White Diamond’s Background Design
One thing I particularly loved about the introduction of White Diamond is how much uncanny valley the staff injected into her appearance, especially through the background design.
Steven Universe has always produced some fantastic backgrounds with gentle soft colours which embellish the striking character designs and palette. Even in scenes which are either very dark or very light there’s always something. Some extra form of colour.
When Yellow, Blue and Pink Diamond are all introduced for the first time, the backgrounds are a soft reflection of their respective colours.
Blue focus, blue background. Yellow Focus, yellow background. Pink focus, pink background. But there’s other colours as well, a few whites, greens, and blues. Everything is very soft and gentle even though all three characters are introduced as antagonists. And keeping with the shows theme of empathy, non-violence, forgiveness, and connection since the latest episode Legs From Here To Homeworld, the war between the Crystal Gems and Diamonds has reached an end and Yellow and Blue seem set for some sort of redemption. There’s no escaping that Yellow and Blue have done extremely cruel deeds but since Reunited they’re no longer the antagonists.
Which makes White Diamond’s introduction terrifying.
There’s nothing there. There’s no softness, no different colour tones. Even the background texture is starkly different, there’s noise. I’ve not gone back and explained the colours in every scene, but I’m willing to bet this is the only one which uses only black and white colours.
It’s outright stated in the show that White isn’t like the other Diamonds, which is true. But everything about her is visually distinct from the rest of the show which sends a pretty clear message to the viewer. She’s out of place within her own universe. White Diamond is wrong.
Could White be given redemption? Maybe, Steven Universe does like to subvert a lot of the usual good guy/bad guy tropes but I have my doubts. But I’m more inclined to believe that for the first time, Steven Universe is presenting us with something truly evil.