PAW Patrol

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
No job is too big, no pup is too small!

PAW Patrol is an animated preschool series created by Spin Master. It premiered on Nickelodeon's Nick Jr. block on August 12, 2013 in America, and on TVO Kids on August 27, 2013 in Canada.

The show entered its seventh season on March 27, 2020. It follows a 10-year-old boy named Ryder, who, along with his pups Marshall, Rubble, Chase, Rocky, Zuma, and Skye, help out the citizens of Adventure Bay. The PAW Patrol are later joined by Everest, Tracker, twin dogs Tuck & Ella, and Rex, who respectively debuted in Seasons 2, 3, 6, and 7.

Despite being aimed at preschoolers, it has a surprisingly big fanbase among teenagers and adults.

A theatrical movie is currently in the works and is aiming for a release on August 20, 2021.

Not to be confused with the Princeton Alumni Weekly.

Tropes used in PAW Patrol include:
  • All CGI Cartoon
  • Aluminum Christmas Trees: The episode Pups Save Friendship Day has the residents of Adventure Bay celebrate the titular holiday. What many don't realize, however, is that there actually is such a thing as Friendship Day, but the day it happens each year varies in every country.
  • Animals Not to Scale: Tracker is rather large for a Chihuahua.
  • Art Evolution: The animation has continually improved as of Season 2, with higher quality textures. In fact, it got even better during Season 8.
  • Art Shift: When Ryder calls the team to the Lookout, the mission briefings shown on the Lookout screen are 2D-animated.
  • Base on Wheels:
    • The PAW Patroller, introduced in the Season 2 episode The New Pup.
    • Beginning with the Season 4 episode Mission PAW: Quest for the Crown, the Mission PAW Cruiser is used for Mission PAW rescues.
    • The Dino Patroller introduced in Dino Rescue: Pups and the Lost Dino Eggs helps the pups travel to the Dino Wilds.
  • Bedsheet Ghost: One appears during the appropriately titled Pups Save a Ghost. Said ghost turns out to actually be Marshall sleepwalking.
  • Cats Are Mean:
    • Averted with Cali. She can be snarky at times, but is otherwise friendly.
    • Played straight with the Kitten Catastrophe Crew and the Copycat.
  • Color-Coded Characters: Each of the pups has a differently colored uniform:
    • Marshall is red.
    • Zuma is orange.
    • Rubble is yellow.
    • Rex is chartreuse and cerulean.
    • Tracker is olive green.
    • Rocky is green.
    • Everest is teal.
    • Tuck & Ella are both sky blue and silver.
    • Chase is dark blue.
    • Skye is pink.
  • Cool Airship: The Air Patroller, introduced in the Season 3 episode Air Pups.
  • Denser and Wackier: While it was never a realistic show to begin with, it wasn't until either the second or third season that the plots and rescues began to become more outlandish and bizarre in nature.
  • Draco in Leather Pants: In-Universe example: Even though Mayor Humdinger's kitties usual follow his orders, Rubble thinks that they're cute.
  • Dramatic Irony: The audience, as well as Mayor Humdinger, Harold, and the Ladybird, are well aware that Mr. Nibbles is the Copycat, but neither the PAW Patrol nor Hailey knows this.
  • Early Installment Weirdness:
    • The animation in Season 1 looks brighter and more plasticky compared to the rest of the series.
    • Chase originally had an allergy to both kittens and feathers. His feather allergy seems to have disappeared after the Season 2 episode Pups Save the Penguins[1].
    • In Season 1, Chase would usually say "Ready for action, Ryder, sir!" instead of "PAW Patrol, ready for action, Ryder, sir!"
    • In a few Season 1 episodes, whenever Ryder called the pups, the pups would respond with "Ryder's calling!" instead of "Ryder needs us!"
    • In the first 2 seasons, Apollo was gray. But as of Season 3, he is now white.
  • Elmuh Fudd Syndwome: Zuma in Season 1. He gradually loses it as the series goes on, however. After he gets a new voice actor in early-mid Season 4, he loses it completely.
  • Enfant Terrible:
    • Sweetie from the Mission PAW episodes. She really wants to be the Queen of Barkingburg.
    • Mayor Humdinger's nephew, Harold Humdinger, who appears to be about the same age as Ryder, from the Mighty Pups/Super PAWs episodes.
  • Evil Brit: Sweetie, who resides in Barkingburg, which is the show's fictional equivalent of the UK.
  • Evil Counterpart: Mayor Humdinger and his Kitten Catastrophe Crew are this to Ryder and the PAW Patrol.
  • Fountain of Youth: In Pups Save Baby Humdinger, Tracker dreams that Mayor Humdinger turns into a baby after drinking coconut milk from an abnormally colored coconut. Tracker gets stuck babysitting him while his owner Carlos and Marshall return to the jungle to find another golden coconut to change Humdinger back.
  • Freaky Friday Flip: Chase dreams that this happens to him and Chickaletta in Pups Save a Freaky Pup-Day.
  • Heroic Dogs: Duh.
    • Sweetie and Arrby, however, avert this trope. The former's main goal is to become queen of Barkingburg, while the latter, though more of an Anti-Villain, takes orders from his owner, Sid Swashbuckle the Pirate.
  • Home Base: The Lookout.
  • My Hovercraft Is Full of Eels: In Sea Patrol: Pups Save a Frozen Flounder, Francois tries to communicate to the PAW Patrol using flag semaphore, but hilariously fails, resulting in this exchange:

Francois: It... was not... Francois'... fault!

Skye: What's he saying with the flags?

Ryder: It looks like he's signaling, "My cheese needs a hat?" What?

  • Non-Indicative Name: The episode Pups Save Alex actually involves the PAW Patrol saving Cali with Alex's help.
  • Non Standard Character Design:
    • Ella has a pink nose, unlike all the other pups, who have black noses.
    • Mr. Nibbles/The Copycat from the Mighty Pups, Charged Up sub-series has a very different look from the other cats we've seen in the show (here's a pic of Cali for reference).
  • Our Werebeasts Are Different: In Pups and the Werepuppy, Uncle Otis tells Ryder and the pups a story about werepuppies. According to the story, in order for a pup to become a werepuppy, they have to be standing in water under the full moon, and to change back to normal, the werepuppy has to sniff a special sunflower. Rocky then proceeds to have a dream where he becomes a werepuppy after washing a marshmallow off of his nose.
  • Palette Swap: Sylvia from Pups Save a Herd looks just like Chase, but with blue fur, purple eyes, and eyelashes.
  • Reality Ensues: Series-wide, even though Rocky often temporarily faces his fear of water, it doesn't mean that his fear is permanently gone.
  • Show Within a Show: Some episodes feature Apollo the Super-Pup, a show the PAW Patrol, especially Rubble, are fans of.
  • Sixth Ranger: Everest, Tracker, the twins, and Rex are usually only called for missions respectively involving either snow, jungle, superhero, or dinosaur rescues.
  • Talking Animals: The dogs. Curiously, none of the other animals have the same ability. Until the introduction of Mr. Nibbles/the Copycat, that is.
  • You Fail Physics Forever: Tends to happen a lot, most notably whenever Marshall goofs up.
  • Your Tomcat Is Pregnant:
    • In Pups Save the Parrot, Ryder's friend Carlos gets a pet parrot named Mateo. But when they discover that "he" laid an egg, Carlos renames his parrot Matea.
    • In Pups Save Chickaletta's Egg, it's revealed that Francois' alligator Jimmy laid eggs some time ago. Upon discovering this, Francois renames her Jenny.
  1. Season 2, Episode 2A