Rolling right along in our start of season 5, we've got "Rise and Shine". Honestly these short episodes are what's gonna save me with making sure I hit all the reviews this month for real lol. Unfortunately, I can't quite muster up such positive affect for this episode though, because man is it a boring one. This episode is so very interesting since it is a short one, and also because it does follow a character we don’t typically follow throughout the day, which is Patrick. Though to SpongeBob's question, no, no I don't wonder about Patrick's mornings. And this episode tells me exactly why I do not.
Patrick being scared of his alarm was very…not funny. And him thinking it was sentient wasn’t that great. I liked that one completely done face he made though. See as we go on I get increasingly annoyed about hearing this alarm sound. Luckily the sound mixers knew what they were doing and made it not very unbearable, but it’s more the principle of having this alarm go off for minutes on end that annoys me. It doesn’t help that I’m not being distracted by it because 2 minutes in (half of the episode, by the way) and I have yet to laugh. Thankfully the weird “SpongeBob” pillow falls on the alarm and it ends that whole thing, so praise. And then we see Patrick learning that his canned food is in fact canned food, and it’s…boring. The seconds and seconds we spend on Patrick trying to get the food out of the can like it is a dog are extremely dull and there’s nothing funny happening.
For some reason, scenes in this episode are very slow which makes absolutely no sense because this is a short. Scenes should not be breathing here, we should be going rapid-fire. And "Rise and Shine" doesn’t seem to understand that until about 3 minutes and 25 seconds in, when there’s 35 seconds left of the episode. At the very least, this section of Patrick officially getting ready for the day after realizing he’s late is entertaining, a first for this episode. I love how Gary was apparently there for no reason, and the way Patrick says “pants” catches me off-guard.
Yeah Patrick is extremely dumb in this episode, and this episode is boring and not funny. And this is why I don’t think Patrick can carry an episode entirely on his own. Dumbness is not funny by itself for the most part unless it has something to play off of, typically another, brighter character. Not just because that character will say “you’re dumb”, but because that dumbness can lead somewhere other than a character not knowing basic facts about life. And this isn’t me knocking The Patrick Star Show so don’t even start, because that show has a variety of characters that means that even though it’s led by Patrick, he gets those dynamics and interactions he need to make his iconic character trait work well.
In general, this episode is just...not great. I wouldn't call it bad, because nothing really happens so I can't call it good or bad. I thought about putting it in my "Okay" tier for that exact reason, but that dang alarm went off for just so long at the beginning. Other than the annoyance I felt from that thing, this episode doesn't exactly inspire any feeling at all in me, other than boredom. Which also isn't a good feeling, but for episodes that do that and little else, those are typically in my "Okay" tier. This episode is a step below that, belonging in "Mediocre".
Episode Tier: Mediocre
Episode Score: 5.8/10
