>>93167168Red and Purple are morons and don't even run the Empire. The Control Brains do.
Irken vs. Gem: the whole premise of IZ is that the entire universe is filled with morons, so the Irkens, who are morons, manage to defeat other morons.
Despite what fans or people who hate SU say about its characters and bad writing in SU the stated premise isn't that the whole universe is filled with morons, so the Gem Empire has more of a challenge conquering races that aren't total idiots.
Even then I feel like the show isn't clear on its track record conquest wise. What is their usual success rate like? We really don't know. They suck with earth but there's weird political intrigue and assassination shit going on that might explain why they've left it along until now and even now don't push. If the earth shit became an excuse to assasinate Pink Diamond they may have been trying not to pull at that thread while making a very half baked effort to seem like they were doing shit, whoever killed her may have hoped it would just go away eventually and not actually care what happens to earth as long as it's either destroyed or survives quietly and out of the public eye.
Meanwhile if IZ hadn't been cancelled some spergy little kid (Dib) was supposed to almsot single-handedly destroy the Irken Empire. If the Crystal Gems win, they have problems, but they're immortal warriors and scientists, not some spazzy little kid. The loss won't be as embarrassing.
I would generally give it to the Gem Empire. The only way the Irkens win is that the Gems are very rigid and logical and might be thrown off by some of the Irken priorities like snacks, they might not be able to understand them and have trouble with them. The Control Brains are all the uploaded wisdom of all Irkens while Gems are just a rigid hierarchy of a few narrow minded aristocrats bred to rule, which is a weakness.
Ironically while I think the Gems could probably still take the Irken Empire I think Zim would destroy them
