At Comic-Con, Friday is all about animation—at least in the Indigo Ballroom across the street from the San Diego Convention Center.  And the day kicked off with a packed room of Steven Universe fans thrilled to witness the Cartoon Network show’s return to Comic Con.  On the heels of “Mr. Greg,” the show’s first fully musical episode which aired on Tuesday, the Steven Universe panel skipped the typical long-table setup for its panel.  Instead, the front of the ballroom was full of music stands and instruments, and the panel turned into a live concert of songs from “Mr. Greg” and various fan-favorite past episodes. 

Former supervising director Ian Jones-Quartey served as MC, introducing composers Aivi Tran and Steven “Surasshu” Velema on synths, storyboard artist Jeff Liu on guitar, writer Ben Levin on bass, creator Rebecca Sugar on guitar and vocals, and the voices of Steven (Zach Callision), Amethyst (Michaela Dietz), Pearl (Deedee Magno), and Garnet (Estelle)—who together made a formidable band.  Liu’s guitar lines sound a bit like The Pillows, who soundtracked beloved anime FLCL, and the compositions by Tran and Velema have delightfully eerie electronic touches like the music on Gravity Falls. 

It's hard to imagine that attendees expected a morning concert at all, let alone one with such verve.  Magno crushed a heart-wrenching ballad about her character competing against Steven’s father Greg in a love triangle with Steven’s mother (“It’s Over”).  Estelle flubbed some fun lyrics in a defiant song (“Stronger Than You”) while getting both sides of the room to sing along with her.  Dietz’s solo on “Tower Of Mistakes” showed off the elegant simplicity of most lyrics in a Steve Universe episode.  And the entire cast joined in to sing the show’s rousing theme song. 

It’s hot in San Diego this week, and audiences can be lethargic in the morning, but the cast and crew of Steven Universe managed to capture exactly what makes the show so endearing—clever and catchy songs that allow Sugar’s characters to emote without leaching the fun out of the proceedings.  It’s also worth noting that the show is one of the few programs aimed at kids and adults that endeavors to represent queer identity onscreen—an issue Sugar went into in detail during the Q&A portion of the panel. 

The panel wasn’t entirely focused on the past.  Sugar has a children’s book version of “The Answer”—the story of how Garnet, leader of the Crystal Gems, came to live on Earth—out in September.  And Jones-Quartey assured the audience that there are more StevenBombs—the week-long marathons where Cartoon Network aires new episodes every night in a week—coming in the fall.  So there’s a lot to look forward to with the ever-expanding Universe of Steven and the Crystal Gems.