser just for the sake of "It's bad writing."
Ronaldo in the episode rocknaldo was a four letter d word
The fact that Garrison of all people told Stan off for saying Timmy is "r***rded". Stan wasn't saying it to be mean, but it's pretty shocking how casually that word can get thrown around.
I used watch this
Wait youre telling me that Ronaldo was meant to be a likeable character?
Every character/ family got an episode expounding on them. That includes the the frymans, he's a dork, that's his joke. Leave it be
Even if he's a dork, that is no excuse not to be likable. Peridot's a dork, and while she's probably a bigger wasted opportunity than Ronaldo, she's still likable, even when she was an antagonist.
Ronaldo is a Neckbeard 😂
Toxic fans bingo
you saying steven universe is a show with no bad episodes..... girl are you actually okay that show is so racist and pro-abuse itt could not possibly be worse 😭
@Crescent Colors human zoo shown as a positive thing (zoomen being happy living in a more or less communist utopia), sidelining of connie, the trope of "white protagonist saves brown girl from her tiger mom by showing her how to Have Fun", fusions that contain garnet, a black-coded character always being portrayed as violent (sugilite is even voiced by a black voice actress) or misguided and ultimately hurting people (the spinny one with pearl i dont remember her name) the whole diamond thing also just generally seems to redeem um...intergalactic genociders which.... yeah..., and even this very episode: it could not be a more obvious metaphor for prejudice (ronaldo's flyers are basically antisemitic conspiracy theory flyers replacing "lizard people" for "rock people"), and then cultural appropriation/racefaking, but its played for jokes instead of being treated like the serious issue it is. also the abuse thing i really meant more about how rose and pearl dating with an obvious power imbalance (master and slave) is portrayed as mostly positive, and then also how pearl pretty much gets away with deceit, using people and crossing their boumdaries, and taking her anger out on others including children, because she's rebecca sugar's self insert, although yeah the diamond thing applies too
@@helsyreason5274 Tea Time, kids! On a real note there is some serious stuff I've got to straighten out of you before you grow up thinking you can get away with saying whatever you want without a challenger. First and foremost, I'm going to start by decompressing your paragraph and separating the facts and opinions in your last comment, like a respectable scholar would do in any given sense. Before I get into it though I'm just going to say that your understanding of communism is not only hilariously misplaced in this situation but factually and incorrectly used just in general, so I'm just gonna fix that up for you, sugar. Communism is a type of government in which the processed work is given out and divided equally amongst all people no matter the scale of work put in by any given individual, I'm not sure if you've ever seen the zoo episode but if you actually paid any amount of attention to it you'd understand that these guys are quite literally the furthest thing from a "functional society" aka government and more along the lines of a day care, not including the bathing and chosening scenes of course. Hell, they don't even grow their own food, it's magically grown for them! You have to work to be in a communist community, they don't work they just leisure about while everything is given to them and they're talked to and treated like toddlers by both the voice and the earth amethyst, I want to say I'm surprised you even came close to the thought that they're a communist community but I've seen that same mistake repeated by people probably 20x older than you. Now onto the actual debunking, I'll try to keep it short since you don't seem to fancy using your eyes for any more than a few seconds. Yes the zoo was supposed to be painted as a "perfect utopia" since the people in the zoo are protected from all wrong, hence why they didn't even know what hurt was before Steven and Greg joined in, which is why although out the actual zoo scene Steven is so visibly uncomfortable/ upset that they're living this way since he knows how wrong it is even going to the length of saying it out loudto them to no avail. No Connie wasn't sidelined for the reasons you thought, she's technically a mix between side character and secondary main character due to the role she plays in the show so if this is about her not being given more screen time I can assure you it's because other characters needed their time to grow as well, Steven didn't save Connie from her mom her mom realized that her way of caring for her child was only causing her child to feel that she can't tell her anything about herself without being strictly punished which is one of the worst things that could happen to a genuinely loving and caring parent that she thought herself to be. No not every fusion with garnet is labeled as violent for racsist reasons, in the episode where garnet explained to amethyst and pearl why they're individual fusions turned out to be so aggressive in the end she specifically said that she can make rash decisions and that it's just a part of her that she can only really control while being garnet and no one else, she's a fusion between a hot headed ruby and a raised-to-be-better sapphire who both can have trouble keeping these flaws in check 24/7 for as long as roughly 6 thousand years, that keystone vacation episode was so important because of this exact reason of understanding! Yes the whole redeeming the diamond issue is contraversal because that's what the show wants to portray, a sense of next level understanding of what constitutes as good and bad when you're standing in the middle of it all is why Steven universe got as deep as it did, to think you understand it to it's fullest extent is to be the most full-of-yourself human there can be since there isn't truly a single correct answer to it all! Yes Ronald is an absolute piece of shit in this episode because he's supposed to represent people like you who think they can just lightly skim a story without first trying to obtain why it exists in the first place and talk all the shit you want while wholeheartedly thinking you're justified in thinking so when you aren't!! Rose and pearl never even dated, do you even understand how crushes work, pearl had a crush on rose because she never truly treated her like how the other diamonds treated their pearls and because she gave her life a whole new meaning by opening her eyes to true beauty not because she was forced to in any sense directly! Pearl has suffered as long as the diamonds have since she never once got to be in a real relationship with the person she loved and she never got her feelings reciprocated but instead repeatedly trampled on by every new lover rose got just for the hell of it ultimately choosing her selfish desires over the possible feelings of her associates, never once thinking that maybe she shouldn't treat love and humans like pawns in her game or thinking of how she put so much pressure on pearl to keep her war crimes a secret and never once taking true care of her since rose her self was never treated with love by her own family. Have you neglected every episode that includes pearl having a mental break down due to how she has no clue how to care for or even love herself due to a continuous string of neglect that shows the consequences of the diamonds actions leading to her unconsciously attempting the same to Steven? Steven had to yell it to blue diamond why she ever thought it was normal to lock the one she loved away and only let her free if she cried and accepted she was wrong even though pink had no clue why the person she loved treated them so bad, how yellow striking blue down wasn't how a real family treated each other, and how no matter what views white thought were perfect she was as flawed as any other gem who thought the same and with no excuse at that. Steven universe, albeit a bit on the nose about the whole protagonist fixes everything in song platform, really gave numerous statements about how so many things are wong and how no matter what you or anyone does there will always be consequences of everyone's actions, wether they be big or small, positive or negative. If you refuse to see it as it is then you're the only one to blame for your flawed views in life and hardly anyone else, not gonna waste any more of my breath on a wall who's paint ain't even air drying at that point, no skin off my back any how. If you made it to the end I congratulate you on at least trying to understand the flaws we all have, most people don't make it that far so I'd be surprised if anyone actually listened to what I mulled over for for years and years of attempted self awareness, I hope you take in some serious consideration of what I had to say on the matter and with that I bid you adieu.
@@aleksbaki5425 i'm not reading this lol
@@helsyreason5274 eh wouldn't be the first time an ingnorant child went on the internet to talk shit then run and hide, life is gonna curb stomp you when you're older kid, thank goodness I'm not you
@@aleksbaki5425 ok npc