Recap / SpongeBob SquarePants S 6 E 9 "Boating Buddies" / "The Krabby Kronicle"

Original air date: 8/7/2008 (produced in 2007)

Squidward is given a ticket for speeding while trying to get away from SpongeBob. His sentence: traffic school at Mrs. Puff's Boating School, and guess who his classmate is?

Boating Buddies contains examples of:

• Alliterative Title: Boating Buddies, of course.
• "Begone" Bribe: Early in the episode, Squidward offers SpongeBob five dollars if he would leave Squidward alone. SpongeBob agrees, but it turns out that Squidward doesn't have enough money for that since he already gave five dollars to SpongeBob for the same reason yesterday.
• Big "WHAT?!": Squidward shouts this to SpongeBob after he keeps shouting his name over and over. SpongeBob actually wanted to give him his car keys.
• Break the Cutie: SpongeBob is deeply hurt when Squidward chides him during the written test and refuses help from him anymore. He is so hurt that he took Squidward's words to heart and refuses to pick up his pencil for him when he couldn't get it.
• Brick Joke: The buff fish beats up Squidward in the bathroom after the latter thought he was SpongeBob. Later, the buff fish walks into the bathroom stall again right when Squidward is teleported there, leading to him being beat up again.
• The Bus Came Back: When SpongeBob is driving recklessly, he almost hits an old lady that turns out to be Granny from "Have You Seen This Snail?", only she is now voiced by Sirena Irwin instead of Amy Poehler.
• Characterization Marches On: SpongeBob reveals near the end he never got one answer right on the written test; this contrasts with "Boating School" back in the first season when he knew every answer to the oral test.
• The Cat Came Back: A brief example. Squidward tries to avoid eating lunch with SpongeBob. He tries to eat next to some garbage cans and then inside a bathroom. This ends when Squidward mistakes a tough muscular fish for SpongeBob and gets beat up for his troubles.
• Comically Missing the Point: When Mrs. Puff asks SpongeBob to explain his side of Squidward's story of why is he attending Boating School, he draws a "SpongeBob + Squidward, Best Boating Buddies 4-ever" picture on the chalkboard, much to the confusion of the students and to Squidward's annoyance.
• Commonality Connection:
  Squidward: I was trying to get away from him! [points at SpongeBob who is gazing at him creepily] He is the bane of my existence!
  Mrs. Puff: Yours too?
• Continuity Nod:
  • During the driving lesson, Squidward and SpongeBob fight over the wheel of the boat, similar to "Pizza Delivery".
  • Much like in “Jellyfishing,” Squidward is seen in a full body cast. Although unlike that episode, Squidward is able to speak fluently with the cast in this episode.
• Downer Ending: For Squidward, he and SpongeBob fail the boating test and have to come back to school next week.
• Eating Lunch Alone: Squidward wants to sit at the lunch table at boating school, but refuses to sit with SpongeBob, so he has to eat alone behind a dumpster "just like in grade school". That didn't end when SpongeBob pops up from a trash can and Squidward goes to eat alone in a bathroom.
• Idiot Houdini: SpongeBob, for being the reason Squidward is trapped in boating school, and for stalking Squidward in the classroom.
• Karma Houdini: As far as we know, the buff fish who beat up Squidward twice did not receive any punishment.
• Negative Continuity: Squidward is never shown at Boating School the next episode on. It is possible that Squidward was able to pass boating school off-screen.
• Rage Breaking Point: When Squidward fails the written test due to his injury getting in the way, he finds out he has to come back next week to re-take it, causing him to scream.
• "The Reason You Suck" Speech: Squidward gives one to SpongeBob after all the pain he received throughout the episode because of him.
  Squidward: How many times do I have to tell you?! I am not your buddy! I don't need your help, and I don't need you, ever! Now just kindly let me take this stupid test, so I can get out of here and never have to see you again for the rest of my life!
  SpongeBob: (sadly) Okay, Squidward... if that's the way you want it.
• The Scream: Squidward screams loud and very long at the very end when he fails the written test and after SpongeBob reveals he also failed the test and is looking forward to seeing his boating buddy again.
• Shout-Out:
  • After Squidward is splashed with his hot beverage, SpongeBob shouts "Coffee rain!" When Squidward tells him it's hot chocolate, SpongeBob shouts "Chocolate Rain!"
  • When SpongeBob drives through the Costume Supplies shop, Mrs. Puff is dressed like Jason Voorhees.
• Stalker without a Crush: SpongeBob to Squidward, even more than usual.
• Suddenly Shouting:
  SpongeBob: Didn't you used to have one of those cucumber bicycles?
  Squidward: Oh, (laughs) that was a recumbent bicycle, and I sold it.
  SpongeBob: Why?
  Squidward: SO I COULD GET FURTHER AWAY FROM YOU! (rushes off)
• Tempting Fate: When SpongeBob offers to help Squidward with the final test, Squidward tells him "I don't need your help, and I don't need you! Ever!". Unfortunately, he ends up needing his help when his pencil ends up rolling out under the classroom door, and SpongeBob refuses to help him now.
• Title Drop: SpongeBob refers to him and Squidward as "boating buddies" when he sits next to him, and when he draws a picture on the chalkboard. Squidward insists that he doesn't want to be SpongeBob's friend and he wants to be alone. When Squidward ends up needing help on the test, he has no choice but to turn to SpongeBob, begrudgingly accepting him as his boating buddy.
• Verbal Backspace:
  • When Mrs. Puff speaks to the students:
    Mrs. Puff: Okay class, how about we get to know our new students, by telling each other why we were sentenced to— I mean, why we are enrolled in boating school.
  • Then Mrs. Puff says "Yours, too?" when Squidward says that SpongeBob is the bane of his existence. She corrects herself by asking him to come to the board and draw a diagram of how he got to boating school.
• Vitriolic Best Buds: SpongeBob considers him and Squidward boating buddies, much to the dismay of the latter.
• What Could Possibly Go Wrong?: Squidward says a variant of this as he is sent to boating school. Then SpongeBob open the doors.

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Original air date: 8/8/2008 (produced in 2007)

Mr. Krabs decides to go into the publishing business, with SpongeBob as his star reporter. But SpongeBob faces a dilemma when Mr. Krabs asks him to "embellish" his stories by writing lies about his friends, which hurts them in the process.

The Krabby Kronicle contains examples of:

• Accidental Truth: Patrick and the pole are actually married.
• An Aesop:
  • Don’t say anything about your friends that’s untrue as it could hurt their feelings.
  • If you are a journalist, watch what you're writing. Don't write fake things or exaggerate things just to sell more, it might cause scandals.
  • Don't mistreat your employees or force them to do stuff at the expense of others.
• Arson, Murder, and Jaywalking:
  • When mentioning how Mr. Krabs ruined their lives, Plankton says he lost his business, Larry is being bullied by all the kids in town, and Mrs. Puff had to go back to watching daytime television.
  • When SpongeBob is looking for news to report, he sees a monster and a bank robbery. What he decides to report is Patrick watching a bus stop.
• Bad Boss: Mr. Krabs! He threatens SpongeBob to swallow his guilt over the phony news stories or he'll lose his spatula. SpongeBob exaggerates this a little in his news story by claiming he's an underage, overworked employee who is given a meager salary (which is technically true because SpongeBob has been out searching stories to write about).
• Big "WHAT?!": Plankton shouts an incredulous "WHAT?!" when he reads the article Spongebob wrote about him making chum out of Bikini Bottom residents.
• Blackmail: Mr. Krabs threatens SpongeBob by saying that if he doesn't do what he says, he'll take SpongeBob's spatula away.
• Brick Joke: Early in the episode, Mr. Krabs changes SpongeBob's story of Patrick watching a pole to him marrying a pole. At the end, Patrick and his "wife" appear at the Krusty Krab.
• Counterfeit Cash: After his newspaper goes under, Mr. Krabs decides to use the printing press to make money.
• Didn't Think This Through: Mr. Krabs forces SpongeBob to write lies about people and ruin their lives or risk being fired. He failed to realize that by telling him that, SpongeBob could also ruin his life as well.
• The Dog Bites Back: In order to get revenge for making him ruin everybody's lives, SpongeBob writes about Mr. Krabs torturing him, forcing him to write stories that lie and ruin other people's lives and keeping the money for himself, only caring for the money and not caring about others.
• Even Evil Has Standards:
  • Plankton calls out Mr. Krabs for writing lies about him.
    Plankton: I lost my restaurant because of you! And I thought I was evil...
  • Mr. Krabs's usual obsession with money and how much he hates to spend it implies that he'll keep the Counterfeit Cash at the end to himself.
• Everyone Has Standards: Unsurprisingly, SpongeBob feels guilty when his fraud stories cause the Chum Bucket to be shut down.
• Exact Words: SpongeBob is told by Mr. Krabs to write humiliating lies about people. The latter never said not to write lies about him.
• Feigning Intelligence: SpongeBob's second-to-last story is about how the "bushy-tailed brainiac" Sandy is really a "slow-witted squirrel". This story causes Sandy to lose her science awards.
  Sandy: (reading) "Sandy Cheeks or Sandy Chump? Bushy tailed brainiac really a slow-witted squirrel, by...SpongeBob SquarePants?"
• Hoist by His Own Petard: Mr. Krabs faces one himself when an angry mob comes in the Krusty Krab and calls him out when SpongeBob wrote a story that revealed that Mr. Krabs is the mastermind behind the lies that he forced SpongeBob to write about. It's about time that Mr. Krabs gets A Taste Of His Own Medicine.
  Mr.Krabs: (reading) "Krabs Overworks Employees? Reaps Reward? Krabby Kronicle mastermind behind bogus stories pays his tired, underage reporter pennies while he rakes in the dough?!"
• Hot Pursuit: One story claims that Mrs. Puff was in a high-speed chase with a police officer. Unfortunately, this ruins her boating school.
• Immoral Journalist: Played with. Upon seeing the potential of money being made from newspapers, Mr. Krabs sets up his own newspaper business aptly named the Krabby Kronicle with SpongeBob as his reporter. However, things get out of hand when Mr. Krabs tells SpongeBob to "embellish" his stories. Being The Ditz that he is, SpongeBob goes around taking pictures of everyone in Bikini Bottom and writes out-of-context stories from them. This turns the newspaper brand into a huge success, but at the expense of ruining people's lives through lies. Eventually, SpongeBob starts realizing that writing juicy stories isn't worth hurting other people's feelings in response tries to tell Mr. Krabs to stop, but he becomes too self-absorbed in his wealth by that point and threatens to take away SpongeBob's fry cooking job is he doesn't do what he says. In a clever act of karma, SpongeBob decides to twist Mr. Krabs's threat into a story to make it seem like he's a child being unfairly overworked and underpaid (which pretty much what happened), and combined with the testimonies of the other offended victims, results in everyone boycotting the business and taking back all the money earned from it.
• "It" Is Dehumanizing: The scientists who confiscate Sandy's science awards refer to her this way under the belief she's dumb, thanks to the news headline.
• Karma Houdini: While the customers get their money back from Mr. Krabs for the made-up stories in the newspapers, it’s not the end for Krabs, as he uses the printing press to make Counterfeit Cash.
• Lack of Empathy: Mr. Krabs is all over this in this episode, even with his girlfriend Mrs. Puff, whom Mr. Krabs has previously stated to be one of his two loves.
• Mundane Made Awesome: How SpongeBob modified what he saw throughout the episode.
• Obliviously Evil: Mr. Krabs. Best illustrated when he responds to SpongeBob's concern about the newspaper:
  Mr. Krabs: How many times do I have to tell you, boy? We're not hurting anyone!
• Pint-Sized Powerhouse: SpongeBob wrote a story about a small fish who punched Larry in the gut as though the "pipsqueak" was beating up Larry. Granted, the punch did make Larry recoil and it did result in Larry getting kicked out of the gym.
  Larry: (reading) "Larry the loser gets beaten up by pipsqueak?"
• The Secret of Long Pork Pies: In one story, it's told that Plankton's chum is made out of citizens, resulting in Health Inspector Yellowtail shutting down the Chum Bucket. This is actually a Truth in Television moment as chum is made out of fish entrails.
  Plankton: (reading) "Plankton's chum made of your chums? The Chum Bucket serves your friends in more ways than one? WHAT?!"
• Shamed by a Mob: In this episode, the mob shames Mr. Krabs. After SpongeBob releases his last story, the entire population of Bikini Bottom shows up at the Krusty Krab, furious over Krabs's abuse of SpongeBob and forcing him to write lies about all of them.
• Sympathy for the Devil: SpongeBob feels upset for even Plankton when his forged stories about his cooking resulted in shutting down the Chum Bucket.
• Take a Third Option: SpongeBob is forced to write humiliating lies about his friends in Mr. Krabs's new newspaper enterprise. Faced with the choice of either continuing to write the stories and destroying the lives of his friends or refusing and getting fired from his beloved fry cook job, he instead chooses to hoist Krabs by his own petard and publish an article in the paper that Mr. Krabs is the mastermind behind the bogus news stories. The paper's readers are so outraged that they storm the Krusty Krab and take all their money back.
• A Taste Of His Own Medicine: How SpongeBob gets back at Mr. Krabs.
• Unusually Uninteresting Sight: While looking for his first story, SpongeBob sees a bank robbery, thugs going on a rampage, a fire in the background, and a mystery monster climbing out of a manhole.
  SpongeBob: No news to report here.
• Worst News Judgement Ever: As a newspaper reporter, SpongeBob's first article is "Local Resident Watches Pole".

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