All of Steven Universe season 3 is dropping every weeknight for the next few weeks, a Stevenbomb the likes of which we’ve never seen before. The “Summer of Steven” started last week with a “Steven Floats”/“Drop Beat Dad" double header, followed by the emotional sucker punch of all-musical episode “Mr. Greg.” Next we met up with the Shorty Squad in “Too Short to Ride,” then revisited Beach City’s least favorite citizen in “The Real Lars.” The week closed with “Beach City Drift,” a fable on how to outplay a professional mind-gamer.
Today’s episode, “Restaurant Wars,” takes us back to an ancient rivalry on the boardwalk. It turns out that Fryman of Beach Citywalk Fries and Kofi of Fish Stew Pizza used to have a devastating “restaurant war” where each infringed on the other’s business. Steven learns this, to his dismay, after requesting something “off menu” from Peedee, who innocently serves him some mozarella sticks from the back of the fridge.
This is enough to reincite the war. Peedee’s new costume is a pizza slice; Kofi sells French-fried pizza with a french-fried crust and twice-baked french fries. In the madness, Kofi offers to brand Steven as part of their new VIP rewards program. Ronaldo has to do deliveries on his wheelie shoes. Steven runs off the boardwalk screaming. It’s classic BeachCity citizenry madness.
Steven calls a meeting with Ronaldo, Kiki, Jenny and Peedee to discuss how to end the war. The kids are all equally fed up, but Steven has an idea, straight outta Shakespeare: he suggest that Kiki and Ronaldo pretend to be in love. Ronaldo protests that he has a girlfriend, to which Jenny slyly replies, “Where’s she at though?” It’s the best line of the episode.
While Ronaldo seems uncertain, Jenny tells him to shut up and cheerfully says, “You’ll get to spend time with the cutest girl in Beach City,” giving Kiki a raspberry on the cheek. Then the grand masquerade begins:
“My dear, sweet Kiki, who I love with all my blog.”
“Oh, ronaldo, you’re so sweet and quirky in a way I can tolerate.”
Their parents run out to confront them, only to be quickly melted by their promising love. They are on the verge of signing a peace treaty when Ronaldo’s girlfriend Jane actually appears to return his Koala Princess DVDs. Ronaldo blurts out that it’s all a trick to get their parents to stop feuding, but Jane runs away in tears. Ronaldo shouts, “Oh, my oh-hime-sama” and falls on his face in tears. His insufferable weeb suffering is delicious.
Take two: Steven asks the kids about the history of the treaty. It turns out the restaurants agreed to work together to take down a place called The Everything Buffet, which had wrecked the boardwalk’s economy because no one could complete. “Operation: Let’s Get Cooking” commences.
Steven pretends to open a restaurant at the Temple, with romantic, moodlit dinner tables. Garnet is maitre’d, Pearl is a waitress and Amethyst is the chef. They serve Fryman some fries… with ketchup on the inside. And they serve Fryman… a pizza bagel with cream cheese. Fryman and Kofi are overwhelmed and beg Steven to close because they can’t compete, which Steven agrees to under the condition that they end the Restaurant War. Kofi and Fryman hug, Ronaldo manages to lift a thumbs up where he’s sobbing over his plate, and Steven asks for help cleaning up, to which the Gems reply that they’re on their break. End of episode.
And it’s… filler. Cute, Beach City filler. The hijinks of citizenry filler. We got the Gems towards the very end in adorable restaurant roles, but this episode doesn’t really add to our understanding of anyone’s characters. It adds to our grasp of Beach City history, maybe, but it’s clear that this lighthearted episode isn’t really trying to be anything but eleven cute minutes of… filler.
The anime touches, like the backgrounds as Amethyst and Steven cooked or Steven’s anime antagonist chuckle, are cute (though any time Ronaldo reveals his sweaty weeb side I break into shudders, remembering my high school days). I liked the gourmet fries arranged on a spiral. I like Kofi’s little pizza bagel commercial jingle joke. I like Onion lurking at Steven’s door being considered a line. But I can’t say I much liked this episode. Filler is filler, and the Restaurant War storyline was a little too annoying for mere moments of cuteness to counteract the stultifying feeling of a wasted episode.
The "In Too Deep" Steven Universe special event for season 3 kicked off with “Watermelon Island” and “Gem Drill ” back to back and ended with “Hit the Diamond.” Cartoon Network is delivering the " Summer of Steven" in the biggest Stevenbomb yet. Steven Universe will be airing new episodes every single weeknight for over a month, July 18 through Aug. 12, so make sure to check back with iDigitalTimes every weeknight after Steven Universe airs for recaps, analysis and news.
