SpongeBob SquarePants Cleanup

Not sure if the comment about the sister episode is necessary, but the rest seems good.

• Author's Saving Throw:
  • "Treats!" sort of feels like an apology letter for SpongeBob's behavior in "A Pal For Gary". The episode shows that SpongeBob will literally go around the world to make Gary happy.

• Many fans see "Plankton's Pet" as a big Throw the Dog a Bone moment for Plankton after "Plankton's Regular" and "One Coarse Meal". Likewise, "Enchanted Tiki Dreams" is one for Squidward.

• Season 9 in general is (mostly) considered an improvement over Seasons 6-8, mainly due to the fact that the writers have made the characters closer to their Season 1-3 selves.
• Seasons 9B and 10, when Stephen Hillenburg returned, have also gotten fans back, considering many fans hold in account that the show was good when he was involved.

• After suffering from They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character for about a decade, seasons 9B-12 have Bubble Bass as a more prominent supporting character. He gets minor roles in "Bulletin Board", "Larry the Floor Manager", "Krabby Patty Creature Feature", and major roles in "Squid Noir," "Moving Bubble Bass," and "Swamp Mates."

• Patrick becomes a true friend towards SpongeBob in Season 9 and onwards, like in Seasons 1-3 (with a few exceptions), while seasons 6-8 had fans asking for SpongeBob to just ditch Patrick.

• After the fan backlash to "Summer Job" ignoring Mr. Krabs' and Mrs. Puff's romantic relationship in "Krusty Love", the Season 10 premiere "Whirly Brains" revealed the two have been dating for years, seemingly rendering "Summer Job" non-canon.

• After fans expressed disappointment that Pearl didn't even get mentioned in "Girls' Night Out" despite the episode focusing on the other major female characters (Sandy, Mrs. Puff, and Karen), "A Cabin in the Kelp" has Pearl become a member of the Gal Pals.

• Post second movie seasons' use of lavish expressive and fluid animation after years of stiff and stilted, almost Family Guy-esque animation from s6-9A was a breath of fresh air for many fans (even if this change still had its detractors.)

• Post second movie seasons' stories and comedy. After years of safe and boring plots which tried a bit too hard to emulate style of earlier seasons and comedy which was unfunny and predictible with fair dose of gross-out and toilet humor, more trippy and surreal storytelling and comedy nowadays is seen as welcomed change. Not everyone are fans of this style, but the show feels fresher than ever, somehow managing to pull off many interesting ideas pretty late into show's run.

• "Gary's New Toy" can be considered one to "Dumped" due to following the same general idea of "Gary ignores Spongebob in order to hang out with someone/something else", but executing it much better due to a better buildup of Gary leaving Spongebob, and he apologizes of his own volition in the end.

Edited by PlasmaPower on May 21st 2021 at 7:16:46 AM

• Badass Decay: Plankton.
  • Sandy Cheeks, to a limited extent. In Seasons 1-3, she was the squirrel version of Chuck Norris, and did things such as lift buildings and throw them. Starting from Season 4, her Gadgeteer Genius side has been focused on more. Starting from Season 9, most episodes (such as "Squirrel Record" and "Surf N' Turf") involving Sandy include both aspects of her personality.

Plankton is a ZCE. Sandy, I'm not too sure about. Just because one side of her personality has been focused on dosen't mean she decayed. I think as a long as she's still protrayed as the badass she is in the episodes where she's athletic, then that dosen't make her an example.

I agree with your Author's Saving Throw assessment.

I think Plankton would count with context. I don't think Sandy quite counts because even as a scientist she still does badass things like make complex inventions. I don't think she's depicted as physically weaker either. It's more of a character shift than a derailment.

I think there could be an Author's Saving Throw entry to be had if people didn't like how focused the writers were on her scientifics over her athletics after Season 3, which Season 9 addressed.

Edited by PlasmaPower on May 21st 2021 at 9:40:41 AM

The Sponge Bob Square Pants S 7 E 131 Keep Bikini Bottom Beautiful A Pal For Gary seems to have some complaining, with these entries standing out (not in validity, but in the way they're written):

• Jerkass Woobie: Squidward. After watching this episode, Squidward's selfish attitude becomes extremely understandable.
• Rooting for the Empire: No small amount of people actually wanted Puffy Fluffy to kill/eat SpongeBob due to the latter's obnoxious attitude in this episode.
• What An Idiot: It's astonishing how oblivious SpongeBob is to the torture Puffy Fluffy is giving Gary.

Those are very complain-y. Requesting more input as to whether they need a cut or rewrite though.

I say rewrite. They seem to be valid reactions IMO.

How about this for a rewrite?:

• Jerkass Woobie: Squidward's selfish attitude becomes understandable with him spending the episode constantly getting tickets for supposed littering. At least Squilliam gets humiliated too.
• Rooting for the Empire: Several fans irritated by SpongeBob grabbing the Idiot Ball admitted to wanting Puffy Fluffy to eat him.
• What An Idiot: SpongeBob seems completely oblivious to how dangerous Puffy Fluffy is, with him witnessing Puffy trying to eat Gary and somehow thinking Gary is the one hurting the other.

Looks good to me.

Yea, although I was thinking of copy pasting the WAI entry from WhatAnIdiot.Sponge Bob Squarepants.

I noticed these two entries on Sponge Bob Square Pants S 7 E 131 Keep Bikini Bottom Beautiful A Pal For Gary

• Laser-Guided Karma: After everything SpongeBob did throughout Puffy Fluffy's stay, the monster rightfully rewards him for his jerkish behavior toward Gary by nearly devouring him whole, to the point of even silencing him with one of his prehensile tongues.

• Karma Houdini: SpongeBob suffers no consequences for treating Gary poorly, aside from almost getting Eaten Alive. Likewise, Puffy Fluffy is last seen breaking through a wall and running off into the distance without any punishment either.

He either got karma or he didn't, which one is it?

On a side note, I really don't know what Laser-Guided Karma even is anymore. The title implies that it's supposed to be instant karma, but it just ends up being used as any time a character gets comeuppance for their actions. I also feel like a lot of people forget that Tropes Are Flexible and never list anytime something good happens to someone who did good.

EDIT: Also, I just want to point out that the episode's image caption is kind of complain-y. I was thinking of replacing it with something like what SpongeBob is saying in that scene.

Edited by PlasmaPower on May 27th 2021 at 4:43:50 PM

Karma Houdini example feels a little weak. It even says he was almost eaten alive, so you can't say there were no consequences.

I rewrote The Woobie entry for A Pal For Gary, although I can't tell if describing SpongeBob as a "dumb jerk" is veering into complaining or an accurate description of him in the episode.

• The Woobie: It's pretty easy to feel bad for Gary in this episode, being terrorized by Fluffy Puffy and SpongeBob being a dumb jerk towards him for not accepting his new pet throughout the episode. Saving his owner at the end was also pretty thankless, SpongeBob scolding him for driving Puffy Fluffy off.

On a side note, I doubt that SpongeBob almost being eaten by Fluffy was a result of being a jerk to Gary, it literally doesn't have the sapience to tell that. Asshole Victim might be a more accurate trope if I'm honest.

Edited by PlasmaPower on May 27th 2021 at 8:26:48 AM

Is it just me, or does this episode seem to be Spongebob's Brawl In The Family?

I'd say it's more like "No Such Luck" is The Loud House's "A Pal For Gary." Every show (especially kids' shows) has that one episode that just drives fans nuts and gets repeatedly exaggerated to be worse than it is.

"Most hated episode ever" might be a stretch. Is it really detested outside of the dedicated cartoon community that really cares about newer seasons of Spongebob?

Edited by mightymewtron on May 27th 2021 at 9:11:55 AM

I would go as far as to say it's one of the most hated episodes of any show ever made; it's had a reputation as one of the show's worst since long before The Loud House came out.

...Eh, that's a bit of a stretch to me. It couldn't be quite as hated as the ending to How I Met Your Mother or Spock's Brain, for example.

Well, it's definitely one of the most hated episodes of any animated show, at least; and I'm guessing that's a safe bet because even people outside the "cartoon community" hate the new seasons, but all the credible "worst episodes of TV shows" lists I can find exclusively focus on live-action shows.

Also, I don't think the hatred towards "Spock's Brain" is anywhere near the hatred for the finale of How I Met Your Mother, considering I've never heard about it until now (Though I'm not much of a Star Trek fan, so...)

I was just trying to think of examples of hated episodes. I don't think that many people outside of the animation world regularly watch and know about SpongeBob episodes, jokes, etc.

From a brief look, "A Pal for Gary" is the lowest-rated episode of the show on IMDB, with a rating 3.3.

"A Pal For Gary", "No Such Luck", "Arthur's Big Hit", "Everyone Knows It's Bendy", "Arnold Betrays Iggy", "Princess Spike"; The list can go on. (although in MLP's case there's also a couple of other episodes that have that reaction due to just how rocky the writing of the show can be throughout, rather just having a single point where it really sucked.)

I'd equate "Brawl In The Family" or "April Fools Rules" to "One Coarse Meal" more than anything.

Wouldn't be surprised if that was because of Enter's fanbase review bombing it.

Edited by PlasmaPower on May 30th 2021 at 10:20:56 AM

I saw this entry on SpongeBob's character page.

• Jerkass Ball: Not as much as other unpleasant characters in the show, but he still has his moments throughout the series where he's ruder and less sympathetic than usual, especially evident during the post-movie seasons. While he's more prone to insensitivity, he can even have a mean streak at times.
  • In "Choir Boys", he seems to be tormenting Squidward deliberately in an attempt to get the latter to listen to him sing and let him come with him to his choir audition.
  • In "A Pal for Gary", he acts like an insensitive jerk to Gary, even after Gary saved his life. Not to mention, he also ignores the saleswoman's warnings and steals a pet from said saleswoman's store.
  • He reaches a new level in "Demolition Doofus". While him injuring Mrs. Puff was an accident, he shows absolutely no remorse whatsoever for his actions, and makes jokes about her situation instead of apologizing.
  • In "Pranks a Lot", he and Patrick go around terrorizing other townspeople pretending to be ghosts for their prank. They even go as far as to trespass other peoples' property to do so, and even block up the Krusty Krab and threaten to burn Mr. Krabs' dollar.
  • In "The Great Snail Race", he pushes Gary to participate in a snail race, which Gary didn't even want to participate in, and harshly trains him to the point of exhaustion, all just because he feels like Squidward thought his snail was better than Gary and wanted to rub it in Squidward's face that Gary could win the race. He at least feels remorseful about it at the end of the episode.
  • In "Survival of the Idiots", he and Patrick taunt Sandy while she's hibernating and steal her fur to keep themselves warm.
  • He spends the majority of "Blackened Sponge" vainly boasting about his black eye and generally just being very arrogant, rude, pretentious and obnoxious to everyone else throughout the episode. He immediately snaps out of it and comes clean when it's revealed the bad guy in his dream was real.
  • In "Slide Whistle Stooges", he and Patrick seemed to be deliberately annoying Squidward with their slide whistles for their own amusement, and/or to get him to play along with them.
  • He also seemed to be deliberately going out of his way to bother Squidward in "Boating Buddies", as he stopped in the middle of brushing Gary's shell just to go outside and supposedly listen to Squidward breathe. He also acts rather harassing toward Squidward while the two are in class together, doing things such as randomly touching him and staring at him while breathing heavily.
  • In "Waiting", he acts rather rude and hostile toward his friends while impatiently waiting for his toy to arrive in the mail. He at least realizes later on in the episode and feels remorseful.
  • He acts hostile toward Gary and neglects to feed him in "Have You Seen This Snail?", prompting Gary to run away. Again, he at least has a Jerkass Realization later on in the episode and regrets what he did.
  • He acts rather bossy and self-centered in "Party Pooper Pants", as he tries to force everyone else to go by his schedule and whines whenever something doesn't go as he planned. Not to mention, it's also heavily implied that he cut Squidward's cables just to get him to come over to his house.
  • In "Frankendoodle", he and Patrick use the giant pencil they found to play pranks on Squidward for their own amusement. Downplayed, as he at least shows concern when DoodleBob starts beating Squidward up.

There's so many entries, I'm starting to wonder if this is just Depending on the Writer since this seems more like a trend rather than individual moments.

Edited by PlasmaPower on May 30th 2021 at 10:27:05 AM

Annoying Squidward is kind of a core trait of his, so I find it hard to say that he's acting out of character for that. Other examples are also him being more misguided than malicious, so not Jerkass Ball. Also going off what you said, many episodes follow the trend of:

SpongeBob does something childish or messes up -> someone gets hurt physically or emotionally -> SpongeBob fixes his mistake.

Those examples feel like SpongeBob's standard for mean behavior, so any examples would have to be clearly worse than that.

An overview based on what I remember:

• "Choir Boys": This one might qualify, because him responding to Squidward's suffering with "Now I have a captive audience!" is really callous for his character, and he knows Squidward is stuck so it can't even be brushed off as idiocy.
• "A Pal for Gary": Unsure whether it's closer to this or the Idiot Ball. He's cruel to Gary because he's too stupid to realize it's Puffy Fluffy torturing Gary.
• "Demolition Doofus": That was Spongebob being a careless dumbass, but not necessarily OOC. Him trying to make a joke was him nervously trying to add levity to the situation, not deliberately mocking her.
• "Pranks a Lot": Not really OOC, as Spongebob's always been a bit of a prankster, and he only stops when it becomes really obviously painful (if he can recognize the situation as painful that is).
• "The Great Snail Race": Keep. His training of Gary is way more brutal than how he usually acts and it's only because he wants to show up Squidward's snail, so it's much more selfish than Spongebob usually behaves towards Gary.
• "Survival of the Idiots": They were messing around but not callously so, and they steal her fur because they would literally freeze to death otherwise. Plus I think stealing her fur was Patrick's idea and he's always been a bit more of a clueless jerk.
• "Blackened Sponge": I don't remember this episode super well but I guess maybe he had Acquired Situational Narcissism cuz he lied about being a hero?
• "Slide Whistle Stooges": A standard plot concept: he and Patrick mess around trying to get Squidward to have fun despite the latter not really being into it, and then Squidward gets really into it by the end. Not OOC for Spongebob, and not very cruel.
• "Boating Buddies": Another case of Spongebob acting stupid and creepy without trying to be. It's a creepy episode but he's not really acting like a jerk, at least not in an OOC way.
• "Waiting": Probably a keeper since it was a deliberate decision to make him act like a dick and then realize it later.
• "Have You Seen This Snail?" Similar to the above, though it's more out of clueless neglect than active spite.
• "Party Pooper Pants": From what I remember, he did act pretty selfish in this episode, but IDK if Spongebob obsessing over things going to schedule and tricking Squidward into coming to his house is very OOC.
• "Frankendoodle": Another case of Spongebob doing pranks, which is standard, and then feeling bad and trying to stop it when things go wrong, which is also standard.

I do agree that Depending on the Writer plays a big role here as well.