I have a love hate relationship with Steven Universe comics. The ongoing is great, but up until recently it's just a lot of filler stories like, "What if Steven set up a lemonade stand" or "What if Steven played a video game." Sometimes we get more interesting stories, like the current arc of the ongoing or last year's harmony mini-series. There's also the original graphic novels. Some of them have been okay, but this one is great! Check out my review of Camp Pining Play after the jump.
Disclaimer: I was sent a copy of Steven Universe: Camp Pining Play courtesy of BOOM! Studios.
Opinions are my own.
When Peridot and Lapis discover Camp Pining Play fanfiction, they fall in love with Lars’ secret story and decide to put on a live performance for Beach City! With Steven, Connie, and the Crystal Gems, Peridot and Lapis become true thespians and work together to find a solution when parts of the story remind Lapis of her time with Jasper and jeopardize the play’s production.
This is hands down the best Steven Universe graphic novel since Too Cool For School. Something about the last few have just been off, mainly due to the art styles being very different and the stories being… blah.
But this one was great! It’s all about Lapis and Peridot putting on a play which, to be fair, is a very generic and boring idea for a story and it plays out exactly as generic and boring as you’d expect a “let’s do a play” story to go, but one of my professors always said the key to a great film is simple plot, complex characters.
Since the story follows a play based on a fanfic that ships two characters from a TV show, it’s only appropriate that this story is basically an official Lapis/Peridot ship (Lapidot as it is known) fanfic. They’re the complete focus on the story with Steven not even showing up for almost 40 pages and then barely being involved in anything to do with the actual story after that.
While the whole “let’s put on a play” thing is kinda simple and goofy, the story eventually gets serious as all stories starring Lapis eventually do. This actually took me by surprise since before this was just a fun and silly story and even though Lapis stories always go this way I still didn’t really see it coming.
I love the current ongoing story arc featuring Lars of the Stars and the Off-Colors because it’s just so refreshing to see something that isn’t about Steven or even from his point of view. He’s basically just here for a running joke about burgers.
Camp Pining Play is now available everywhere books are sold. Click here to order a copy for yourself.
