Western Animation / Camp Lazlo

L-A-Z-L-O! L-A-Z-L-O! L-A-Z-L-O! And Lazlo is his name-o!

Attention, tropers! Attention, tropers! It's time to describe Camp Lazlo!

Camp Lazlo is an Emmy-winning Cartoon Network show, running from 2005 to 2008. Created by Joe Murray, previously known for Rocko's Modern Life.

The series follows the adventures of Lazlo, a spider-monkey, Raj, an Indian elephant, and Clam, an albino pygmy rhino. They, along with other campers like Edward, a platypus, Chip and Skip, a pair of dung beetles, and Samson, a guinea pig, go to Camp Kidney, home of the Bean Scouts. The campers are under the direction of Scoutsmaster Lumpus, a moose, and his second-in-command, Mr. Slinkman, a banana slug. To Lumpus' dismay, Lazlo's search for adventure around the camp and obliviousness to danger makes him uncontrollable. Occasionally, the local girl scout equivalents, the Squirrel Scouts, show up too. Sometimes they're friends, sometimes they're enemies.

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This series provides examples of:

• Abhorrent Admirer:
  • The episode "Love Sick" had a concussion cause Clam to become attracted to Gretchen, much to her dismay. By the end of the episode, it's reversed with Gretchen as the abhorrent admirer and Clam as the unwilling object of affection, but that quickly ends with both having no interest in each other after Gretchen gets a pie in the face.
  • "Hard Days Samson" involved Samson getting unwanted attention from the Squirrel Scouts because he happens to look like a celebrity known as Hanly Manster.
• Abnormal Ammo: Edward's lice cannon in "Mascot Madness".
• Accidental Dance Craze: Raj creates one while trying swat a mosquito in "Slap Happy". It also happens to be same as the Secret Handshake of Scoutmaster Lumpus' Brotherhood of Funny Hats.
• Accidental Misnaming: Scoutmaster Lumpus/Loompus.
  • And several characters, including Miss Doe and Commander Hoo-Ha, keep referring to Slinkman as 'Slugman'.
  • There's also the Running Gag of Lumpus getting Edward's name wrong.
• Accidental Ventriloquism: In "Snake Eyes", the Jelly Beans' new pet snake escapes and seemingly eats the other campers until Lazlo and Patsy are the only ones left. When Lazlo finds the snake, he apparently hears Raj's voice coming from inside it, but it turns out that he's hiding in the tree along with everyone else.
  Raj: You silly monkey, we are up here!
  Lazlo: (sobbing) Where "up here"? In the great camp in the sky?!
  Raj: Up in the sky? No, no, we are on a tree in the sky! And the pine needles are sticking in my rumpus. They are quite painful. Perhaps you and Patsy could get rid of Snakey so we could all get down from this tree?
  Skip: Yeah, I gotta go to the little camper's room.
• Adoring the Pests: Lazlo gets a leech/sea lamprey attached to his head. Despite draining him dry, Lazlo insists that it's friendly.
  • Raj in "Creepy Crawly Campy" to the point where he cries when Elebug departs, even after seeing her adult stage which he thinks is beautiful.
• Aerith and Bob: Everyone has normal names and weird names.
  • The five Platypus brothers. Three of them are called Cheesly, Alpine, and Fancy Pants; and then we have Philip and Edward.
  • The Loons, Dave and Ping-Pong.
• Afraid of Clowns: In "Clown Camp", it's shown that Lazlo has hated clowns ever since a clown frightened him on his fifth birthday. Unfortunately, Lumpus has decided to make every day Clown Day.
• Alliterative Name: Phillip Platypus (one of Edward's brothers)
• Animals Not to Scale: A spider-monkey, an elephant (though a juvenile one), a rhino, a guinea pig, a platypus, a crocodile, and a slug are all about the same size, while the dung beetles are almost twice as large as those and the moose is larger still. Yes, the dung beetles are twice the size of the elephant.
  • This was lampshaded in an early bumper for the show. Lumpus tells Slinkman that he's big for a banana slug, being half Lumpus' (a moose's) size. Slinkman then suggests that Lumpus could just be a tiny moose.
• Art Evolution: The first three seasons had a rougher art style that was akin to Rocko's Modern Life. Seasons 4 and 5 were smoother and more expressive.
• Artistic License – Biology: In the episode, "Tomato Paste", Commander Hoo-Ha immediately disqualifies Edward from being a Tomato Scout when he notices Edward crying due to being a firm believer in Men Don't Cry to the point he has Tomato Scouts shrivel up their tear ducts from a long period of disuse. Tear ducts don't work like that in Real Life.
• Ascended Extra: Samson started off as just a background character in the first season, until one writer decided to develop the character and add him to the regular cast. To be fair, as a main character, he still complained about being a minor character.
• Asian Store-Owner: Raj in "No Beads No Business". He really wanted to run the camp store. He quickly becomes a Bad Boss to Lazlo
• Asinine Alternate Activity: In "Movie Night", as the campers get ready to watch Mutant Zombies from Scab Lagoon, Slinkman reminds Scoutmaster Lumpus that Edward is too young to view it, so he takes him to watch Mr. Cotton Goes to Bubble Land with him.
• Attention Whore: Edward, especially when competing with Lazlo. One of the reasons they're rivals.
• Attractive Bent-Gender: The guy-dresses-as-woman variant has happened to Lumpus a couple times.
  • The first time is in "Prickly Pine Dining"; after leaving a restaurant without paying, he and Slinkman must sneak back in dressed as women. Sure enough, an employee falls for Lumpus even after he bangs on the men's room door, shouting in his normal voice for Lazlo to let him in.
  • It was done hilariously later in "The Engagement", when Jane, the love of his life, was engaged to Mayor Pothole McPucker, the most disgusting character on the series. Lumpus happens to be in a dress when he finally confesses his love for her... and everyone thinks he's a lady confessing her love for Jane's fiancé, who simply says, "Sorry, Jane, she's hot," and chases Lumpus.
• Badass Adorable: Clam is small and innocent looking, yet he has immense strength and a vast amount of skills.
• Bait-and-Switch:
  • When the staff finally catch Lumpus, who dine-and-dashed at Beef Lumberjacks in "Prickly Pining Dining", Tarson the bear waiter raises a chainsaw and converges on a screaming Lumpus. You'd think he cut off Lumpus' head and mounted it on the restaurant's walls... but then Lumpus angrily pulls his head out of the plaque holding it when a little kid throws food at him, and it's revealed that the staff merely forced him to act as a moose's head to Work Off the Debt along with Jelly Cabin (themselves punished for flooding the restaurant's bathroom by cleaning the place with toothbrushes).
  • In the short named "The Amazing Race", one scene shows Samson finishing a pile of leaves and commenting how it took all day and that he couldn't imagine doing it all over again, seemingly setting up for Edward's out-of-control boat running through the leaf pile; however, Slinkman appears and the boat runs into him instead.
• Bathroom Control: In the episode "Hold It Lazlo," Edward loses a lemonade drinking contest to Lazlo, and does everything in his power to prevent him from being able to use the restroom as revenge.
• Beleaguered Assistant: Lumpus' right hand man Slinkman is frequently shown to be more rational and sensible than his boss.
• Berserk Board Barricade: Subverted where the Bean Scouts barricade the door of their cabin to keep the Squirrel Scouts out. In order to get the wood for the barricade, they completely dismantle the back wall of their cabin.
  • Played straight in "Radio Free Edward" when yetis attack the radio station and Edward is finding everything he can to barricade the door.
• Beware the Nice Ones: Be very afraid when Slinkman is pushed to the breaking point. Especially if a scout is in possession of candy.
  • Do not get between Clam and pancakes.
• Big Brother Bully: Edward has four, and all are rough, tough (well, Fancy Pants has a nasty attitude, at least), and have mean facial expressions.
• Bigfoot, Sasquatch, and Yeti: Two yetis raid the radio station in "Radio Free Edward", but they look more like sasquatches.
• Big "NO!": Edward has one that was overheard throughout the whole camp, with Lazlo giving a big "YES!" upon responding in the episode "Hello Dolly".
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: In "O Brother, Who Art Thou", Slinkman brings in Edward's four older brothers, who are Camp Kidney alumni, to try and discipline the campers. He fails to recognize how much big bullies Edward's brothers are and how abusive they're actually treating the Bean Scouts.
  • Even by the end of the episode where Edward successfully overthrows his brothers out of Camp Kidney, Slinkman is not only angry and disappointed, but he remains convinced that the Platypus brothers are goody two-shoes that would've helped the Bean Scouts.
• Black Belt in Origami: Patsy claims to have a black belt in bok choy.
• Blatant Lies: Raj resorts to an increasingly improbable series of lies to explain Clam's absence in "Where's Clam?", culminating in him attempting to claim that a traffic cone and a bag of chips is Clam, and then that Clam is invisible and flying.
• Borrowed Without Permission: In "Lazlo Loves a Parade", Lazlo "borrows" various objects from around Prickly Pines to make a Camp Kidney float for the town's annual parade. When the Squirrel Scouts steal the float, they end getting the blame for the thefts.
• Bowling for Ratings: In "Bowling For Dinosaurs", Scoutmaster Lumpus tricks the campers of Camp Kidney into building him a bowling alley by having them dig for dinosaur bones. While the other campers soon realize they've been hoodwinked, Lazlo, Raj, and Clam continue to dig for dinosaur bones, interfering with Lumpus' bowling game in the process. They eventually manage to find a real (living) dinosaur skeleton under Lumpus' office.
• Break the Cutie: Lazlo, at times. Particularly in something like Loogie Llama.
• Break the Haughty: Edward on multiple occasions gets humiliated as comeuppance for his high and mighty attitude.
• Brotherhood of Funny Hats: Scoutmaster Lumpus is a member of one of these, the Legume Council.
• The Bully: Edward frequently goes out of his way to torment other campers.
• Butt-Monkey:
  • Samson. He's a catastrophe magnet with nothing but bad luck, poor social graces, and allergies galore.
  • Edward, whenever an episode focuses on him instead of Lazlo.
  • Lumpus is often injured or humiliated, though he's totally deserving of it due to his Jerkass tendencies.
• Buy or Get Lost: In the episode "No Beads No Business", Raj made it perfectly clear to Lazlo that if campers didn't have any beads to trade for things from the camp store then, well, no business.
• The Cameo: Apparently Heffer was the real scoutmaster, as Lumpus kidnapped him and took his place. This was Tom Kenny's idea.
• Candlelit Bath: Scoutmaster Lumpus is a fan of candlelit baths. In the Halloween Episode "Hallobeanies", his bath is interrupted by the Jelly Bean campers, leading him to think there is a monster in the house.
• Cardboard Pal: In "The Weakest Link", Scoutmaster Lumpus creates fake scouts after all the scouts go missing on the day when Commander Hoo-Ha is due to make his inspection.
• Carnivore Confusion:
  • Interestingly, no one bats an eyelash at Lumpus (a moose) and his love of meat, except when he attempted to eat a bird that was still alive.
  • At the end of "Beans and Weenies", where all the Bean Scouts partook in meat hot dogs, Raj actually brings up the question of what the hot dogs are made of, to the revulsion of all.
• Cartoon Conductor: Edward conducts a belching orchestra in front of his brothers, and meant for Clam to start singing operatically until Lazlo makes the piece more fun.
• Cartoon Creature: Clam is a pygmy rhino, but Lumpus could never identify his species.
• Chained to a Railway: Happens to Lumpus after he is captured by the clowns of Slapstick Mountain.
• The Chessmaster: Slinkman tries to be this, with varying success.
• Chew Toy (and Butt-Monkey): Lumpus, which, as usual, is played entirely for laughs which is helped by the fact that he is such a totally deserving victim.
• Childhood Friend Romance: It is revealed in the episode "Spacemates" that Patsy and Lazlo are soulmates, meaning that they will be together forever in the future.
• Christmas Episode: "Kamp Kringle", where the Bean Scouts run into Santa Claus and try to help him get a good vacation while Lumpus attempts to take over Santa's workshop for himself.
• Coincidental Accidental Disguise: At least twice, turning Raj into a yeti in "Marshmallow Jones" and Lumpus into a snipe in "The Great Snipe Hunt".
• Comically Small Bribe: In "The Tusk Wizard", Raj attempts to bribe Nurse Leslie into removing a perfectly healthy tusk by offering him a quarter.
• Comic-Book Adaptation: Camp Lazlo comic stories were featured in Cartoon Network Block Party.
• Comically Missing the Point: No matter how many times they tell him, Lazlo just won't get it that HE's the Hugger.
• Conjoined Twins: "Valentine's Day" featured a pair of Bean Scouts who were pigs joined together by an eye.
• Contemporary Caveman: "Cave Chatter" has Lazlo, Clam, and Raj thaw out a frozen caveman that they assume to be the first Bean Scout and name him Beastly Bumblepuss.
• Continuity Nod: On the episode "Hello Dolly", Edward has a Barbie-esque doll named Veronica, who makes cameos later on "No Place Like Gnome" and "Beans in Toyland". On another episode, the campers start the Camp Kidney radio station back up, and Lazlo is shown in the station at the start of the episode "Samson Needs a Hug".
  • We can safely say that this show is pretty consistent. Other examples include when Raj and Clam flashback to when they first arrived at Camp Kidney with Lazlo, and splashing in the lake despite Raj not being able to swim (yet). In another, Samson and Raj try to argue over a hot spring, and when trying to embarrass the other with their gross secret, Edward and the other campers show the rash they got on their behinds from that same spring to get them to shut up. Few episodes later, he's trying to mail himself out and takes off his shirt for less weight. When he goes to collect more stamps, Samson covers his eyes and remarks that he's still got his rash.
• Counting to Potato: Skip's efforts at counting to ten in "Snake Eyes".
  Skip: One, three, eleven...
• Creator Thumbprint: Kaz (one of the show's storyboarders) liked incorporating eyestalk gags with Slinkman in the episodes he boarded.
• Credit Card Plot: A downplayed version in the episode "Racing Slicks". After the Jelly Bean Trio's budget to build box cars were wasted on a kiddie ride, they ask Mr. Slinkman for money, where he gladly gives them $50... only for the trio to spend all of that money on the kiddie ride again. Upon realizing their blunder, the Jelly Beans ask for another $50, with Lazlo being adamant that they'll actually buy car parts this time. You already know where this is going...
• Cry into Chest: Edward buries his face into Slinkman when he thinks he's going to be eaten by "deadly wood gnomes" in "There's No Place Like Gnome."
• Crying a River: In "The Engagement", Scoutmaster Lumpus gets dumped by Jane Doe, and cries for 3 days until his office is flooded with tears and Slinkman had to use a boat.
• Crying Wolf: Double subverted in "Radio Free Edward". Edward makes everyone believe he's being attacked by yetis. Then when yetis break into the radio station for real, he successfully convinces the campers that it's not a drill... only for everyone to discover that the yetis are calm intellectuals.
• Deadpan Snarker: Nurse Leslie has a habit of being this. Edward is also this in spades.
  • Dave and Ping-Pong towards Edward in "Seven Deadly Sandwiches". Especially Ping-Pong.
• Deus ex Machina:
  • In "Kamp Kringle", Lumpus is riding atop his walking lawn chair the elves built him (don't ask). He has Santa, who is armed with naught but a tether ball, down on the ground (don't ask). Slinkman and the kids have failed in rescuing the jolly old elf and are lying in a heap. This looks like the end...'til Lumpus is hit by a meteor. There was mention of a meteor shower at the very beginning, but still. And then another meteor shows up and narrates the ending a la the snowman from an early film version of Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. Just in case you were still wondering what kind of show this was.
  • Subverted in "Meatman". Right when Meatman prepares to eat Lazlo, we see Lazlo, Raj, and Clam telling the story to the other Bean Scouts and claiming that they are still alive because Clam and Raj somehow stopped the Meatman in the nick of time (which makes no sense because those two were stuck to the ceiling with meat cocooning). Then it is creepily implied that Lazlo, Raj, and Clam are meat duplicates made to take the place of the real trio after they were killed.
• Dirty Cowards: None of the Bean Scouts (except for Lazlo) were willing to help Edward pull a nosehair off of Scoutmaster Lumpus in order to prevent the former from being eaten by wood gnomes. It could be interpreted that they were afraid to risk getting themselves harmed for Edward's survival, or they wanted to throw him under the bus and let him get killed because of how much of a Jerkass he is.
• The Ditz: Chip and Skip. Because they're so dumb they run up to the speaker every time the camp announcements come on looking for the voice and also can't think at all. Their brains work to make them become geniuses when hung upside down but right side up, they're ditzs. This all happened in just in one episode too and they demonstrate this the rest of the time.
• Doorstop Baby: Chip and Skip did this to themselves to get Jane, the scoutmistress of the girls' camp, to adopt them in "Doting Doe-Eyed Deerest". Jane assumed Lumpus did it to get out of taking care of them, and was less than pleased with him.
• Does This Remind You of Anything?: Edward pantsing everyone in Camp Kidney. His last target is Lazlo, who he ends up tricking into a bunker to pull his pants down.
• Drill Sergeant Nasty:
  • Commander Hoo-Ha has all the characteristics of the short-tempered and domineering commanding officer.
  • Miss Mucus is also a bit like this. "Squirrel Scout Slinkman" even shows a picture of her in a military uniform and a plaque engraved with a motto indicating that she prefers to be harsh and aggressive to her charges.
• Eaten Alive: Lazlo and Lumpus by the Lard-a-Doodle bird in "The Big Weigh In". They escape my making it lay eggs which just so happens to contain everything it's ever eaten.
• The Echoer: Clam often repeats what the person that spoke before him had said but usually just one word. That said, he sometimes speaks for himself.
• The Ending Changes Everything: The final episode reveals that Scoutmaster Lumpus was a kidnapper who locked the real Scoutmaster in a closet to steal his job.
• Education Through Pyrotechnics: In "Sweet Dream Baby" the Jelly Beans manage to put their cabin into orbit with something they mixed up in a store bought chemistry kit.
• The Eeyore: Samson is the one most frequently depicted and depressed and pessimistic, and a health-nut version too.
• Entertainment Below Their Age: Scoutmaster Lumpus prefers to watch Mr. Cotton Goes to Bubbleland, a movie made for young kids, over horror movies.
• Everybody Cries: In "Tree Hugger", the Bean Scouts start crying when Scoutmaster Lumpus insists on having the Migrating Mulberry Tree cut down.
• Exact Time to Failure: In "The Big Cheese", Raj says that anyone who eats the cheese will disintegrate in exactly 13 minutes. Scoutmaster Lumpus, naturally, eats the cheese.
• Extreme Doormat: Slinkman, in earlier episodes, would submissively follow Lumpus' orders.
• Eye Scream: "Float Trippers" has two pictures of Raj's brother to highlight why his retainer is important to him; the first one is relatively harmless aside from the ridiculous-looking, overgrown tusks, but the second one, shown by Lazlo to Raj during a trip down the river, has Raj's brother's tusks grow so much that one stabs him in his left eye, combined with an unsettling Staggered Zoom. Unsurprisingly, Raj freaks out.
• Faceplanting into Food: In the short "The Eternal Flame", various scouts are having a baked bean eating contest. Many contestants woozily faceplant into the beans when they've had enough.
• Farts on Fire: The short "The Eternal Flame" turned this up to eleven for a hilariously disastrous fuel-air bomb when Lazlo was invited to a ceremony right after a bean-eating contest. The beans caused gas to build up and overload Lazlo's insides. The moment the ceremonial torch was lit, he let it all go.
• Fence Painting: In "Bowling for Dinosaurs", Scoutmaster Lumpus tricks the Bean Scouts into clearing the space for his new bowling alley by getting them to dig for dinosaur bones.
• Finger-Snapping Street Gang: In "Where's Lazlo", when the other campers approach Raj and Clam on their first day at Camp Kidney, Raj is so nervous that he actually imagines the campers as a street gang approaching them while snapping their fingers.
• Fishing Episode: The series' first episode is entitled "Gone Fishin' (Sort of)". Nobody in Camp Kidney has been able to catch a fish, not even Scoutmaster Lumpus. Just to rub it in Lumpus' face, the fish jump into the Squirrel Scouts' boat. Lazlo, Raj, and Clam take Lumpus' fishing boat on a joyride and decide to fish in its spot when it runs out of fuel. When Lumpus catches up to them, he gets attacked by the legendary Leakey Lake Monster, but still manages to catch a fish in the struggle.
• Flushing Toilet, Screaming Shower: Happens in the episode "Slugfest", in which Slinkman deliberately causes Lumpus' shower water to become hot by flushing the toilet to get back at him for denying him time off to participate in Slugfest.
• Foreshadowing: In "The Big Cheese", a police officer describes Scoutmaster Lumpus, who's driven off in Commander Hoo-Ha's jeep, as "A bloated escapee from some asylum". The Grand Finale reveals that Lumpus is indeed a crazy escapee who imprisoned the real Scoutmaster and has been living his life since then.
• French Jerk: The swim instructors in "Swimming Buddy" have French accents and are quite rude.
• Freudian Excuse: Edward's meanness is implied to be a result of being endlessly bullied by his older brothers.
• Fun-Hating Confiscating Adult: Miss Mucus has a room in her trailer full of toys she has confiscated. Scoutmaster Lumpus also has elements of this but, in his case, he tend to confiscate items so he can use them himself (like his stash of confiscated candy) rather than to deprive the children of them.
• Furry Confusion: In one episode, Clam attempts to insult the Squirrel Scouts by calling them "animals". This results in awkward silence, because after all, they are animals.
• Furry Reminder:
  • In "Snake Eyes", Patsy says she can track the Jelly Cabin Trio's missing snake because she's a mongoose. Though she eventually turns out to have been lying to impress Lazlo.
  • In "Slugfest", Lazlo complains that Slinkman has no backbone. Slinkman says that's literally true because he's a slug.
  • In "Friendward", Edward befriends one of the Recurring Extras, who is a beaver. They build dams together in a friendship montage.
• Gainax Ending: The last minute of "Lumpus' Last Stand" takes a turn when the police pull up to Lumpus' statue-unveiling ceremony with a shaved old steer in tow. It's then revealed that Lumpus was actually a fake Scoutmaster who stole the old man's job and locked him away, and said old man is heavily implied to be an elderly version of Heffer from Rocko's Modern Life. It's a Sudden Downer Ending that comes out of nowhere at the very last second.
• Gassy Gastronomy: In the short "The Eternal Flame", Lazlo wins a bean-eating contest. Whenever someone faceplants into their bowl of beans, there's a farting sound effect. After that, Lazlo starts to feel gas bubbling up from inside him and tries to find a private place to let it loose, but he's then forced to light a torch for the victory ceremony. At that point, he finally lets it out - cue the explosion. Lumpus then comments that they really need to stop having the ceremony after these contests, implying this has happened before.
• The Generic Guy: Lampshaded agressively in one episode. Samson complains that he's never noticed.
  Edward: Poor Samson, nobody notices you. (Edward holds up one of the generic campers, whose name is Gordon despite his claim of not having a name.) This guy doesn't even have a name, but you don't see him hijacking any yearbooks!
• Genius Ditz: Clam. The episode "Prodigious Clamus" is built entirely around this trope.
• Girls vs. Boys Plot: Quite a few episodes have the Bean Scouts (boys) and the Squirrel Scouts (girls) face off against each other.
• God: The Scoutmaster in the sky is this for the series.
• Going Commando: The Squirrel Scouts seem to wear nothing underneath their skirts.
• Gone Horribly Right: The Jelly Bean's plan to pretend to be Lumpus' parents and spending the day with him in Parent's Day. Lumpus became much more optimistic and lovey... to the point of worrying the campers. It is summed up in this exchange below:
  [Lumpus announces he loves his parents, the campers and Camp Kidney over the intercom]
  Lazlo: Doesn't it give you the warm fuzzies?
  Raj: More like the cold creepies, Lazlo.
• Gone Swimming, Clothes Stolen: In the short "Nudist Camp", this happens to Lumpus when Lazlo takes his uniform while he's bathing in the lake.
• Goo Goo Getup: In "Hold It Lazlo", Edward loses a lemonade-drinking contest to Lazlo and tries to keep him from going to the bathroom as revenge. Lazlo is eventually able to relieve himself, at which point Edward tricks him into wearing a diaper, passing it off as a "Tinkle Tog", which is what astronauts wear. Edward's plan appears to succeed at first, as the other campers (save for Raj and Clam) laugh at Lazlo, but when Lazlo explains the concept of Tinkle Togs to them, they all start wearing them (and a few even start using them). Eventually, Edward himself starts wearing a diaper, and ends up humiliating himself in front of his four older brothers when they come to visit.
• Go to the Euphemism: In "Snake Eyes", Skip says he needs to go to the "little campers' room" after everybody except Lazlo and Patsy ends up stranded on a tree.
• Good Angel, Bad Angel: The episode "Dirt Nappers" had Samson consult his shoulder angel and devil on whether to tell the other Bean Scouts that he's the reason all their dirt went missing.
• Goofy Print Underwear: "Campers All Pull Pants" is about Edward attempting to pants everyone in Camp Kidney. Guess what just about every camper is wearing?
• Grand Finale: The series ended with "Lumpus' Last Stand", where Lumpus appears to achieve solving all the world's problems by replacing clothes with body paint to save laundry time, only for all his efforts to be undone when it starts to rain. It is also revealed that Lumpus is a lunatic who had locked the real scoutmaster of Camp Kidney away the whole time.
• Gratuitous German: Samson puts on a fake German accent and peppers his speech with German words when disguising himself as a German Organ Grinder.
• Green Gators: Gretchen is a green alligator, despite real life alligators being blue-gray.
• Group Hug: The main trio tend to do this to each other, often with heartwarming effect.
  • The Bean Scouts all do this to "Kevin" (whom they don't know is Edward trapped inside a bunch of sleeping bags zipped together), but this is cut short when they realize that the beaver supposedly communicating with him doesn't "speak monster" (but he does speak French.)
• Half-Dressed Cartoon Animal: Edward, Samson, Chip, Skip, Dave, Ping Pong, Beaver, Nurse Leslie, Chef McMuesli, and yes, even Jane Doe are all anthropomorphic animals who don't wear anything below the waist. At least most of them wear shoes, though.
  • Several later episodes, however, have Dave and Ping Pong avert this trope by wearing long black pants like the Jelly Scouts do.
• Halloween Episode: "Hallobeanies", where Lazlo, Clam, and Raj try to trick-or-treat at Camp Kidney and Lumpus unsuccessfully tries to turn them away so he can be alone to gorge on candy.
• Hand-or-Object Underwear: In the short "Nudist Camp", Lumpus is left naked when Lazlo takes his uniform while he's bathing in the lake. Throughout the short, Lumpus covers himself using a trunk, a potted plant, and his own hands.
• Hide and No Seek: Scoutmaster Lumpus wants to spend the day fishing, and tries to convince the scouts that "You can help me by NOT helping me." Of course, this results in Lumpus actually needing help...
• Hypercompetent Sidekick: Slinkman and to an extent, Miss Mucus
• Hypocritical Humor: This bit from "Beans in Toyland":
  Edward: I hate toys. (Veronica, his beloved doll, falls from the sky) Veronica...?
• I Am Not Weasel: Clam gets this a lot (but he doesn't mind).
  • Edward is not a duck (or a beaver).
• I Need to Go Iron My Dog: Raj says "Well, I'm off to get some chutney" when he sneaks off to his secret hot spring and Samson says he's going to Belgium when he does the same thing.
• Incest Subtext: Unfortunately, the ending of "Irreconcilable Dungferences" contains this when Chip and Skip have a friendship "graduation ceremony" that is played out exactly like a wedding. It's not taken very seriously, but still.
• Inevitable Waterfall:
  Raj: Must. Get. Retainer. Before. The. WATERFALL!
• Informed Species:
  • Although Clam is supposed to be an albino pygmy rhinoceros, he looks more like an alligator or crocodile with horns. Lampshaded by Scoutmaster Lumpus, who doesn't know what animal he is.
  • Chip and Skip are supposed to be dung beetles, but look more like purple beings.
  • Samson is supposed to be a guinea pig, but he doesn't look like one at all - for one thing, he doesn't have visible ears. He looks more like a porcupine or hedgehog.
  • Ping-Pong and Dave are supposed to be loons, but they look more like ostriches.
  • For some reason, the Lemming brothers look more like green frogs with ears than, well, lemmings.
  • Patsy is said to be a mongoose, but she doesn't have black rings around her eyes, plus her tail and large feet make her look more like a kangaroo.
• The Inspector Is Coming: In "The Weakest Link", Scoutmaster Lumpus attempts to get the Jelly Beans out of camp before Commander Hoo-Ha makes his inspection. It backfires horribly (of course) and he ends losing all of the scouts.
• Interrupted Bath: In "Hallowbeanies", Scoutmaster Lumpus' attempt to take a Candlelit Bath are continually interrupted by the Jelly Beans, who are trick-r-treating and keep walking in a circle and coming back to his door.
• Interspecies Romance:
  • Somehow, a moose and a Migrating Mulberry Tree can get married and have offspring.
  • There's also the matter of Commander Hoo-Haa (a buffalo) who is somehow the father of Patsy, a mongoose. We never see her mother, so it's a possibility.
    • It’s entirely possible Hoo-Haa adopted Patsy.
  • Patsy (a mongoose) has a crush on Lazlo (a monkey).
• In Touch with His Feminine Side: Edward, of all people, secretly plays with a doll named Veronica.
• It's Always Spring: it's always summer. Makes sense, since they're at summer camp, right? Except it's still summer, and they're still at camp on Valentine's Day. Most of the Christmas Episode took place in July, for crying out loud.
  • Though it's shown that the Bean Scouts go home around Halloween.
• Jerkass: Scoutmaster Lumpus takes the cake in being a jerk, though Edward is a worthy opponent to the title because of how rude and mean he is to the other scouts.
  • The Squirrel Scouts, especially Gretchen are snooty and abusive towards the Bean Scouts, at least when grouped.
• Jerkass Has a Point: Edward is certainly a grouchy, mean Bean Scout, but Camp Kidney is poorly run and therefore doesn't think it worth saving in the Season Two finale "Hello Summer, Goodbye Camp". Still, he'd take dirty old Camp Kidney over Math Camp any day.
• Jerk Jock: The Platypus Brothers (save for Fancy Pants, who's just an Alpha Bastard), but especially Cheesly.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: Edward sometimes, when he shows appreciation for Lazlo despite his hostility. Also Commander Hoo-Ha and, in very rare cases, Lumpus himself.
• Karma Houdini: The Squirrel Scouts rarely receive any punishments for their actions. For a subversion, see Sticky Situation below.
  • Averted in "Squirrel Scout Slinkman". Slinkman becomes their substitute Scoutmaster, and they proceed to bully him to tears. They immediately regret it, only for them to learn he's become as mean as Scoutmaster Lumpus. He not only rejects their apologies, he literally sends them up a creek without a paddle.
• Karmic Butt-Monkey:
  • Lumpus is a corrupt scoutmaster who abuses his subordinate Slinkman, as well as the camp kids. However, he'll always meet his comeuppance with slapstick injuries.
  • Edward is a braggart who thinks he's better than everyone else despite Lazlo doing better than him. As such, most of his focus episodes will have him suffer for his rudeness and boasting.
• Kick the Dog: Edward in one episode forms a club based around his hatred of Lazlo. Everybody joins. Even Lazlo's friends.
  • In "Float Trippers", he actually took joy to the possibility of Lazlo, Clam, and Raj dying.
  • He also deliberately tripped Lazlo and broke his ankle in "The List". Lumpus was also pretty assholish in this episode as he straight-up congratulated Edward for doing so and expressed visible joy and excitement at the idea of Lazlo's ankle being broken.
• Kids Shouldn't Watch Horror Films: In "Movie Night", according to the Bean Scout regulations, Edward is too young to watch Mountain Zombies of Scab Lagoon (rated BB, Big Boys), and has to watch Mr. Cotton Goes to Bubbleland instead. He later locks himself in the projection room and watches Mountain Zombies of Scab Lagoon alone and scares himself silly. When he officially becomes a "Big Boy" a few minutes later and the other campers give him a surprise gift of letting him watch Mountain Zombies of Scab Lagoon, Edward is initially scared again but quickly finds himself enjoying it this time.
• The Killjoy: The platypus Edward is embedded forever into this role. He's always whining about bad luck or else he's trying to put someone else down. Scoutmaster Lumpus also seems this way, all he wants is for the Bean Scouts to just stop having fun so he can get some rest.
• Knife-Throwing Act: The clowns of Slapstick Mountain make Lumpus the unwilling target of one.
• Know Your Vines: "Raj? Why are you hiding in that poison ivy?"
• Large Ham: A few characters are this, with Edward probably being the biggest of them all.
• Lawyer-Friendly Cameo: In the episode Sweet Dream Baby, redesigned versions of Ralph Bighead and Filburt Shellbach (with their original voices) appear as members of the Legume Council. In a later episode (the series finale), the real scoutmaster is shown to be a shaved and elderly version of Heffer Wolfe from Rocko's Modern Life, complete with insisting that he is not a cow, but a "steer".
• Leaning on the Fourth Wall: The alien/cheese episode gives us this exchange:
  Samson: Finally, my suspicions, validated!
  Raj: (long laugh) Steaming saffron, you think it makes any difference that those vague background characters believe you?^note It was Harold, Wilbert, and Bear that Samson was talking with.
• Lethally Stupid: Chip and Skip. At the beginning of "Waiting for Edward", their bumbling ends up injuring Slinkman.
• Lint Value: Lumpus attempts to pay a restaurant bill with the contents of the Bean Scouts' pockets: buttons, lint, string, a frog...
• Long Pants: Some of the campers, including the entire main trio, wear these instead of no pants at all.
• Loud of War: Raj and Samson trying to get each other to leave a secret hot spring by singing very loudly and very badly.
• Meaningful Name: Scoutmaster Lumpus' first name, Algonquin is the name of the indigenous American language that gave us the word Moose.
• Meat-O-Vision: Parodied in the short "Marooned Maroons", where Chip and Skip go out on a wooden raft and end up thinking they're stranded on an island, attempting to stave off their hunger by eating pieces of the raft. At one point, one of them sees the other as a giant piece of the wooden raft, but it turns out that he instead had his brother swim back to camp to retrieve food rather than eat him.
• Mega Meal Challenge: An episode revolves around the characters trying to get Camp Kidney on a Prickly Pines restaurant's place mats, which feature a map of the Prickly Pines area, including a vacant spot where Camp Kidney is located. The cost-effective way of doing this is to eat a gigantic steak that still continues to grow with each bite. The task goes to Scoutmaster Lumpus because of his established fondness for meat.
• Medium-Shift Gag: Raj's photo of his older brother in "Float Trippers" is a photo of a real elephant.
• Merit Badges for Everything: In one episode, Scoutmaster Lumpus bemoans the failure of any of the Bean Scouts to achieve a single merit badge. Edward then reveals that he has full set (having dishonestly bought them). We never find out a full list but it does include "Motorcycle Maintenance". Another episode mentions the Taxidermy Badge.
• Mid Life Crisis Car: Lumpus gets a huge monster truck that he names "Hammy" after suffering a mid-life crisis in "Peace Frog".
• Misplaced Kindergarten Teacher: Ms. Jane Doe, the scout mistress for the Squirrel Scouts.
• Mistaken for Dying: Lumpus in "The Big Cheese".
• Mistaken for Pregnant: In episode "Ed's Benedict", Dave and Ping-Pong slip an egg into Edward's bed as a prank. For the rest of the episode, all the kids think he's expecting while Lumpus and Slinkman awkwardly try to explain the concept of pregnancy to them. To the point where everyone at the end of the episode are waiting for their turn for The Talk.
• Mistaken for Special Guest: In "The Weakest Link", the three Jelly Beans are mistaken for three eccentric Finnish princes.
• Moose Are Idiots: Lumpus, who is a Jerkass who doesn't even like his Scoutmaster job.
• Mundane Made Awesome: PINE CONE-SITTING!!
  Ms. Doe: Oh, my! It's too exciting!
• Naked People Trapped Outside: Comes up in the final episode "Lumpus' Last Stand", where Lumpus is praised for eliminating the arduous task of laundry by having everyone paint their clothes on, leaving everyone with plenty of free time to make such accomplishments as time travel and ending world hunger. Things end up going bad when it starts to rain and everyone is left naked from having the rain wash their painted clothes off.
• Nature Tinkling:
  • In the "Where's Lazlo?" special, Skip at one point informs Chip that he needs to pee. Chip advises him to go in the bushes.
  • In the first half of "Hold It Lazlo", Lazlo tries to resolve his Potty Emergency by peeing in the lake as advised by Scoutmaster Lumpus, only to be admonished by a fish (who turns out to be Edward wearing a mask). Later, Lazlo tries to relieve himself on a tree before Edward stops him.
• Neat Freak: Samson.
• Nerdy Inhaler: Samson. He even calls it his "Asthma Buddy".
• No Celebrities Were Harmed: Tom Kenny's voice for Lumpus was a mix of W. C. Fields and Richard Nixon, according to Joe Murray's old website.
• No-Holds-Barred Beatdown: The clinax of "Valentine's Day" has Patsy delivering one to ALL the Bean Scouts (especially Lazlo) in order to save them from a much worse beating her father.
• No Matter How Much I Beg: In "Radio Free Edward", Edward insists that his listeners all listen to his talk show from the safety of their own cabins, because he was going to fake another yeti attack inside the radio station. Before long he's screaming for help when real yetis attack.
• Noodle Incident: Whatever made Ms. Mucus really hate the Bean Scouts.
  • In "Snow Beans":
  Lumpus: Quick, Slinkman, I was holding this chair so tight my fingers are welded to it.
  Slinkman: Should I get the pliers again, sir?
  • In the same episode, Slinkman advises Lumpus taking skiing lessons to avoid a repeat of the "accident" that occurred the year prior. We don't get any details of it.
  • In the episode "Prickly Pining Dining", when the last time the Bean Scouts visited the town of Prickly Pines, something went wrong that resulted in an explosion. It's implied to be resulted from hijinxs committed by the Jelly Bean Trio as it shows them flashing back to the explosion.
• Swallowed Whole: The Lardadoodle in "The Big Weigh In" doesn't chew Lazlo or Lumpus as it has a beak.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: Clam is shown to be this in "Prodigious Clamus".
• Ocular Gushers: Happens in some episodes. But in "The Engagement", Scoutmaster Lumpus doesn't just have these, he flooded his office with them.
• Odd Friendship: Edward and The Dung Beetles
  Edward: I need their stupidity to make me feel smart.
• Oddly Small Organization: Camp Kidney's only staff are Scoutmaster Lumpus, Slinkman, Chef McMuesli, Nurse Leslie and the lifeguards Pierre and No-Neck (who only appeared in two episodes). Still, they were better off than Acorn Flats who only had Jane Doe and Ms. Mucus.
• Odd Name Out: All the cabins in Camp Kidney are named after types of beans. The central trio live in Jelly Cabin; A Jelly Bean is candy, not a real bean.
• Old Faithful: The Bean Scouts and Squirrel Scouts visit one in the episode "Squirrel Seats". Raj ends up sitting in it to prevent it from erupting as part of a Zany Scheme to stop Lazlo getting back on the bus.
• Only Sane Man:
  • Mr. Slinkman is the only one with common sense and is usually more mature and rational than anyone else in the camp. He is even fully aware that Camp Kidney is a terrible camp.
  • Raj is usually the "voice of reason" of the Jelly Bean trio and is comparatively rational.
• Origins Episode: The hour-long special "Where's Lazlo?" reveals how Lazlo, Clam, and Raj first met.
• Orphaned Punchline: The show would often feature the central trio walking in at the tail end of one Edward's stories to the rest of the scouts; e.g. "...so that's why I don't play croquet any more."
  • One of the lemmings (of all characters) delivers this classic in "The Weakest Link":
  ...So the man says to the chicken "How are you going to get your taxidermy badge if you never learned to play the accordion?"
• Paper-Thin Disguise:
  • In "Swimming Buddy", Lazlo, Raj, and Clam sneak into the Squirrel Scouts camp to use their pool with Lazlo and Clam disguised as Squirrel Scouts and Clam disguised as a log. Nobody at the camp sees through their disguises.
  • "Loogie Llama" has the Bean Scouts trick the Squirrel Scouts into thinking that a filthy llama is a unicorn by putting an ice cream cone on the animal's head.
  • In "Beans and Pranks", Slinkman pretends to be a new Bean Scout named "Boris" by wearing a blue baseball cap.
  • "Parents' Day" has Lazlo and Raj impersonate Lumpus' mother and father by forming Totem Pole Trenches with Chip and Skip and simulating antlers by putting sticks in their ears. Clam also impersonates Lumpus' parents' dog by wearing a dog collar and socks over his ears.
  • To get a hold of the camp newspaper in "Scoop of the Century", Lumpus disguises himself as a scout named "Scooter" by kneeling down to make himself look short.
  • Played With in "Dirt Nappers": Dave and Ping Pong claim to be spa inspectors but aren't disguised at all (with their only props being a magnifying glass and their script on a clipboard), Edward is Playing a Tree (much to his chagrin) and Samson and Lazlo dress up as an Organ Grinder and a pet Monkey. Gretchen easily sees through all their disguises though.
• Parental Bonus: In "Strange Trout From Outer Space", when it's revealed that the aliens that abduct him can't resist fiddle music, Samson remarks that they have a "weird fiddle fetish".
• Parody Episode: A story in the comics features a lake monster and Lazlo treats the case like a Scooby Doo mystery. There's a "Mystery Latrine" with a sign painted the same style as the Mystery Machine, Lazlo and his friends split up ("Tradition dictates that we all split up and explore!", Lazlo says), someone theorizes the "monster" is some Corrupt Corporate Executive wanting the land for mining rights and, when the monster is revealed to be the squirrel scouts just out for a midnight boat ride, Lazlo remains convinced that Patsy is someone wearing a mask.
• Pec Flex: Commander Hoo-Ha does this in the Valentine's Day episode.
• Plank Gag: Happens to Chip and Skip, using a pair of skis rather than a plank, in "Snow Beans".
• Playing a Tree: In "7 Deadly Sandwiches", Lumpus insists on being part of the play, and brags to Miss Doe about his "strong" part. "Strong", it turns out, was literal; He plays a rock.
• Post-Treatment Lollipop: In "The Big Weigh-In", Lazlo has a check-up with the camp nurse and is handed a lollipop, only for Scoutmaster Lumpus to steal it from him. Nurse Leslie, thinking Lazlo's still there, rattles off his test results, which Lumpus thinks is his, thus kicking off the episode's plot.
• Potty Emergency: Pretty much the entire plot of "Hold It Lazlo". Lazlo having unwittingly annoyed Edward (again) by beating him in a lemonade drinking contest soon has to go (bad). Edward takes advantage of this and repeatedly thwarts all of Lazlo's attempts to go (he eventually uses Lazlo's predicament to trick him into wearing a diaper, but it backfires of course). The potty emergency comes to it's peak when in the middle of it, Lazlo relieves himself in the lake, only to be reprimanded by a "fish", forcing Lazlo to suck it back into himself. Ouch!
  • Not to mention that the fish was a puppet controlled by Edward!
    • Which only makes it worse once you think about it, Edward was swimming in the lake after Lazlo relieved himself. Just... ew.
• Perpetual Frowner: Edward.
• Psychopathic Manchild: Scoutmaster Lumpus.
• Puzzling Platypus: In "Burpless Bean", Edward the platypus has a dramatic breakdown because he fears that Lazlo's inability to burp will ruin Edward's dream of a conducting a burp chorus at the Camp Kidney talent show. When Edward asks Lazlo rhetorically "why do you hate me?", Lazlo assures him that he does not hate him and that he "love[s] all creatures—even whatever you are!"
• The Quiet One: Clam rarely says more than two words at a time.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: In "Waiting For Edward", Edward gives one to Chip and Skip when he is made their chaperone as punishment for them destroying Scoutmaster Lumpus' cabin.
  Edward: You guys are a couple of clay noggins. You're dopey, deficient, you're unnecessary! What's in those domes? Can a thought even survive in there? Here's a thought; THINK!
• Red Oni, Blue Oni
  • Lazlo is the optimistic and excitable red oni to Edward's grumpy and sullen blue oni.
  • The sweet-natured and sensitive Raj is the red to the quiet and collected Clam's blue.
  • Lumpus is the ill-tempered and often psychotic red oni to Mr. Slinkman's more level-headed blue oni.
• Retro Universe: The setting was made to evoke the 1950's and 1960's
• Running Gag: Lumpus being unable to identify Clam's species.
• Saving Christmas: Santa wants to cancel Christmas to take a vacation, but Lazlo convinces him to take a short vacation at summer camp and return in time to finish the presents. Christmas is saved...right? Nope; Santa doesn't want to leave camp. Laz finally convinces Santa to go home. Saved! Except, while Santa was gone, Lumpus hijacked his home and servants. An epic battle ensues, with Lumpus armed with a walking lawn chair and Santa a tether ball. Lumpus is hit by a meteor at the last second, and Christmas is saved.
• Scary Stinging Swarm: In "The Big Cheese", Scoutmaster Lumpus attempts to steal a cheese wheel by picking it up with his buttocks. Somehow he accidentally picks up a bee hive instead. Hilarity Ensues.
• School Nurse: Nurse Leslie, a male Nurse Shark.
• Scout-Out: The Bean Scouts and the Squirrel Scouts
• Scream Discretion Shot: In "There's No Place Like Gnome" when Edward pulls out one of his own nose hairs.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: Lumpus and Edward.
• Screw the Rules, I Have Money!: Edward.
• Second Place Is for Winners: Edward wins a race, only to find that Lazlo's Middle Place trophy is bigger than his First Place trophy. The Stinger shows that Chip and Skip's Last Place trophy is shiny, golden, and huge.
• Self-Made Lie: In one episode, Edward wears a sash of fake badges to show himself to be the best Bean Scout in Camp Kidney. For this reason Commander Hoo-Ha decides to send him to Tomato Camp, but when Edward sees a video showing how ruthless Tomato Camp is, he tries to find a way to prevent him from going. He can’t reveal the truth, because then Hoo-Ha would send him to Skull Crush camp as punishment. Fortunately, Edward is able to avoid Tomato Camp when he cries at the other Bean Scouts’ farewell gift, because according to Hoo-Ha, Tomato Scouts don’t cry.
• Serious Business: In the episode "Dungs in Candyland", Mr. Slinkman acts more uptight than usual when campers are in possession of candy. It's implied the reasoning behind this attitude is mostly out of fear of Scoutmaster Lumpus punishing him with salt.
• Shave And A Haircut: Most episodes end with this riff.
• Shout-Out:
  • A lot of the music from SpongeBob is public domain stock music, actually. This show was the first to make this obvious, by sharing a few of the themes iconic to the show.
    • The opening sequence is vaguely reminiscent of the show.
    • The loudspeaker opening is a Shout-Out to M*A*S*H, which often prefaced camp announcements with "ATTENTION, ATTENTION!"
  • There is also an episode featuring a leech named Lamarr.
    • To further it, Lamar attaches itself to Lazlo's head and at the end of the episode it turns out Lamarr was a girl just like the Headcrab.
  • In the episode "Club Kidney-Ki", Lazlo at one point says "I don't know where I'm gonna go when the volcano blows". This is a reference to the Jimmy Buffett song "Volcano".
• Ski-Resort Episode: In "Snow Beans", the Bean Scouts go skiing on Mount Whitehead. Lazlo and Scoutmaster Lumpus are assigned to the bunny slope and get stranded on a broken ski lift.
• Skyward Scream: "WHAT IS WRONG WITH THESE BEAN SCOUTS?!?!?!?!"
• Small Name, Big Ego: Edward carries heavy shades of this.
• Snipe Hunt: "The Great Snipe Hunt"
• Spelling Song
  "L-A-Z-L-O! And Lazlo was his name-o!"
• Stealth Sequel: Word of God stated that the real Scoutmaster of Camp Kidney is supposed to be Heffer Wolfe from Rocko's Modern Life (given a redesign for a Lawyer-Friendly Cameo so as to not get in legal trouble with Nickelodeon).
• Sticky Situation: After finding out that the "yeti" they were chasing after was really Raj, 5 of the Squirrel Scouts decide to go back to their cabins... only to find that their feet got stuck in the liquid marshmallow that used to be stuck to Raj until his reunion with Lazlo & Clam.
• Stinky Flower: The episode "Camp Kidney Stinks" features the blooming of foot-shaped flowers literally called stinkweed.
• Strange-Syntax Speaker: Clam rarely utters complete sentences; most of his verbal interjections consist of an echolalia-like repetition of a key word or phrase from another character's dialogue. When he occasionally does utter an original statement, it tends to be syntactically-challenged.
• Stuck on a Ski Lift: Happens to Lumpus in "Snow Beans".
• Stylistic Suck: The eponymous play in "7 Deadly Sandwiches". Not only is it horribly acted, but the campers read from the script right on stage.
• Sudden Downer Ending: Lumpus was an insane kidnapper.
  Lazlo: Boy, what a happy ending!
  Edward: Lazlo, we're standing in Prickly Pines naked, and the moose we thought was our scoutmaster just got hauled off as a deranged lunatic to a funny farm.
  Lazlo: Yeah, what a great summer! I can't wait for next year!
• Summer Campy: The setting is Camp Kidney, a halfway crappy summer camp.
• Surprisingly Realistic Outcome: One episode has Lazlo hugging people without their consent, much to the annoyance of the other campers. Slinkman calls him to his office to have a talk about displays of affection, and tells him that he should only hug people if they specifically want it.
• Surrounded by Idiots: Slinkman and Edward.
• Swivel-Chair Antics: Nurse Leslie is always sitting on one. When the chair is broken, he can't even use his own two legs to support himself standing up.
• The Power of Friendship/The Power of Love: The Jelly Trio uses this to face (and resolve) every problem they encounter.
• Those Two Guys: Chip and Skip.
• Tongue on the Flagpole: In "Beans Are From Mars", Chip and Skip get their tongues stuck to an ice cream truck, which then drives off.
• Token Human: Santa Claus, for whatever reason, is human.
• Too Dumb to Live: Chip and Skip.
• Toothy Bird: Dave and Ping Pong.
• Trademark Favorite Food: Lazlo's is a banana (fitting, considering that he's a monkey), Raj's is marshmallows, Lumpus' is chicken pot pie.
• Treasure Map: Raj gets a treasure map marked out on his butt in mosquito bites in "Lumpy Treasure".
• True Companions: Lazlo, Raj and Clam (The Jelly Trio). They live great adventures together, and it's clear they love each other deeply, always being there for the other.
• Ultimate Job Security: Scoutmaster Algonquin C. Lumpus, who is generally extremely incompetent and apathetic, and doesn't even like being a Scoutmaster. At least until the Grand Finale, where he's finally removed... because it turns out he was never actually the Scoutmaster — he'd actually locked the previous Scoutmaster in a closet and stolen his job; The Reveal here gets him imprisoned as a dangerous lunatic.
• Unconventional Food Usage:
  • In "The Big Cheese", Raj receives a wheel of cheese from India which he uses as a toy. Justified since the cheese is toxic if consumed, although it's revealed at the end of the episode that the cheese is actually a non-poisonous type made in China.
  • In "Meatman", Lazlo, Raj and Clam get a can of mysterious meat (uncooked, no less) that they find disgusting until they see how jiggly it is. Lazlo and Raj make different sculptures out of it (including the titular meatman), while Clam uses it as a bouncing ball.
  • In "Hello Dolly", Edward makes a doll using a pickle, a marshmallow and some toothpicks so he wouldn't need to blow up his beloved Veronica doll.
• The Un-Favourite: From the way his brothers treat him, Edward seems to be this in his family.
• Unintentionally Karmic: Two for one deal. Scoutmaster Lumpus is rude, cankerous, and treats the campers like servants, while Edward the Platypus is a Barbaric Bully who kicks everyone around for fun and thinks himself superior to them all. Almost all of Lazlo’s conquests to assist and impress Lumpus and Edward end in disaster, with the latter two in the eye of the tornado he created.
• Unique Moment Ruined: In "Lights Out", Scoutmaster Lumpus wants to see a comet that's been named after him through a telescope, but he has trouble putting the Jelly Bean cabin to sleep and having the lights in their cabin turned off. In the end, while he's trying to explain to them the reason why he wanted all the lights in the camp to be turned off, the comet passes by and he misses it, though the Jelly Beans manage to see it. The comet only passes Earth once every 50,000 years, so that was Lumpus' only chance.
• Unplanned Staycation: In "Club Kidney-Ki", Slinkman starts to go mad from overwork and is advised to take a Hawaiian vacation. To keep him from leaving the camp, Scoutmaster Lumpus offers to "accompany" him on his trip, takes him around the block in the dead of night, and tells him he's already in Hawaii. The scouts soon join Slinkman in his "vacation game", ands he eventually becomes so convinced that when Lumpus finally admits to his trick, Slinkman believes he's the one who's gone mad.
• Unusual Euphemism: In one episode, an air conditioner falls from the sky during a heat wave. They ascribe its arrival to "The Great Scoutmaster in the Sky".
  • Brought up in some episodes after wherein they refer to this "Scoutmaster in the Sky" as "S.M.I.T.S."
    • Scout Master In The Sky
• Vile Villain, Saccharine Show: Meatman from the episode of the same name proves to be a very disturbing antagonist, especially when it's implied he killed the main characters.
• The Virus: Played for Laughs. When Samson gets sick, his germs can cause others to at first, get sick, and then end up looking a lot like a hamster who is sick.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Lazlo towards Scoutmaster Lumpus and Edward
• Vocal Evolution: According to Joe Murray, Slinkman's voice was intended to sound "like Dustin Hoffman's Rain Man." Over the process of the series, Slinkman's voice drifted away from the Rain Man and sounded more towards like Christian Slater.
  • Nina had a lisp in earlier seasons.
  • Scoutmaster Lumpus' voice was less nasally and slightly lower pitched in earlier seasons.
• Voice Changeling: Clam can do an accurate impression of Edward.
• Walk on Water: Clam, as a oneshot joke in the swimming episode.
  • And again in "Beans in Toyland".
• Wallet Moths: When Scoutmaster Lumpus opens his wallet in "Prickly Pining Dining", a large cloud of dust escapes.
• Went to the Great X in the Sky:
  • The episodes "Over Cooked Beans" and "Are You There S.M.I.T.S.? It's Me, Samson!" use "Scout Master in the Sky", or "Smits" for short, as an Unusual Euphemism for God.
  • In the episode "Snake Eyes", Lazlo comes the conclusion that the other Bean Scouts have been eaten by a snake. When he hears Raj and Clem, he asks if they've gone to the big camp in the sky.
• Wide-Eyed Idealist: Lazlo.
• Work Off the Debt: "Prickly Pining Dining" ends with the Jelly Beans cleaning the bathroom and Scoutmaster Lumpus working as the restaurant's stuffed moose head.
• World of Funny Animals: Every character in this show is an anthropomorphic animal.
  • ...except Santa, oddly enough.
• X-Ray Sparks: In "Hallobeanies", Lumpus gets struck by lightning at one point and has his skeleton visible.
• Yank the Dog's Chain: It looks like something's gone right for Lumpus, when it turns out that he's just some looney who has the real Scoutmaster, an aged version of Heffer from Rocko's Modern Life, locked up in a closet and is dragged off to a looney bin.
  • Happens to Samson at the end of Bad Luck Be A Camper Tonight. When The Scoutmaster In The Sky allows him a second chance at getting a shot of good luck, he actually succeeds, at first. But then he just had to try to go for double or nothing. Leading him to hit the Reset Button and giving his status as a Butt-Monkey back.
• Yes-Man: Slinkman is this to Lumpus, while Chip and Skip are this to Edward.
• Your Tomcat Is Pregnant: The ending of "Parasitic Pal". Lazlo decided to change "Lamar"'s name to "Lauren".

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