Web Video / Sugar Pine 7

Sugar Pine 7 was created in 2017 by Steven Suptic, Clayton "Cib" James, and James Deangelis. The channel would post vlog-style improv content dubbed Alternative Lifestyle which would feature the three founders along with a varied cast of characters. The line between reality and fiction is blurred throughout most of this series, but it has been confirmed that these characters act as exaggerated versions of those playing them. The Sugar Pine 7 name encompasses the full channel, whereas Alternative Lifestyle specifically refers to the mockumentary style content that spans four chapters.

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In 2019, the Alternative Lifestyle series ended, but the channel still continues to upload their podcast, Beyond the Pine somewhat regularly.

Examples of tropes found within the channel:

• Arc Words: "Is this a bit?"
• Artistic License – Medicine: After Cib hit Steven with his car in "Why I was really audited.", Steven's spine broke in three places as a result. Not only was Steven still able to walk, but the neck brace he put on following that was covered in blood.
• A Simple Plan: In "Ghost Hunters", the Sugar Pine 7 crew split off into two groups to look for ghosts. The end result is that Cib, James and Jeremy end up being locked up on the roof of James' apartment complex (resulting in them breaking into someone's apartment in order to get back down), while Steven and Andrew are hunted down and chased when the demon in Parker's body emerges.
• Back from the Dead: Parker returns midway through Season 2.
• Bait-and-Switch: Ever since "Band practice.", building up to "The Sugar Pine 7 Live Show", it seemed like James (in his plan to crash the live show and turn it into a Battle of the Bands) was going to do a recorder number. And when, after a few seconds of recorder, he straight up starts freestyle rapping.
  Steven: Are you fucking kidding me?
  • The opening of "What do we do with the body?" sees Steven, Cib and James standing before Jeremy, who had just stabbed a shovel into the ground. While it was meant to look like Jeremy buried Parker's corpse, it was actually Jeremy refusing the others' request to do such a thing.
• Bathos: Steven, Cib and James trying to dispose of Parker's corpse in "What do we do with the body?" becomes this once it's revealed that Cib forgot to put it in his car prior to James blowing it up, all to the strains of "My Own Worst Enemy".
• Big Bad: Effectively, Jeremy had become this ever since Parker's death. Cib winds up fixing the situation in "No more Jeremy." by having everyone go boating.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: We ultimately don't see the rest of Steven and James fighting Enlargened!Cib in "Happy Accident." because "the budget [could] only afford fifteen seconds of green screen".
  • In a moment that winds up turning the series on its head, "The good, the bad and the idiot." sees Steven, Clayton and James outright break character (during filming of a video, no less) as a fight winds up breaking out as Clayton's frustrations over playing an idiot are once again brought to the forefront.
• Brick Joke: The first half of "What do we do with the body?" concerns Steven, Cib and James trying to dispose of Parker's corpse, culminating in Cib fucking up their attempt at blowing it up (along with his car) by forgetting to put it in the car. At the end of the episode, as Steven and Cib sing about Parker's death, Steven suddenly realizes they still forgot to get rid of the corpse.
• Butt-Monkey: Parker. One of the videos is titled "Heaven is a place called: Anywhere Parker isn't."
  Steven: I'm not trying to say that [Parker] is the worst person that exists. All I'm asking is... show me somebody worse.
  • Andrew is arguably a close second. Steven legitimately doesn't know his name, when it was revealed that Andrew snuck in footage thanking Steven for the mountain getaway in "Sugar Pine 7" (which reveals that he thought Steven did this for his birthday weekend), Steven admits that it made him laugh, and James tricks him into going to "the furthest mountain you can find" in "Alcohol changes you.".
  • Autumn has also been on the receiving end of a lot of insults and lectures from the rest of the group, who usually berate her for being rude or disrespectful even when she hasn't said or done anything.
• The Cameo: A lot of other YouTubers have shown up, particularly Cow Chop and former SourceFed hosts.
• Catchphrase: Let's get peas.
• Cloud Cuckoolander: Cib. Alfredo somehow manages to outdo Cib in this department.
• Cutting the Knot: A key factor in Steven and James managing to defeat Enlargened!Cib in "Happy Accident."? Steven going for the balls.
  Steven: Sometimes the biggest problems have the simplest solutions. And sometimes the budget can only afford fifteen seconds of green screen.
• Did You Just Flip Off Cthulhu?: At the end of "Replacing Cib.", James (having gotten fed up with him) threatens Alfredo at gunpoint. Alfredo then promptly grabs the gun and twists it out of James' grip.
  Alfredo: Guns don't fear me. I've got the power of a player.
• Downer Ending: "Akrasia" ends with Cib murdering Parker, and Steven and James arriving too late to stop him.
• Even Evil Has Standards: Jeremy flat out refuses to help Steven, Cib and James bury Parker's corpse.
• Failed a Spot Check:
  • Somehow, it was not noticed that Parker's body was not in the car until Cib brought it up after James blew it up.
• Fantastic Racism: Steven justifies calling his dog Little Foot inbred and broken by pointing out his dog doesn't understand English.
• "Flowers for Algernon" Syndrome: Cib winds up becoming a lot more verbose and eloquent after falling off of the upper level of the strip mall where the office is based in "Happy Accident.". Unfortunately, he became super annoying, so Steven and James effectively beat the crap out of him until he was back to normal.
  Steven: We had to make Cib Cib again, the only way we knew how. With violence.
• Forgiven, but Not Forgotten: While Steven and James acknowledge that Cib murdered Parker in the heat of the moment and it was unintentional, they are still acknowledging that Cib still murdered Parker.
• Foregone Conclusion: "Show of the Year." sees Steven become convinced they are going to not win a single award at the Streamys, especially when what he felt was their last chance, "Comedy", went to Liza Koshy.
  Steven: (clearly emotional) So... that... happened.
  • It was basically a given that the skating competition the boys were prepping for in "Roller Skate '78" wasn't being held in 2017.
• Gretzky Has the Ball:
  • Parodied: Cib tries to explain what basketball is to Steven and James in "Happy Accident.". Not only do they already know, but Cib makes the game sound far more intellectual than it already is.
• Halfway Plot Switch:
  • "Ghost Hunters" starts with Sugar Pine 7 splitting up in teams of two to find ghosts. Then Parker gets possessed by a demon and attacks Steven and Andrew while Cib, James and Jeremy get trapped on the roof of an apartment building.
  • Played with in "Our Internship Program.": while the bulk of it is Steven, James and Cib talking with FBI Agent Cody Banks over their "Handjobs for Kids" internship program, Steven takes the time out at one point to talk about how he's been teaching Cib act more appropriately in public... by obstructively interrupting his interactions with people in a supermarket.
  • "Our message to IGN." starts with Steven managing to get renter's insurance... before he and James are distracted by Cib freaking out over the IGN situation.
  • "Akrasia" goes from Steven and James helping Autumn hear, to Alfredo telling Steven about Sami Jo meeting up with Parker, to Cib's downward spiral and eventual murdering of Parker.
• Here We Go Again!: Near the end of "Happy Accident.", Cib admits that he wound up falling off of the upper floor because he was chasing pigeons. He then goes back outside when he notices they are still there, and the last shot of the episode before The Stinger^note and even then, The Stinger showed he landed on the same car in the same way was of Steven filming Cib jumping.
• I Am Not Spock: In-Universe. Near the end of Season 2, Clayton makes it clear that he is tired of "Cib" being the stupid one, citing that since he's now engaged, he feels the need to grow up.
• I Just Shot Marvin in the Face:
  • James accidentally shoots Seth in the arm in "Sorry Funhaus" while doing their greeting. Part of the greeting involves shaking guns at each other while chanting "Bang, you're dead!"
  • Steven uses the trope naming scene from Pulp Fiction when explaining who Phil LaMarr is in "We're actually screwed".
• Killed Off for Real: Played with and subverted: Steven and the others assume Jeremy killed Parker and left his body in the desert in "I'm tired of good times.". A few episodes later in "Fired from Funhaus.", when Steven goes to talk to Parker about the posters they were selling, he immediately remembers this, whereupon Jeremy and Parker admit it was a prank.
  • "Akrasia" ends with Cib beating Parker to death in a drunken rage, culminating in him slamming Parker's head into a table corner.
• Luke, I Am Your Father: Jeremy is actually Parker's dad, due to him growing Parker in a lab.
• Love Triangle: Cib, Sami Jo, and Parker of all people.
• Manchild: Steve is essentially Cib's dad, despite the fact they are both in their twenties.
• Meaningful Background Event: As Steven films Dr. Captain Phillips suggesting they cut off Famous Actor James Allan McCune from his stash near the end of "This is why you shouldn't do drugs.", you can clearly see him remove his shirt in the background and leave.
• Mood Whiplash: For most of "Here's some bad news...", it's just Cib and Steven fishing. And then Steven reluctantly drops the bombshell that it's very likely that he will not be able to resolve Cib's VISA issue before he has to return to Canada in September. It wasn't a bit.
  • "Akrasia" begins with the guys up to their usual antics with Autumn. It ends with Cib brutally murdering Parker in a drunken rage.
  • "What do we do with the body?" kinda zig-zaggs all around. It starts with Steven, James and Cib deciding to hide Parker's corpse, ultimately settling on blowing up his car with him in it... only for Cib to reveal that he did not undestand the plan and did not put Parker in the car prior to it blowing up. Then, the second half of the episode sees Steven and Cib back at the office in private, talking about (in order) them wearing the same shirts, Parker's death and Cib possibly being deported. This prompts the two of them to sing a song to try and alleviate the mood... only for Cib to start singing lyrics that attempt to pin Parker's death on Steven.
• Nightmare Fuel: In-Universe. In "Roosterteeth Eats World", Steven described a dream he once had where Cib burned his (Steven's) house down, and he just stood there and watched him do it.
• 90% of Your Brain: Implied: after Cib fell and injured his head in "Happy Accident.", his brain was "functioning at over 100%". Also, he could use his brainpower to make himself huge and deformed.
• The Other Darrin: In-Universe. Sometimes, Parker is played by Rickey Mizuno. The other boys think he's a lot cooler that way.
• Paste Eater: Famous Actor James Allan McCune mentions in "Our new boss." that all he had to drink for two weeks was rubbing alcohol.
• Poor Communication Kills: Alfredo. The events of "Akrasia" could have been avoided if he had mentioned sooner that he had more footage, especially since he clearly didn't understand the footage he had.
• Real Life Writes the Plot:
  • Because the show is partially based off of Steven's real life, events in it wind up being the basis of some videos. Case in point, the hunt for the Sugar Pine 7 office.
  • As discussed on the "Beyond the Pine" podcast, Parker agreed for In-Universe his character to be killed off at the end of Chapter One because his contract with Disney consumed a lot of his time and prevented him from joining the rest of the crew in some of the more risque material they wanted to cover further down the line.]]
  • The show wound up taking a hiatus for the first half of October in part due to Steven getting in a car wreck. "Happy Accident." has Cib be the reason why the car got wrecked.
• The Reveal: As it happens, the reason why Jeremy was intent on getting revenge for Parker's death... is because Parker was Jeremy's laboratory baby.
• Running Gag: There are many running gags throughout the videos.
  • Steven is (pretending to be) a part of the 1%.
  • Cib will claim he is an expert of survival.
  • Cib being beat up by children.
  • Cib will ignore someone, to listen to "Through The Wire" in his imagination.
  • James was a water warrior in Iraq.
  • James was drafted by NASA to lead.
  • Parker being possessed by a demon.
  • Parker's atrocious taste in clothing.
  • Parker's cooler version, played by Rickey Mizuno.
  • James and Steven's occasional replacement cameraman, Alfredo.
  • Famous Actor James Allan McCune is in poverty.
  • After Chapter One, Steve and James reassuring that Cib killed Parker, not all three of them
  • Steven's absolute horror at the cast of Chop House.
• Running Gagged: "No more Jeremy." sees the end of Steven's facade of being part of the 1% and James' facade of being a water warrior when Jeremy forces the truth out into the open. However, it takes several more episodes for James to actually come out and admit the truth, mainly out of stubbornness.
• Sadistic Choice: Dowplayed: fed up with James' lying about being a water warrior, "Death of a water warrior." sees Steven put his foot down and give James an ultimatum: tell them the truth, or he's fired.
• Sanity Slippage: Steve seems to be suffering from this in Season 2, doing odd things he normally wouldn't do like drilling into glass, talking about the air purifier after watching a report about Parker's body being found on the news and ruining a perfectly good popsicle. Of course, it's probably something to do with the stress of Cib killing Parker.
• "Scooby-Doo" Hoax: In the video "The annual bi-weekly Sugar Pine 7 sleepover.", the boys have a seemingly normal sleepover, until it appears that Cib and Steve summon Bloody Nose, a demon, who haunts them. It is revealed that Bloody Nose is actually Famous Actor James Allan McCune, who has been mooching off Parker due to his poverty.
• "Shaggy Dog" Story: The mission to get Cib a new transmission in "One man's trash..." falls apart when it becomes apparent that Cib only had $30 in his wallet.
• Shout-Out:
  • "This is why you shouldn't do drugs." has a nod at the Sugar Pine 7 subreddit as, when James and Cib are arguing, Steven pointedly zooms in on one particular thread.
• Shirtless Scene: "A traitor in our midst..." has this for just about everyone. It's about as Fanservice-y as it is Fan Disservice.
• Skewed Priorities: In "Don't listen to the news...", after he and James saw the breaking news report involving someone finding Parker's corpse, Steven was more concerned about whether or not the air purifier in the office is working.
• Slipstream Genre: The Sugar Pine Universe seems to use the same rules of our reality, but everyone seems to be pretty chill with the monstrosity that is Alfredo and Parker being created by Jeremy in a lab.
• Soundtrack Dissonance: Whenever Steven waterboards someone with a kitchen sink, it's set to the strains of Aaron Carter's "How I Beat Shaq".
• Sudden Downer Ending: "I'm tired of good times." ends with Steven and the others abandoning Jeremy in the desert (while also tending to a severely dehydrated Cib) due to him apparently murdering Parker. And then a few episodes later, it turns out this was a joke.
  • In "Akrasia," the episode starts with James and Steve comically helping Autumn hear and ends with Cib murdering Parker in a drunken rage.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome:
  • "Roosterteeth Eats World" ends with Steven admitting he and Cib called the Scottish police on James for joking how one of the bosses in Bloodborne is actually Jared from Subway (and attacks by throwing kids). Since they do not live in Scotland, it was essentially pointless.
  • After Parker attacks Andrew following his demonic possession in "Ghost Hunters", Steven reacts in the same manner he wishes anyone in a horror movie would react: "Just get the fuck out of there."
    Steven: (books it away from the bridge) Nope. Nope. Nope. Gotta go. (to some passersby) Watch out for the bridge, there's something bad.
  • After getting shot in "Sorry Funhaus.", Seth wraps a cloth around the wound. After some time hanging out with the others, he passes out from blood loss, prompting Steven, Cib and James to leave.
• Take That!:
  • In-Universe, As part of the interview in "I hired Autumn, and here's why.", Steven asks Autumn if she saw season 5 of House of Cards (US), her response (asking if it's out) is declared correct. Why?
    Steven: (voiceover) There's no point in seeing House of Cards Season 5. It's dog trash and beats you over the head with its parallels to reality. (silly voice) Heugh immigration ban! (normally) That came out of left field, and they talked about it for two seconds, and was very much out of Frank's character. And who gives a fuck about Tom Yates?!
  • Steven takes time out of "Taco Trip 2017" to call out the rude guy who interrupted filming by telling him to not film everything.
  • "Our message to IGN." concerns Steven discovering IGN ripping off his style of videos. Special mention goes to him deconstructing IGN's statement on the matter and how they state that IGN did this exact kind of video before with "Kylo Ren Goes to a Star Wars Convention".
• Temporary Blindness: Downplayed: as a result of drinking rubbing alcohol for the past two weeks, Famous Actor James Allan McCune was "currently 30% blind at the moment" during the events of "Our new boss.".
• Too Dumb to Live: Steven recounts a story in "Dust thow." where Cib was supposed to pop out of a cake for his brother's birthday, but due to his cue coming fifteen minutes late, Cib experienced "18 different stages of grief" before eating his arm to stay alive.
  Let's recap: he ate part of his arm, when he was surrounded by cake.
• Unfortunate Names: At one point, Steven decided to create an internship so that people could help him out with videos. He and James determine that would mean a lot of hands on work for the younger demographic who would be willing to intern (they determine this group to be kids). The name they decide upon? "Handjobs for Kids".
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: At the start of "Roller Skate '78", no one seems to notice or care about the man shambling down the road with dark bags under his eyes, and blood on the side of his head.
• The Voice: Alfredo's face is never shown.
• Wham Episode: "An eye for an eye." Parker returns, appears to be Biologically Immortal with a dash of Nigh-Invulnerability (he gets right back up after a truck suddenly hits him, but he can still bleed from a gunshot to the head), and it's strongly implied that he's linked to the pentagram that our main trio encounters within the episode. Additionally, Cib shares a Dorian Gray-style relationship with Parker as a result of being exposed to the pentagram, with him collapsing mere seconds after Parker is shot in the head.
• Wham Line:
  • From "The Sugar Pine 7 Live Show":
    James: That's it. Alfredo, hit the beat.
  • In-universe in "Show of the Year.":
    Liza Koshy: And the Streamy goes to... Sugar Pine 7!
  • And, meta-wise:
    "Sugar Pine 7 is cancelled"
• Wham Shot: The beginning of Roller Skate '78 has a disheveled Parker walking back to LA after being (seemingly) Killed Off for Real in "Akrasia".