Characters / Steven Universe — Pearl

Steven Universe Main Character Index
Crystal Gems (Steven Quartz Universe | Garnet | Amethyst | Pearl | Rose Quartz | Connie Maheswaran | Peridot | Lapis Lazuli) | Gem Fusions | Homeworld Gems | Diamond Authority (Yellow Diamond | Blue Diamond | Pink Diamond | White Diamond) | Yellow Diamond's Court (Jasper) | Blue Diamond's Court | Spinel | Off Colors | Gem Monsters | Little Homeworld | Humans (Greg Universe) | Other

Pearl

Voiced by: Deedee Magno-Hall (English)^{Other Languages} Sachiko Kojima (Japanese)

"I will fight in the name of Rose Quartz,
and everything that she believed in!"

^{Click here for her second outfit} 

^{Click here for her first outfit} 

^{Click here for her outfit during Greg's story} 

^{Click here for Pearl during the rebellion} 

^{Click here for Pearl during her time in servitude} 

"Humans just live short, boring, insignificant lives, so they make up stories to feel like they're part of something bigger. They want to blame all the world's problems on a single enemy they can fight, instead of a complex network of interrelated forces beyond anyone's control."

A perfectionist and intellectual strategist, Pearl is the mental powerhouse of the Gems. She strives for structure and logic and gets easily flustered when things don't go as planned. She is driven to keep things orderly, and is most protective of Steven. The slightest hint of endangering Rose's son will immediately result in Pearl seeking to get him to safety. She is nervous and uptight, has some trouble speaking emotionally when others are upset, and is a little quietly resentful that her strengths are not ones Steven considers admirable.

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A-E

• Absurdly Sharp Blade: Pearl's spear is able to cleanly slice through solid stone.
• Ace Custom: She did the customizing. Her kind are a made-to-order Servant Race that's just supposed to stand around and look pretty, with Peridot even referring to her as a "model", but her training and equipment have made her much more powerful than her fellow Pearls. Just ask the two Quartz Gems she curbstomped in Blue Diamond's court. It also seems other Pearls are specifically designed to match their owner, while Pearl spends a long time regenerating to change her look to her preferences.
  • This is best contrasted to when she is reset to her default state in the movie. It's revealed that the owners of Pearls can customize them before they "appear" and identify their owner by name. Given the confusion, Pearl instead appears in her default form, that of a happy servant/advisor though with Greg as her master. Her memory is restored when Greg and Steven fuse and use The Power of Rock to remind her of her growth.
• Animal Motif: Pearl has several bird-like traits, though not blatantly obvious. Her very pointed, beakish nose is the most noticeable, along with her hair which somewhat resembles the crest of a blue jay or cardinal. Her pearl gem on her forehead looks like an egg, and Steven even tried incubating it like one when Pearl was recovering. Pearl's whole body is long and reedy like a crane's, and her ballet dancing could evoke a connection to Swan Lake. Amethyst refers to her nagging as "squawking". She can rotate her head 360 degrees like an owl. In The Movie, she gets reverted to her pre-Rebellion state and latches on to Greg as her owner, bringing to mind the way baby birds imprint on the first thing they see when they hatch. Last but not least, her protectiveness of Steven makes it easy to call Pearl a "mother hen".
• Anime Hair: Her hair, when viewed from the side, looks like a triangle.
• Astonishingly Appropriate Appearance:
  • Pearl's weapon is a stick with a point at the end. Pearl herself is a stick with a point at the end. Her face is also the same oval shape as her gemstone.
  • Her pointed hair is shaped somewhat like a rose bud, evoking the name of Rose Quartz, the Gem she dedicated herself to serving.
• Bad Liar: She gets very visibly nervous when lying.
• Badass Bookworm: Pearl is shown to be quite knowledgeable in engineering, as she was able to repair and upgrade Greg's destroyed van and was able to construct a spaceship out of scrap. It is possible that Pearl is the most educated of the Crystal Gems, since she seems to excel in aeronautics and aerospace engineering as well.
• Badass Driver: Pulls off impressive tricks in Greg's Dondai when evading the cops on the way to a rock show in "Last One Out of Beach City".
• Badass Teacher: As of "Sworn to the Sword", Pearl begins teaching Connie about swordsmanship.
• Badly Battered Babysitter: She is comically inept with Onion on her own, although she does much better as part of Rainbow 2.0.
• Battle Butler: She's incredibly skilled at fighting, and not just for someone who was made to serve others.
• Beautiful Singing Voice: She's noted to have one in-universe (and shows it, since her voice actress is a Broadway alum). Both Blue and Yellow Pearl are shown to have similar voices, implying this may be part of an inborn skillset for Pearls.
• Beautiful Slave Girl: Like all Pearls, our Pearl was made to stand around and look pretty as a status symbol for higher-class Gems. However, thanks to Rose Quartz she's managed to grow beyond this, becoming a skilled engineer and warrior. Though she is shown to still be struggling with the after-effects of her past as one of these. But in "A Single Pale Rose", it's revealed that she served Pink Diamond, who turned into Rose Quartz. That's why she's so loyal to Rose.
• Because You Were Nice to Me: Implied. According to Pearl, Rose made her feel like she was "everything". Given that she was supposed to be Rose's slave when she was Pink Diamond but that Rose treated her like a confidant and an equal instead, this is justified.
• Berserk Button:
  • Untidiness, which is Played for Laughs.
  • On a more serious note, casting doubt on her relationship with Rose, as evidenced by her reaction in "Rose's Scabbard" when she discovers that Rose hadn't truly confided all of her secrets in her.
  • Being discriminated because she's a pearl. It earned Peridot a punch in the face.
• Betty and Veronica: The "Betty" (Rose's bodyguard and very first ally in the war against Homeworld) to Greg's "Veronica" (aspiring human musician) for Rose's "Archie".
• Beware the Nice Ones: She is very sweet to the people she likes, and it takes quite a lot to make her mad. But in "Back to the Barn", Peridot begins picking on her for being created as a made-to-order servant. Pearl gets very ticked off at that, starting the episode off with a very angry speech towards her.
  Pearl: Now you listen here you tiny twerp! In case you've forgotten, you're on OUR turf now, and I did NOT fight a thousand-year war to take orders from the likes of YOU!
  • Near the end of that same episode, Pearl finally gets enough of Peridot's teasing, and gives her one HELL of a right hook.
• Bifauxnen: Not in her normal attire, of course, but she certainly looks this way whenever she wears male-oriented outfits (i.e. a tuxedo).
• Birds of a Feather: With Connie. Both are intelligent, have an attention to detail, and have a tendency to be overly hard on themselves in the face of perceived failure.
• Blade Enthusiast: Pearl has a large collection of swords. While she is a skilled swordfighter, she also seems to simply collect them as a hobby, and indeed, they're not even her primary weapon in the present day.
• Blood Knight: Pearl is occasionally shown to have a gleeful love of battle.
• Blow You Away: In "Sworn to the Sword", Pearl is able to channel clouds in the direction of her choice — having the channel towards her when fighting Connie and away from her when Steven interfered.
• Blue Means Smart One: Pearl's gemstone is white, but she's the only one of the initial Crystal Gem trio who wears blue. She's an intellectual strategist who usually serves as The Smart Girl for the core team.
• Blush Sticker: Prone to a blue-colored blush of this variety, as well as a Luminescent Blush. Sometimes used to indicate a Crush Blush when talking about Rose, or just to express embarrassment or frustration.
• Bodyguarding a Badass:
  • Deconstructed; Pearl tried to act as a bodyguard to Rose, but she got herself involved in fights she could not win, even though Rose could have handled them. Reconstruction as well; when your feared bodyguard is a lowly Pearl, it speaks volumes about just how serious a threat you are.
  • Taken up to eleven when she reveals she's actually Pink Diamond's personal Pearl, and Rose Quartz was actually Pink Diamond! She was bodyguarding one of the four most powerful Gems in the universe. Also justified, since Rose being poofed would have exposed her original identity.
• Boom Stick: Pearl's spear can fire energy blasts in quick succession. She can charge it for a sizable explosion. A sufficiently agile or skilled opponent can dodge them, though.
• Boyish Short Hair: Inverted. Pearl's hair doesn't even reach her shoulders, but she's the most feminine of the Crystal Gems.
• Bratty Teenage Daughter: Flashbacks shows Pearl acting like this when she was younger, mostly towards Greg. She even looked the part.
• Broken Bird: Pearl suffers from a lot of confidence issues, always desperate to prove that she's smart and right. Her unhealthy and obsessive relationship with Rose was her validation and emotional pillar for many millennia. Losing Rose has not been easy for her, especially now that she has to be that pillar for the likes of Steven and Amethyst. "Cry for Help" seems to indicate that she has a bit of an inferiority complex as well. She knows that she's physically weaker than Rose, Garnet, and even Amethyst. That normally doesn't bother her, but being fused with Garnet gave her a Power High and reminded her of how weak she is. When Rose was around, her undying loyalty and eagerness to do anything she wanted made up for it. Rose's death hit her the hardest, and she's still trying to cope with it.
• Butt-Monkey: Mild example. She's occasionally suffered Amusing Injuries, notably bitten twice by Steven Jr. in "Giant Woman" and by Amethyst in "Rose's Room" and hit with Cactus Steven's spines in "Prickly Pair".
• The Champion: Deconstructed. Pearl was Rose's most loyal and devoted follower. However, that devotion had its darker (and obsessive) side: Pearl would often put herself in needless danger in order to assure Rose's safety, despite Rose being very vocal about not wanting Pearl to do so. And now that Rose is gone, Pearl is struggling with coming to terms with it and deciding what to do with her life after spending the last thousands of years dedicating it to serve Rose.
• Character Development:
  • Pearl gradually learns to accept who she is. For example, note her different reactions to being "a Pearl" in "Friend Ship" and "Back to the Barn".
  • While she's still fairly serious, Pearl has become more open to having fun or telling jokes.
  • Out of her friends, Pearl had the most indifference towards humans, making her the biggest Noble Bigot of them all. However, "Last One Out of Beach City" has her intentionally befriending humans in order to move on from the past.
  • She verbally acknowledges Rose’s flaws in "Now We’re Only Falling Apart", a major contrast to earlier in the series when Pearl put her on such a high pedestal.
  • At the end of "Reunited", with Steven's help she finally snaps out of her "Do it for her/him" complete devotion, and starts fighting harder while shouting "I do it for ME!"
• Characterization Marches On:
  • Later episodes have firmly established that Pearl doesn't like to eat, considering the whole process to be gross and uncomfortable; however, several early episodes seemed to suggest otherwise, as she was willing to join in on a meal Steven made in "Together Breakfast" and was happy to take what she thought was an offer for pie in "So Many Birthdays". A comment on a crew member's Twitter gave the latter a Hand Wave by explaining that she likes the process of pie (as in baking).
  • In some earlier episodes, Pearl acted more childish and less maternal, closer to her characterization in the pilot.
• Cheated Angle: Because Pearl's most distinguished facial feature is her conical nose, her face is rarely shown from the front; her model sheet◊ doesn't even have a front view. Even when the rest of her face seems to be pointing directly at the camera, her nose is slightly turned to one direction◊ or another◊. One time we're shown a horizontally centered low shot, it's (very deliberately) strange-looking◊. In her song "It's Over, Isn't It?", Pearl has an entire 360-degree spinning shot focused on her, and they still manage to never have her look directly at the camera.
• Chick Magnet: Between the episodes "Last One Out of Beach City" and "A Single Pale Rose", she has apparently managed to get at least nine different women to give her their phone numbers. She's also had at least one male admirer in Bill Dewey. In Future, Pink Pearl/Volleyball seems to have a certain chemistry with Pearl, and it turns out Bismuth has been nursing a crush on her for quite a while.
• Clingy Jealous Girl: Oh boy, Pearl's obsessive clinginess towards Rose is... truly something else.
  • She was quite proud knowing that Rose confided in her alone the location of some of her deepest secrets, but when Steven reveals that Lion had already shown it to him, she became very upset by the fact that Rose hadn't truly confided everything in her and takes it out on Steven in "Rose's Scabbard".
  • In "Story for Steven", she reacts to Rose showing interest in Greg by jealously pointing out that she can sing too.
  • In "We Need to Talk", she fuses with Rose into Rainbow Quartz just to spite Greg and rub it in that he will never be able to fuse with Rose like she can. She tells him he's just a "phase", and is visibly distraught when her claim gets disproven.
  • While she's on better terms with Greg in the present, she appears to still harbor some resentment towards him subconsciously, as seen in her dream in "Chille Tid" where she tells Rose to "forget about Greg" so they could travel the galaxy together.
  • The depths of her obsessive jealousy are explored in "Mr. Greg", where we learn Greg was the latest in a long string of male lovers Rose had. Pearl didn't mind the other men as they were phases and she assumed Rose would eventually choose her because First Girl Wins. Pearl was never able to accept that Rose made a definitive, final choice, and it was to be with Greg and not her. By the end of the episode, Pearl and Greg are working on building a true friendship.
  • Deconstructed following "A Single Pale Rose" where it's revealed she was made to love Pink Diamond/Rose Quartz with all her heart and spend her life with Rose, so losing Rose is a literal ongoing existential crisis for her.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: Subverted. As a defective Pearl, she has the colors of all the Diamonds, White, Yellow, Blue and Pink, thus cannot belong to any one master. It ends up being Double Subverted as she's still Pink Diamond's Pearl, just... with a new form, good enough to deceive other Gems from a glance (it was enough to fool Jasper, after all). She was not, however, Pink Diamond's original Pearl. She was a replacement given to Pink Diamond after Pink Pearl got too familiar with her.
• Condescending Compassion:
  • A lot of her attempts to comfort Steven over his Power Incontinence come off as this. In "An Indirect Kiss", Steven even says it feels like she's saying they don't want anything to do with him.
  • It even extends to interactions outside of Steven, such as her initial attempt to comfort Amethyst after their fight in "On the Run".
• The Confidant:
  • In "Rose's Scabbard", it's revealed she was privy to secrets Rose kept from the other Crystal Gems. It hits her rather hard when she learns that Rose still had secrets known to no one, not even Pearl (specifically, Lion's existence, and the secrets physically contained inside him).
  • It turns a little justified as one of those secrets that not even Pearl could handle turns out to be Bismuth's betrayal.
  • Raised up to eleven in "A Single Pale Rose", where we discover that Pearl was the only person who knew Rose's true identity as Pink Diamond.
• Control Freak: Pearl will immediately become comically distressed if something is asymmetrical.
• Cool Sword: She has a sword collection, and "Steven the Sword Fighter" shows that she can fight quite well with them. However, her weapon is still her spear, though she can change its length and use it as a sword. Flashbacks to the war show that she used to fight with the saber she wields when training Steven and Connie.
• Cultured Badass: Pearl is the most enthusiastic when discussing Gem culture to Steven. She can also play the violin and collects swords as a hobby.
• Dance Battler: She incorporates ballet into her fighting style.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Poor Pearl has had a lot of pain in her life. Seen as nothing more than a bauble in the eyes of her Homeworld's society, having to fight a war that affected the emotional levels of all the Gems involved, and the loss of the person she loved most.
  • Considering Rose and Pink Diamond were one and the same and she was her Pearl, she saw when Pink came up with her “Rose Quartz” disguise and decided to start a rebellion on her own colony. Then saw how after Pink’s wishes were ignored by her fellow Diamonds, she came up with the drastic plan to fake her own shattering. This caused her enough trauma to keep her from using her shapeshifting powers ever again. Then seeing most of her friends be forcibly mutated.
• Deconstructed Character Archetype:
  • Of someone with an Inferiority Superiority Complex. Pearl's ego is frail due to how she lived in Homeworld where those of her Gem class were considered mere "pretty decoration" and status symbols, and her confidence was maintained and grew thanks to Rose's presence. But, once Rose was gone, most of Pearl's confidence took a nosedive. She doesn't know how to act naturally confident without using someone else to project herself her own issues on. This come ahead in "Cry for Help".
  • Of someone with Undying Loyalty. Pearl was Rose's closest confidant and bodyguard and kept all her secrets, including the nature of her Secret Identity. Everything she did of her own choice was to serve Rose, because she loved her so much. She would have happily stayed by Rose's side for the rest of eternity—but without Rose, Pearl is completely lost and has no idea what her purpose is in life, because she has built so much of her identity, if not her entire identity, around being so devoted to her Diamond.
    Pearl: Everything I ever did...I did for her. Now she's gone, but I'm still here.
• Defrosting Ice Queen:
  • Pearl was apparently much more dismissive of humans in the past, and used to be particularly nasty to Greg because she saw him as a rival for Rose's affection. Losing Rose and raising Steven has softened her up quite a bit.
  • This can also be seen in her relationship with Amethyst. They start off antagonistic towards each other but throughout the series there's a visible, gradual change in their demeanors when interacting, particularly after the events of "On the Run", that shows them growing closer and coming to accept their differences.
  • Pearl has been the most aloof and dismissive towards Greg, mostly because of his romance with Rose. Even after having Steven, she is still somewhat frosty towards him. It isn't until "Mr. Greg", when Steven has them talk about their issues with each other, does she begin to warm up to him.
• Desperately Looking for a Purpose in Life: "Mr. Greg" explores just how lost Pearl feels without Rose by her side, wondering what to do with herself. Becomes more important in the episode "A Single Pale Rose" where we learn truly Pearl's devotion is a very part of her core being, her design, and she truly lost what was defined as her purpose when Rose gave birth to Steven.
• Desperately Needs Orders: Pearl was made to be a servant on Homeworld, and following the orders of a superior comes naturally to her. She loyally followed Rose Quartz's teachings and stood by her side for thousands of years, but now that Rose is gone, she doesn't know what to do with herself.
  Pearl: No matter how hard I try to be strong like you [Garnet]...I'm just a Pearl. I'm useless on my own. (begins to weep) I need someone to tell me what to do.
• Determinator: Her song in "Sworn to the Sword", Jasper's remarks, and Peridot's explanation of what a Pearl is meant to do signifies that Pearl was not made to be a warrior (and may in fact be a "defective" Gem), but through her sheer obsessive desire to protect Rose at any cost, she became a powerful and skilled swordsmaster.
• Devoted to You: Pearl was vastly devoted to Rose, and by extension, her cause, to the point of being unhealthy and obsessive. Given how Rose was actually Pink Diamond and what we know of Pearls, this devotion is actually a feature of Pearl, inherent to her.
• Dishing Out Dirt: In the episode, Giant Woman telekinetically controls sand to illustrate to Steven how she and Garnet's Fusion Dance works.
• Ditzy Genius: Pearl is a knowledgeable Gem who can build things like rockets when she has the right tools. Too bad her concept of sensitivity is subpar.
• Dramatically Missing the Point:
  • Though Pearl was the closest to Rose and knew her better than anyone else, she doesn't seem to personally understand the majority of her beliefs. While she does work to defend all life on Earth in honor of everything that Rose stood for, her character quote nonetheless shows a striking contrast between her and Rose's attitudes towards organic life.
  • On a more personal level, why her and Rose did not work out like she wanted it to: Because Pearl is a servant first and foremost, it's how she frames her relationship toward Rose/Pink Diamond. She clearly indulged in the position of Rose's confidant and being treated equally, but Pearl never grasped what Pink Diamond was looking for in an equal partner. Pink wanted someone to love her for who she was and out of choice while Pearl put her on a pedestal and later it's heavily implied that she was made to love Pink, replacing her original Pink Pearl. While she was not blind to her faults, she was pretty content with what they had while Pink was looking for more, to change, and to grow. It's ultimately why Rose chose to be with Greg as the latter demanded to be treated with equal respect and helped Rose grow and become better, empathizing with her better than Pearl ever could. Even now, it appears she has not grasped what was it Pink really wanted, or at least, does not fully understand.
• The Dreaded: "The Answer" reveals she was this to the Homeworld Gems during the rebellion, with Garnet referring to her as Rose's "terrifying renegade Pearl". Considering that she's part of a Gem subspecies made to be little more than a pretty accessory, yet was able to effortlessly take out two Quartzes entirely on her own, this makes sense.
• Dual Wielding: While most of the time she uses a single spear, a flashback to the early days of the Crystal Gems shows that she used to fight very effectively with a pair of swords.
• Eternal Love:
  • Between her and Rose Quartz. Confirmed by "Rose's Scabbard", and given Rose's responses in the flashback/hologram, according to Rebecca Sugar her feelings weren't unrequited.
  • Alluded to between Pearl and Garnet, as well. Pearl quickly turns to Garnet as a source of safety and comfort, and their dance in "Alone Together" has definite romantic/sexual overtones (a close and intimate tango that ends with Garnet pinning Pearl against a wall while Pearl blushes).
• Exact Words: In "Message Received", Steven asks Pearl if she knows Yellow Diamond's Pearl, to which she replies that not all Pearls know each other. She never says that she doesn't know Yellow Pearl, and later revelations make it clear that she does.
• Exorcist Head: It's not emphasized or commented on but Pearl can fully rotate her head 360 degrees. This aligns with her bird motifs, a similar trait being famous in owls. At first this was shown by her hologram, which could be overlooked due to its nature, forgetting how literal and meticulous Pearl would be to have such an inaccuracy. It only comes up again in "Change Your Mind" when a White Diamond controlled Pearl casually spins her head around after standing up, likely alluding to trope namer to emphasize the possession. It explains where Sardonyx and Alexandrite get full on Abnormal Limb Rotation Range on seemingly every joint, as they inherit this ability from Pearl.
• Expressive Hair: Her hair droops and becomes noticeably disheveled when she gets stabbed in the gut. It also sticks straight up when she panics in "Say Uncle", and "So Many Birthdays".

F-L

• Fatal Flaw:
  • Pearl's selfishness in wanting to feel special has indirectly hurt others (Steven in "Rose's Scabbard", and Connie in "Sworn to the Sword"). It finally bites her back in "Cry for Help", when she keeps rebuilding the communication hub in order to fuse with Garnet, so she can feel Garnet's confidence and created a giant rift between all three Gems for four episodes.
  • Her Innocently Insensitive nature has led to major problems with other characters — it made Steven once think that she doesn't care about him ("An Indirect Kiss"), had Amethyst believe that Pearl considered her a mistake ("On the Run"), and nearly had Connie throw away her self-esteem ("Sworn to the Sword").
  • A subtle one, but Pearl has a habit of having a frame-set of obsessing over the past. It makes her unable to move forward in a productive manner. "Last One Out of Beach City" has her actively trying to resolve this flaw so she can move on. It seems to be working, considering in the episode she willingly went to a concert with Amethyst and Steven as well as crushed on and got the number of a woman (admittedly one who looks like a human Rose gone wild, but it's a step in the right direction).
• Fat and Skinny: The skinny one with Amethyst.
• Fighter, Mage, Thief: The Mage of the group, who uses the most conventional magical abilities.
• The Finicky One: In earlier episodes, Pearl's Neat Freak tendencies, poor response to attempts at humour, tendency to nitpick and easily stressed nature made this her defining trait. As the show went on and more of her character and motivation was revealed (in addition to her relationship with Amethyst improving), these traits became more downplayed.
• First Love: She was Pink Diamond's.
• Foil:
  • Pearl and Amethyst play off each other by being opposites in every respect. Pearl is well-mannered, dainty, hard-working, and protective; Amethyst is a slob, ill-mannered, lazy, fun-loving, and irresponsible. Physically, Pearl is skinny while Amethyst is fat. Amethyst's weapon is flexible and crushes while Pearl's is rigid and pierces. Their differences can even be seen in the way they sit◊.
    Steven: Where did you get these? I thought they stopped making them!
    Pearl: Well, we heard that too, and since they're your favorite...
    Amethyst: We went out and stole a bunch!
    Pearl: [annoyed grunt] I went back and paid for them.
  • To Steven, as two gems that are arguably the closest to Rose. Steven barely knows his own mother since by definition his birth means that she cannot exist at the same time, but comes to be genuinely inspired by Rose's ideals and love for everyone. Pearl loved Rose and believed herself to be the gem that knew her the most, but mainly fought out of a blindly obsessive loyalty towards Rose rather than necessarily believing in the same ideals (at first, at least).
  • To Blue Diamond. Both are mourning someone, the same person in fact. While Pearl seemed to be obsessed with Rose at first, she eventually grew out of it and moved on. Blue, on the other hand, still heavily mourns Pink Diamond to this day, and is basically what would have happened if Pearl didn't let go of her obsession.
• Force and Finesse: The finesse to Amethyst's force.
• Forgetful Jones: If you take note throughout the series, you'll notice that Pearl can actually be quite forgetful sometimes. Must be where Opal gets it from...
• Freudian Trio: Of the Gems who were close to Pink Diamond, Spinel (Id) follows her desires for Revenge and attempts to destroy Earth after having Gone Mad From The Isolation, Crystal Gem Pearl (Superego) is The Smart Guy of the Crystal Gems, and Pink Pearl/Volleyball (Ego) has a balanced and playful personality.
• From Nobody to Nightmare: In "The Answer", Garnet tells Steven that Pearl was genuinely terrifying to other Gems, apparently not just despite, but rather because she was a "mere" Pearl who had made herself into a deadly threat to the Rebellion's enemies.
  • And this was when it was just her and Rose trying to scare every gem off the planet.
• Gadgeteer Genius: On multiple occasions, Pearl has demonstrated a high level of skill in mechanical engineering, ranging from reverse-engineering Flask Robonoids to constructing a combat-ready robot in a moment's notice, as well as constructing a rocket in an attempt to leave Earth, proving herself able to compete with an "expert" mechanic such as Peridot.
• Gag Nose: Pearl has a very long, triangular nose that protrudes almost straight outward. Played with in that while it is deliberately silly looking, no one comments on it, nor does it keep other characters from finding her attractive.
• Gagging on Your Words: Whenever Pink Diamond is brought up in conversation, she is prone to cover her mouth. While at first it comes across as a nervous tic brought on by war memories, "Gemcation" implies that it is something ingrained into her to an almost pavlovian degree, actively getting in the way of her talking about it to Steven. In "A Single Pale Rose", it is revealed that her owner Rose Quartz (who was actually Pink Diamond this whole time) gave her last decree as a Diamond — to tell no one the truth about her identity — complete with having her cover her mouth with her hands as she did so.

• Girly Girl with a Tomboy Streak: She's a Lipstick Lesbian who's more or less the Team Mom, hates getting messy, and is a skilled dancer... as well as a swordfighter (though a Lady of War at that), engineer, and veteran of a thousand-year war. And her most-worn piece of formalwear is a tuxedo.
• Good Is Not Nice: Pearl may be dedicated to defending the Earth and humankind, but her condescending nature towards both is not a positive trait and actually gets on people's nerves.
• Green-Eyed Monster: She used to be very jealous of Greg and Rose's relationship, having wanted Rose to love her exclusively and constantly obsessing over her. Her dream vignette in "Chille Tid" shows that, subconsciously, Pearl still views Greg as the thing that came between her and Rose. Her relations with him are often somewhat strained as a result. "Mr. Greg" has the two talk about their issues, and she seems to be getting better about this.
• Grew Beyond Their Programming:
  • Pearls as a whole are meant to be servants or ornaments for other Gems. The Crystal Gem Pearl is a Master Swordsman, engineering genius, and is her own master, treated as an equal by her fellow Gems (though, as "Friend Ship" showed, she's struggling with that last part). Jasper outright calls her defective for being more than what a pearl is supposed to be. When she first started becoming "defective" she confronted her master, Pink Diamond, about it, telling her that she needed to be replaced immediately. When Pink said no to the request, Pearl told her about how she fantasizes about living a different life, one where she was just a runaway Pearl living free on Earth with Rose Quartz, and then all but demanded that Pink order her to stop acting defective. Pink instead ordered her to never stop. The freedom aspect of the trope is ultimately subverted in that Pearl never stopped serving the person she was made for.
  • While not able to directly defy Rose when she gave an order as Pink Diamond, eventually Pearl managed to work around the order in "A Single Pale Rose" to completely subvert it.
• Happiness in Slavery: Downplayed. Since Rose Quartz was actually her owner Pink Diamond the whole time, there's a lot more ambiguity whether Pearl joining the rebellion was ever her fighting for her own freedom or just doing what would make her owner happy. Episodes like "Mr. Greg" imply it's a bit of both, as she talks about both freedom and Rose's attention in turn as positives. Similarly, flashbacks imply Rose herself never really wanted Pearl to be her slave, encouraging Pearl when she had thoughts of her own and calling her "My Pearl", which according to Word of God is how Gems refer to a superior (such as "My Diamond").
• Has a Type: Prior to "Last One Out of Beach City", Pearl has shown no attraction to anyone, Gem or Human, other than Rose Quartz. In that episode, Pearl quickly develops an obvious crush on a tall woman with a curvy build and pink hair. Steven calls this out as soon as they get back to the car. "Now We're Only Falling Apart" also reveals Pearl's the one who came up with her beloved Rose Quartz's appearance originally.
  Steven: Okay, nobody's going to say it? She kinda looked like Mom. You noticed. I noticed. We all noticed.
  • She's also shown to be very physically affectionate and emotional with the big, tall, muscular Bismuth. Future shows that Bismuth has a crush on Pearl, and they are still very affectionate with each other, though there is no clear indication that Pearl has any romantic feelings.
• Heart Is an Awesome Power: Since she was originally designed to be a simple courtesan servant, at first she only had the ability to create holograms. To work around this, Pearl created a holographic double to practice her swordfighting and became skilled enough to Curbstomp quartz Super Soldiers. She has also somehow retooled her light manipulation to fire laser beams, which is either a rare ability or something she developed over time based on Bismuth's reaction.
• Heartbroken Badass: Pearl is still grieving over Rose's "death", though she is trying to get beyond it for her own sake.
• Hidden Depths:
  • She often acts overconfident, but "Coach Steven" reveals a lot of insecurity on her part when it comes to being physically strong.
  • In "Space Race", she is shown to miss space travel very much; her desire to return to space severely impairs her judgement skills, which is demonstrated when her attempt to fly Steven and herself to space almost gets the both of them killed.
  • She was also revealed to have been deeply in love with Rose Quartz, and still misses her dearly because of this. She had a Heroic BSoD in one episode when she realizes that Rose kept secrets from her as well.
• Hologram: Her gem can project holograms, made of Hard Light as necessary, and this appears to be an ability unique to Pearls if not Pearl herself. Notably, she has made hologram clones of herself to fight (usually used for training), a very detailed hologram of Rose, and has been shown to unconsciously project her dreams while sleeping. And once, to cheat at volleyball.
• Hot-Blooded: She loses her normally calm demeanor whenever she gets enthusiastic about something, which is fairly frequently.
• Hypocrite:
  • Pearl criticizes Amethyst for bringing Steven into wrestling (or what she deems a "circle of violence"). However, she has been revealed to be a Blood Knight who still revels in the war.
  • She reasoned Rose keeping secrets away from the other Gems with her as having been for "their own good", and keeps a lot of secrets from Steven, but she got extremely upset when she discovered that she was on the receiving end of some of Rose's secrecy as well.
  • Pearl stresses at one point that fusion should be used for deadly situations. However, a flashback shows Pearl fusing with Rose just to make Greg jealous, and, to a more dramatic extent, Pearl kept repairing the Communication Hub in order to trick Garnet into fusing into Sardonyx so that Pearl could feel Garnet's confidence and perfect relationship.
  • Pearl tells Greg about how Fusion is the ultimate connection between Gems. Ignoring how Fusion was originally seen as little more than a battle/utility tactic, Pearl uses it to exploit her partners to validate herself. She just used it with Rose to make Greg jealous, and would later do the same to Garnet to feel her confidence.
• I Just Want to Be Badass: Along with wanting to be unique, Pearl also wishes to be physically strong like Garnet and Amethyst.
• I Just Want to Be Special: Pearl's incredibly low self-esteem stems from her intense desire to be unique.
• Inferiority Superiority Complex: She acts haughty and self-assured, especially in regards to humans. In reality, she's deeply insecure about her strength and her desire to be special. This likely comes from the fact that she's a member of a Servant Race on Homeworld.
• Informed Ability: Mentioned being able to shapeshift as early in "Cat Fingers", but has never been shown to use it.
  • In "A Single Pale Rose", the reason why she doesn't shapeshift is revealed. The last time Pearl shapeshifted, it was to assist Pink Diamond staging her shattering, and this led to the Diamonds retaliating with corruption, with nearly everyone Pearl knew being afflicted.
  • In "Snow Day" she surprises Steven by willingly shapeshifting to play Steven Tag, implying that she is starting to work through this trauma.
• Innocently Insensitive: Doesn't pick up much on what Steven or other humans say or think until she steps over the line.
  • She was unable to realize how upset Amethyst was about her origins.
  • She said her quote above about how humans' lives aren't meaningful to Steven, who is half-human, and would have been most likely hurt and insulted by her statement had he not been concerned with Ronaldo at the time.
  • When Steven is feeling guilty over trusting Peridot, Pearl tries to console the upset Steven, but the reaction he has on his face clearly shows that she only made things worse.
    Garnet: This is no time for feeling horrible!
    Pearl: That's right. You can feel horrible all you want back at the temple.
• Insecure Love Interest: "Sworn to the Sword" has Pearl using a song and Connie as frames, to indirectly refer to herself as a "nothing" when in comparison to Rose, who she deeply loved.
• Insignificant Little Blue Planet: Seems to hold this opinion of Earth. She is the most reluctant to indulge in Earth-based culture, and jumps at the chance to leave in "Space Race". This seems to come less from actually looking down on Earth and more from having been there for so long that she feels trapped there, as she planned to come back (relatively) soon, and has expressed in "Serious Steven" that she finds the Earth beautiful. "Rose's Scabbard" revealed that her main reason behind her decision to stay on Earth was to be with Rose.
• Insufferable Genius: Pearl is not insufferable most of the time, social skills notwithstanding, but she's not used to being wrong and gets agitated when told that she is.
• Interspecies Romance: She (a Gem) gains a crush on Mystery Girl (a human).
• Ironic Name: Pearl is the Crystal Gem who keeps herself most separate from humans and even hates eating because she finds the process so disgusting. And yet, her namesake gem is an animal byproduct. Pearls are partially organic, being mostly made of nacre (a composite of a mineral and oyster proteins) and natural pearls usually have a core made of organic tissue — it's basically how oysters isolate parasites and prevent wounds from becoming infected.
• Irony:
  • Despite knowing what it was like to be treated as weak by other Gems because she's a pearl, one would think Pearl would have the greatest empathy for humans. Turns out, she has the most apathy for them. It's sort of justified in that Pearl was never treated badly as a servant.
  • "The Answer" reveals that the extremely insecure Pearl was The Dreaded for the Homeworld Gems.
  • Pearl is shown to have the most bigoted views on humans throughout most of the series. Come season four, she now has a mutual attraction with a female human.
• Jerkass Has a Point: As snobbish and condescending as she can be, when she states something with her Brutal Honesty, she usually has a valid point.
  • While Pearl's above character quote was condescending and bigoted towards humans, she wasn't wrong in suggesting that Ronaldo's actions are mostly done because he wants to feel important. And despite the harshness of her words, she's not incorrect in pointing out that humans often have elevated perceptions of their own importance and ability, as well as their tendencies to scapegoat in situations beyond anyone's capability to control.
  • It was a hurtful statement, but in "Rose's Scabbard", Pearl was technically right about Steven knowing nothing about his mother, something he himself acknowledges in "Lars and the Cool Kids" and "An Indirect Kiss".
  • Her angry outburst at Connie for working with Steven to defeat the Holo-Pearls in "Sworn to the Sword" was out of line (not to mention her spending the entire episode worsening Connie's already low self-esteem), but she made a good point: Steven won't always be there to protect Connie from danger.
  • Her conversation with Greg in "We Need to Talk" was obviously a jealously-motivated attempt to discourage him from pursuing Rose. Even so, she was never lying about how little Greg knew about Rose, nor the fact that his relationship with her at the time was just another "phase", which prompted Greg to have an important "defining the relationship" conversation with Rose.
  • In "Rising Tides, Crashing Skies", Pearl argues that the Crystal Gems should stay in Beach City, despite attracting dangerous corrupted Gems, because they were there first. As callous as she puts it, the people of Beach City were the ones who chose to move and/or stay there despite the clear and obvious danger.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Downplayed. Pearl displays the most traits of a Noble Bigot and has a hard time taking people's feelings into consideration, but she loves her friends and has made an oath to protect the planet Earth from Homeworld. She becomes a full-on Nice Girl in The Movie and Future.
• Kick the Dog:
  • During Pearl's Heroic BSoD in "Rose's Scabbard", she snaps at Steven for suggesting why Rose would keep secrets from Pearl specifically, gives him a nasty Death Glare when he calls to her, and she doesn't bother helping him when he's dangling on a mountain.
  • For the almost entirety of "Sworn to the Sword", Pearl basically teaches an already insecure Connie to think of herself as less important than Steven.
  • In the Whole Episode Flashback "We Need to Talk", a young Pearl deliberately fuses with Rose in an attempt to make a young Greg insecure in his relationship with her. Then, she smugly tells Greg to his face that he'll never have a true bond with Rose.
• Killer Rabbit: Pearl-type Gems are supposed to be harmless, weak, decorative servants. This Pearl isn't, to the point she was known as "Rose's terrifying renegade Pearl".
• The Kirk: She tries to balance out logic and emotion. Most of the time she's the one to come up with a plan, but she also doesn't mind engaging in cheering Steven on or scolding him in a motherly fashion.
• Klingons Love Shakespeare: Despite her general lack of understanding when it comes to human culture, she is shown to enjoy music to some degree. However, she has extremely strange taste in music. For example, one of her favorite "songs" is a commercial jingle for a car mechanic called "Cam's Cam Shafts".
• Lady of War: Pearl is very graceful in battle, given how she combines ballet and swordplay in her fighting style. This is taken further with her calm and composed nerve in combat.
• The Lancer: She acts as the second-in-command to the less talkative Garnet.
• Large Ham: Shows shades of this when she and Garnet pretend to be a Heel tag team that wants to "destroy all wrestling". She even throws in a maniacal laugh for good measure.
• Leeroy Jenkins: According to Garnet, Pearl had a habit of jumping into battle to protect Rose without any concern for her own safety. See Heroic Sacrifice above. With the reveal in "A Single Pale Rose", this is implied to actually be because she couldn't let Rose get poofed under any circumstances, as it would reveal her gem was actually Pink Diamond's.
• Leitmotif: It's a prim and proper piano piece.
• Light 'em Up: Although less overt than some gems, Pearl can manipulate light to form holograms (some of which are solid) or channel it offensively through her spear to create laser beams.

• The Lightfooted: She provides the trope image while dancing on her tiptoes on a glass balcony railing in "Mr. Greg".
• Like a Son to Me: Pearl seems to see Steven as the son she and Rose could never have, and even blurts out, "That's not my baby!" when confronted with a jealous Pizza Steve posing as Steven in the "Say Uncle". Similarly, in "Historical Friction" she attends Steven's play and loudly fawns over him from the audience like a mother excited to see her child's school production, and nervously covers Steven's eyes when Garnet and Amethyst perform their Fusion Dance in "Coach Steven".
• Literal-Minded:
  • In "So Many Birthdays", Pearl is horrified when Steven tells a joke about her, not understanding how a joke works.
    Steven: Why did Pearl throw butter out the window?
    Amethyst: You did what?
    Steven: To see a butterfly!
    Pearl: [mortified] I never did that! Steven... are you telling lies?
  • Back when she was a much younger gem, before she started learning how to think outside of the box, she tended to interpret even offhanded comments literally. Though she's better about it now, she occasionally slips back into the default Pearl mode of trying to follow orders precisely as given.
    Rose: Could you imagine that running a colony would be this dull?
    Pearl: I could imagine it, if you would like me to, my Diamond.
• Loophole Abuse: Has only one case of this. When Pink Diamond leaves her old life behind and stages her own shattering, she gives Pearl one last order to "never speak of this again". However, she never said anything about showing other people her memories, which is how Pearl shows Steven what actually happened to Pink Diamond.
• Loving a Shadow: Downplayed. Despite her deep and lingering obsessive love for Rose Quartz, there are multiple hints that her adoration prevented her from seeing certain facets of their relationship and of Rose herself. Aside from the secrets Rose kept, the Dramatic Irony section of her profile here notes how there was much about Rose's philosophy that Pearl didn't understand. With the reveal that she knew that she used to be Pink Diamond and Pearl used to be her servant, it is unknown if Pearl truly loved her as who she really was or her current identity more, though she begins to acknowledge Rose/Pink's flaws and grow out of this unhealthy obsession.
• Luminescent Blush: Pearl gives off a bright blue blush from time to time.

M-R

• Mama Bear:
  • Expect her to flip out if Steven is ever in danger. She's almost always the first one to worry about his safety and try to get him out of a dangerous situation. In "Tiger Millionaire", she scolds Amethyst for using her powers on humans, only to draw her weapon and threaten Ronaldo when he kidnaps Steven, thinking he was a "snake person" in "Keep Beach City Weird". Her protectiveness is even Played for Laughs when it's mentioned that once when he was a baby, she mistook the babysitter for a kidnapper and threw an entire jungle gym at her.
  • She becomes protective towards Connie, as seen in "Gem Hunt".
• Master Swordswoman: Her sword collection isn't just for show. Still, her modern weapon of choice remains a spear.
• Meaningful Name:
  • In gemstone mythos, pearls are often associated with virginity, beauty, modesty, purity, and happiness. They're also the astral gemstone for the Cancer sign in the Western zodiac, which carries an association with motherhood.
  • In modern society, pearls are on par with diamonds for being a symbol of wealth and status. On the Gem Homeworld, Pearls are a slave-race of servants that their owners purchase as a status symbol, as well as being the only companions the Diamonds keep (before Spinel, anyway).
• Mental Picture Projector: She doesn't need a machine; she can do this on her own, as seen in "Cheeseburger Backpack" and "Serious Steven".
• The Mourning After: She loved Rose with all of her heart and still loves her, even if all she has now is memories.
• Ms. Exposition:
  • Very quick to explain Gem culture when prompted, or not, especially to Steven. However, she's very reluctant to tell Steven about the darker aspects of Gem culture, such as the Kindergarten.
  • In the movie, when reverted to "factory settings", she sings about the functions of the other Gems in Homeworld society, in the process revealing the name and intended purpose of the villainous heart-shaped Gem — Spinel.
• Muscles Are Meaningless: Skinny as a rail, but just as strong as a near-unbeatable alien warrior is expected to be. On the other hand, she seems to only be physically strong compared to humans as opposed to other Gems. Pearl has described herself as having to use skill and determination to compensate for not being "built for fighting".
• My Beloved Smother:
  • She's not Steven's actual mother, but she can act this way towards him. If there's even the slightest whiff of danger, she'll want to take Steven back home while the rest of the Gems do the dangerous stuff. While it doesn't help Steven grow as a Gem, she has a point considering how many times he's almost gotten himself killed. She apologizes profusely when she realizes that she almost got Steven killed herself in "Space Race". Steven bluntly admits that with how many times his life has been put in danger, he's gotten used to it. And out of all the Gems, she's the one who tries to skirt around the darker aspects of Gem history around Steven, believing that he's too young to know about it.
  • Pearl acts as this to a lesser extent to her fellow Gems, which can account for half of her and Amethyst's arguments.
  • In the non-canon Uncle Grandpa crossover, she outright refers to him as her "baby" during one of her many, many mental breakdowns during this episode.
    Amethyst: Hey, where's Steven?
    Pizza Steve: [dressed as Steven] Looking for me, Pizza Steven Universe?
    Pearl: [gasps and hides behind Garnet] That's not my baby!!
• My Master, Right or Wrong: She loved Pink Diamond, and their relationship was arguably far closer than even Pink's older siblings. She was willing to follow her mistress headlong into rebellion, permanent exile, and even risk shattering.
• Mysterious Past: How Pearl became so devoted to Rose that she'd join her rebellion is quite a mystery. Raising further questions is the evidence that Rose was not Pearl's original owner — the two other Pearls we've seen look like their owners while Rose and Pearl look nothing alike, and the one time Pearl describes working for Homeworld, she conspicuously avoids specifying who she served under.
  • During "Gemcation", when Greg and the Crystal Gems believe Steven's depression upon coming back from Homeworld stems from what he experienced there rather than his fight with Connie, they pressure Pearl into talking to him about what she knows about Homeworld. When she cannot seem to get anything out of him, she begins to talk about the Diamonds and nearly confesses to something she has trouble admitting to until Steven reveals why he is upset.
    • Not only that, it seemed like she was unable to speak about it. Her hand covering her mouth seemly involuntarily. Her piano theme even became wild and dissonant during that moment. And it isn't the first time that's happened when the topic of the Diamonds came up either.◊
  • Turns out that Rose Quartz was actually Pink Diamond in disguise, and Pearl was HER Pearl (meaning she was specifically created to serve Pink Diamond). Pink Diamond's last order to Pearl before becoming Rose Quartz permanently was to forbid Pearl from "ever speaking of it again," as Pink Diamond/Rose Quartz never wanted to look back.
• Naginatas Are Feminine: Her weapon is/looks a lot like a miniature naginata, though she uses it as both a polearm and a fencing saber, and she's the most feminine of the Crystal Gems.
• Neat Freak: Pearl is so obsessed with order and cleanliness that when the Crystal Gems drew up a chore wheel with Dusting, Laundry, Mopping and Dishes on it, she crossed off everyone else's name and substituted her own.
• Nervous Wreck: Not always, but Pearl does not handle pressure well.
• Noble Bigot: Harbors some prejudice against humans, at least subconsciously, probably at least partly due to the fact that her decision to remain on Earth was made out of devotion to Rose. She is very protective of the half-human Steven and helps to protect full humans. Her overall attitude toward humans seems to be similar to most humans' attitudes toward animals: a mix of indifference, bemusement, and thinking they're "cute" on occasion.
  "I saw humans get on fine without power for millennia. You used to hunt and gather. [chuckles] What happened to that?"
• Noblewoman's Laugh: Does this pose while laughing in "It Could've Been Great", though the laugh is not of the "OH-HO-HO!" kind like Sardonyx's.
• Non P.O.V. Protagonist: Along with Steven, Garnet and Amethyst, she is one of the four main protagonists of the show. But said show is exclusively told from Steven's Perspective.
• Non-Standard Character Design: She is the only Pearl we've seen with multiple colors. Notably, she seems to have used the varied color scheme even when she was Pink Diamond's Pearl, instead of adopting her Diamond's colors as Blue and Yellow Pearls do.
  • Also, while most Gems are seen to be an Amazing Technicolor Population with improbable shapes and sizes, Pearl looks the closest there is to looking like a human. She has pale skin, blue eyes, strawberry blonde hair, and a very normal body shape skin to a human’s. Ironic, considering she was a bigot towards them for a long time.
• Noodle People: She's the slimmest of all the Gems and could probably hide behind a post if so inclined.
• No Sense of Personal Space: Tends to get clingy when stress starts getting to her. Mostly with Garnet.
• Not So Above It All: In "Snow Day", she shapeshifts for the first time in millennia to join Garnet and Amethyst in playing Steven Tag.
• Odd Couple: With Amethyst. Pearl is the neat freak, of course.
• Odd Name Out: She's the only Gem, barring Steven of course, whose name is an organic gemstone (produced by or from a living thing), instead of a mineral gemstone (formed by geological processes). This fits with her Gem type: Pearls are made-to-order servants rather than being grown in Kindergartens.
• Old Soldier: It's pretty easy to forget that she's one of Rose's earliest supporters and a battle-hardened warrior who was known as the "terrifying renegade Pearl", particularly when she's standing next to Garnet.
• Only Friend: To Pink Diamond, before she became Rose.
• Only Sane Woman: Garnet normally takes this role when they're all together as a team, as Pearl is usually Not So Above It All, but when only with Amethyst and Steven, she tends to come off as one.
• O.O.C. Is Serious Business: In "Rose's Scabbard", she's in such a bad state that even with Steven hanging precariously at the bottom of a cliff, she doesn't make a move to help him.
• Open Mouth, Insert Foot: She's prone to saying insulting or upsetting things without intending to, which leads to many an awkward moment.
  • "Amethyst, you're not a mistake, you're the byproduct of a mistake." Eek!
• Orange/Blue Contrast: Her first and second outfits utilize a pastel variation on this trope, with peachy pink and golden yellow playing off different shades of teal.
• Parental Substitute: Out of all the Gems, she fits this trope the most for Steven. In the absence of Rose Quartz, Pearl often behaves like a standard mother would towards Steven, such as occasionally scolding him, being the first to panic when he's in potential danger, and helping him clean his room on a regular basis. She even refers to Steven as "my baby" in "Say Uncle". (The fact that she was in a romantic relationship with his mother is likely the reason for this.)
• The Perfectionist: Neat, orderly, and disdainful of any form of mess.
  "Symmetrical means both sides HAVE TO BE THE SAME!"
• Person of Holding: After doing a (ridiculous) chant, she's able to summon various objects from storage out of the gem in her head. "Sworn to the Sword" reveals she doesn't need to do the pose and drawn-out yell at all, but does so anyway.
• Personality Powers:
  • Pearl describes the process of summoning her spear as a complex and methodical process, comparing it to the laws of physics on a flower-petal while also describing it as a "dance", reflecting her harmonious, yet strict and calculated personality, as well as just how hard she has worked to become an effective fighter.
  • Pearl has the ability to project holograms to create Hard Light clones of herself in training Steven and Connie, an especially ironic example as she tends to psychologically project her own dynamics and insecurities onto them.
• Picky Eater: Pearl is disgusted by the entire concept of eating.
• Pining After Protagonist's Parent: Pearl was deeply in love with Steven's mother, Rose Quartz. Rose ended up with Greg Universe and had a child with him. Pearl loves Steven like a son, but remembering her can be awkward for Pearl, as shown in "Rose's Scabbard". It's why she doesn't think highly of Greg as well.
• Pink Means Feminine: Downplayed, as blue is much more prominent in Pearl’s designs, but nonetheless, Pearl incorporates a pale shade of pink in all of her clothes (i.e. the leggings in her debut design, socks in her first regeneration, the shoes in her next regeneration, etc.).
• Power Incontinence: When dreaming in "Chille Tid", her hologram power activates by itself, showing her dream to Amethyst and Steven.
• Prone to Tears: Pearl gives Steven a run for his money in the crying department, to the extent that Peridot expresses confusion and annoyance towards her "spontaneous singing; crying; singing while crying." Given her Dark and Troubled Past, this makes some sense.
• Proper Lady: Despite her Noble Bigot tendencies, she's immensely graceful, tidy, and (usually) mature.
• Psychological Projection: Pearl has done this, particularly in "Sworn to the Sword", where she ended up (temporarily) indoctrinating Connie into the mindset that she was "nothing" compared to her liege, Steven, and that to protect him she needed to be willing to put herself into hopelessly dangerous situations and even die for him without hesitation. It is revealed that during the war, Pearl "took great pride" in giving her life for Rose Quartz, using herself as a shield and getting needlessly "killed" numerous times despite Rose being much stronger than her and fervently objecting to Pearl senselessly putting herself in danger.
• Red Oni, Blue Oni:
  • The uptight, neurotic Blue Oni to Amethyst's Red.
  • To a lesser extent, she is also the Blue Oni to Pink Diamond's Red.
• Really Gets Around: Has no less than 9 phone numbers stored in her pearl, 4 of which are begging her to call. The post-season 5 podcast had Word of God confirm that she's dated many human women since "Last One Out of Beach City", but has yet to meet anyone she wants to pursue a long-term relationship with.
• Renaissance Man: At least in comparison to the other Gems. Pearl has demonstrated knowledge in a variety of specialized disciplines, including mechanics, astrophysics, aeronautics, chemistry, history, swordplay, and (obviously) dance.
• Replacement Goldfish: She is Pink Diamond's second Pearl, after she damaged her first one and she was taken away from Pink Diamond by White Diamond.
• The Resenter:
  • It's subtly implied she wishes she was the leader of the Crystal Gems and not Garnet, since in "Arcade Mania" she's extremely reluctant to admit that Garnet's the one in charge, because she was in the Crystal Gems long before Garnet joined up. However, this was likely because she will always consider Rose Quartz as the leader of the Crystal Gems.
  • As noted above, she harbors resentment towards Greg for winning Rose's love. As of "Mr. Greg", she finally seems to be moving past this.
• Retractable Weapon: Her spear has a shorter "wand" form.◊

S-Y

• Sand Blaster: She is briefly shown manipulating sand as a visual aid in "Giant Woman", though this may have a display of general telekinesis. She never uses it again after.
• Satellite Character: Deconstructed. Pearl's entire identity was being Rose Quartz's loyal confidant and servant, and was happy to be such... until Rose died, and she's left struggling to find a purpose for herself after spending so much of her life as a servant.
• Secret-Keeper: She was the only one who knew that Rose and Pink Diamond were the same person, but Pink ordered her never to tell anyone.
• Servant Race: Pearls are a servant race on Homeworld, treated as property for other Gems.
• Sesquipedalian Loquaciousness: In "Warp Tour", when Steven's allergies are acting up, she tells him to sneeze into his "antecubital fossa", i.e., his inner elbow.
• She Cleans Up Nicely: Pearl's already attractive (Mayor Dewey in particular singles her out as "The Hot One"), but she looks especially good in men's formalwear. Steven and Greg both note she looks great in the tailor-made tuxedo they buy for her in "Mr. Greg", and she looks just as good in the waiter's shirt and pants she wears in "Restaurant Wars".
• Shipper on Deck: She seems very eager to try to get Steven and Connie together.
• Shipping Torpedo: Jealous of his relationship with Rose, Pearl makes a point to flaunt her and Rose's passionate fusion dance in front of Greg, rub in his face that fusing is something that she can do with Rose that he can't, and tell him that he's nothing but a "phase" for Rose, all in the flashback in "We Need to Talk". Ironically, it backfired on her as this was what prompted Greg to get closer to Rose and furthermore, help Rose gain a better understanding of loving an individual and thus falling for Greg.
• Significant Wardrobe Shift: Her outfit gradually grows less traditionally feminine over the series, and is eventually shown as more feminine in flashbacks, moving from a pastel sundress while she lived on Homeworld to a miniskirt at the start of season 1, which she trades in for a ribbon in "Steven the Sword Fighter", then finally a jacket in "Change Your Mind". This reflects Pearl slowly letting go of her Homeworld-assigned role and her dependence on Rose for validation.
• Single Woman Seeks Good Man: She was deeply in love with Rose Quartz. The very Gem who treated Pearl like an individual, instead of "just another pearl". This is deconstructed in the series though. Besides feeling like she was nothing when in comparison to Rose, Pearl put Rose on a pedestal and couldn't accept that Rose would keep stuff even from her. This is something that was explored in "Rose's Scabbard".
• The Smart Girl: She's the Gems' main strategist.
• Smug Smiler: Whenever she's right about something — a trait Amethyst hates.
• Snobs Vs Slobs: The source of friction between her and Amethyst, where she's the snob.
• Stealth Pun: Her being Steven's primary mother figure may be a reference to the material called nacre, or in other words, mother of pearl.
• Stepford Smiler: Her relationship with Steven is implied to be built off of this on her end in "Rose's Scabbard". Having been obsessively in love with Rose Quartz, Pearl is still deeply saddened by her death, and because he's Rose's son, Pearl sees very much of her in Steven. "A Single Pale Rose" makes this worse; she knew that Rose having a baby would kill the Gem, and was sobbing in private about it even though Rose was so excited. She also feels extremely guilty for going along with Rose aka Pink Diamond's plan to fake Pink's shattering and save the Earth. It doesn't help that she had to shapeshift into Rose to make the ruse plausible, since as Pink jokingly points out, she can't shatter herself. Then Pink ordered her to never tell anyone; if not for that Geas, Pearl could have told Steven the truth about his mother way back in Season Three, and she said she wanted to reveal the truth.
• Stepford Snarker: One of the ways she hides her own insecurities is by snarking at Amethyst's (perceived) shortcomings. This largely disappears after season one though.
• Stern Teacher: "Sworn to the Sword" proves Pearl to be a strict and firm teacher when instructing Connie on swordfighting. She's much less strict when she's training Steven in "Steven vs. Amethyst". (Besides likely having learned in the aftermath of "Sworn to the Sword", those methods simply wouldn't be very effective with Steven or Amethyst.)
• Still Wearing the Old Colors: Bears a Diamond insignia not only on the jumpsuit she wears in "Space Race" and "Back to the Barn", but also when she fuses with Garnet to turn into Sardonyx the same symbol appears on her feet, presumably coming from Pearl's part of the fusion. Considering she is still loyal to her Diamond, Pink Diamond, this is justified.
• Straight Man: Especially around Amethyst.
• Straight Man and Wise Guy: The straight man with Amethyst more or less any time they're onscreen together.
• Stronger Than They Look: She has the most slender and delicate physique out of the Crystal Gems but this doesn't stop her from splitting large boulders in half with a single kick and tanking multiple powerful blows from the likes of Sugilite without getting poofed or shattered.
• Stupid Sacrifice: In "Sworn to the Sword", Garnet explains to Steven that Pearl did this a lot for Rose, jumping in to protect her even when it wasn't necessary. Subverted when it turns out that Rose is Pink Diamond, and her getting poofed would expose what her gem really is.
• Subordinate Excuse: For thousands of years, Pearl devoted her life to serve and follow Rose, whom she was deeply in love with. There's also a deeper reason: Rose is Pink Diamond, her original Diamond.
• Sugar-and-Ice Personality: Pearl dotes over Steven, is friendly with her fellow Crystal Gems and Connie, and is apathetic towards other humans.
• Super-Powered Robot Meter Maid: Downplayed. Although she's weaker than specifically combat-oriented Gems like Rubies or Quartzes, and she relies largely on agility and finesse to be effective in combat, Pearl (and presumably the rest of her kind) was still able to get very strong by human standards. This is despite the fact that she was created specifically to be a largely decorative maidservant that wouldn't often have much need for superhuman strength. Comments about Homeworld's production methods suggest Gems made in her time were over-engineered in terms of strength and power, and only later started cutting back once they ran low on resources.
• Surrounded by Idiots: Though she mellows out later on, in the first season, Pearl has little patience with Amethyst or Steven's mischief and immature behavior, and she barely acknowledges Greg's existence.
• Sword Beam: Pearl can fire arrow-like energy blasts from the tip of her spear. She can also charge it to perform a more powerful version. In all cases, it's merely a long-range attack that isn't effective on fast or skilled foes; she's never shown firing it while moving on her own, the blasts travel too slowly to be useful on a moving target (vs. Amethyst), and it seems to telegraph enough that the shots can be dodged (vs. Bismuth). When they do hit, it's a one-hit poofing for something along the lines of weaker gem mutants, and sort of a severely weaker version of Opal's arrows.
• Take a Third Option: Back when she served Homeworld, her past outfit is a dress with blue sleeves, a yellow bust, and a pink hem.
• Team Mom: Though Garnet is also a maternal figure for Steven and is the leader of the team, Pearl is a more hands-on motherly substitute for him and the 'caretaker' of the Crystal Gems as a whole, being the one who does most of the housework (apparently for the sheer enjoyment of it), makes schedules, and generally keeps the group focused and in line when she's able to. In "Fusion Cuisine", Steven pegs her as the most mom-like of the three when trying to decide which of them to bring to dinner as his mother, and the only reason he doesn't just take her is because she finds eating disgusting.
• Token Good Teammate: Though she isn't exactly this to the Crystal Gems, she was definitely this to the Homeworld Gems before she and her Diamond, Pink Diamond, secretly defected.
• Tongue-Tied: She always knew Pink Diamond was never shattered and she and Rose were one and the same. However, Pink Diamond ordered her to never speak the truth to anyone. For this reason, Pearl could never reveal their secret, even if she really wanted to. If she tried, her hands would cover her mouth to silence her. She finally got around this by just showing her memories to Steven.
• Took a Level in Badass: "Back to the Barn" makes it clear that Pearl and other pearls are a Servant Race on Homeworld, and weren't "made" for fighting or inventing, meaning that Pearl had to learn to do both. Now, she is not only an experienced sword fighter, she is also an mechanical engineer and the "brains" of the Crystal Gems. (Has a mean right cross, too.)
• Took a Level in Kindness: She acted outright malicious to Greg in "We Need to Talk", telling him that he's just a phase to Rose, and rubbing it in that he will never be able to fuse with her like she can. In the present, while she seems to lack faith in Greg at times, the two are on relatively good terms and are capable of working together amicably, particularly when it comes to fixing or building things. "Mr. Greg" has them both at becoming better friends to one another, and by the movie, she is happily taking bass lessons from him.
• Tranquil Fury: In "It Could've Been Great", this is her reaction to Peridot gushing over Homeworld's plans to turn Earth into a Gem colony, not caring that it would have resulted in the extinction of all organic life on the planet, and then blaming Rose Quartz for canceling the project to boot. She never raises her voice, but her tone is filled with rage and her expression is downright murderous.
  Pearl: Rose Quartz believed all life was precious and worth protecting.
• True Blue Femininity: All of her outfits throughout the series incorporate blue in some way, and she is the most feminine of the Crystal Gems.
• Tutu Fancy: She has a ballerina-inspired design and her first outfit is a complete aversion, as both her hair and clothes are short enough that they'd never get in the way. Her second outfit plays this straight to a small extent, as it has a large ribbon draped over the back of her legs.
• Uncatty Resemblance: Played with. She's one of only two Pearls to be a different color scheme and have a different Gem location compared to the mistress she was supposed to be for, her gem is white, and on her forehead, like White Diamond, even though she was made for and served Pink Diamond. Meanwhile, White Pearl's gem is on her belly, like Pink. Pearl's gem does have a slight pink tint, just as Blue Pearl and Yellow Pearl do with their respective colors, but the rest of her color scheme incorporates very little pink.
• Undying Loyalty: "Rose's Scabbard" reveals that she was fiercely devoted to Rose, and chose to stay on Earth mainly because Rose had chosen to stay. "Sworn to the Sword" shows how devoted — during the War, she frequently threw herself into extreme danger to protect Rose, and judging by the tone of her argument with Steven, did so even though Rose herself was begging her to stop. Turns out there is a very good reason for that: She's the Pearl to Pink Diamond.
• Unreliable Expositor: Before "A Single Pale Rose" and "Now We're Only Falling Apart" Pearl literally could not tell the truth about Pink Diamond or how she was Pink's Pearl. Because of this, when Pearl wasn't stopping herself from speaking on the topic she would rely on Exact Words and omitting the full truth. For example, in "Message Received", when Steven asks if she knows Yellow Pearl, Pearl says that not all Pearls know each other. While this statement is technically true, she didn't actually answer the question. It's later shown that Pearl did know Yellow Pearl.
• Unwitting Instigator of Doom: From Homeworld's point of view, anyway. Her innocent attempts to fulfill her original purpose of making Pink Diamond happy led, by Pink's own admission, to the creation of Rose Quartz and Pink seeing the beauty of Earth, which then caused the rebellion by the Crystal Gems, the corruption by the Diamonds, and centuries of depression suffered by Blue and Yellow that followed. Of course, if she hadn't, Earth would've been dead from the colonization and Pink wouldn't have seen the error of her ways.
• Violently Protective Girlfriend: Pearl will go ballistic for Rose.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Pearl and Amethyst spend almost all of their shared onscreen time arguing, but every once in a while there's a subtle indication that they do care about each other. i.e., after Amethyst's Dark and Troubled Past is revealed to Steven and Amethyst shuts down, Steven asks Pearl to help her, which she does.
• Walk on Water: Pearl can walk on water as seen in "Together Breakfast"; an ability Opal and Lapis Lazuli share with her.
• Water Is Womanly: Pearl is somewhat water-associated, with her room in the Temple being full of fountains and pearls in real life being formed by aquatic animals. She's also the most conventionally feminine of the Crystal Gems: her dancing tends to take its cues from ballet, many of her outfits integrate a dress-like or skirt-like element, her combat style stresses grace and elegance, and she's the Gem who most feels like a substitute mother to Steven.
• Weak, but Skilled: She's not the strongest Gem in hand-to-hand combat, as Pearls as a norm are essentially a Servant Race with little combat capability, and she lacks the sheer strength Amethyst and Garnet have. Pearl is conscious of it and compensates with tactical thinking and precision — and basically, any time that gives her an edge, it's enough. In fact, if you watch for it, Pearl's the Crystal Gem most likely to go for a one-hit kill/poofing.
  • In "Coach Steven", she feels both jealous and insecure because Steven looks up to Sugilite's raw strength and suffers a Break the Cutie moment when she's unable to stop the Gem fusion alone. She does it anyway, turning Sugilite's character flaws to her advantage.
  • This comes to a head in "Ocean Gem", where she does the best out of all the Crystal Gems in their Mirror Boss fights, just by there being such a gap in skill between her and her water clone. The clone eventually splits into two, but it turns out that two Pearl clones with a spear each is not greater than a single Pearl Dual Wielding spears. (And if you look closely, it doesn't look like her clones were in solid form when Steven dissipated them...)
  • She also has a pretty good right cross, according to "Back to the Barn" and a bit of swelling in Peridot's cheek (and Peridot can come out pretty much unscathed from falls off tall cliffs and being crushed under lots of large rocks/a massive boulder).
• We Used to Be Friends: A milder example. She and Amethyst used to be very close, as seen in the flashback for "Story for Steven", but they aren't as close in the present storyline. A few episodes, such as "On the Run", show them awkwardly becoming closer again, sometimes bringing up issues they hadn't properly dealt with before, such as Amethyst's feelings about her origins.
• What the Hell, Hero?: She sometimes gives this to the other Gems and Steven, but found herself on the receiving end of one of these in "Cry for Help".
• Wrench Wench: Just like other Pearls seen in the show, her nature as a maidservant in a highly advanced alien civilization gives her quite the tech expertise.
  • She manages to fix Greg's van off-screen, despite having no experience doing so. Judging by the oil stains she's covered with, she didn't use magic to do it; judging by how badly wrecked it had been, she probably used her Super-Strength.
  • In "Space Race", she builds a nearly-functional (nearly being a key term here) spaceship with outdated plane parts in a barn, showing off knowledge about aeronautics and engineering while trying to teach Greg and Steven.
  • She built an EMP weapon in anticipation of Peridot's attack on Earth, incidentally rebuilding one of the damaged Robonoids as a test subject.
  • In "Back to the Barn", she even builds a fully functional Mini-Mecha out of the same outdated plane parts as the spaceship in the same (very short) amount of time as Peridot.
• The Xenophile: By the time of "Future" she has completely flipped her initial attitude toward humans and has developed a genuine interest in human culture. Granted, she still has some strange mannerisms such as randomly offering toilet paper as a greeting and singing along to commercial jingles on the radio, but thankfully her new human friends appear to find these traits endearing.
• You Are Better Than You Think You Are: Garnet tells her this in "Friend Ship".

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