[2/3 of Rose The Flower Analysis]

Major Spoilers to Steven Universe Arkham Edition.

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So Rose The Flower is one of those characters where you literally can't comprehend her true power since there's little to no restrictions about her.

Yeah, already digging into her character a little bit without even stating the main factors of her. 

Don't worry, I won't go too far ahead.

Oh yeah, before I move on forward, I need to address something real quick. This is what Rose looks like in a 2D Style:

And, of course, her 3D model looks not too different from this. The same could be said about her comic-book counterpart. I honestly think this is the peak of Rose's design in all forms of media.

 And then there's this...

*sighs*

...

*contemplates all of my decisions and past mistakes that led me to this point in my hobby and life*

*takes a heavy sip of Diet Pepsi*

*sighs*

WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT... IS... THAT?!

THAT'S NOT THE ROSE I KNOW!

Okay, now that I've calmed down, I just want to say don't EVER think this is what Rose The Flower looks like in any story written by me.

This may be the latest version of her character and she functions just the same as her other counterparts, but this is such a garbage look of her character - in my opinion. They replaced her cape on her back with some leaf, WHY WOULD YOU TAKE AWAY HER GLITTERING STAR CAPE?!

Don't even get me STARTED on her head! Her head was perfect the way it was, why did they CHANGE it?! She looks like an alien now!

They took away her petal hands and replaced them with just little claws that look very similar to human hands. SHE'S NOT SUPPOSED TO RESEMBLE A HUMAN BEING IN ANY WAY, THAT'S WHAT MAKES HER SPECIAL! 

It hurts seeing such a compelling character like Rose lose such an interesting and unique design just because the developers thought she 'needed' a change. NOTHING WARRANTED THAT!

I can't talk about this anymore, let's just get on with the analysis. 

A: Overview of Her Character (+ cut content/details)
B: Her Influence Affecting The Story
C: Why She's Different
D: Her Near-Victory

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A: Overview of Her Character.

Rose is kind of an out-of-place character when regarding Steven Universe. She doesn't serve much of a purpose to the plot other than be a threatening villain, but her villainy act will be covered later.

But what we can cover is the basics of her life. Rose is a flower who grew up on a goat farm, but then a magical potion was given to her and it ingested her roots and then she became a flying flower that can talk and interact with humans.

She didn't do much other than be a faithful friend/daughter figure to her creator. She was just simply a pure yet curious being that just wanted the best for everyone. But then it was all taken from her in an act of paranoia and violence from the same creatures that walked on the soil that made her. 

And in return, she gives them a much more cruel variation of violence that turns it from a revenge kill to straight up genocide.

You can sympathize with her all you want, it's justified to feel that way, but you can't cut her slack on that. She brutally murdered people with ideas she came up with on the spot, random people that had little to no doing with her creator's death.

So yeah, that's basically her origin story and why she hates humans so much. Surely she ends up being like another Steven Universe villain who gets redeemed through a rushed way like what the writers did for Spinel and the Diamonds, right?

Except no, she didn't. Rose may have been neutered from her powers but she still holds the firm belief that humans are the enemy. As of now, I'm on the fence of whether or not she gets a redemption arc. 

Yeah, it's very easy to ignore Rose and just move on from her defeat - pretending she doesn't exist. But a character like her doesn't deserve to just be left alone for the audience to depict what happens to her after the story ends.

She got her beginning and middle act, she should have a final act as well. 

Anyways, I was mostly concerned about making Rose all-too similar to the Diamonds, Spinel and Moonlight since they all were terrifying villains and now they're allies to the Crystal Gems. 

It's not unheard of for the villains to not have a redemption arc, just look at Jasper, Bluebird, Squaridot, Emerald, etc. But Rose also doesn't belong to be compared to them as well.

You can definitely see my struggle for where to put this character since she's not a redemption arc type of villain but also not some generic villain that only holds reference to the plot as an obstacle.

Rose is the only villain in the series that has been a villain for two long nights in a row as the main villain.

Fun fact: Rose was meant to be sidelined intentionally during Night 4 of Arkham Edition, and then we would've gotten our main focus on the other villains trying to make a comeback since Steven was gone. The reason I intentionally planned to sideline Rose was because I wanted to trick the readers into thinking she's not that threatening before she just swoops in and proves them wrong.

But the problem with that is it would have required me to think of a legitimate reason to bring the old villains back, since they've been used so much at the point. And even if I brought in the more underused gems like Emerald and Bluebird, they aren't really that threatening on their own with the likes of Jasper or Holly Blue Agate backing them up. 

And I certainly didn't want to create new and original villains to set up a conflict, so I just made the spotlight stay at Rose at all times and just surprised the audience in a boring way. 

To add even more to the fun fact: Rose was also not supposed to be a villain. Rose was originally going to just be a character that existed, and the readers was supposed to figure out what she is before the story revealed it.

As well as her fate in Arkham Edition ended much more sadder than what you currently have.

To make the long turn of events short, Rose was going to die because Steven broke her wand after he was freed from her control. Rose shriveled up and died similar to what happened to her when the group sprayed Rose Repellent then burned her.

Except this was more sadder than that since Rose couldn't do anything but scream until she was dead, and then she turned into ashes for good - leaving one tiny seed behind.

Spinel picked up the seed and asked Steven, "if I plant this and nurture it, would it bring Rose back?"

Then Steven replied with, "Rose's magic is gone. That would only grow a normal rose plant."

And Spinel planted it in a flowerpot anyway, keeping it as a trophy-like thing that would remind her that she tried her best with Rose.

The Gnome King ending where she just loses her powers may seem like a cheap-shot to utterly defeat her without ending her life, but it played out very well since it gave me the chance to bring Pink Diamond back as well.

Yeah, I should've established the Gnome King a little more, but he does a good job nonetheless as serving a character who has the power to stop Rose.

Because I feel like Rose couldn't defeated by anyone except maybe Steven.

I know all of you are thinking, "Why is Steven the only one who could defeat Rose The Flower? Are you trying to make Steven 'the chosen one' or something?"

Is there any other character in Steven Universe (both Arkham and Canon) that has the amount of powers, skills and intelligence as Steven? I know I raved on Moonlight's for being the perfect villain, but even she is incapable of facing Rose The Flower.

Magic beats most things. But there's one thing that beats all.

Brain beats all. It just depends how you use it.

Rose beats the Diamond Authority because she uses magic and brain.

Rose beats Moonlight because she uses magic and brain.

How did Huge Gigantacus manage to stay alive after encountering her for so long? Because he used his brain.

He may be mini, he may underwhelming (at first glance), but he is actually very smart and he carried the entire story along with two other characters.

I am probably the only one would say this, but here we go:

Spinel, Huge Gigantacus and Rose The Flower are living plot-devices that make Arkham Edition good and advance the story.

Spinel left a forever impact on the characters with her debut and one-night performance, as well as a breath of fresh air take on her plan. Her impact affected Night 3, and it wouldn't be the same if she didn't affected Steven the way she did.

Huge Gigantacus is the comic relief that takes the depressing tone away from the story, along with carrying the entire story on his tiny back. I have a list that I was originally going to share on here, but I'm saving it for when I do the Huge Gigantacus analysis (it's gonna happen soon).

And then Rose is the one who basically started most of the conflicts.

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B: Her Influence Affecting The Story.

It was hinted in the story that she's in control of a lot of villains and evil creatures out in the universe, which could explain why the Diamonds, Spinel and Moonlight were so evil yet they also seemed to have a sudden change of heart when Steven got through to them.

This was such an interesting concept that I should probably implement it more in other stories (or maybe someone could take notes from it).

To explain it in simple terms (or paraphrase what was said in Arkham): imagine Rose having a universal chess board where her pawns are figurines of villains and creatures that are under her control.

And when they fail her enough times, she pushes them over as a sign of checkmate and then they lose her control of them.

That explains why White Diamond's development felt so sudden during the start of it, because Rose finally tipped over her pawn and White finally saw what's going on around her.

[This is the alternative option to go with instead of my White Diamond Theory.]

This actually seems like a really great way to explain why the likes of Spinel and Moonlight get a second chance of redeeming themselves since they were gripped by Rose's evil petals before she tipped them over.

With that in mind, every single enemy that the Crystal Gems had ever faced were just mini-bosses building up to the final boss.

But doesn't that mean that characters like Jasper and Squaridot are no longer evil?

Not exactly. They're still the same as before, Rose just doesn't have a hold them anymore. Villains like them, who were evil for petty reasons or just having beef with Steven weren't necessary pawns for the flower to use - so she did nothing to them. 

And I don't think anyone caught up on this (mostly because this concept wasn't talked about enough to be relevant), did you notice how Black Diamond was kind of easy to persuade after Rose lost her magic? That's because Rose no longer had a hold of her anymore, and then Black suddenly felt lonely instead of bitter.

This was basic my first intentional attempt at being subtle with something, but it still failed since I didn't talk about Rose's control too much in the story.

And no, I don't mean her vessels. There's a clear difference between her vessels and her pawns. 

A vessel is someone who Rose manually controls with her magic. An example of this is purple eyes.

A pawn is someone who Rose only influences their emotions and decision making. An example of this is Spinel and the Diamond Authority.

Moonlight is a mix of both because she naturally has purple eyes, plus she seemed to be free from any form of influence, aside from her condition.

All in all, Rose basically manipulated every antagonist into fighting the Crystal Gems purely because she hated what they stood for.

And also because she's bored.

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C: Why She's different.

Rose is very different than the standard villain since her motivation is much deeper than at first glance.

When looking at her, you'd think she's a good guy because of her cute-looking exterior. But once she kills someone, then you think she's just a murderer who kills people for fun.

But her true motivation for killing humans is because she genuinely thinks it's the right thing to do, along with the fact its her way of revenge since the rules of her magic can't allow her to bring George back the way she wanted. 

A gem who is very close to being compared to her is Spinel. But even then, they're both very different. 

Spinel's motivation was to take out all of her anger out on one person. And even then that one person isn't aware of what happened to her. Her best course of action was to ruin Pink's planet and son's life - by wiping his friend's memories so he would die alone on a barren world. 

Rose's motivation is to kill every single human being on Earth, except she can't physically do it all with a spell - as that would require too much magic from her. If Rose ever were to do a Thanos-snap and wipe out all humans on Earth, she would die because that's too much of a request for her frail flower body to handle. Instead, she gathers creatures of all kinds to kill humans for her while she sits back and watches.

Every single Steven Universe villain is evil because of something Steven and/or Pink Diamond did... except for this flower.

Rose isn't motivated by being screwed over by one individual, her motivation is being screwed by an entire species. 

So basically she takes the term 'Steven Universe villain' to level ten. 

Another thing to consider is the fact she's... not easily defeated.

How did Steven defeat Jasper? Well, he sometimes beats her with his natural skill in combat. But other times, he beats her with brute force since he can get stronger than her.

How did Steven defeat Spinel? Part of it is because he had a stronger mental resilience than her to keep going and letting her tire herself out emotionally. As well as being a shoulder for her to cry on in her last moments (figuratively, though I should've made it literally). 

How did Steven defeat White Diamond? Manipulating her and forcing her cooperation, still manipulating her through her egotistical and self-absorbent personality. 

How did Steven defeat Squaridot? Using his head and playing along with her games, just to trick her or beat her fairly, as well as manipulating her into throwing tantrums.

You see a pattern? Steven beats them all either through a fist fight or manipulating them.

How did Steven defeat Rose? Garden Gnomes.

Yeah... I-I realize just how silly it has gotten in this universe...

Well, let's move on to the last segment--

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D: Her Near Victory

Rose almost won her fight with the Crystal Gems two times. Her first near-victory was on Night 4 when everyone was trapped in ice blocks by Frost Rose. And she would have ended everyone in that room if it weren't for Spinel.

And her second near-victory happened on Night 5, where she was out for blood while possessing Steven. She would have won if Samuel didn't distract her.

These two instances prove that even power beings like Rose can be defeated, you just need to outsmart her.

That's the theme I was aiming for, and its also why I say that Steven Universe is the only character in this universe - besides the Gnome King - that could beat Rose in a fight. 

He could manipulate every single gem character, with his expertise in psychology. Rose may have universal knowledge and can do almost anything, but she doesn't quite have White Diamond's mind-reading power. 

She could see someone's heart (both figuratively and literally) and use that as a lie-detector. But she can't read someone's mind without physically touching them (meanwhile White has to be looking at someone in the eyes to read their mind). 

That being said, Steven could beat Rose through manipulation. But perhaps he could also physically beat her.

One of Steven's many powers is his super speed. He could avoid Rose's spells very easily with that. He could also deflect them with his shield/bubble powers, or just block it out with his bubble. 

A lot of Steven's powers can counter or defend himself from Rose's offensive capabilities, and all it'll take is one good punch to really stop her for good - whether it would kill her or knock her out. 

I don't think the fight between the two of them at Chapter 61 was them at their full potential.

Rose was weakened by the Rose Repellent, and Steven was stalling for time.

A full fight between them would be spectacular to write. Any one of them could win the fight, so it's mostly something to just think about.

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And that's my analysis about the British flower. I hope this character lived up to everyone's expectations as being the final boss of Arkham Edition. Otherwise I failed as a writer and should just retire. 

Jokes aside, I hope you find the character much more menacing than any other character (even Moonlight). If not, tell me why and explain who you think is the scariest character in Arkham Edition. 

June 14th, 2023. 7:52 PM.