Pure Pwnage
is a Web Original P.O.V. Cam mockumentary series. The fictional series purports to chronicle the life and adventures of Jeremy, a Canadian self-proclaimed "pro gamer," filmed by his brother Kyle, an aspiring film director. A 6 episode TV series has also been released. The TV series generally focuses on larger stories, including Jeremy's interactions with the denizens of the local netcafe, and his difficulty adjusting to life outside videogames.
This work contains examples of:
- Affectionate Parody: Machinima parody of Red vs. Blue, and live action parodies of Homestar Runner, animated parody of Zero Punctuation
- Agitated Item Stomping: FPS Doug does this to his keyboard after ending up on the receiving end of his favorite move.
- Boom, Headshot!: The Trope Namer.
- Brick Joke: Twice. "Everyone knows you run faster with a knife" in reference to first-person shooters where this rule is invoked.
- In the Counter-Strike tournament final against Deathstriker 6666, Jeremy trusts his instincts and uses a knife throughout the entire match, resulting in a "death from above" kill on Deathstriker 6666's avatar to win the match.
- In the TV series, Doug's Manchild nature is escalated when he is out at a playground and scares away an old woman while attempting to return her purse to her. Doug, reasoning that he would "run faster with a knife," does so while trying to catch up to the old woman and is promptly arrested.
- Cliffhanger: In the first season's finale.
- Code Name: FPS Doug, T-bag go by their gamer names, Anastasia is often called Tagi, her World of Warcraft character's name.
- Continuity Reboot: The TV series addresses the web series as the reason for its own existence, but goes off in its own direction. With the exception of Jeremy, Doug, and Kyle, all their friends in the TV show are expies of the original cast.
- Damsel in Distress: Anastasia in the Season 1 finale
- Deadpan Snarker: Dave.
- The TV series has Simon, manager of the Internet cafe. Pure Pwnage seems to like giving the roles to Asian guys.
- Disc-One Final Boss: The Counter-Strike player "Deathstriker 6666" and the Power Glove Man qualify.
- Even Nerds Have Standards: Doug's obsession with shooters sometimes worries even Jeremy.
- Face–Heel Turn: FPS Doug after Jeremy is too busy hanging out with Anastasia to play games with him so he teams up with the bad guys and tries to kill Jeremy. Later on he Heel Face Turns back into being Jeremy's BFF since Status Quo Is God.
- Gamer Chick: Anastasia, and then Kris. The TV Series has October.
- Heroic Comedic Sociopath: FPS Doug.
- Heterosexual Life-Partners: Mostly Jeremy and Doug but really all the guys on the show except Kyle.
- He Who Must Not Be Seen: Kyle. Until the Season 1 finale.
- Insufferable Genius: Jeremy is the best gamer ever and isn't shy about letting people know it.
- Most Gamers Are Male: The composition of the cast is a demonstration of The Smurfette Principle, with one female gamer and 4-6 male gamers.
- Music Video Syndrome: Many episodes include original music including "Hey Noob", "I Feel Like Pwning Noobs", and "Get out of Myspace".
- Mysterious Past- Teh_Masterer is a mysterious master gamer who is always shown clad in ninja costume, is capable of playing four games at once and and seems to have omniscient knowledge of Jeremy's actions.
- Noob: In Jeremy's opinion the only reason to play games is to pwn noobs.
- Not What It Looks Like: Dave walks in right on time when Jeremy and Doug accidentally turn on the porn that Kyle directed while they take off the clothes they spilled their drinks on.
- Product Placement: The web series has many PP t-shirts for sale and the characters often wear them on the show.
- Runs with Scissors: In one scene FPS Doug is seen holding a knife and offers to go on a jog with Kyle. A nervous Kyle asks him what he's doing and Doug cites the mechanic from Counter-Strike about how one always runs faster with a knife (never mind that he has the option of holding nothing, which would be lighter than a knife).
- Serious Business: The entire main cast (besides Kyle) takes gaming very seriously.
- Spin-Off: Pro At Cooking with Dave. There also was a Webcomic.
- Take That!: in the Pro At Cooking spinoff, Dave regularly delivers Take Thats to vegetarianism. In "Dave's Pimpin' Pizza" (episode 3), he made three types of pizzas: two vegetarian pizzas and one "real pizza" and justified his meat eating to his vegetarian assistant that episode. In "Dave's Mouthwatering Chili" (episode 4), he told his vegetarian assistant to prepare the meat. Finally in "Dave's Eggplant Parmesan," he had a vegan assistant. When she told him about the environmental benefits of not eating meat (ie: the production of meat releases a lot of greenhouse gases), he mentioned since she drove a car and he rides a bike (which is more environment-friendly), that gives him the right to eat as much meat as he wants. Then when she began ranting about the health and ethical benefits of her diet as they waited for the meal to finish cooking, he overdubbed a rant about how pro at cooking he is and how good meat is.
- Techno Babble: To anyone not familiar with Command & Conquer: Generals jargon:"I'm coming at your base with two rockvees and an ambo. You've got a Jarmen, two scorps, and a quad. What do you do?" explanation
- Took a Level in Badass: Up until "The Story of Dave", Dave had shown little interest in games until Jeremy is attacked by micro warriors. During the middle of the battle, the action cuts off to an important flashback of Dave's past in China, revealing his gaming history. He reveals that he too has micro skills and comes to the rescue.
- Unstoppable Rage: The epic scene in which FPS Doug dies (in Counter-Strike), proceeds to scream "FUCKING GODDAMN LAG!", and smashes the everloving shit out of his keyboard.
- Wide-Eyed Idealist: Oh, Doug. In the final episode of the TV series, Doug cheerfully signs up for the actual Canadian Army, thinking it'll be a life where he gets to carry out missions with real guns and if he dies, he'll simply "re-spawn" like video game avatars do. Kyle and October try in vain to explain to Doug what it is he's actually doing.
- This was implied to have happened in the backstory for the web series as well, as Doug had contemplated joining the army, since in his mind it was just like an FPS, except better graphics, but, to his dismay, "there are no respawn points in RL".
