CONNIE’S BIRTHDAY Steven Universe is an American animated television series created by Rebecca Sugar for Cartoon Network. It is Cartoon Network’s first animated series to be created solely by a woman. The show tells the coming-of-age story of a young boy, Steven Universe (Zach Callison), who lives with the Crystal Gems—magical, humanoid aliens named Garnet (Estelle), Amethyst (Michaela Dietz), and Pearl (Deedee Magno Hall)—in the fictional town of Beach City. Steven, who is half-Gem, has adventures with his friends and helps the Gems protect the world from their own kind. Its pilot was first shown in May 2013, and the series ran for five seasons, from November 2013 to January 2019. The TV film Steven Universe: The Movie was released in September 2019, and an epilogue limited series, Steven Universe Future, ran from December 2019 to March 2020.
CONNIE’S BIRTHDAY The themes of the series include love, family, and the importance of healthy interpersonal relationships. Sugar based the lead character on her younger brother Steven, who was an artist for the series. She developed Steven Universe while she was a writer and storyboard artist on Adventure Time, which she left when Cartoon Network commissioned her series for full production. The series is storyboard-driven; the show’s storyboard artists were responsible for writing the dialogue and creating the action in addition to drawing the storyboards. Books, comics and video games based on the series have been released.
The series has developed a broad fanbase and has been critically acclaimed for its design, music, voice acting, characterization, prominence of LGBTQ themes and science fantasy worldbuilding. The series won a GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Kids & Family Program in 2019, becoming the first animated series to win the award. It also received a Peabody Award for Children’s & Youth Programming in 2019. It was nominated for five Emmy Awards and five Annie Awards.
