Highly Anticipated Steven Universe: The Movie Airs Tonight

Steven Universe: The Movie has been highly anticipated since it's announcement in 2018 at Comic-Con and today it finally releases!

The show has been considered a cult classic among the LGBTQ+ community for its representation of gender nonconformity. Led by bisexual nonbinary creator Rebecca Sugar, Steven Universe has been a staple in many queer hearts for the past six years.

The show has had over 150 episodes so far, but thankfully viewers don't have to see them to understand the film.

"My hope is that if you were going in without any knowledge of the show, it would be a crash course, but if you went in as a fan of the show, it would be just a celebration of all of the things we've gone through together -- that it would have a little extra weight," Sugar told TV Line of the film. For those who have no knowledge of the series, a short explainer at the beginning of the movie will prove vital.

The project is set two years after the events of season 5. We find the titular character Steven Universe, now age 16, feeling as if his troubles are over. This feeling comes to an end as a new villain seeks to ravage Beach City, the fictional city where Universe lives. It's up to Universe and the Crystal Gems to fight this, in what is being talked up as the show's darkest adventure ever.

Sugar also told TVLine that the full-on musical movie "is not the end" of the series. "There is more," she said."That's all I can say at the moment, but there will be more, and everything that happened up to this point will continue to matter in true Steven Universe fashion." The film features 38 songs.

The show has earned many accolades. In 2018, it was given a Peabody Award for children's programming, with the Peabody Board noting that the show's representation of empathy as "perhaps the most important superpower" is "something our real-world human society needs now more than ever." This added to five Emmy nominations. Each season has received 100% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.

Steven Universe: The Movieairs tonight at 6PM in all time zones.

RELATED |Steven Universe Creator Rebecca Sugar Comes Out as "Non-Binary Woman"