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Crossover-Enthusiast from an abaondoned mall (Lucky 7) Relationship Status: Chocolate!
#48151: Mar 18th 2017 at 1:14:00 PM

These ratings are better. They're not great, but they're definitely better.

Jawbreakers on sale for 99¢
Ultimatum Disasturbator from the Amiga Forest (Old as dirt) Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Disasturbator
#48152: Mar 18th 2017 at 5:13:44 PM

Always nice to see the ratings improve,hopefully a Steven bomb will take them back up to a million

So about the gem battlefield where they have the strawberries,I have theory that Rose encouraged the strawberries to grow there to honer the gems that fell there,or there's bleaker theory I have that the shattered gems were reabsorbed into the soil making it fertile enough for the wild strawberries to grow

edited 18th Mar '17 5:36:30 PM by Ultimatum

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darkabomination Since: Mar, 2012
#48153: Mar 18th 2017 at 5:35:57 PM

I do like the idea at least even if it's somewhat improbable that shattered Gems can be put into the ground to get back the life they soaked up, and achieve something akin to proper death.

Smasher from The 1830's, but without the racists (Don’t ask) Relationship Status: The best thing that ever happened to a bum like me
#48154: Mar 18th 2017 at 5:37:07 PM

If you want to know what episodes are important, we have a page for that.

JBC31187 Since: Jan, 2015
#48155: Mar 18th 2017 at 5:46:58 PM

Strawberries grow best in sandy soil, I believe. So it's basically Flanders Field.

thatother1dude from Land of the Ill, Annoyin' Since: Jan, 2001
#48156: Mar 18th 2017 at 7:13:32 PM

I do like the idea at least even if it's somewhat improbable that shattered Gems can be put into the ground to get back the life they soaked up, and achieve something akin to proper death.
If the resources put into a gem could be retrieved, both sides should have done so—the Crystal Gems to undo the damage to the Earth (or at least have more than five sane gems left to defend it) and Homeworld to make more (by default loyal) gems. Gems were reburied in the ground to form clusters, and there was no mention of their resources returning to the Earth. The clusters seem like closest anyone's come to recouping the loss from a gem shattering, whereas shards seem more often used for other purposes—which, given Pearl's spiel about "the living armor and infantries and many, many deaths", don't seem very successful either.

The only slightly plausible scenario is that Earth lifeforms have an ability to metabolize gemstones that's as of yet undiscovered (as the whole idea of metabolism seems foreign to gems).

Jeez, that's a thought: Homeworld breeding/genetically engineering plants and microbes that digest the shards of their dead, then putting those in extractors to make new gems. Though I guess that's basically what all heterotrophic life on Earth does already.


Speaking of gem's ignorance of Earth biology, I still like the "Rose worked as the Zoo" theory, but noticed it has one big flaw:

She had no idea how fragile human babies are. That doesn't seem like a mistake someone would make if they were essentially a human breeder.

Ultimatum Disasturbator from the Amiga Forest (Old as dirt) Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Disasturbator
#48157: Mar 19th 2017 at 7:57:32 AM

I'm tempted to chalk it up something like "Rose spent thousands of years fighting Homeworld forces and leading her armies,in that time it's probable that she forgot about her time at the zoo,more specifically dealing with human infants. It's unclear how long she worked at the zoo,it may have been months or even years,either way she devoted a lot of her energies to liberating Earth so it's little forgivable that an inorganic lifeform like her would overlook something has basic as infant mortality because it's not something gems normally have to concern themselves with and probably takes a long time for them to get anyway.

Well it's either that or Rose was straight up lying to Greg and playing the role of 'Naive Alien' as she did say that she was glad he didn't anything about her,she did tell him some things like she fought in a war,but the zoo stuff she might have had a reason for not to mentioning

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thatother1dude from Land of the Ill, Annoyin' Since: Jan, 2001
#48158: Mar 19th 2017 at 8:20:51 AM

Well it's either that or Rose was straight up lying to Greg and playing the role of 'Naive Alien'
Rose wouldn't deliberately endanger a child just to maintain a facade she had almost no motive to put up.

JBC31187 Since: Jan, 2015
#48159: Mar 19th 2017 at 8:56:46 AM

Maybe Rose Quartzes in general are human caretakers, and our Rose was a Super Prototype (her healing tears are unique, I believe) who was responsible for finding new specimens for the Zoo before the human race was wiped out.

Incidentally, has anyone read the Tripod series? It also has an alien race planning on terraforming Earth for their own needs, and gathering specimens for preservation. Except instead of a Zoo, it's more of a taxidermy exhibit.

Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#48160: Mar 19th 2017 at 8:58:50 AM

I wouldn't suspect the Zoomans of having any child rearing ability

So either there was some automated process that took care of them or the zoo was so child proofed that Rose didn't understand how much danger a baby in the real world can get into

Or maybe she was never assigned to the zoo

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
sgamer82 Since: Jan, 2001
#48161: Mar 19th 2017 at 11:25:21 AM

[up] I'd say the latter since Rose said it took her centuries (or more?) to even understand the concept of physical maturing

xanderiskander Since: Mar, 2012
#48162: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:25:18 PM

I wouldn't suspect the Zoomans of having any child rearing ability
IMO it'd be weirder for the gems at the station to know anything about it. I think they would just give the Zoomans what they need to care of it, and let their instincts do the rest. It'd be a lot easier for them than it is for normal people because they don't need to do things like hunt for food or work for money or anything.

edited 19th Mar '17 2:26:17 PM by xanderiskander

Ultimatum Disasturbator from the Amiga Forest (Old as dirt) Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Disasturbator
#48163: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:28:56 PM

maternal instincts can only take them so far,they have to have support from someone from who knows what they doing.

And now I have this horrible scene in my head of zoomen's having their children forcefully taken from them

sad

edited 19th Mar '17 2:31:15 PM by Ultimatum

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thatother1dude from Land of the Ill, Annoyin' Since: Jan, 2001
#48164: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:30:30 PM

I'd say the latter since Rose said it took her centuries (or more?) to even understand the concept of physical maturing
She didn't specify an amount of time, just that Greg "wouldn't believe how long it took".

Rose never said a timeframe either, so she could have found out before the Zoo was even built.

[up]They don't need to take away the kids, they could just tell the Zoomans how to raise them through the earrings—like how they tell them to do everything else.

edited 19th Mar '17 2:32:07 PM by thatother1dude

randomness4 Ghost '11 from The Land of Inconvenience Since: Sep, 2011
Ghost '11
#48165: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:37:47 PM

But if Zoo humans don't know what hurt is then how can the women have given birth to anything...

Plus there were no children at the zoo...despite have a child sized version of the thing.

So it's like...what?

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Ultimatum Disasturbator from the Amiga Forest (Old as dirt) Relationship Status: Who needs love when you have waffles?
Disasturbator
#48166: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:40:03 PM

Just because we never saw any infants or children running about doesn't mean there aren't any,there's probably another part of the zoo where they are housed

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Bocaj Funny but not helpful from Here or thereabouts (4 Score & 7 Years Ago) Relationship Status: Pining for the fjords
Funny but not helpful
#48167: Mar 19th 2017 at 2:43:31 PM

Huge honkin' epidural?

Forever liveblogging the Avengers
xanderiskander Since: Mar, 2012
#48168: Mar 19th 2017 at 3:13:16 PM

But if Zoo humans don't know what hurt is then how can the women have given birth to anything...

Plus there were no children at the zoo...despite have a child sized version of the thing.

So it's like...what?

The Zoo humans we met in the episode had never been "choosened" before so they wouldn't have.

And what's also weird is that there are no old people there. Do they just get tossed out of the "human disposal chute" when they get too old?

edited 19th Mar '17 3:13:37 PM by xanderiskander

Cross (Don’t ask)
#48169: Mar 19th 2017 at 3:19:35 PM

I remember seeing an old lady there.

thatother1dude from Land of the Ill, Annoyin' Since: Jan, 2001
#48170: Mar 19th 2017 at 4:11:35 PM

Plus there were no children at the zoo...despite have a child sized version of the thing.
There was one kid you could see a couple times. Maybe a second, though that one may just be a short adult (the artstyle does exaggerate height differences).

I remember seeing an old lady there.
Yep.

The demographics still don't really make much sense—a self-sustaining population wouldn't have the ages that concentrated during any point in a generational cycle. Even if they were killing the (even slightly) elderly Logan's Run-style, there should be more children.

It would have made more sense if we saw no children or elderly, because then we could just assume they're grouped (and eventually paired) by generation and there are other groups of humans we aren't seeing. (Greg would have been there, despite being older, because he's single. Steven... dunno, maybe the machine could tell he was 14? Though he still wasn't part of the Choosening, obviously.)

edited 19th Mar '17 4:52:09 PM by thatother1dude

JBC31187 Since: Jan, 2015
#48171: Mar 19th 2017 at 7:28:31 PM

Maybe the Zoo uses artificial wombs, kind of like their injectors and Kindergartens? The Zoomans don't seem surprised when a new human pops out of the lake.

Also, do the Quartz caretakers make regular visits? The Zoomans said the door never opens, but they didn't seem surprised when a bunch of Gems come running in.

darkabomination Since: Mar, 2012
#48172: Mar 19th 2017 at 7:41:25 PM

Well, they all were busy dealing with a mental breakdown/friend zoning, so they didn't have time to be freaked out.

It all kinda gives me Brave New World vibes, and I'd not be surprised if that was the main inspiration. A group of emotionally-stunted, eternally shallowly happy humans who have a constant voice conditioning them what to say, think, and feel with no concept of pain or sorrow.

If it is like Brave New World, and this would follow with what Gems would think, they could be cloned and genetically spliced to raise them artificially by whoever/whatever's manning the limb-enhancer-looking machines and conditioned until they're of sufficiant age, then put into the Zoo.

KarkatTheDalek Not as angry as the name would suggest. from Somwhere in Time/Space Since: Mar, 2012 Relationship Status: You're a beautiful woman, probably
Not as angry as the name would suggest.
#48173: Mar 19th 2017 at 8:32:37 PM

I'll be honest, while I'd like the Zoomans to be given a resolution, I'd prefer if we didn't spend too much time with them - this sort of plot makes me rather ill for some reason.

Oh God! Natural light!
32_Footsteps Think of the mooks! from Just north of Arkham Since: Jan, 2001 Relationship Status: THIS CONCEPT OF 'WUV' CONFUSES AND INFURIATES US!
Think of the mooks!
#48174: Mar 20th 2017 at 6:38:46 AM

I'm mostly fine with using a Hand Wave or two as to some of the particulars on zoomans - sufficiently advanced medicine such that they can block pain during childbirth is one obvious one (we are talking about gems being capable of FTL Travel - other scientific advancements aren't off the table). A Uterine Replicator is also possible, and in fact strikes me as most likely, since that would probably strike gems as the closest to mimicking their own reproductive cycle.

Though as pointed out, it's a side detail at best.

Reminder: Offscreen Villainy does not count towards Complete Monster.
thatother1dude from Land of the Ill, Annoyin' Since: Jan, 2001
#48175: Mar 20th 2017 at 9:14:36 AM

Why would they have the Choosening if the Zoomans didn't reproduce naturally?


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