Original airdate: March 17th, 2014
Production code: 1020-018
Steven is looking around his house for a toy of his called Ranger Guy. Amethyst and Pearl don't have any clue, so Steven goes to tell his dad at his car wash. While there, Steven reminds Greg about the special day when he bought it for Steven, and Greg gives Steven a bag full of quarters to get a new one.
Steven goes a toy vending machine at Funland Arcade to get a new Ranger Guy, but just gets a much lamer toy called a Dave Guy over and over until the machine runs dry. Just then, Onion comes out of the adjacent snack vending machine and Steven notices he has a Ranger Guy in his pocket as he walks away. Steven follows Onion around for a while and, after finding out Onion barely gets to see his dad because he's always so busy, Steven tries to trade. Even Steven's whole bag full of Dave Guys isn't enough for Onion, so he walks out on Steven.
Back at Steven's house, he complains to Amethyst and she gives him something of Pearl's: a replicator wand that make copies of things. Steven goes back to Onion and offers even more Dave Guys, but Onion instead asks for the wand itself, and Steven complies. Steven starts playing with Ranger Guy at the beach until a Dave Guy falls from the sky—then many more. He sees that Onion had used the wand to flood Beach City with them, and the Crystal Gems were already on their way to stop him.
A struggle break out to stop Onion as he starts shooting more Dave Guys and then cars at the Gems, which Greg gets involved in. Steven eventually reaches him, offers to trade back the Ranger Guy, and notices from the initials that it's his original toy and Onion stole it. Steven angrily declares their trade null and void, then takes back the wand which Garnet crushes to get rid of all the duplicates. Afterward, Steven realizes Onion was messing around because he's bored and lonely waiting for his dad, so he gives Onion his Ranger Guy, content that the (terrible) memories he's made are more valuable.
We Iris Out over the sky.
Tropes:
- All There in the Script: Onion's father, Yellowtail, is not named in the episode (and was credited as "Onion's Dad"), but had his name revealed
by a post on the crew's Tumblr. - Bland-Name Product: Onion throws a bunch of ketchup packets that are labelled "Hynes", a play on the Heinz ketchup brand and the show's lead character designer, Danny Hynes.
- Brick Joke:
- Onion gets a bagged fast food lunch, but throws the food inside away. Later in the episode we see he just wanted a bunch of ketchup packets to run over.
- Amethyst mentions using the wand to fill Pearl's room with trash. At the episode's end, the wand is destroyed and everything it made disappears.Amethyst: So all the stuff that got copied turned into nothing?
Pearl: Yep.
Amethyst: Rats. - Onion uses the scooter he won in "Arcade Mania" to destroy ketchup packets, several episodes later.
- Car Fu: Onion is using the replicator wand to flood the town with copies of the Dave Guy figurine. When Garnet tries to take the wand from him, he aims it at her, which she blocks with her Power Fist. Onion then turns the wand on a car and starts burying her in duplicate cars.
- Continuity Nod: Onion uses the scooter he won with tickets in "Arcade Mania" (and destroys it).
- "Could Have Avoided This!" Plot: As Onion floods the town with Dave Guys from the replicator, Pearl asks Steven why he didn't just use the replicator to duplicate another Ranger Guy instead of trading it to Onion. Cue "Dang it!" from Steven.
- Creepy Child: Onion's disturbing characteristics are played to hilt in this episode, to the point he comes off as overtly demonic in one scene.
- Do You Want to Haggle?: Steven tries to get a Ranger Guy from Onion by offering him one Dave Guy, then keeps increasing to a whole bag. Onion clearly doesn't want any of them, so he walks out.
- Easily Forgiven: Steven figures that Onion stole Steven's G.U.Y.S. figure because he was bored and lonely with his father out to sea all day, so Steven lets him keep it.
- Epic Fail: Greg gives Steven a bag full of quarters to get a new Ranger Guy, but the dispenser spits out Dave Guy (the one Steven wants least) thirty times in a row until the machine runs dry.
- Foreshadowing: Steven says his Ranger Guy is unique because the hat is miscolored. The Ranger Guy on the machine picture has a black hat, whereas the one Onion carries around has a white hat, and turns out to have been stolen from Steven. Somehow, Steven didn't notice this.
- Fun with Acronyms: The toyline Guys Under Your Supervision. Keep Beach City Weird apparently gives us the pewter version, Boys On Your Shelf.
- Gale-Force Sound: Steven quietly tells his father "Thank you" for a bag full of quarters to try to replace Ranger Guy. Greg couldn't hear him, and Steven repeats so loudly the wind blows Greg's hair back.
- Hammerspace Hair: Amethyst found and kept the Replicator Wand in her hair. Steven even lampshades this.
- How Did That Get in There?: Pearl comments on how messy Steven's room is. To prove her point, she opens a window, where out flies a seagull holding a pizza crust in its beak and wearing a banana peel. Steven gives the phrase, and Pearl says it's because he leaves his window open.
- Infernal Background: Onion walks toward Steven to get the duplicator behind a background of flames. It's not just a visual, Onion literally set part of the boardwalk on fire.
- Instant Emergency Response: Onion crashes a scooter, and though the fire it starts instantly grows enormous, it's put out by firemen within two minutes.
- Karma Houdini: Onion gets no comeuppance from the Gems or Steven after stealing Ranger Guy, setting the boardwalk on fire, drowning the city in Dave Guys, and flat-out attacking Garnet and Pearl by shooting cars at them (nearly killing Greg as well).
- Matter Replicator: Pearl owns a wand that can make duplicates of objects.
- Mundane Made Awesome: Steven trading the replicator wand to Onion for the Ranger Guy is made rather unsettling by the creepy music playing, the fire in the background, Onion deflecting a toy shot at his face in slow motion, and a closeup of Onion staring greedily with dilated pupils as the background goes pitch black.
- No Ontological Inertia: Pearl's replicator wand is able to make perfect copies of any object, but destroying the wand destroys every copy it has ever made.[Garnet steps on the wand]
Pearl: Garnet!
Garnet: I'm not cleaning up this mess. - Offscreen Crash: Onion sends his scooter crashing into something off screen, creating a towering wall of flames and sending one wheel rolling around, all while he just stares happily.
- Offscreen Inertia: At the episode's start, Amethyst is sitting on a porch chair. Steven comes back, sees her in the same position, and asks if she'd been sitting there the whole time (she wasn't).
- Popcultural Osmosis Failure: Steven advises Amethyst to emulate Scrooge McDuck when moving through a pile of small objects, but Amethyst has no idea what he's talking about.Steven: Try and act like a rich duck.
Amethyst What does that mean? - Recursive Acronym: G.U.Y.S. — Guys Under Your Supervision.
- Shout-Out: When Amethyst asks Steven how to move in the flood of toys, he says "try and act like a rich duck."
- Stating the Simple Solution: When Steven explains that he traded the Replicator Wand for Ranger Guy, Pearl asks why he didn't just replicate Ranger Guy?
- Super Weapon, Average Joe: Onion is just a child and the duplicator isn't even meant to be a weapon, but with some creative (ab)use he's able to (at least temporarily) overpower the Crystal Gems.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: Steven comes to trade Onion, never giving any notice to the raging wall of flames growing behind the younger child.
- Tempting Fate: Greg says he's glad it stopped raining toys right before Onion shoots a car at him.
- They Wasted a Perfectly Good Sandwich: Onion gets a cheeseburger from Suitcase Sam and throws it into the dock, to Steven's horror.
- Victory Is Boring: Steven replace his Ranger Guy figure, but then doesn't have anything to do with it.Were you always this boring, Ranger Guy?
