as dumb and overly cliche as it is, part of me kind of hoped there would be a way to separate pink diamond/rose quartz from the gem in a sense of bringing her back, but no longer being a gem as that IS part of steven now. i mean, i guess there's a movie and another season, but i don't even know if that is a possible thing in the end.
I think that was well and truly answered by the scene where the gem was split from Steven and the gem-Steven screamed “SHE’S GONE” from the depths of hell itself.
But on a more serious note, Rose/Pink is gone for good, and bringing her back would undermine a lot about the show’s themes and the character development for a lot of people (primarily Steven himself, and Pearl as well). So much of the show is about dealing with grief, how to move on when the person you defined your life around is no longer there, how to deal with never knowing a parent that everyone compares you to. To use some sort of magic asspull to bring Rose/Pink back would just be tossing all of that aside. So much of Pearl’s arc was about processing grief, moving on, and truly becoming her own person separate from fulfilling Rose’s desires. So much of Steven’s arc was about accepting himself, not trying to live up to his mother’s image, and grappling with the fact that she can never answer his questions.
So there was a moment in Change Your Mind when I legitimately wondered if Pink/Rose was going to pop out of the separated gem, but doing so would just ruin so much of everything. The point that Steven makes to White Diamond is that she more or less has to “grow up.” She cannot demand that Pink Diamond return in her “perfect vision.” Steven forced these more-or-less immortal goddesses to grapple with human life - change and mortality. Demanding that everyone kowtow to your wants without compromise is immature, accepting that other people will change and be who they are and you need to respect that - THAT is maturity.
