Connie Maheswaran

"Connie Maheswaran" is a character in Steven Universe. She made her debut in the episode "Bubble Buddies".

Appearance
Connie is a young girl with waist-length, dark brown puffy hair and glasses. She's usually seen in a mint-green and white dress, along with a baby blue sash, and lime green socks, as well as salmon-colored boots. Unlike in the intro, where she wears a hat and has no socks. Her casual wear includes blue overalls with a green-striped white shirt; a green shirt and gray khaki shorts; white shirt which has a golden sun, with blue shorts and dark pink flats; pink shirt with blue shorts, and her boots; sleeveless periwinkle dress with a pale violet lace around her waist, and powder blue flats. For tennis practice, she wears the outfit she previously wore in "An Indirect Kiss" (the second casual outfit), along with a pale blue tennis visor and has her hair in a ponytail. Her formal outfit is a pale yellow mini cardigan, white top, black-gray leggings, and pink heels. Her snow wear is a pale blue coat with a thick white fur-collar, white mittens, and pale blue-colored version of her boots.

Personality
Connie has a reserved/bookwormish personality. She is withdrawn and introverted, as well as curious and intelligent. But because she moves so often, she has been unable to make lasting friendships and often feels lonely. It is heavily implied that her parents are somewhat controlling and disallow her from doing common childhood activities (such as eating donuts or anything with trans-fat). This has also led her to flat-out lie to her parents about Steven and his family, paranoid at how they may react, and tell them that they have a nuclear family. Despite obeying her parents consistently, she does exploit loopholes (such as not buying snacks at a theater, instead Steven supplying them with some at his home). Connie does seem to have grown used to the dynamic strangeness of her friend despite her initial uncertainty to it, as in " Marble Madness " when she barely reacts when the Gems destroy one of Peridot's robots in front of her, giving a spacy gaze and saying "[she] loves hanging out at [Steven's] place."

Connie can be a bit deadpan at times, such as when she jokes about cutting off Steven's hand in "Lion 2: The Movie" and in that same instance she quickly caught on that by poking/tickling Steven she could provoke a reaction from Rose's Training Cave. Her hobbies appear to include tennis and reading, she also plays the violin, as seen in "Fusion Cuisine."

Steven
Steven first saw Connie about a year prior to the start of the series during a parade. He saw her drop her bracelet, so he kept it in the freezer so he could return it one day. She also remembered seeing him on his father's float, mentioning the soap bubbles in his hair. He becomes her first friend, although Connie does sometimes feel like her life is rather mundane compared to Steven's. They are currently good friends. They share a mutual crush, as seen in "An Indirect Kiss" and "Alone Together". Steven at least was heavily implied to have a crush on her in "Open Book". It also implies she cares deeply for Steven, as she said she wants to be part of his universe in the episode, 'Full Disclosure'.

Mr. Maheswaran and Dr. Maheswaran
She is very loyal to her parents. While they tend to be strict, they want the best for her, and want her to be smart, orderly and healthy. She closely follows their orders, but does occasionally exploit loopholes or even lies to them to get away with something.

Episode Appearances

 * Bubble Buddies (debut)
 * Lion 2: The Movie
 * Rose's Room (Rose's magic)
 * An Indirect Kiss
 * Mirror Gem
 * Ocean Gem
 * Fusion Cuisine
 * Alone Together
 * Winter Forecast
 * Marble Madness
 * Full Disclosure
 * Open Book
 * Love Letters

Trivia

 * Connie appears in the title sequence as the "Mr. Universe" van drives by. She holds the book "A Wrinkle in Time".
 * The creators of the show were planning on having a character in the show that would be Steven's girlfriend. It may be possible that their final idea was Connie.
 * She is able to write backwards. This is seen in the very short amount of time it took her to write "Harpoon Gun" on the inside of the bubble in "Bubble Buddies".
 * It is revealed in "Lion 2: The Movie" that Connie plays tennis.
 * According to writer Matt Burnett, Connie's race is Indian.
 * Following the events of "An Indirect Kiss", Connie can now see normally without her glasses thanks to the healing powers in Steven's spit. However, in order not to agitate her parents and optometrist, she pops out the lenses of her glasses and puts the frames back on.
 * It is revealed in "Mirror Gem" that Connie plays violin.
 * In "Fusion Cuisine", it is revealed that Connie's last name is Maheswaran, and she is also shown to be a bit embarassed of Steven and the Crystal Gems.
 * Connie is the only character so far seen wearing a different outfit each episode she appears in.
 * In "Alone Together", she fused with Steven to create Stevonnie.
 * Connie's personality seems to be the more dominant one in the fusion.
 * She is also revealed to be embarrassed to dance in public.
 * It is implied in the episode that Connie suffers from Social Anxiety (Saying that she's too scared to dance in front of people, and Stevonnie's hallucination when people started to stare at them.)


 * Connie is very protective and understanding of her friends shown in "Full Disclosure" when she repeatedly called Steven and visited him to make sure he was okay.
 * In the episode "Winter Forecast" she said "itadakimasu" before eating a waffle sandwich, implying she has a Japanese heritage, is an enthusiast of Japanese culture, or is multilingual with japanese.

Connie