Dang that’s 3 episodes in a row where “SpongeBob” is the first word of the episode title. And yes technically two of them are “SpongeBob’s”, but same difference. And that’s even weirder that two of them start with that. Anyway, “SpongeBob’s Bad Habit” is not an episode I’ve ever had much of a strong opinion on. It’s an episode about SpongeBob biting his nails. Sure, why not. Honestly, I’m reminded of “The String”.
The beginning of this episode makes me feel for Squidward immensely…not necessarily because of misophonia (but also yeah a little bit), but like why are we getting gratuitous close ups and sounds of people eating??? I hate this, make it stop now. Anyway, this scene also has very weird pacing to me, particularly when Squidward starts listing his qualms. It just feels much slower than it should be.
After this scene, the episode gets straight into SpongeBob’s titled bad habit. And it’s nasty, because we see SpongeBob’s nails all over the food, people accidentally swallowing it, it’s just gross. Also I don’t know why they have Tom Kenny making these weird noises when SpongeBob bites his nails…I’m assuming it’s to give us auditory stimulation when so much of the episode consists of SpongeBob biting his nails, but I still don’t like it. Is this episode about to bring back bad noises?? Please no.
We then transition to SpongeBob trying to break his bad habit of biting his nails, but of course this doesn’t work. None of the attempts work. I do like that we got to see SpongeBob paint his nails though, because yeah he does that on the regular. I don’t make the rules. And it ends with him leaving poor Gary behind. I gotta admit, I chuckled. Internally.
SpongeBob’s habit gets to the point where he gets the compulsion to bite other people’s nails. Sure, why not. It’s funny seeing SpongeBob basically become a nail-biting fiend. He eventually comes across Patrick, who tries to distract him by taking him to Glove World…but this fails for perhaps obvious reasons. So next stop to trying to get SpongeBob to stop biting his nails is Sandy. Hey, I always like a Sandy appearance (and by the way, I liked that Mrs. Puff was in this episode too). The way SpongeBob gets around Sandy’s helmet solution was actually pretty funny, can’t even lie. I also find it humorous that Sandy wears a nightgown over her space suit. And another thing I found funny was the use of a pillory for SpongeBob’s fingers.
When Sandy and Patrick are sleeping, SpongeBob manages to escape the pillory, and he chews on Sandy’s nails. Okay, I did like the way SpongeBob was like “Hi Sandy” while still clearly chewing, that was a good use of this weird sound work. Sandy decides to take SpongeBob to a hypnotist to fix his nail biting issues. The hypnotist that’s…Hans. But also before I get to that, the hynotist reveals that SpongeBob subconsciously thinks he’s Squidward. You know what, I like this. It’s so out of left field but also not since the beginning of the episode kind of set this up. And then in the end, turns out the hypnotism doesn’t work, as once SpongeBob learns the doctor is Hans, he goes crazy. Which causes Squidward to walk in on a murder scene LMAO. Yeah, Squidward’s gonna need that therapy for his therapy, stat!
“SpongeBob’s Bad Habit” was an alright episode. It was a pretty simple one, with a plot that reminded me of “Earworm”. The only thing I really didn’t like was the weird sounds SpongeBob was making. They weren’t grating, but they weren’t quite pleasant. So. But other than that, the episode was rather entertaining. But it wasn’t one I was particularly invested in either, as the habit here was portrayed rather…uncomfortably (yet balanced well with humorously). A high Good should do the trick.
Episode Tier: Good
Episode Score: 7.9/10