Just For Fun / Camp Pining Hearts

Last time on Camp Pining Hearts...

"It's the Colour War, Paulette. Doesn't that mean anything to you?"

— Percy

Camp Pining Hearts is a popular Canadian teen soap opera ^note at least in the world of Steven Universe set in the titular camp. It focuses on two campers and Star-Crossed Lovers, Percy and Paulette. Unfortunately, Percy and Paulette are on opposite sides of the Colour War. The Colour War is a yearly competition where the campers must compete with each other in various sporting events. One of the rules of the Colour War is that participants cannot talk to each other in fear of strategies being leaked out to opposing teams. In season 2, the scenario complicates itself even further with the introduction of Pierre, the strongest man in the camp who is also vying for Paulette's affection while struggling to work with Percy.

Following Season 11, the show was quietly canceled. Just a year and a half later, the show would be rebooted/revived as Camp Pining Hearts: New Generation. The show now focuses on new campers named Jasmine and Rodrigo, attending the new Camp Pining Hearts after the original was closed. Some characters from the original show come back for cameo appearances.

---

Trope Away, Campers!

Camp Pining Hearts

• Accidental Kiss: This happens to Officer Patel and Statue while they both try and swat a fly. While she assures Counselor Jacques it meant nothing, she admits to Pierre, and later Patel himself, that she enjoyed it and is fighting the urge to kiss him intentionally. This sparks the Love Triangle between the three.
• Aesop Amnesia: Several times.
  • Gabrielle never catches on that Cheaters Never Prosper.
  • Season 6, Episode 3 is dedicated to Paulette's team being turned against her by Gabrielle, with only Percy and Pierre believing in her. After they discover the truth (working to expose it despite their hang-ups with each other and the Colour War, because they're honest), the camp learns an important lesson about not believing in gossip and not jumping to conclusions incriminating friends... and one season later, Paulette is again the primary suspect for something.
• All There in the Manual: The show's website and tie-in book Pining for More, reveals several details not mentioned in the show itself.
  • A lot of the characters full names are revealed:
    • Francois' full name is Francois Francois, Jr.
    • Kozue's last name is Ikenaga.
  • The sumo wrestler from the Season Four trailer is a canon character; Kozue's uncle, Minoru, who she mentioned in passing in a few episodes. It also confirms that he's the father of her dastardly cousin Mitsuru, better known as Fiskur-Draugur.
  • Ludwig Fick, the camp janitor, is a veteran of some kind and immigrated to Canada from Germany in 2002.
  • Gabrielle is adopted; her biological parents abandoned her in a box outside an ice hockey arena.
  • The Three Cool Hats or rather the humans they have possessed, are named Jon Bergstrom, Angelino Archer, and Hyun-woo Kang.
  • The kid who sang the song about shining Paulette's shoes is named Kevork, and he was doing so to impress a professional shoeshine boy he has a crush on.
• American Gothic Couple: The camp was previously land owned by two deceased farmers (Stale Bread and Rice Pudding Smith), who are shown in a picture aping the painting American Gothic.
• Annoying Laugh: Francois, a local cop, has a very awkward, donkey-like laugh. The campers try to avoid anything that could amuse him whenever he's around.
• Archangel Raphael: Counselor Jacques claims that Raphael visits him in his dreams.
• The Artifact: The Colour War becomes this in later seasons, funnily enough, with the writers clearly jumping through hoops to justify having campers ignore it without consequence.
• Arc Villain:
  • The Devil Werewolf acts as the primary source of overarching conflict in Season 3. He returns in Season 7, although he shares this role with the New Campers (well, mostly Lucian, Isabel, and James — the rest are Innocently Insensitive for the most part, but they trust those three), who provide more personal conflict.
  • The Undead Wanderer in Season 4 provides a similar source of conflict, though his role is a tad more hands off.
  • Dr. Cactus McCactus, a mysterious medical doctor trying to get the camp closed, serves as a threat throughout Season 9.
  • Mitsuru Ikenaga, Kozue's cousin, is the main villain of Season 10. Under the guise of a masked digital media celebrity/DJ called Fiskur-Draugur, she tries to buy the campgrounds to build a studio, which is really a front for a scheme to create counterfeit króna.
  • The Three Cool Hats, three criminals who appear to have superhuman strength and speed, menace the characters in Season 11.
• Beach Episode: Season 5 had twelve episodes taking place at the beach. The first few were Justified, as the camp is near a lake and the beach was used for the events — canoeing, firemaking, swimming, and sandcastle building respectively. The rest... not so much. The one with a listing under Bizarro Episode is probably the most pointless.
• Beware the Nice Ones:
  • Paulette is probably the kindest person in camp and part of the reason she hesitates so much is that she doesn't want to make anyone upset by her actions, but she's the one who ultimately lures out and (re)kills the Undead Wanderer.
  • It also turns out you shouldn't actively try and upset Hervé, as Dr. McCactus learned.
• Bizarro Episode:
  • Season Five's eighth Beach Episode had Pierre be transformed in a giant pineapple by a motorcycle gang made up entirely of Polynesian witches, Paulette being hypnotized into thinking she's in love with Madelyn and challenging Kozue to a breakdancing contest to win the former's affections, and Percy doing nothing but play romantic ballads on an accordion while sitting in a rocking chair (after a previous episode established that he had never even heard of accordions before Counselor Jacques showed him a picture of one).
  • Season 10's fourth episode is largely set in Finland of all places, focusing on a criminal named Bjarni evading the police, getting into a fight with a gang of bikers in mime makeup, stealing a hyena from a zoo and setting it loose in a bar, and many other strange things. The only relevant development is that he watches Fiskur-Draugur's video announcing her efforts to buy Camp Pining Hearts.
• Captive Date: In the fifth Beach Episode, this is a plot point; Gabrielle kidnaps a random man to build a sandcastle with her for a couples' sandcastle building contest.
• Connected All Along: Fiskur-Draugur is actually Kozue's cousin Mitsuru.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Alicia Chavez was kidnapped for several years by her own uncle.
• Did You Just Romance Cthulu: Statue says her ex-boyfriend was, and we quote, "a 70-foot tall tentacled insect-crustacean hybrid with fire for blood and the screams of thousand perishing galaxies for a voice, who rules the eternally traveling nebula born of humanity's suffering as he bathes in the water mountains of cosmic decimation". She never clarifies if she was kidding or not.
• Ejection Seat: Wilfred of Ivanhoe inexplicably has an "Eject" button (big and red, naturally) on his dashboard, leading to a Running Gag throughout Season 2 involving other cops.
• Emotion Eater: The Undead Wanderer is this. It is revealed he is drawn to the camp because of Paulette's uncertainty. Yes, uncertainty is his favorite "flavour", although he also has a taste for paranoia and distrust, to a lesser extent.
• Everyone Calls Him "Barkeep": The camp janitor is always referred to as just that or even just "the janitor"... until the Season 6 premiere, where Officer Francois introduces him to Officer Patel as Ludwig Fick.
• Fake Nationality: Digital media personality/DJ Fiskur-Draugur seems to be from Finland, but is actually a half-Japanese, half-Finnish girl who spent most of her life in Japan, albeit raised by her Finnish mother. Nonetheless, her criminal partners are all Finnish.
• Fanservice with a Smile: Jackie and Flappy's, a breakfast-focused restaurant in town, has waitresses who dress in revealing plaid flannel shirts and jean hot pants. As such, Counselor Jacques doesn't want the campers to go there when they go to town for supplies (so of course some of them do). Interestingly, a line by a minor female character suggests the waitresses choose to dress that way because they enjoy how daring it looks.
• Fatal Flaw: Paulette's uncertainty and inability to make decisions. It's the reason the Undead Wanderer attacked the camp. She eventually exploits it by using herself as bait to lure him into an ambush. Her uncertainty over the danger of the whole thing prevented him from realizing that it was a trap.
• Genre Shift: The first two seasons were very rooted in normal life and teen romance drama, while Season 3 begins to introduce supernatural creatures. The latest seasons include psychological horror and crime thriller elements.
• Healthcare Motivation: The reason the burglars in Season 2, Episode 7 try to rob Counselor Jacques is to pay for an operation for one of their younger sisters. Upon finding this out, Jacques convinces the burglars to leave by reminding them that they live in Canada and thus have universal healthcare anyway.
• Hiccup Hijinks: The Season 4 premiere actually had someone having the hiccups be a serious plot point.
• Human Chess: Hervé has a personal chess set that has the pieces based on characters from the Star Battlers franchise.
• Hypno Pendulum: In an attempt to get Pierre and Percy to work together in one episode of Season 2, Paulette uses a cameo that she wears around her neck as one. Her hypnosis goes awry when she realizes that someone forgot to cover the mirrors, and she hypnotizes herself because of it.
• The Igor: The last Beach Episode of Season 5 has a man who fits every facet of this trope appear... but without a mad scientist, instead being the assistant to a Jerkass ice cream vendor.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Gabrielle, despite doing some rather eyebrow-raising things, actually regards her team as her friends. Outside of the Colour War, it's shown she actually doesn't have anything against those not on her team, even if she treats it as seriously as everyone else does.
• Love Triangle:
  • Following Pierre's introduction, he and Percy fight for Paulette's affections, and all the while Paulette becomes more and more unsure of who she truly loves.
  • Shortly after Officer Patel's Accidental Kiss with Statue in Season 7, one of these develops with Counselor Jacques. It lasts until the end of Season 9 when Statue leaves Jacques for Patel after growing sick of his pettiness towards Patel.
• Mean Character, Nice Actor: Gazsi Kedves, the actor who played the villainous title character of Señor Gates, is apparently "the kindest semi-retired Hungarian-Australian actor you can ever meet in a Thai restaurant in Wholesale City, Manitoba, Canada."
• Missing White Woman Syndrome: Parodied; the missing poster for Alicia Chavez, a middle-aged Latina who is one of the camp cooks (who briefly goes missing in Season 5), is shown to be much smaller than a gigantic picture of a young blonde that says "I'm more important" (and nothing else) in the police station. Dialogue indicates that the blonde was found years ago, but that some genius insisted on having the poster permanently glued to the wall. In Season 8, they paint over it and put up a new payphone.
• Murderous Mask: A mask shaped like a skull with a large fin on top is seen as one of the items owned by the Undead Wanderer. It is never used, but it implied to make anyone who wears it go ballistic and then explode.
• Neutral Female: Paulette zig-zags this. There's a lot of episodes that are basically about Percy and Pierre with her as the prize, but she has won some contests herself, and there are episodes dedicated to her relationships with her teammates (neither Percy nor Pierre appear in Season 2, episode 5), and her attempts at solving conflict within the camp. She's also the one who finally kills the Undead Wanderer.
• Nice Girl: Paulette is friendly to everyone at camp and just wants everyone to get along.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: Dr. McCactus receives one at the hands of Hervé, of all people.
• Nubile Savage: The cavewomen seen in the visuals accompanying the Undead Wanderer's explanation for how he came to be look surprisingly healthy and beautiful from a modern perspective.
• Odd Friendship: Lucian and James are extremely different from one another; Lucian is snooty, a neat freak, and is a pretentious aspiring author and James is blunt, a bit of a slob, and is illiterate. Despite this, they actually seem to have a sort of twisted camaraderie they lack with Isabel.
• Only Known by Their Nickname: Statue, though she's eventually revealed to be named Ruth Luther.
• Our Werewolves Are Different: The Devil Werewolf has Black Eyes of Evil, glows in the dark, is essentially a human who just has wolf-like attributes, is stuck in his form permanently (which obviously mean he doesn't require a full moon to transform), is harmed by the sunlight like a vampire, can teleport in puffs of red smoke, and is vulnerable to not silver, but rust from metal.
• Posthumous Character: A few examples...
  • Stale Bread and Rice Pudding Smith, the long deceased farmers whose land became the camp.
  • Counselor Jacques's father is deceased. This comes up in dialogue because said father was also a counselor for the camp.
  • Randy, a camper who died in a car crash four years before the start of the show. He shows up in a flashback. Subverted in Season 9, which reveals he actually faked his death to flee to Scotland and start a new life, becoming Dr. McCactus.
• Puppeteer Parasite: The Three Cool Hats are revealed to be this. They are able to. possess those who put them on. their heads, and the three guys call themselves the Three Cool Hats are nothing more than their victims.
• Repetitive Name:
  • Subverted with Dr. Cactus McCactus, who is revealed to really be named Randy Founder.
  • Francois Francois, Jr., on the other hand, plays it perfectly straight.
• Ron the Death Eater: Poor Paulette gets this In-Universe as well as out. She's usually the first person to be suspected of any sabotage because of all the time she spends with Percy and Pierre (who are on the other team). In Season 6, Episode 3, Gabrielle uses her reputation to slander her, hoping to make her team start infighting (and as a cover for Gabrielle's own cheating). According to Gabrielle's rumours, Paulette has Chronic Backstabbing Disorder and is using the Colour War to weasel her way into (false) friendships in both sides. Or maybe she's just a Yandere who loves Pierre so much she'll sabotage her own team for him. The rumours weren't all that consistent, but everyone but Percy and Pierre believed it.
• Rugby Is Slaughter: Percy gets the crap knocked out of him when he attempts to play rugby in Season 3.
• Serious Business: The Colour War. Paulette's about the only camper who treats it more as a game than an actual war, which has caused friction between her and her team.
• Shot-for-Shot Remake: In-Universe, Paulette decries the remake of Señor Gates for being this, since she's already seen the original.
• Shout-Out:
  • Francois calls his cop car Wilfred of Ivanhoe, simply due to it being a repurposed cop car from somewhere in England.
  • Paulette gets teased for her Crying Breakfast Friends plushies.
  • The camp theatre troupe performs an adaptation of 1776 in the third episode of Season 4.
  • A extra is shown wearing a Dogcopter sweatshirt in the Season 2 finale.
  • Percy regularly goes browsing at a store called Guy-tar Romantic.
  • A camper dresses up as Lonely Blade when the campers come to think the camp janitor is the Devil Werewolf.
  • The Devil Werewolf refers to his plan to turn Paulette as Operation Darkness.
  • A poster for Troll (1986) is seen taped to the side of one of the outhouses.
  • Season 3, Episode 9 is a Whole-Plot Reference to Nothing but Trouble.
  • The two burglars from Season 2, episode 7 look and act just like Raoul Duke and Dr. Gonzo.
  • The two police detectives met in the Season 3 finale are a man named Marple and a woman named Poirot. While in their cruiser, a show on their radio also mentions a man known as Mason escaping from Alcatraz.
  • Statue is shown reading Norwegian Wood in the Season 5 premiere.
  • Counselor Jacques has posters for the films The Birdcage and Honey, We Shrunk Ourselves in his new office he gets in Season 6. He also has a framed autographed photo of the late Tupac Shakur, an action figure of the Blue Galaxy Ranger and a copy of Black Beauty on his desk.
  • Da Chief at the police station is named after Danielle Judovits. That he's named Danielle and not Daniel is what makes it obvious.
  • Percy and Kozue discuss The Prince of Egypt twice in Season 7.
  • Hervé owns a poster for the film Canada 3000.
  • Hervé's chess set is based on the Star Battlers franchise.
  • The Summation Gathering parody promo features clear stand-ins for Cookie Lyon, Vanessa Ives, Becky Botsford (not as a superhero, of course, but she even has a chimpanzee companion), Dr. Rick Solomon, the Sixth Doctor and a sumo wrestler.
• Shoe Shine, Mister?: A kid in town very randomly sings a song offering to shine Paulette's shoes in Season 7.
• Show Within a Show: Señor Gates, a crime-horror film about an American Serial Killer fleeing to Mexico and buying and operating a hotel as a cover.
• Snow Means Death: The Undead Wanderer died in a pile of thick snow.
• Spontaneous Crowd Formation: In the Season 9 premiere, a crowd forms when Pierre first encounters Dr. McCactus.
• Statuesque Stunner: Conselour Jacques' fiancé is three feet taller then him and is gorgeous. Appropriately, the campers call her Statue.
• Summation Gathering: Parodied in the trailer for Season 4, where Counselor Jacques does this to some completely random characters who don't appear in the show, who then point out he isn't supposed to be there and that it's nothing more than an unusual book club.
• Tall, Dark, and Handsome: Officer Patel is flat out called this by Percy.
• Thicker Than Water: Paulette is very loyal to her cousin Colette even though she tried to sabotage her attempts to talk to Pierre.
• Token Minority:
  • Alicia Chavez, one of the cooks, is the only Latin-Canadian.
  • Kozue is the only Asian-Canadian camper, while Statue, Counselor Jacques' fiancé, is the only Black Canadian to appear who has spoken lines.
  • Subverted in Season 5, which introduces another Asian-Canadian camper named Hervé, though he only plays a real role in the story in two episodes. In later seasons he receives more focus and development.
  • Season 6 introduces Francois' new partner, an Indian-Canadian named Officer Patel.
• Token Trio: The Three Cool Hats are a villainous example; They're Swedish Canadian, Black Canadian, and Korean Canadian. They were indeed all friends even before being possessed and turned into supervillains by the magic hats.
• Turtle Island: The final Beach Episode of Season 5 reveals that an island off in the distance is actually a large monster that looks like a giant manatee with a turtle-like shell. The episode's writer confirmed in an interview that it was a reference to a dream he had, and it is otherwise irrelevant to the plot.
• Unexplained Accent: Madelyn has a stereotypical Upper Midwestern accent despite no indication she isn't a homegrown Canadian. This is because her actress is from Granite City, USA.
• Was Once a Man: The Devil Werewolf reveals this is his backstory, disproving the campers' theories of it being an alien.
• Yellow Eyes of Sneakiness: The Devil Werewolf has glowing yellow eyes. Notably, he is shown to have had them back when he was human in a flashback.
• Zombie Infectee: A good part of Season 7's plot is finding who the Devil Werewolf may have infected and became the person stalking the camp. Paulette is a prime suspect, due to the events of the Season 3 finale. It's no one. The wound on Paulette's wrist was a Red Herring; Paulette and Percy really did stop the Devil Werewolf from turning her. The one responsible is the spirit of the Devil Werewolf himself, brought back by a few of the campers using New Camper Kiara's occult books (going behind her back). The suspicion against Paulette did serve a purpose, as the Devil Werewolf was trying to isolate her so he could finish what he started. It unfortunately doesn't work, since Paulette befriended some of the New Campers, who mostly didn't believe in the Devil Werewolf.

New Generation

• Actor-Inspired Element: Secondary camper Dalia is a trans girl, which was only made canon after her actress (Destiny Ugalde-Cho) came out in an interview with WatchYoYo.com.
• Arc Villain:
  • The "The Stegosaurus Who Loved Me" arc has Dr. Tebros Sorbet, a shadowy scientist who is trying to create an army of dinosaurs. Since he only successfully gains one dinosaur, he decides to try and conquer the woods surrounding Camp Pining Hearts, bringing him into conflict with the campers.
• Ascended Fanboy: The alien in the "Alien in the Camp" arc of Season 3 was played by Fandom VIP Peridot Facet-2F5L Cut-5XG, a Gem from the planet Homeworld whose first experience with Earthen media was the original series and ran the popular "A Space Alien's Guide To Camp Pining Hearts" blog.
• Covers Always Lie: The DVD cover for the first season of New Generation features Counselor Jacques menacingly pointing an automatic crossbow at the viewer. He is only seen with it twice in the entire season, and neither time is he presented as threatening anybody with it.
• The Danza: Camper Calvin Sel is played by Calvin Sucre.
• Darker and Edgier: While the original series got pretty dark with its storylines, this iteration has an entire subplot about a murder and corpse disposal.
• Dark Secret: Jasmine killed her voice actress sister's stalker.
• Fossil Revival: In the "The Stegosaurus Who Loved Me" arc, the mysterious Dr. Sorbet revives a stegosaurus using a fossil and a strange device of his creation.
• Fur Against Fang: Alluded to with the names of the Strigoi and the Lycanthropes, two rival gangs who've made the town near the camp much less nice than in the previous show.
• Gangbangers: The Lycanthropes would be a straight example, especially in appearance, if it weren't for the presence of some White Gangbangers in their ranks. One of the white guys, Algernon, is apparently The Dragon to Ponkert, the Lycanthropes' resident Bald of Authority.
• Genius Ditz: Zakaria is presented as an oblivious goofball, but is shown to be an absurdly good geologist; he spouts of very detailed trivia about rocks and has apparently already been accepted into a very prestigious university's geology program.
• Hero Antagonist: Detective Magneto, who is investigating the the murder of Olive's stalker. If he succeeds, he'll bring a murderer to justice, but said murderer is Jasmine, a main character who had sympathetic motivations. As a result, he's a recurring looming threat, but is still presented as a good man.
• Mr. Fanservice: Zakaria is ripped and regularly strips naked in almost every episode.
• Ms. Fanservice: Greta is a highly sexualized character, constantly acting very forward with various characters, posing seductively, and more. Some episodes featuring her have had to be flat out censored in the United States, something that never had to happen with the original series. This has attracted some criticism, since it was rumored her actress was underage (though this proved to be false).
• Happily Married: According to Counselor Jacques, Statue and Officer Patel are now married and trying to get pregnant.
• Naked People Are Funny: Zakaria stripping naked whenever he thinks it's time to go swimming is a Running Gag.
• Nervous Wreck: Rodrigo has a very hard time keeping cool, and is quick to stammer and talk himself down. This is at its worst when around Jasmine, due to his crush on her.
• Overly Long Name: Dove, as detailed below. There's also the secondary character Ted Seibert-Tartakovsky-Partible-McCracken-Wasson-Atoms-Miller-Schaeffer-Krstic-Register-Winick-Murray-McNally-Cahill-Rouleau-Casey-Kelly-Seagle-Peck-Benjamin-Lynch-Greenblatt-Van Orman-Ward-Quintel-Andrews-Rudish-Buckley-Deasy-Jones-Browngardt-Sugar-Rothbell-McHale-Chong-Szeles-Carrozza-Jones (yes, "Jones" twice)-Quartey-Gendi-Burnett-Levin-Pott-Molano-Simmons-Dennis-Chilian-Neary-Boqcuelet-Cassuto.
• Preppy Name: Dove Angelique Marie Helmsley Cumberbatch Upton.
• Remember the New Guy?: Counselor Jacques' pet turtle is introduced with him loudly talking about how he's owned him for years, despite there being no sign of him having a pet in the original show; this lead to the online fan community theorizing that the show is an Alternate Universe, where the presence of the turtle, Masaccio, is the cause of the apparent differences with the original series. The creative team has yet to confirm or deny if this is true.
• Ridiculously Average Guy: Calvin is the most generic camper and hasn't been shown to have any quirks. He's Dove's boyfriend, but this just highlights how normal he is, since even she has more to her than him despite appearing slightly less often.
• Show Within a Show: The characters occasionally watch an anime called Zeppelin Warrior Mina. This is actually relevant to the plot, because Jasmine's sister Olive is an actress in the English dub of the series and a "fan" of the show stalked Olive and sent her disturbing "gifts". Jasmine killed him to protect Olive and the whole reason she came to Camp Pining Hearts was to return to the forest where she did the deed and bury the stalker's corpse before it could be discovered.
• Soft Reboot: The show focuses on an all-new set of characters, yet Counselor Jacques is still the head of the camp and there are easy-to-miss references to the original continuity that are just vague enough to keep one guessing whether it's set within the same continuity.
• Tropey, Come Home: Counselor Jacques pet turtle Masaccio goes missing in one, resulting in an entire episode being dedicated to finding him.
• Wham Shot: The third episode opens, apropos of nothing, with Jasmine burying a body deep within the woods.
• When Trees Attack: There's a tree near the camp that is heavily implied to sentient and potentially malevolent. Counselor Jacques calls it Patsy and shown to be very cautious around it, sometimes warns that it previously harmed a camper, and is seen giving it offerings in exchange for peace. The campers doubt that Patsy is really "alive", but ominous music tends to play when it's seen.
• Worst News Judgment Ever: Camp Pining Hearts now has a camper run newspaper, and it always has these sorts of headlines as a sort of Running Gag. For example:
  • These Red Pandas are Oh So Dapper
  • Local Man Finds a Nickel in Dungarees
  • American President Calls Prime Minister "Hot Mama"
  • K-Pop Band Poses Nude for Charity
  • Geese Can Fly, Eh
  • Vrući belgijski vaflji! Prema novim anketama, vaflji su ukusni!^note Hot Belgian waffles! According to new polls, waffles are delicious!
  • Less and Less Parents Naming Their Babies 'Timothy'
• Zeppelins from Another World: Exaggerated with ''Zeppelin Warrior Mina'', where the plot resolves around super weapon zeppelins and their pilots.

---