Characters / Blue's Clues: Human Hosts

Human Hosts

Blue's Clues Main Characters Index
Yellow House (Human Hosts)
Neighborhood | Family Members
Nearby Skidoo Locations | "Real World" Locations | Blue's Room

Joe, Josh and Steve

Blue's caretakers and owners, the only human members of the yellow house and the three owners of the yellow house. Designed not to be "Adults", but rather big brother figures who need frequent help from their "friends" (the audience). They are quirky, silly, and a little anxious, but also kind and incapable of intentionally hurting anyone. Blue had three caregivers in the main timeline (Steve, Joe & Josh) who are members of the same family, although at least three more are known from international versions (Kevin, Duarte and HyunSup Shim).

In General

In General

Three generations of hosts

Tropes shared by the hosts. These men have all owned Blue and lived in the Blue's Clues house.

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• All-Loving Hero: They are friendly and cheerful men, without the slightest bit of malice in their bodies. Although they are not immune to moments of anger or sarcasm, they always seem quick to get their good mood back.
• Ambiguously Absent Parent: The three have grandparents, cousins and Steve and Joe are brothers, but their parents are never mentioned.
• Book Dumb: A particularly ironic case as the three are also Bookworms, but while they are Bunny-Ears Lawyer ears, they have visible difficulties in some basic academic content like math.
• A Boy and His X: Both series are about Blue's adventures with her caretakers.
• Breaking the Fourth Wall: They talk to the viewers, to be expected from kid's show hosts.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: All three hosts. Although they are normally silly and absent-minded men, they sometimes show talent in different areas.
  • Even though Steve is an absent-minded detective, if you take his statement about needing a maximum of 5 clues to solve a mystery literally, it implies that he is better at his job than he lets on.
  • Joe is a salesman talented enough to keep two present stores running. In addition, he possesses all sorts of other talents, being an accomplished seamstress, tailor, and craftsman, to the point where his art becomes a completely new skidoo world with its own society in one episode. He is also implied to be the reason that Santa Claus can wrap presents for the whole world, as he volunteers to help out every year, and he completes his hard job in the space of minutes.
  • Josh is an extremely talented singer, dancer, and overall musician (based on his actor's talents). He proves to be good at multiple musical instruments and is a Broadway-level singer.
• Consistent Clothing Style: Apparently, all of the human characters in Storybook World seem to have a fixed clothing pattern that is most visible to the hosts.
  • Green stripes for Steve, not always being exactly clothes, sometimes being accessories.
  • Joe will always have at least squares in his clothes, sometimes with the squares being replaced by things of the same shape as the present boxes on his present store uniform.
  • Blue stripes for Josh. He will always have stripes and the color blue, but not all of his uniforms will have blue stripes.
• Excited Kids' Show Host: All three are visible examples of this trope, each having their own unique quirks that complement the trope.
• Exploiting the Fourth Wall: Sometimes they ask the viewers for "help".
• Friend to All Children: They were designed to act as friendly older sibling figures to children rather than being the “Token Adult” so it is natural for them to be friendly to the children they encounter, all of whom they consider close friends.
• Inexplicably Awesome: Blue can skidoo, they can too... we don't know how, though.
• Instant Costume Change: All three can change clothes in a matter of seconds after leaving the viewer's point. In the real world, Josh doesn't seem to have this limitation, although the costume change still isn't visible.
• Manchild: They are (apparently) adults, but they have an almost childlike joy, and are prone to acting immaturely. They love to sing lullabies, play in childish ways, sleep with plushies, and need help with the most basic riddles. On the other hand, they don't have any problems with having adult responsibilities, and Steve and Joe seem to be doing well in their jobs even though they never lost their airhead status.
• Not-So-Imaginary Friend: This is their heavily implied nature. Various promotional materials imply that they are sentient fictional characters in-universe, but that initially, only the children that watched the show were aware of this fact. The 2022 film kind of confirms this, as several people in the original series' age range seem to already know who they were even though they never interacted directly and products with the theme of the characters could be seen around the city. Steve and Joe seem to understand this to some extent, but Josh doesn't seem to be fully aware.
• Offscreen Reality Warp: They can use Hammerspace freely, change clothes in a matter of seconds, bring objects to life and teleport, all while the viewer is not looking (or cannot see them). The reason the movie is so weird is precisely because it's one of the only times one of them do it onscreen.
• One of the Kids: A strange example, because in fact the "children" in the house (with the exception of the children of the spice family) are on average the same age as Joe, and are actually childhood friends of the two original series hosts, but as they don't age normally, over time, they became an Intergenerational Friendship.
• Reality Warper: Implied. All three seem to have the power to defy the rules of logic with no apparent explanation as to why, in ways that no other human, including the other live action neighbors, can do.
  • Steve can see thought bubbles, which Josh can also do, can bring objects to life with greater freedom, and has even casually touched the fourth wall once.
  • Joe exaggerates Offscreen Teleportation, being able to teleport not only himself but also large objects when out of view, not only of the viewer, but also of characters within the universe, which Sidetable lampshades in "The Case of the Missing Thinking Chair”. Furthermore, he can change the shape of objects (such as transforming a cardboard box into a plane, a car and a train) and even the objects he sells in the Present Store have some kind of magic of their own.
  • Josh takes this to the next level, doing it completely unconsciously, bringing various random objects to life and turning the space around him into a musical. At one point in the film, he even makes New York City dark in the middle of the day, without even questioning it, before returning to daytime.
• Shaking the Rump: During the mail song, they shake their bottoms, pretending that they have a tail and are wagging it.
• Super Cute Superpowers: They have the ability to skidoo and bring objects to life which is accompanied by a colorful swirl aura and lovely music.
• Token Adult: Zig-Zagged. While they are played by adults, at least Steve and Joe could easily pass for older teenagers and they are not supposed to act like an adult figure (Mr. Salt and Mrs. Pepper were once described as "the only adults in the house") but rather act like peculiar older siblings and One Of The Children, yet they still have permission to do “grown ups only” actions like using the oven or cutting things with knives.
• Token Human: Barring the kids in the video letters, the host is usually the only human character. The other main characters are animals and Animate Inanimate Objects.

Steve

Location: Yellow House (formerly), Blueprints Detective Agency (currently)
Actor: Steve Burns
As a Kid: William Ullrich (original series), Rowan Pichora (reboot)
Fixed Pattern: Green stripes

Steve

^{Click to see Steve in the flash games}

^{Click to see Steve in Blue's Big Musical Game}

^{Click to see Steve post Timeskip}

^{Click to see Steve in the reboot}

Series: 2 (Blue's Clues, Blue's Clues & You)
Seasons: 4
Episodes: 101^note 96 (Blue's Clues) 5 (Blue's Clues & You)
Games: 43^note 30 Shockwave Games, 6 CD/PC games: Blue's Birthday Adventure, Blue's ABC Time Activities, Blue's 123 Time Activities, Blue's Treasure Hunt, Blue's Art Time Activities, Blue's Reading Time Activities. 5 Flash Games: What's in the Box?, Joe's Scrapbook Journey (Cameo), Periwinkle's Disappearo, Goodnight Bird (Narration only). 2 console games: Blue's Big Musical, Blue's Alphabet Book
Movies: 2

Blue's first caregiver and owner. He was the owner of the yellow house before he left for college. Steve is airheaded, constantly curious, have an unspoken desire to be special and needs constant help to function in the world, at the same time, he is charismatic, a little snarky, and really likes helping the people around him.

Blue's Clues & You! reveals that he now runs the Blueprints Detective Agency.

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• Animal Lover: Since his childhood, Steve always wanted a puppy to play with and to be his friend, which led baby Blue to leave her storybook and become Steve's puppy friend.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Steve has a terribly short attention span, and will get lost at the first distraction that comes his way, especially involving food. This greatly frustrates Joe and Mr. Salt in Blue's Big City Adventure as he continues to lose focus of the investigation to find Josh and Blue.
• Badass Longcoat: As per typical dress for his profession, he wears a very slick beige trenchcoat after becoming a detective.
• Baldness Angst: In the music clip "You Can't Spell Blue without YOU", he makes a quick comment that implies he really misses his hair while remembering the adventures he went through during his era.
  Steve: I had hair...
• Big Eater: He showed signs of this in the original series, but it is expanded upon in the reboot where in most of his appearances, he is seen eating as his way of thinking is eating, implying that his usual absent behavior is a result of Hunger Causes Lethargy.
• Blue Oni, Red Oni:
  • Steve is the blue Oni to Joe's red Oni. Steve is calmer, patient, and more likely to think before acting, while Joe appears to be more impulsive, excited and hasty. Steve is soft-spoken and treats the viewer like a coworker, while Joe has a more animated voice and treats the viewer like a playmate. Steve needs to stop and think often to be good at his job, while Joe is good at his job because he never sits still.
  • He's also the red oni to Miranda's blue oni. Being immature, energetic and silly, while she is calm, easy to get along with and more mature than he is.
• Bookworm: Steve is a rare case who avoids Book Smart. He is a book lover who often reads his favorite books over and over again. In fact, Blue is a character from Steve's favorite book when he was a kid that came out of a book he read non-stop for days.
• Bespectacled Cutie: He starts wearing glasses in Blue's Clues & You, and still endearingly as always.
• Butt-Monkey: Compared to Josh and Joe, Steve seems to be much more likely to be the butt of jokes (and in some cases physical comedy).
• Caring Gardener: In one episode, he treated his tomato plant, called Nero, as if it were his daughter, treating “her” with the same affection someone would treat a child.
• Childhood Friend: With Blue, who was his favorite book character when Steve was a kid and wished to be her friend, which made baby Blue to skidoo out of her storybook to be Steve's friend.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Sometimes has trouble hearing the viewers and/or asks very obvious questions, as well as a tendency to make bizarre guesses to the game's solution in the earlier episodes. For example, in "What Time is It For Blue?", when he has all three clues that indicate that it's Blue's nap time, he thinks it's time for her to wrap a pillow in a blanket and read it a story. He also wants to get a degree in hopscotch.
• Clueless Detective: Steve is talented at many things, but investigation wasn't one of them, so he often needs help from the audience to solve mysteries. By the time of the reboot, it is revealed that after graduating from college, he became a detective who works on his own agency, but didn't improve that much. According to Blue's Big City Adventure he needs to eat "Thinking Snacks" to do any investigative work (which frustrates his younger brother). In "The Mystery of the Missing Thinking Chair" from the fourth season, he barely manages to leave his own office, as he loses his keys and investigation items, his version of Skidooland, the Wizard of Skidoo, tries to look cool and awesome but is unable to figure out how to fix the skidoo frames.
• Color Motif: His main color is green, and the secondary is tan.
• Cool Big Bro: Steve Burns stated that the character of Steve was designed with this trope in mind, a kind older brother figure to his younger friends. He also acted as a mentor figure to his younger brother, Joe, during their youth by being patient, understanding, and encouraging him to have fun while Steve was away.
• Country Mouse: He used to be a country mouse to Periwinkle's City Mouse, trying to help the kitten adapt to the rural neighborhood he had moved to and even inventing new ways that Periwinkle could play in the ways he played in his old neighborhood, in ways more suited to his new surroundings. Ironically, he becomes the city cousin to Josh's Country Cousin in Blue's Clues & You!, as he has an office on the big city.
• Cute Bookworm: As seen in Bookworm above, Steve REALLY love books, and is an adorable dork, curious, kind and who loves to help other people.
• The Ditz: While he has his moments indicating that he is smarter than he appears, Steve is typically not the sharpest knife, often needing help with basic tasks. At one point, he even acknowledges that the viewer is probably smarter than him, but this encourages him to try harder instead of letting himself get knocked down.
• Dork Knight: Despite being the local Clueless Detective, Steve still appears to be quite intelligent, just having difficulty applying it correctly; no wonder he is a successful detective who kept his two base agencies running!
• Early-Installment Weirdness: In his early episodes, Steve was noticeably more excited and easily stimulated, going visibly crazy upon finding the first clue in the series. From the middle of the first season, he calms down a little, trying to appear cooler to the viewer, but he still very giddy.
• Early Personality Signs: Flashbacks show that as a kid, he already wore stripes, loved dogs, and read a lot.
• Endearingly Dorky: Steve is childish, goofy, a little socially awkward, and terrible at solving mysteries, but everyone is quite understanding of him if he's not causing trouble. He loves sharing his favorite things not only with the viewer but with anyone who appears in front of him. This helps him make new friends and bond even more with those he is already close to.
• Even the Loving Hero Has Hated Ones: Downplayed. Hate is a strong word, but he is much less friendly with Gopher than with other characters. While Josh and Joe appear to be on good terms with Gopher and are even seen having fun together with him, Steve and Gopher do not appear to be particularly fond and are constantly trying to outsmart each other.
• Everyone Is Christian at Christmas: Avoided. Although he celebrates Christmas, he doesn't seem to be aware of the religious significance of the date before talking to Wynonna in "Blue's Big Holiday".
• Eye Take:
  • He reacts this way whenever Pawprint is erased in strange ways, such as disappearing or just walking away, almost seeming like he wonders if the viewer is also seeing this happen.
  • How he reacts to seeing Santa Claus during "Blue's Night Before Christmas", although it's barely audible amidst the celebration you can faintly hear how impressed he is:
  Steve: It's Santa!
  • In Blue's Big City Adventure he and Joe react this way when observing Josh's magic being manifested during Happiness is Magic.
• Fake Ultimate Hero:
  • Like the Wizard of Oz, the Wizard of Skidoo is built as a great hero who can help Josh and Blue get home and acts imposing and respectable, but at the end of the day, he's just the same old Steve wearing flashy clothes and is just as confused as Josh and Blue about everything that's going on in Skidooland.
  • His usual self can also be seen as this, as twice he is constructed as the help the protagonists need, but at the end of the day, the case is only solved by luck. In Blue's Big City Adventure, his plan only works because Josh happened to be looking out the window at the right time, and the one to save the day ends up being Mr. Salt, while in "In the Case of the Missing Thinking Chair", it takes him as long as Josh to find the third clue, and still needs the viewer to find it, even if though already knew where it was.
• Friend to Bugs: Just like Shovel and Pail, Steve is a friend to all living things, but insects in particular seem to be his favorite, having an entire episode dedicated to his hobby of observing them; in fact, one of his friends is a worker ant called Antoinette. Ironically, he didn't know what a chrysalis was before Pail explained it to him.
• Genius Ditz: In his best moments, he is that. Despite what you might imagine, Steve is surprisingly quick at formulating plans when he doesn't have the clues to help him, but bad at maintaining his train of thought. He's relatively good at explaining specific things, even if he has difficulty understanding others that are simpler. He also appears to understand Blue's Clues in theory in many cases, getting them right in concept but being unable to find specific words to express his Puppy's intention.
• Heroic BSoD:
  • He has a minor one in Blue's Big City Adventure when he becomes temporarily depressed after failing to catch up to Josh at the end of "That's My Song" and needs to be comforted by Joe. Luckily, he snaps out of it quickly when he finds the pretzel stand.
  • During Blue's Big Musical Movie, he goes into a depressive state because he realizes that he is in fact very dependent on the viewer and has never found a single clue on his own since he met them. After the viewer finds the first two clues on their own, Steve temporarily gives up and sings a BSoD Song about how he wishes he was as smart as the Viewer.
  Steve: Sometimes I wish I was as smart as you.
• Hidden Depths:
  • He is actually quite interested in biology, being very good at naming different types of rare animals, is a good botanist and gardener, knows lots of random facts about anteaters and is often seen doing field research to observe different types of animals (especially insects).
  • “Blue is Frustrated” implies that he represses his feelings a lot in front of the viewer, twice becoming frustrated but starting to smile calmly when he remembers that he is being watched.
  • In a comic con Q&A, Steve Burns stated that Steve probably majored in forensic sciences, which even if you believe he is a terrible detective, is still impressive.
• Humans Are Morons: Downplayed. Steve is one of the few human characters in the series, and is far less sharp than the children he plays with or the talking objects around him. He has a lot of difficulty finding clues, solving basic puzzles and generally being less intelligent than his Magical Puppy. This trope is deconstructed in Blue's Big Musical Movie where he is revealed to be quite aware of how silly he appears to be by always being dependent on viewers to solve the Blue's Clues game and sings a BSoD Song about how useless he felt for not be as smart as the friends around him.
• Hunger Causes Lethargy: Implied. Steve mentions a few times that away from the viewer and the Thinking Chair, his method of thinking is to eat something, implying that his absent behavior is a result of this trope.
• Iconic Outfit: His green striped shirt.
• Innocently Insensitive: A source of conflict in "Blue's Big Musical" is that Steve is so busy with the musical and wanting to find his first clue that he accidentally ignores Sidetable and Periwinkle's visible sadness, hurting them both in the process.
• I Just Want to Be Special: Due to his low self-esteem, Steve always wants to be, or at least appear, cooler and more impressive than he already is. It is implied that his main motivation for going to the college and becoming a detective is his desire to be admired by the people around him, as his theatrical personality is much more visible when he is in his detective uniform.
• Keet: He is very upbeat and energetic. Although he rarely loses his composure, he remains expressive and is cheerful and curious about the simplest things.
• Limited Wardrobe: Always wears a green striped shirt and brown pants, later accented with a fedora and longcoat.
• Mellow Fellow: Steve acts much calmer than his brother and cousin, being soft-spoken and a little slower in behavior, with few moments when he loses his cool or becomes impatient.
• Mondegreen Gag: A running gag is him mishearing the word "clue".
• Nature Lover: Steve is constantly curious about everything, but especially about nature. Among his interests are botany, entomology and zoology, and he will be more than happy to do field research in different skidoo worlds or even in his backyard. In fact, he's even friends with the literal personification of Mother Nature.
• Never Bareheaded: In the reboot, he always wears some kind of hat; sometimes a baseball cap, but more often a brown fedora (to go along with his detective aesthetic). This is all because Steve Burns is now bald-headed.
• Non-Standard Character Design: In the video game "Blue's Big Musical", he is an animated character, but unlike the other characters, he is animated in 3D.
• Not So Above It All: While he normally remains calm regardless of what misfortune befalls him during episodes, in "Blue is Frustrated", everything seems to go wrong at the same time and he looks like he's about to have a tantrum the entire time.
• Obfuscating Stupidity: In Blue's Birthday Adventure, if the player clicks on the Thinking Chair before all three clues are found, Steve would start thinking about hopping there, but realizes they haven't found them yet. The more you click, the more Steve makes clear he knows you're fooling him, implying that he is more aware than he appears.
• Occult Detective: Weirdly Averted. While Steve has magical abilities and comes from a magical world, most of the cases he is seen investigating are pretty mundane, like things disappearing or people being lost.
• Paper-Thin Disguise: In "The Mystery of the Missing Thinking Chair", during the Mailtime segment, he sends an Email to Josh using Groucho Marx glasses as a disguise, and Josh is able to recognize him very quickly, which surprises Steve.
• Perma-Shave: A funny example. While he is in the real world, his beard seems to grow normally (probably to demonstrate that he has aged like the original series viewers); however, when he is in Storybook World, he is always as clean as he was before he passed his role to Joe.
• Private Detective: Blue's Clues & You! reveals that he now runs a detective agency called "Blue Prints Detective Agency".
• Put on a Bus: Literally, when he went off to college.
• Red/Green Contrast: Steve wears green all the time, and with the exception of his grandmother and Tyrese, all of the humans that Steve interacted with while he was the host wore red or red-ish orange shades, and would normally be more mature than he is.
• Running Gag: Generally, when viewers first find a clue, he’ll tend to confuse them calling out, "A clue!" with virtually any word that rhymes with clue. He even points out one time where he doesn’t do this. (To be fair, Joe also did this, but not nearly as frequently.)
• The Rival: For Gopher. Steve considers himself smarter than Gopher and likes to try and beat him at his own games. It rarely works though
• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Downplayed. His and Joe's reactions to not being able to get Josh's attention the end of “That's My Song” seem to suggest they have this dynamic, with Steve being much more emotional and despondent while Joe becomes brutally honest and a little mean-spirited.
• Sick Episode: In "Steve Gets the Sniffles", he spends the whole episode with what seems to be a very weak cold or sinus infection.
• The Snack Is More Interesting: Steve has a tendency to lose focus on whatever he's doing when there's food involved, like in the movie where he eats pretzels earlier in the process of creating a plan to locate Josh and Blue (which bothers both Joe and Mr. Salt). In his case, this is Handwaved, because as he himself states, his method of maintaining a train of thought on a subject is to eat something.
• Socially Awkward Hero: Even though in each episode he will happily ventures between different worlds and is implied to have reality warping powers, during his hosting days, Steve was a dork with difficulties interacting with people his own age (and sometimes with the viewer), but he opens up a lot as the series goes on. It is most visible during his interactions with Miranda and Sam (Orange Kitten's owner), where he clearly doesn't know how to act around them.
• Straight Man: Of the three hosts, he is the most likely to act like "the normal guy", seem a little confused by his cousin and brother's quirks, and be surprised by the crazy things that happen in Storybook World.
• Too Dumb to Fool: In "The Mystery of the Missing Thinking Chair", he unconsciously delays Joe and Blue's plan to lure him for the simple fact that he is a Clueless Detective and loses the objects necessary for him to go out to investigate.
• Took a Level in Badass: Seems that playing Blue's Clues was pretty good investigative field training, since, after he graduated college, he opened his own Detective Agency by the time Blue's Clues & You! takes place.
• The Short Guy with Glasses: The only one of the three hosts to wear glasses and also the shortest of the three (Steve Burns is 168 cm/5'6").
• Trademark Favorite Food:
  • Steve likes anything with bananas in it. Banana cookies, banana muffins, etc.
  • In Blue's Big City Adventure, he eats pretzels to help him think.
• Vague Age: Literally to the point of creating debates. It's unclear how old Steve is supposed to be, a young adult, a child or teenager? Him going to college didn't make answered anything, as people still argued whether he was a teenager or an adult on a gap year. At least Blue's Clues & You made it a little easier to know since he's clearly a middle-aged man and is treated as such.

Joe

Location: Yellow House (formerly), Present Store (currently)
Actor: Donovan Patton
As a Kid: Ethan Twomey Perello (original series/baby), Felix Pindor (reboot)
Fixed Pattern: Squares

Joe

^{Click to see Joe in the illustrated books}

^{Click to see Joe in the flash games}

^{Click to see Joe in the reboot}

Series: 3 (Blue's Clues, Blue's Room, Blue's Clues & You)
Seasons: 3
Episodes: 70 ^note  48 (Blue's Clues) 12 (Blue's Room) 10 (Blue's Clues & You!)
Games: 14 ^note  9 flash games: You Take Blue to School, Ghost Hunt, Joe's 3D Scavenger Hunt, Dot to Dot, Blue's Gold Clues Challenge, Blue's Mix 'n Match Dress-Up, Joe's Scrapbook Journey, Blue's Music Maker, Blue's Matching. 4 CD/PC games: Blue's Clues Preschool, Blue's Clues Kindergarten, Blue Takes You to School, Blue's Room: Blue Talks. Console Game: Blue's Clues: Blue's Collection Day
Movies: 1

Steve's younger brother and Blue's second caregiver, taking over the yellow house when Steve went to college. Joe is a pretty smart, artistic and dramatic guy who likes to think outside the box and attracts attention wherever he goes, but at the same time is impulsive, naïve and hyperactive, and can occasionally cause problems (sometimes on purpose).

Blue's Clues & You! reveals that he works at the Present Store.

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• Ageless Birthday Episode: The episode “Joe's Surprise Party” is about his friends organizing a surprise party for him, and also revealing his birthday date^note August 5 but never even implies how old Joe is supposed to be.
• Animal Motifs: Ducks. Joe is always accompanied by his stuffed duck, Boris, ducks are his favorite animals, his slippers are ducks, he has a duck mascot costume, he imitates ducks several times and the reason why the Blue's Clues game was created was because of Baby Joe's duck blanket.
• Art Initiates Life: Unlike Josh and Steve, Joe can bring his clue drawings to life, which may be a variation of Josh and Steve's ability to bring objects to life.
• Balloonacy: In "Meet Blue's Baby Brother", he is dragged through a curtain of balloons while in ABC Puppy territory.
• Big Guy, Little Guy: The big guy (6'0"/183 cm) to his older brother Steve (5'6"/168 cm) little guy. Which he lampshades in the promotional material for Joe's Scrapbook. He's also the big guy to Periwinkle from the house behind, a kitten who sees Joe as a big brother figure.
• Big Little Brother: Younger than Steve by an unrevealed amount of years, Joe is taller by at least a few inches. Lampshaded in the promo material for Joe's Scrapbook.
  Joe: Hi, i'm Joe! I'm Steve's little brother, even though I'm taller.
• Big Ol' Eyebrows: Joe has the biggest eyebrows in the main cast, being longer than most humans, and thicker than most animated characters. This is more prominent in illustrated media involving him, where most of the character's eyebrows are represented by thin lines, while Joe has more realistic eyebrows.
• Blue Oni, Red Oni: Joe is the red oni to Steve's blue oni. Joe is a keet incapable of sitting still, while Steve needs to stop to rest frequently as he needs to eat to gather his train of thought. Joe has a more animated voice, while Steve is soft-spoken. Steve is more passive and relies on his friends to decide what to do, Joe is more likely to think outside the box and then thinks of many ways to break out of the routine during his era.
• Bucket Helmet: His "robot Joe" costume uses a frying pan as a helmet, to give the illusion that he has a metal head.
• Bunny-Ears Lawyer: Joe is undeniably a quirky man, but he's talented enough to keep two Present Stores and Santa's factory running. Furthermore, he has every kind of random talent you can imagine, from artistic talents to vehicle driving skills, while also having difficulty with some things considered basic like tying his shoelaces.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Like Steve, Joe is not stupid, but he has some problems with deductions and is easily distracted, which makes playing Blue's Clues a little more challenging than it should be.
• Cuckoosnarker: He doesn't have much more common sense than Steve has, but he'll still be more than happy to make sarcastic remarks and respond to his attempts at mockery with the same level of politeness.
• Commuting on a Bus: Even though Josh took over his role as host, he still continues to make guest appearances on Blue's Clues & You!, even more so than Steve. He even gets to help celebrate Blue's Birthday, and join Josh and Blue in singing "Old Macdonald had a farm" in Bluestock.
• Companion Cube: While in his era, Joe was almost always accompanied by his stuffed duck Boris, who, strangely, is treated as a sentient duck and one of Joe's friends.
• Color Motif: Although he wore shirts of various colors, he was mainly associated with Orange. In "Blue's Clues & You!" Joe's main color became purple, the color associated with the Present Store and the shirt he found the most clues with while wearing during his era.
• Consistent Clothing Style: Joe wears different shirts but they always have a pattern of three squares on them.
• Deadpan Snarker: Surprisingly, in Blue's Big City Adventure when Steve stops at a pretzel cart.
  Steve: It helps me think, it's complex carbs. Please respect the process.
  Joe: The carbs could not be simpler.
• Decomposite Character: In Blue's Clues & You!, the roles he played were divided between Josh (the host), and Aly and Mauve (the people who take care of Periwinkle). Meanwhile, he replaced the Cash Register as the administrator of the Present Store.
• Depending on the Writer: Maybe Depending On the Costume Designer would be more correct. His Present Store shirt can have three gifts on the back or three regular squares like his purple shirt from the original series, depending on the episode or media.
• Evil Is Hammy: He parodies this trope in "The Mystery of the Missing Thinking Chair", where he acts like a typical mystery movie villain when explaining to Steve and Josh about his "Evil Plan"... which turns out to be to distract them from their responsibilities to get together with him at a vegan barbecue in the back yard.
• Eye Take: Twice in Blue's Big City Adventure.
  • When Josh is carried away by two trees away from him and Steve, Joe just looks confused for multiple reasons, looking at Josh being carried away, at the fallen balloons and especially at the New York citizens dancing out of control around him and Steve.
  • Both he and Steve have this reaction during "Happiness is Magic" when Josh's music creates a visible magic aura in front of them.
• Foolish Sibling, Responsible Sibling: ZigZagging. Hilariously, both he and Steve seem to believe they are the responsible brother while the other is the foolish brother, though Steve is the one who plays the responsible role most often, being a little more down to earth than Joe.
• Friendly Scheming: Just like his grandmother, Joe seems to enjoy organizing treasure hunts and acts like a true mastermind in his cleverest moments. In some episodes he implicitly influences Blue's Clue game or is even the one who places the clues, as in "Joe's Clues". In “The Mystery of the Missing Thinking Chair” he takes on the role of the episode's antagonist, although this is only revealed at the end, having “stolen” the Thinking Chair, and organized the Blue's clues game, with the aim of attracting Josh and Steve for his surprise barbecue.
• Friendly Shopkeeper: In the reboot, he is the new owner of the Present Store and although he is visually tired, he is still as full of love for what he does as ever.
• Fun Personified: It applies to the three hosts, but especially to Joe, as he is never still and always tries to use his creativity to escape the routine and have fun with both his friends and the viewer.
• The Gadfly: While Steve causes trouble, mainly through inattention and Josh through naivety, Joe seems to take some genuine pleasure in having fun at others' expense, although he is kinder than the usual examples of this trope. "Joe's Clues" demonstrates his mocking side better than any other episode, as he switches roles with Blue, being the one spreading the clues and enjoying every second of it, from hiding among the toys in his duck costume to getting in a big chase with Blue with the aim of stopping her from finding the third clue.
• Genius Ditz: Joe is a quirky guy, who acts much more like a cartoon character than the cartoon characters themselves, but he also demonstrates that he can be as smart or even smarter than Blue depending on the moment. He is the best host playing Blue's Clues, as he never gets the answers wrong, is a natural pawprint cleaner, knows how to use Blue's tricks against her, and even manipulates Blue's Clues games during Josh's era for his own purposes. He also seems to be an amazing store manager and is one of Santa's helpers.
• Goofy Suit: Inverted. He has a big duck costume that he loves and isn't ashamed to wear, and he even uses it to trick Blue once during "Joe's Clues".
• Hammerspace: All three hosts can use hammerspace, but Joe is the one who uses it most frequently, being able to teleport off-screen, pull entire objects with him without being noticed, and, unlike Steve and Josh, what he does cannot be explained by the Rule of Funny.
• Hidden Depths:
  • Blue's Big City Adventure revealed a sarcastic side he doesn't normally show, especially directed towards the older brother he adores.
  • You wouldn't be blamed if you assumed someone with questionable driving skills like him couldn't drive. But he is seen driving multiple types of vehicles both on land, in the air and on the water both in promotional materials, games and in the series itself.
• Hollywood Giftwrap: At some point between the original series and the reboot, a gift box wrapped in this way became his main symbol, replacing the squares, probably to symbolize his love for presents and his work at Present Store.
• How Can Santa Deliver All Those Toys?: The answer in the Blue's Clues universe is Joe. He claims that every year during the holiday season, he teams up with Santa's factory to help with the gift production, and he is able to do it in minutes.
• Huge Guy, Tiny Girl: The Huge guy, for Blitzen, one of Santa's reindeer, the Tiny Girl. According to Joe, they are good friends, and work together every year.
• Hypocritical Humor: Makes a joke about Steve always wearing green striped shirts since he was a kid in "Blue First Holiday", even though he himself was wearing the exact kind of square orange clothes he wore when he was a baby on the video.
• Iconic Item: His stuffed duck Boris is probably his most iconic item, being his store's mascot and the origin of his Animal Motifs.
• Imagination-Based Superpower: Joe can apparently change the shapes of objects with just the power of his imagination, as seen in an episode of Blue's Room, where he transforms a cardboard box into different means of transport and travels around the world with Blue and Sprinkles on it.
• Jack of All Trades: Joe's main quality is that he is good at basically everything, even though he has just learned how to do these things. He has been shown to be a good actor, seamstress, costume designer, painter, driver, pilot, salesman, administrator, craftsman, instrumentalist, singer, dancer, cook, sportsman, coach, Blue’s Clues player, and pawprint cleaner, among other things, although all this talent is offset by him being easily distracted.
• Kazoos Mean Silliness: His signature instrument is the kazoo and he's definitely a pretty silly guy.
• Keet: Joe may even be more enthusiastic than Steve, even if he demonstrates having a little more common sense. Joe is cheerful, loves to show affection and create new ways to have fun, having so much energy that even working alone at the neighborhood Present Store doesn't seem to affect him often.
• Kind Hearted Cat Lover: Of the three hosts, he was the closest to Periwinkle, their neighbor who is a cat, during his era, acting like his older brother, guardian and being the one who took him to school during his early days.
• Large Ham: Joe is the character who is most likely to act "cartoonish", he is very animated, expressive and has a tendency to overreact for impact, especially when playing a character.
• Limited Wardrobe: Played With in the original series, Played Straight and Handwaved in the reboot. In the original series, he has a Consistent Clothing Style, which changes color, but always has three squares in the front, and three in the back. In the reboot, he always wears a purple shirt with three gift boxes on the front and three squares on the back, which is his work uniform of the present store.
• Living Drawing: One of Joe's peculiarities is that he can bring to life the clues he writes down (or puts down), letting the clues do the talking for him. This does not happen to Josh when he uses Joe's notebook, and only happens to Blue when Joe is the one spreading clues, indicating that it's something only he can do.
• The Mad Hatter: Joe is crazy, impulsive, has a tendency to laugh mad, and behaves in a way you would expect a Looney Tunes character to do, but at the same time, he is a very fun and pleasant guy to be around.
• Multiple-Choice Past: He claims to have crafted Boris with his own hands and Steve doesn't seem to recognize him, but a flashback shows Boris with Joe when he was a baby.
• Manipulative Bastard: He parodies this trope in the episode "The Case of the Missing Thinking Chair" by distracting Josh with a game of Blue's Clues and luring Steve into the Yellow House in search of the missing Thinking Chair. The goal? Having Steve and Josh take time out of their current responsibilities so they can spend some time together in his vegan barbecue.
• Mundane Utility: Like the other two hosts, he possesses an implied ability to alter reality off-screen, being able to teleport and change clothes instantly, which he primarily uses for his one-man acts during the original series and to work alone at the Present Store in the reboot.
• Occult Detective: In the game "Blue's Clues: Ghost Hunt", while adventuring through the haunted house and guiding Blue in her search for ghosts, he dresses like a Victorian-era detective.
• Odd Name Out: Of the hosts, he is the only one not to have the same first name as his actor. This is because the name Joe had already been chosen before the actor was chosen.
• Offscreen Teleportation: Has the ability to teleport when going to places where the viewer (and sometimes characters in-universe) cannot see him. His brother and cousin have variations of the same skill, but he does it more often.
• Paranormal Investigation: In the game "Blue's Clues: Ghost Hunt", he and Blue investigate a haunted house in search of Boo and his ghost friends who are hiding.
• Pungeon Master: Like Josh and Mailbox, he loves to tell puns, and you can judge the quality of a joke when Josh of all people is able to recognize how unfunny it is.
• Platonic Declaration of Love: In "Love Day", he and Cinderella mutually declare that they love each other not romantically, but rather as reader and character.
• Purple Is Powerful: Joe is associated with the color purple and is the most adventurous and competent of the three hosts, being the one who uses his "host skills" most frequently and creatively. Furthermore, he is very adaptive to new situations, is a surprisingly competent business administrator, helps out at Santa's factory in his free time (in record time on top of that), and, surprisingly, he has his moments as a Manipulative Bastard and The Gadfly where he uses his unpredictability to surprise people for his own amusement.
• Quirky Curls: As one of the series' hosts, Joe is a hyperactive but well-intentioned manchild who tends to throw himself headlong into most situations and who has curly hair from "Meet Blue's Baby Brother" onwards.
• Real Men Wear Pink: Joe seems to have no problem looking feminine, he apparently owns a pink dress, is willing to act as Little Red Riding Hood twice, and owns a customized Granny Wolf uniform.
• Sensitive Guy and Manly Man: Downplayed. Steve and Joe's reactions to not being able to talk to Josh at the end of "That's My Song" seem to suggest they have this dynamic, with Steve being much more emotional and despondent while Joe becomes brutally honest and a little mean-spirited.
• Silly Walk: Joe is a showman first and a person second and tends to walk around in a silly and theatrical manner.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: He and Steve are pretty similar in how they behave.
• Took a Level in Cynic: Downplayed Trope. He remains silly, kind and friendly, but as seen in the movie, his stay in New York seems to have soured Joe a little.
  Joe: Every Day is a Gift- that you pay for.
• Universal Driver's License: In "Away Great Playdate" on Blue's Room, Joe conducts a train, drives a taxi and pilots a plane. In the flash game, "Joe's Scrapbook Adventure", Joe is seen piloting a boat and a hot air balloon.
• Unlimited Wardrobe: Wears a different color shirt every episode, although most of them have the same three-square pattern.
• Vibrant Orange: In the original series, Joe was associated with the color orange and he had a striking and lively personality, even surpassing Blue in his best moments.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: Blue's Big City Adventure reveals that he and Steve act this way when Josh is not present. Both are a little sarcastic and critical with their respective peculiar behaviors, though in the end, they both love each other and know how to admit when the other is right.

Josh

Location: Yellow House
Actor: Joshua Dela Cruz
As a Kid: Leon Victor Aureus (Sage and Ginger's Baby Book), Alesso Joaquin Spinelli (Blue's Big City Adventure), Graham Horhager (Voice, If You Don't See It, Be It!)
Fixed Pattern: Blue Stripes

Josh

^{Click to see Josh in the illustrated books}

^{Click to see Josh in Blue's Big City Adventure}

Series: 1 (Blue's Clues & You!)
Seasons: 4
Episodes: 112 ^note  86 released, 26 ordered episodes
Games: 9 ^note  Silly Town Skidoo, Tap It Game, Play Along Video (4 Episodes), Counting with Shovel and Pail, Blue's Friends and Big Feelings, Felt Frame Dress Up, Card Game Draw, Nogginville (Guest), Let's Play Pretend (Narration)
Movies: 1

The host of the series Reboot Blue's Clues & You!. Josh is Steve and Joe's cousin, and Blue's current caregiver. Josh is an incredible performance artist, very charismatic, kind and affectionate, but he is also quite anxious, self-critical with attention and patience problems that he needs to improve.

After Blue's Big City Adventure, he is revealed to be a member of a band alongside Blue and Rainbow Puppy named "The Puppystars".

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• Affectionate Nickname: His. Lola calls him "Joshy".
• Affirmative-Action Legacy: Contrasting his two white predecessors, Josh is Filipino.
• Amusing Injuries: During "Josh Crummy Day", where he was physically injured at least three times, one of which required him to ice his elbow, something that is never mentioned again in the episode.
• Arc Symbol: Swirls have been in the series since the beginning, being symbols made to represent skidoo and the Storybook World in general, although originally they were mainly decorative they gradually became more and more prevalent especially for Josh who left little blue swirls behind when he skidooed. Come the movie and it's revealed that the swirls didn't just represent skidoo, but also when magic is manifested in general, appearing whenever Josh unconsciously used his reality warping ability.
• Asian Airhead: An important point of Josh's character is his Filipino ancestry, and like his cousins, he is not the brightest lamp.
• Attention Deficit... Ooh, Shiny!: Josh doesn't seem to be able to stay focused for more than a few seconds and will forget what to do at the first distraction, luckily he has the kids and Blue to help him.
• Brainless Beauty: Josh is a good-looking guy, and what he lacks in common sense, he makes up for with his charm.
• Break the Cutie: Although it ends with a happy ending, Blue's Big City Adventure was probably not the most pleasant experience for Josh, he discovered his painfully self-conscious side, was Mistaken for Insane, got lost in the city and almost lost his job opportunity, causing him to enter a temporary depressive state, almost making him give up on his dream if Mr. Salt didn't intervene with his plan.
• Character Catchphrase: “Incredible honor” whenever a character invites him to do something and his fanboy mode is activated.
• Clap Your Hands If You Believe: How his powers of bringing objects to life seem to work. If he believes the object is alive, it turns to life just a few seconds later.
• Cloudcuckoolander: Josh appears to be unable to retain information for more than a few seconds and seems to mix the most peculiar traits of its predecessors (Steve's absent mind with Joe's hyperactivity).
• Color Motif: Mainly blue, but also red. Colors that when put together are associated with heroism and courage.
• Cosmic Motifs: Stars. Mr Salt tells him that he is a star. In Blue's Big City Adventure, he reprises the song from the original series “Planets” about the solar system and later has people spinning around him while he dances, imitating the translation movement that planets make around a star during "That's my song". Moreover, his magic that brings objects to life is surrounded by shimmering stars.
• Creating Life Is Unforeseen: Josh has the inexplicable ability to bring objects to life by interacting with them when he is in the "real world", but it only works after he realizes that the objects are in fact inanimate. While Steve can do the same thing, he appears to have more control of the ability.
• The Cutie: Despite being surrounded by a naturally Moe world, Josh still stands out as a kind and naive All-Loving Hero who sees beauty in everything.
• Does Not Know His Own Strength: It is revealed in Blue's Big City Adventure that Josh possesses reality warping abilities when in the "Real World" although he doesn't seem able to control it or even be aware that he can do it.
• Eccentric Artist: He is a overly cheerful man who talks to obviously inanimate objects (which to be fair create life just a few seconds later) and have the attention span of a goldfish, but at the same time he is an extremely talented musician and dancer, who is able to influence people who listen to his music in an almost supernatural way.
• Endearingly Dorky: Josh is extremely vibrant, naive, kind and playful, he is also Constantly Curious and loves to make puns and tell jokes, all of these characteristics make it extremely easy for him to make new friends, even in situations where he is stressed or sad.
• Failed Attempt at Scaring: Every time Josh tries to scare the viewer he not only fails miserably but will probably be scared by something else just a few seconds later.
• Fairytale Motifs: Josh's story appears to be based on Dorothy Gale from The Wizard of Oz (and he even plays her in "The Wizard of Skidoo") with some elements inverted. He is The Ingenue one who is associated with the color blue wears red shoes and is taken by a "swirl" (in this case a Skidoo instead of a tornado) to a new world accompanied by his puppy where his mean of transport makes a bad landing creating confusion. In this new world he needs to find a person who came from the same world as him to complete his objective and along the way he makes new friends who advise him about courage (Ali Stroker), heart (Taboo) and wisdom (The Cabbie), following by a golden place (the NYC Thinking Chair) and learning that what he needed was already with him. With the role that belonged to the witches being replaced by Josh's own anxiety.
  Josh: We are definitely not at Storybook World anymore.
• Fatal Flaw: Impatience. As the Taxi Cab points out, due to his lack of patience Josh acts without thinking and ends up losing things along the way, like the notebook or the clues Blue left to him during the movie, this is something he demonstrates since the third episode "Playdate with Magenta" where he has a breakdown due to being unable to find the third clue, the phone, which was in his hand the entire time.
• Fish out of Water: During Blue's Big City Adventure, he mentions feeling this way in New York City, as it is completely different from anything Josh has ever experienced in Storybook World. It is much noisier than the rural environment he is used to, his eccentric behavior was seen as crazy rather than friendly like at home and objects are not naturally animated so talking to them is seen as strange, luckily Blue is there with him, to prevent him from panicking.
• For Happiness: Josh's happiness is in fact magic. Everything he does seems to intentionally or unintentionally make the world a happier place whether by literal magic coming from his charisma or simply by making new friends with his kindness.
• Good Luck Charm: Josh has two for different situations:
  • His lucky sock, that has probably seen better days, which he believes brings luck because it's the sock he was wearing the day he met Blue.
  • His lucky seashell, that was a gift from his Lola from his childhood, which he believes brings him luck during performances.
• The Heart: Josh is a genuinely kind guy with a gentle heart, which is often the only thing stopping other characters from getting into conflict. His empathy is so great that he can bring inanimate objects to life if he interacts with them.
• Hollywood Genetics: Handwaved. The only explanation given as to how Steve and Joe are related to a Filipino is that he's their cousin. It's possible Josh may be mixed, a step-cousin, a distant cousin, adopted, or an honorary cousin.
• The Ingenue: A rare male example. Josh is idealistic, gentle and friendly, but with a complete lack of awareness of how the real world works due to having spent his entire life in Storybook World.
• Keet: He's been shown to be very giddy and excitable. His introduction episode alone had him awe after skidooing for the first time, and him in shock over getting to sing "Mailtime" (in which he reacts with "I can't believe I get to sing this song"). His voice also gets rather squeaky when he gets excited. Possibly his most infamous example of this is in "Playdate with Magenta", where his reaction to being the first clue is even more over-the-top than when it happened to Steve. He goes complete Motor Mouth, and says that after waiting for so long, his dream is finally coming true. Many have compared this to fanboying.
• Kindhearted Simpleton: Like his cousins Josh isn't the sharpest knife and he doesn't have a single malicious bone in his body either. In fact, his innocent kindness is something of a superpower, as that's where his ability to bring objects to life on the movie comes from.
• Limited Wardrobe: A blue striped shirt and jeans. Remarkably similar to Steve's outfit. It's revealed in "Tickety's Musical Morning" that, hilariously, even though his wardrobe is mostly made up of the same type of clothing, Josh can still see some kind of difference between the identical shirts.
• Lovable Coward: On many occasions he is shown to be easily startled by seemingly silly things such as seeing someone putting letters in a non-sentient mailbox who he assumed was alive or some Jack-in-the-Box toys being activated, but he is also an All-Loving Hero, who actively makes the world around him a happier place.
• Magic Feather: His lucky shell he received from his Lola when he was a child and claims to take it to any of his performances. This becomes an issue in "Josh Visits the Philippines" when he believes that he just can't sing well in front of others without his lucky shell, with even Rainbow Puppy questioning whether it really brings good luck or if it was just his Stage Fright kicking in again.
• Magic Music: He demonstrates two types in the series. The first is related to his abilities of Reality Warper when he is in the real world where he can render places where he sings in music videos and bring objects to life. The second in the super city, where as a Song Man his singing voice becomes powerful enough to break objects.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: Although he definitely demonstrates magical powers throughout the film, it is unclear how much of the behavior of the citizens he interacts with is really how they usually act and how much is the influence of Josh magic.
• Mistaken for Insane: It is implied in the movie that people in New York City who don't recognize him think Josh is crazy because of his eccentricities.
• Mistakes Are Not the End of the World: At the end of "Night at Blueseum" it is revealed that he was the one who caused the episode's problem, when he accidentally picked up the sheet that contained Blue's masterpiece thinking it was an ordinary sheet, and obviously he is sad about it, Blue however is not hurt and forgives him quickly, because she knows his intentions were good.
• Mr. Fanservice: A suitable example for a children's media. Josh is played by Joshua Dela Cruz, who is considered quite attractive to the series' adult audience, and Nickelodeon knows this, which is why a lot of the series' promotional material on social media focuses on Josh's charming side. In fact jokes about Josh being a "thirst trap" were a meme during the early days of Blue's Clues & You! (mixed with a shirtless photo of him taken in 2018), which Dela Cruz himself embraced.
• Muscles Are Meaningless: Because he is played by the athletic Josh Dela Cruz, Josh is visibly more muscular than the other human characters, unfortunately this does not make him stronger than a 2-inch salt shaker.
• Performance Anxiety: Despite being a fantastic musician, Josh has a crippling fear of singing in front of people he is unfamiliar with, which is an important point in the movie. Although he improved a little after realizing his dream, the fear did not completely disappear as seen in "Kamusta, Philippines!".
• The Power of Love: His care for everything, even inanimate objects, seems to be the origin of his powers.
• Pungeon Master: Josh tries hard to always have a pun on hand regardless of the situation, you might think it can't get any worse, until he tells the next pun. Hilariously, Josh himself seems to recognize how terrible his puns are, usually giving the viewer a sheepish look after making one.
  Josh: Giants are huge right now (Beat).
• Pink Girl, Blue Boy: The blue boy to Miranda and Aly's pink girls.
• Remember the New Guy?: Despite not knowing how to play Blue's Clues until his debut episode, everyone at the house appears to already know him.
• Screams Like a Little Girl: Josh is ridiculously easy to scare, and screams loudly whenever he feels scared.
• Sensory Overload: Josh has one during the beginning of the film, as New York City is much noisier than he is used to, he overcomes this by rearranging the sounds to form a musical rhythm.
• Signature Instrument: In almost every episode he appears using his guitar.
• Star Power: One sign that Josh's magic is manifesting is an aura of swirls and stars surrounding him, best seen during the audition version of "Happiness is Magic".
• Smelly Feet Gag: Somehow, a single sock of Josh's was able to stink up the entire house in "The Silly Smelly Smell". The sock smell seems to be able to freely move around the house (Josh even implies that the smell may be partially sentient) and only get worse even after they get rid of other nearby stinky things.
• Stage Magician: During “Joshini the amazing” he becomes one, complete with a wand, cape and a magic top hat, he has a more traditional magician uniform at the end of “Blue's Big City Adventure”, during the musical version of "Happiness is Magic".
• Stepford Smiler: While Josh's joy is genuine, he is shown at several points to have some confidence issues and trying to smile when it is clear that he is not okay.
  • In "Playdate with Magenta" he is seen smiling while talking to Magenta only to collapse the second the call ends in a mental breakdown due to his inability to find the third clue.
  • Blue's Big City Adventure he has not one but four on-screen anxiety attacks, related to his stage fright, problems with the new city and stress of not being able to get to his audition.
  • In "Josh's Crummy Day" he is having a difficult time trying to maintain his usual positive behavior as his day is being terrible and he is being hurted in multiple ways.
  • In "Josh and Blue's Ice Cream Shopee" all of his funny moments are immediately followed by a reminder of how sad he feels without his friends. He almost gives up on meeting his friends when he thinks they don't want to be around him (a communication problem as Mailbox was unable to find him).
• The Storyteller: In several YouTube videos from the series he is seen telling the viewer different stories of Blue's adventures, including some experienced by his cousins years ago.
• Transformation Sequence: Downplayed. During "We're on our way" (one of the songs from the movie ) he has a transformation sequence where the city temporarily turns dark and an aura of blue swirls surrounds him as his clothes change to something more appropriate to the environment.
• Vague Age: Even worse than Joe and Steve. He is shown as being in a photo with Steve and Joe in which the three are children which would be impossible if he were the same age of his actor Josh Dela Cruz who is 17 years younger than Steve Burns. Whether this is artistic liberty or Josh is older than his actor is is unclear.
• Vampire Dance: His characterization as Count Joshula in "The Legend of Jack O'Lantern" is mainly based on his dancing and acting skills, rather than his (nonexistent) ability to be scary, which Jack O'Lantern praises.
• Visible Odor: His sock in “The Silly Smelly Smell” is so stinky that the odor is visible in a dead shade of green.
• Vocal Evolution: His voice starts out deeper in the first episodes of the series, only becoming the high tone seen in later seasons when he becomes excited, as the series goes on his voice becomes more high pitched, though the deep tone sometimes returns at some points when he tries to tell a joke.
• Your Normal Is Our Taboo: He learns the hard way that most objects in New York City are not sentient, and that trying to communicate with them is socially viewed as strange.

International Hosts

Location: Yellow House
Actor: Kevin Duala (Kevin)
Actor: Duarte Gomes (Duarte)
Actor: HyunSup Shim
Fixed Pattern: Green Stripes (Orange Squares later for Kevin)
Series: 1 (Blue's Clues)

Kevin

Duarte

HyunSup Shim

Blue's Clues didn't just have an American version, although the American version is undoubtedly the best known. Each of these different versions had a different host who was Blue's caregiver in that country. In the UK, Kevin took over Steve's role, in Portugal it was Duarte and HyunSup Shim in South Korea.

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• All-Loving Hero: As kind and well-intentioned as the three main hosts, incapable of intentionally hurting anyone.
• Ambiguous Situation: The three main series hosts have magical reality-warping abilities that make them stand out from the other characters, who at most can skidoo, it is unclear whether the hosts of the international versions are capable of similar feats or whether they are ordinary humans who can only skidoo together with Blue.
• Asian Airhead: HyunSup Shim is Korean, and like the other hosts is not the sharpest knife.
• A Boy and His X: They are the caretakers of the Blue Puppy in the international versions.
• Color Motif: Green like Steve, though later Kevin would be associated with the color Orange.
• The Ditz: They are not very intelligent, or good at finding clues, much like Steve, being quite dependent on the children to solve the episode's mysteries.
• Dub-Induced Plot Hole: Kevin was given Joe's shirt and notebook when the writers started adapting Joe-era episodes. Both were Handwaved in the adaptations of "I'm So Happy" (in which Sidetable Drawer hands Kevin his new notebook) and "Shape Searchers" (where he says it's because that squares are his new favorite shape).
• Foreign Remake: They are exclusive characters from the international versions, and only appear in the final episode in documentary format, which was the celebration of the series' 10th anniversary.
• Iconic Outfit: The green striped shirt they share with Steve.
• Manchild: In the tradition of Blue's Clues hosts, these grown men are airheaded, immature and goofy, but kind and incapable of hurting a fly.
• Nice Guy: They don't have a bad bone in their body. They are hosts of Blue's Clues after all.
• Unlimited Wardrobe: Similar to Josh (but not on the same level as Joe), they (especially Kevin) can change their clothes quite frequently, having several different outfits for different occasions, although they usually wear green striped shirts. In the British version's pilot, Kevin even wears a completely different outfit, although the green striped shirt is still visible.
• Vibrant Orange: Like Joe, during seasons 5 and 6, Kevin becomes associated with the color orange. And he's a happy and vibrant man.