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Does Lion have something to do with Rose?

Pearl, "Rose's Scabbard"

Lion is a magical pink lion befriended by Steven that occasionally assists the Crystal Gems. Once a normal lion (presumably owned by Rose Quartz in the Desert hundreds of years ago), Lion eventually died through unknown means. Rose Quartz was able to resurrect Lion through her healing powers, giving Lion pink skin and magical abilities. After being entrusted with many of Rose's belongings, Lion roamed the Desert alone following Rose's departure until eventually being found by Steven.

Lion's mane contains a pocket dimension that houses many of Rose's belongings (and, formerly, Bismuth's bubbled gemstone). The pocket dimension can be accessed from multiple entrances, such as the one within Lars Barriga's hair.

Appearance

Lion has round ears, pink fur, black eyes, a soft light pink star-shaped mane, and a dark brownish-magenta heart-shaped nose. When Lion uses his magical abilities, his eyes and mane emit a white glow. There is a tuft of soft pink fur at the end of his thin tail.

Personality

Lion is an enigmatic creature whose sentience and sapience is somewhat questionable. However, he seems to act like a typical house cat, doing things like chasing butterflies in "Rose's Scabbard" and snapping at the dragonfly-like lights created by Sardonyx in "Cry for Help". Much like a normal animal, he rarely changes his expression and for the most part, he is quiet and docile. Though he is considered a "pet" for Steven, Lion looks after himself and often sees to his own activities. While Lion does not seem to acknowledge Steven most of the time, he does appear to understand Steven to a certain extent, responding whenever Steven needs him in mysterious ways. "Lion 2: The Movie" shows this understanding when he takes him and Connie to Rose's Secret Armory after Steven remarks how Lion is not "trained very well", and in "Lion 3: Straight to Video", Lion nearly smothers Steven's face to show him the dimension in his mane when Steven said he wanted to know more about his mother.

However, in "Dewey Wins", after Connie asks Lion to take her home after frustratingly giving up trying to make Steven understand how much he hurt her by surrendering to Homeworld, Lion shoots Steven a disapproving glare before leaving with her, showing that he shares her anger at Steven over his surrender, as well as him treating the situation as nothing, and ignoring her feelings about it. Lion stays with Connie over the next few weeks afterwards, presumably to give her comfort and companionship during her and Steven's estrangement, as well as teach Steven a hard lesson over his actions; Connie later rides him over to Steven's house to try and work things out in person after failing to do so over the phone, only to discover that he had left on vacation. In "Kevin Party", Lion returns along with Connie, bringing her to Kevin's party, and following her and Steven's reconciliation, forgives him as well, and by "Lars of the Stars", he shown to once again be under Steven's care and on good terms with him.

In "Can't Go Back", Lion demonstrates his caring and protectiveness of Steven's well being when he stops him from blindly running after Lapis after she opens the base's doors, and then nuzzles him in comfort when he ultimately fails to stop her from leaving.

History

Click here to view the history of Lion.
Click here to view the history of Lion.

Abilities

File:Steven's Lion - Sonic Roar.png

Lion's concussive roar.

Lion 2 The Movie 097

Lion's Portal Creation and Manipulation.

  • Concussive Roar: Lion has a loud, powerful roar that sends pink rings to knock down/destroy structures. Examples include knocking down multiple sand constructs in "Steven's Lion", pushing the remains of the Gem Warship in "Jail Break", and trying to defeat Lapis' water clone of Steven in "Ocean Gem". In "Crack the Whip", his roar sends the Snow Monster flying.
  • Dimensiokinesis: Lion can manipulate dimensions with relative ease.
    • Portal Creation and Manipulation: Lion's roar can also open up pink portals, connecting two non-adjacent areas. "Lion 2: The Movie" first shows this when he takes Steven and Connie to Rose's Secret Armory, and additionally when going to the Gem Communication Hub in "Cry for Help". He also uses this ability to bring Connie and Steven to the Maheswaran residence in "Nightmare Hospital" and when Lion, with Connie on his back, rescue Steven in "Ocean Gem". Lion also uses this power to find and bring Steven to Pearl in "Rose's Scabbard". Lion can create portals that help him cover enormous distances as shown in "It Could've Been Great" when he creates a portal from Earth to the Moon in mere seconds. This does leave him fatigued afterward, possibly due to carrying Garnet, Amethyst, and Pearl on his back and Steven and Peridot in his mane while traversing the portal
      • Super Warp: Once inside his portal, Lion can create multiple portals that cause him to accelerate with each pass on an individual portal. This trick is likely done to increase speed and distance traveled, as seen in the episode "It Could've Been Great".
    • Pocket Dimension: Like Pearl, Lion has a pocket dimension that is currently only accessible through his mane as well as Lars' hair after his resurrection. This dimension is a vast pink savannah that now includes two grassy hills, one with an acacia tree and another with a tree resembling an oak. As shown in "Lars' Head," Steven (and presumably others) can travel through one entrance and exit through the other.
      • Dimensional Storage: Rose stored some of her most cherished and important belongings inside of Lion's mane for safe keeping. These include a variety of items, such as her sword, a photo, and videotape of her and Greg, a treasure chest, the Mr. Universe Shirt Greg gave her when they first met, a tattered flag with Rose's symbol,  and formerly Bismuth's gem. It also contains some of Steven's belongings such as his bike, helmet, some magic trick paraphernalia, soda, and probably much more. Thus far, Steven is the only one who can directly access Lion's dimension, as we see when Pearl touched Lion's mane with little success.
  • Supernatural Stamina: Lion has incredible stamina, as shown in "Ocean Gem" where Lion kept pace with Greg's Van for an entire day while carrying Steven and Connie. He also demonstrates the capability to leap far distances. However, his stamina does have limits, as in "Cry for Help" when after carrying all three Crystal Gems with Steven in his pocket dimension, he shows signs of fatigue. "It Could've Been Great" further shows this limitation since the strain Lion feels is directly proportional to the distance traveled; making a portal from the Earth to the moon was enough to make him collapse and breathe heavily.
  • Water-Walking: Lion can walk on water, as seen in "Lion 2: The Movie" when he takes Steven and Connie to Rose's Secret Armory. He shares this ability with Lapis Lazuli, Opal, and Pearl.

Episode Appearances

Trivia

  • Lion appears to like Lion Lickers, as shown in the episode, "Lion 3: Straight to Video", when he presses his face against the glass of the freezer holding the Lion Lickers. This attraction can be a reference due to him being a lion.
    • In "Nightmare Hospital", Steven gives Lion Lickers to Lion to get him to stay in the Hospital parking lot. Lion seems enthralled by them, frantically attempting to reach the treat before the plastic is even off, to which Steven remarks about the animality of doing so.
  • Rebecca Sugar's pet cat is also named Lion.
  • Lion's ability to teleport might explain how he manages to follow the Crystal Gems back to the Temple in "Steven's Lion".
  • Lion usually sleeps near the house of the temple, as shown in "Fusion Cuisine" and in "Steven the Sword Fighter", when he is seen resting underneath the house.
    • In "Lion 3: Straight to Video", Steven allows Lion to sleep in the house in a bed he made for him.
  • One of the concepts designs considered for Lion is an "unsettling, silent caricature of a lion", like an "old medieval heraldry image. His face frozen into an uncertain grin except for his eyes which would follow Steven around while he creeped out the other Crystal Gems. He might not be pretty and actually kinda suspicious, but Steven loved him!".[1]
  • As revealed in "Rose's Scabbard", Lion can restrict who can enter his mane. Pearl is rejected initially in "Rose's Scabbard"; Pearl makes no further attempts since.
    • It should be noted that after reaching the Moon Base in "It Could've Been Great", Peridot can be seen sharing space with Steven and stepping out of Lion's Mane.
  • It is unclear how far Lion can teleport, but the furthest he has teleported so far is to the Moon while carrying Steven, Peridot, and the Crystal Gems. The jump to the Moon required several portals to stay open and is shown to exhaust Lion.
  • Steven states in "Lion 2: The Movie" that Lion "does his own thing most of the time".
  • Lion's portals are in the shape of diamonds and his teleportation theme features distorted accordions, the same instrument used in the theme songs for characters of the Diamond Authority.
  • When Lion saves Steven from the sandstorm in "Steven's Lion", Lion's color scheme changes and resembles the male Lions seen alongside Rose Quartz in the episode "Buddy's Book". His mane becomes darker than his body fur, changing from pink to cream-colored.
  • In the episode, "Lars' Head" we see that Lars develops an ability to allow Steven to travel to Lion's head, indicating a connection to how Lion's ability and fur color formed. Given that Lion resembles the male Lions from "Buddy's Book" and Lars gains his abilities after he is revived by Stevens healing powers, Lion may have similarly been revived by Rose Quartz's healing powers which Steven inherited. This would indicate that Rose may have used them to revive Lion after it died, either in battle or old age.
    • Rebecca Sugar has confirmed in an interview that Lion got his powers the same way as Lars.[2]
  • He is similar in some respects to the Marvel Comics character Lockjaw.

Galleries

New Gallery

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Lion.

Design Gallery

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Lion.


References

ve Characters in Steven Universe
Crystal Gems Human-Gem Hybrids: Steven Universe

Unfused Gems: AmethystBiggs JasperBismuthLapis LazuliLarimarPearlPeridotRubySapphireSnowflake Obsidian
Fusion Gems: AlexandriteCrazy Lace AgateGarnetMega PearlObsidian (Rose Quartz Fusion)OpalRainbow QuartzSardonyxSugilite
Hybrid Fusions: Obsidian (Steven fusion)Rainbow Quartz 2.0Smoky QuartzStegStevonnieSunstone
Inactive Gems: Rose Quartz
Humans: Connie Maheswaran
Pets: LionPumpkinCat Steven

Homeworld Gems Unfused Gems: CombyEmeraldPebblesPeridotsSapphiresSpinel

Fusion Gems: MalachiteTopazZebra Jasper (fusion)Giant RubyRuby (triple fusion)Lemon JadeBluebird Azurite
Inactive Gems: Pink Diamond

Off Colors Unfused Gems: PadparadschaRutile Twins

Fusion Gems: FluoriteRhodonite
Humans: Lars Barriga

Other Gems (Formerly) Corrupted Gems: AlbiteAngel Aura QuartzBig Bird • Biggs Jasper • BixbiteBlue ChalcedonyBlue Lace Agate • Cherry Quartz • ChrysocollaDesert GlassEarth BeetleGrossular DiopsideHeaven Beetle • Jasper • Lace Amethyst • Larimar • Moonstone • Nephrite • Ocean JasperOrange Spodumene • Snowflake Obsidian • Tongue MonsterUnknown Giant Gem MonsterWater BearWatermelon TourmalineWhite TopazZebra Jasper (singular)Minor Corrupted Gems

Other Gems: Minor GemsUnknown Gems (Morganite • Nephrite-XJ Cut-763 • Unknown Quartz Warrior • Blue Diamond's Court • Pink Diamond's EntourageUnknown Crystal Gems67 Elite CitrinesPyritesHessonites, Demantoids, and PyropesKyanites)

Forced Fusions: Cluster Gems (The Cluster)

Comic Gems: Ant Gem MonsterClock Tower GemFrozen FragmentGlass GhostInvisible Manta RayMole Gem MonsterMolluskMonster Lizard GemObeliskOld Book GemPlant MonsterPerils of PweepweeRainbow Cloud MonsterRed Bird Gem MonsterRed Eel MonsterScorching ShardSlime Gem MonsterSlug MonsterSnowbeastTentacle MonsterUnknown Giant BirdVine Monsters

Other Major Characters Humans: Greg UniverseSadie Miller
Recurring Characters Humans: Andy DeMayoBarbara MillerBill DeweyBuck DeweyBuddy BuddwickDante and Martha BarrigaDoug MaheswaranPriyanka MaheswaranHarold SmileyJamieJaneJenny PizzaKevinKiki PizzaKofi PizzaMartyMr. FrymanMystery GirlNanefua PizzaOnionPeedee FrymanQuentin FrowneyRonaldo FrymanShepSour CreamSuitcase SamVidaliaYellowtailZoomans (F-3Jay-TenU-12Wy-Six)

Others: Baby MelonBlue CrabsCactus StevenHolo-PearlMagic MossSteven Jr.Watermelon Stevens

Minor Characters Humans: The Best Diner in the World's WaitressEmpire City Wildlife Rehabilitation Center EmployeeGaryGreg's family (Aunt and Uncle • Aunt DebGrandfatherParentsGreat-aunt Gregargia) • Hospital Employees (Dr. GeroDr. StrombergDr. West) JeffKhajima, Jaime, and BrandishMarty's RoadiesMayoral BodyguardsMike KrolOnion's Friends (Garbanzo • Pinto • Soup • Squash) • Patricia and DanielRickySabinaSteven's BabysitterSunshine JusticeWilliam Buford BuchananWilliam DeweyMinor Human Characters

Animals: Butt LobsterCrystal BasiliskDogGiant BirdMask Island BirdsMask Island FishMask Island WormOnion's MouseOnion's SnakeParty GuyRaccoonSeagullsSnakeSteven The ThirdSusanMinor Animal Characters
Aliens: Beetle AliensBird Blob AliensUngulate AliensWorm AliensFlower-Like AliensMinor Alien Characters

Fictional Characters Cookie CatDogcopterMearlPizza JennyMinor Fictional Characters

Camp Pining Hearts: PaulettePercyPierre
"Garnet's Universe": FoxmanHopperHoppyRingo
Golf Quest Mini: AceAce's Father
Li'l Butler: Li'l ButlerMr. MoneyMrs. MoneyDaughter Money • Dirtbike Money
Lonely Blade: Evil JanitorLonely BladeLonely Blade's Brother
Rose's Room: Cloud ConnieTiny Floating Whale
The Spirit Morph Saga: ArchimicarusLisaPlinkmanWind Lizard

Antagonists Blood PolypCentipeetlesCrab MonstersCrystal ShrimpDrill ParasitesElectric SkullsFryboHolo-ConnieShadow ConnieSmoke MonsterWater Clones
Alter Egos Billy Bank AssetsChunk TruckConcrete HeatDashing Danny DooberHandsome Hank HackleschmidtHowl JonesLoch Ness BloggsterPurple PumaSea WaspShark-O-ManiaTiger Millionaire
Attack the Light Blue LightGreen LightIndigo LightOrange LightRed LightViolet LightWhite LightYellow Light

Groups: Light ArmyBlue Monsters • Green Monsters • Indigo MonstersOrange MonstersRed Monsters

Save the Light Hessonite • SquaridotHessonite's Citrines
Unleash the Light DemantoidPyrope
The Phantom Fable Fable • Lonely PearlJasper (Eyeball)
Groups The Cool Kids • Crystal Gems • Crystal Temps • The "Famethyst" • The Great Diamond Authority • Homeworld Gems • Off ColorsSadie Killer and the SuspectsSecret Team • Steven and the Stevens • Zoomans • Species
Gem Types Aquamarines • Bismuths • Diamonds • GarnetsJades • Lapis Lazulis • Nephrites • Pearls • Pebbles • Peridots • Quartzes • Rubies • Sapphires • Topazes • Zircons
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