Show News An unorganized, unchronological review thread

[Fear Of A Nerdy Patty]

Patty Caper/Plankton's Regular

Patty Caper:

Mr. Krabs has run out of the secret ingredient needed to give Krabby Patties their special taste, and is expecting a new delivery. He orders SpongeBob to guard it carefully so nobody steals it. And yet, someone manages to steal it right under his nose! Who's the culprit?

This was a pretty welldone comical mystery story. SpongeBobs determination as he goes around investigating everyone is a joy to watch. I love when he gets more self confident than usual in order to fullfill a goal. It reminds me a bit of when he was a lawyer in Krabs Vs. Plankton.

Speaking of that, Plankton is naturally the first one to be suspected. He gets caught redhanded eating Krabby Patties cooked by himself... except that he's just been experimenting with different flavors in attempts to figure out what the hidden ingredient is. You gotta feel bad for his complete lack of self awareness in somehow thinking raw sewage would even feasibly measure up to a success.

The second one to be interrogated is Sandy. This is the start of the rollicking running gag where SpongeBob assumes what someone's genius plan was in order to steal the formula. With Sandy he assumes she used an invisibility ray, froze time, shot a laser blast through the suitcase and ran off with the ingredient. Unamused, she tells him to consider the fact that she might have just ordered more food for the winter. She even confronts him with the receipt, which makes SpongeBob recall the large order he had to prepare earlier. It's highly unusual for her to buy tons of Krabby Patties for what I assume is a ghastly amount of money instead of searching for acorns, but works for the scene's pay-off.

The third suspect is Gary. Yes, SpongeBob's own freaking pet. And the plan SpongeBob claims that he had for stealing the ingredient is so wildly convoluted to a hysterical degree. It's so inspired I almost don't even want to spoil it.

After going through the grilling, Gary says that he saw someone leaving The Krusty Krab with a black suitcase. When Patrick hears the description, he deduces that the person seen was Squidward.

SpongeBob and Patrick arrive at his house and indeed see a black suitcase, but instead it contains tap dancing shoes. Understandably upset, Squidward throws them out of the house. Well... actually he *moves* his house instead of simply kicking them out. He's gotten more creative over the years.

SpongeBob's forced to admit to his boss that he never found out who committed the crime. Mr. Krabs unexpectedly then accuses his own frycook of stealing the secret ingredient. He lays out his supposed plan (in the same uproarious fashion as SpongeBob did with the earlier suspects) which involved him planting a decoy as a distraction in order to snatch the briefcase and make a quick buck from Plankton.

After the story is finished, he almost calls the cops before they catch him and makes him admit that he stole it himself so he could save 2 dollars on delivery. This is easily one of the dumbest and meanest things that he's ever done. You question just how much Mr. Krabs values his devoted employee. He does at least get punished at the end when the judge sentences him to give away free Krabby Patties for a full day.

We also get to see him strapped to a chair while watching in horror as the customers line up and SpongeBob happily gives them away. In concept I actually like this idea for an ending, but it's executed way too weirdly. Why does the cops hold his eyeballs and laugh at the same time? It's kinda creepy, but not in a way that I think was intended. This is just a nitpick however.

Plankton's Regular:

I have mixed feelings about this segment. It has a lot of potential, but simply doesn't live up to it.

To start with the positives, Plankton's in very good form. You feel happy for him when someone actually appreciates his incredibly simplistic fast food. And seeing him get to gloat in front of his nemesis is pretty satisfying.

Mr. Krabs' characterization is a bit iffy since unlike other times when he goes against Planky, he didn't do anything to deserve it this time. The fact that he can't let him have out of his generous amount of customers makes him come across as petty to a borderline childish degree. It does make sense for the story, but pushes his likability even more than Patty Caper.
Some of SpongeBob's attempts to make Nat eat a Krabby Patty are amusing though, such as "tripping" over a rock and trying to get one inside his mouth, plus his godawful imitation and disguise of Karen as he gets into The Chum Bucket.

Mr. Krabs breaking into The Chum Bucket at night with Plankton pointing out how ironic this scenario is gave me the biggest chuckle. Krabs is just completely dumbfounded and somehow can't see how they've literally switched roles.

There are two pain gags on different occasions I found rather strange. First Plankton rips his own skin off out of frustration, then SpongeBob gets his skin ripped off too when a door closes on him. The second instance is especially bizarre given the face that he makes before it falls off. While they are brief and easily ignorable, you still wonder why they're there in the first place.

The main problem I have is the ending. The customer comes storming into The Chum Bucket proclaiming how he can't eat this crap anymore, and has been having stomach problems since he started consuming chum. Karen paid him to be a customer because she got tired of her husband's endless complaining. Plankton breaks down and cries at this revelation while Krabs chuckles at him.

First of all, this puts Mr. Krabs in the worst light possible since we see him laugh at someone who we feel sad for and gets no comeuppance for it. As for the big twist, it would have worked much better if Karen wasn't so cold and unlikable. If she did it because she just wanted to see him happy it could at least have been a solid bittersweet conclusion, where even though things didn't work out for the best she didn't mean anything bad by it. By making Karen act like Plankton's an irritating crybaby however, it results in the ending being far too much of a downer.

The second half of the episode is just okay, but Patty Caper is worth a watch. 7.3/10

(Patty Caper: 8.4/10
Plankton's Regular: 6.2/10)

 

[MattTheSpongeFanatic]

I semi-agree with Patty Caper, I think it could be rated lower but still it's a good episode.
Agree on Plankton's Regular, it has potential but it is a meh episode.

 

[Bigsmoker]

tbh I like both of them.
Patty Caper gets 7/10 and Plankton's Regular gets 7.5. this episode is underrated for me

 

[Fear Of A Nerdy Patty]

Boating Buddies/The Krabby Kronicle

Boating Buddies:

After trying to get away from an insidiously annoying SpongeBob, Squidward uses his boat as an escape route. When he gets pulled over for speeding however, he's forced to go back to boating school. To his horror, he discovers that a certain yellow menace goes there too...

While not unwatchable to the same degree as Slide Whistle Stooges, this is still an awful episode. Once again SpongeBob is being obnoxious more than endearing, and we just get to see Squidward being tormented to the point going nuts with no clever jokes or anything to make up for it. If anything it's simply depressing. When he sees that SpongeBob attends boating school too, he literally gets so stressed out about it that he cries.

In the classrom everything moves at a really slow pace for some reason, where we get a lengthy scene with Squidward explaining in detail why he has to go to boating school, and then SpongeBob being offered to give his own side of the story. The punchline is amusing to be fair, but not enough so to warrant being dragged out this much.

The worst thing however is how SpongeBob has now made the full-fledged transformation into stalker. The quick joke where he was standing outside of Squidward's house for 3 days in House Fancy or "I like Squidward" in 20,000 Patties Under The Sea was fine and amusing since it didn't take up the whole plot.

When they base a whole episode around that however, it becomes creepy and annoying really fast. SpongeBob staring at Squidward in an obsessed manner while breathing in the most unsettling manner possible not just once, but *thrice* has to be one of the worst jokes of the series. One of the few times I actually shuddered instead of laughing at something that apparently was supposed to be funny.

And when it's lunchtime Squidward can't even eat his lunch without being bothered. He has to get into a misunderstanding which results in him getting beat up by a muscular brute. Maybe in the right context this might have been chuckleworthy, but after how much he has suffered already this just becomes another annoyance.

When SpongeBob, Mrs. Puff and Squidward start driving together we finally get something else in terms of humor, such as the very random but still amusing scene of a scientist strapping a test subject crazy for potato chips while planning to shrink him. The boating trio get shrunk down instead when they accidentally crash into the lab, though once they fall into a drain and out of a drinking fountain everyone are back to their normal sizes. What a shame. While not original, that could at least have been more enjoyable to watch than what most of the story consists of.

When it's time for the big test, Squidward demands that SpongeBob leaves him the hell alone and for ONCE he finally listens. Unfortunately Squid has no idea what to answer on the questions though, so he begrudgingly asks for help. But since he told him they are no longer "boating buddies" he *of course* has to waste time convincing him they now are.

And just when the bell rings and he had no time to fill out any answers, Mrs. Puff tells him he has to spend another week in boating school. Jesus, you feel so bad for this guy it's painful.

The Krabby Kronicle:

After seeing people line up to buy a tabloid magazine, Mr. Krabs decides to start his own sensationalist newspaper. When the first story SpongeBob brings in is boring though, he forces him to use his "imagination" in order to create articles that bring in the money.
Thankfully this segment is much better written than Boating Buddies. It teaches a good lesson about how it's more important to print the truth than coming up with colorful lies.

SpongeBob's first report involving Patrick staring at a lamp post is funny. Mr. Krabs changing it to say Patrick marries the lamp post is even funnier.
When Krabs demands that SpongeBob writes the stories to be more interesting, he cleverly phrases it as coming up with practical jokes that everyone will have a good laugh at.

The scenes of everyone partaking in normal activities getting twisted into looking like something else are all pretty clever and enjoyable. My favorite has to be the weird fish in a trenchcoat who for some reason wants to punch Larry The Lobster just once to get to know how it feels like. Obviously this gets subverted into making it look like someone actually beats Larry up. I gotta say though, what a meanspirited gym instructor who kicks a giant muscle mountain out just for getting beaten one single time. Maybe Mr. Krabs is not the only monster here.

Sandy somehow being declared dumb because of a picture where she gleefully chomps into a nut has to be the most hilariously big stretch. The Neptunian Science Committee thinking she doesn't even know how to read made me laugh out loud.

Plankton gets his business closed down after an article says his chum consists of chum from real people. Unlike in Plankton's Regular where he also gets punished unfairly, this instance is amusingly silly in its execution.

After getting fed up with being pressured to make up life-destroying lies, SpongeBob comes up with the biggest story yet: an exposé of his boss's poor treatment of his employee while forcing him to create rumors! Considering how often he blindly follows along on Krabs' plans, it's very satisfying to see him stand up for himself for once. SpongeBob might love his job and devoted to Mr. Krabs like no other, but he still knows right from wrong.

Getting yelled at by all the customers and losing his cash, Krabs is down in the dumps. Until he gets the idea of printing new money using the newspaper press.

Okay, so he didn't learn anything and continues to act like a greedy maniac, but sometimes it's funny to see just how desperate he can get trying to stay on top. My only issue is that SpongeBob should have called out him and say this is wrong too. Patrick showing up having married a lamp post was a good joke to end on though. He's so dumb that he fell for a rumor about himself and made it a reality. 5.7/10

(Boating Buddies: 3.5/10
The Krabby Kronicle: 8/10)

 

[MattTheSpongeFanatic]

Boating Buddies is better than The Krabby Kronicle in my opinion. Both have funny scenes (the car crashing through stores in BB and Patrick marrying the pole in TKK) but I prefer Boating Buddies more than Krabby Kronicle. Understandable review though.

 

[Fear Of A Nerdy Patty]

The best thing about Boating Buddies is the unique and cheery title card track, but saying that really makes it sound like I'm stretching

 

[DannyWapbang]

Boating Buddies is Squidward Torture, and a SpongeBob's a Stalker episode. I never liked it (I actually used to think it was season 8 for some reason.)

 

[Fear Of A Nerdy Patty]

Another older review.

Party Pooper Pants

SpongeBob is excited to throw his first really big party. He's got tons of friends coming over and a whole list of fun planned. But his idea of fun is clearly different from the rest of them...

Season 3 is known for being where the specials really started taking place, containing a total of three. This is the first of them.

Maybe I'm in the minority, but I quite enjoy the Patchy the pirate segments. It's clear Tom Kenny has a blast playing the role. I thought the somewhat dark joke where he accidentally punctures the area filled with water the mermaid needs to be in to survive was pretty funny. Mistaking dynamite for a flute and practically blowing his body off was amusing too.

The story with SpongeBob throwing the party had its moments. Patrick mistaking Mr. Krabs for Patrick (yes, it really is that dumb), Larry looking at himself in the mirror which turns out to be an image of a real lobster, SpongeBob coming up with the utterly boring idea of reading a comic strip outloud and Patrick giving the phone to an ice sculpture of SpongeBob in a punch bowl. The song at the end was cool as well, with some interesting visual animation.

The reason why this is one of the weakest classic episodes however is that SpongeBob is unusually unlikable. It feels out-of-character for him to care more about his silly schedule than his friends having fun. It almost felt like the script was originally written for Squidward. Yet at the end when Patrick tells him the party was great, he's happy that they loved the party. But he could see that they were having fun before and tried to stop it anyway. It doesn't make a lot of sense, but oh well.

Despite these flaws, Party Pooper Pants is still enjoyable. It does break the streak of the 10 amazing opening episodes, but it doesn't lack in entertainment value. 7.7/10

 

[MattTheSpongeFanatic]

Party Pooper Pants OK in my opinion.

 

[Fear Of A Nerdy Patty]

The Slumber Party/Grooming Gary

The Slumber Party:

After Pearl forces her dad out of the house to enjoy a slumber party, Mr. Krabs orders SpongeBob to spy on her.

This is one of the season's highpoints for sure. Immediately you start chuckling at the sight of Mr. Krabs falling asleep in front of the TV looking like a worn-out middleage bachelor, and it only gets better once he tries to control Pearl's sleepover. His idea of snacks are a bunch of crackers with a glass of water, and additional ketchup packages as condiments. Then he puts up a giant sign outside listed with a ton of authoritarian rules. Some of these rules are amusingly ridiculous, such as "No rhubarb and strawberry pies" and "No exchanging of underwear garments". Pearl understandably gets infuriated by this and kicks him out.

Mr. Krabs goes over to SpongeBob's house to ask for help. SpongeBob mistakenly thinks he's come over for a sleepover and literally shoots up into the air like a rocket with joy. The animation in that sequence is enjoyably energetic.

The cheesy horror movie SpongeBob and Krabs watch on TV with teenagers turning into zombies is appropriately cheesy and silly. But the old crab is more horrified by the destruction of property than the actual zombies, which leads him destroy SpongeBob's house as demonstration of how it could happen to him too. The lack of self-awareness on his part and SpongeBob somehow not minding that his home got turned into a total wreck makes this the most hilarious part of the entire episode.

We then cut what we assums is SpongeBob in disguise calling herself Girly Teengirl, claiming to come from Farawayville. Pearl and her friends chase away her away, which leaves her running off in tears. Krabs and Sponge then arrive, wondering who that was. Tom Kenny's delivery on SpongeBob's response "I don't know, but she is uuuugly" gave me a big laugh.

The actual plan is for him to pose as a pizza delivery salesman, which leads to Pearl and the gals putting him down in the box as a pizza. He gets sent back to Mr. Krabs. Krabs not realizing the "pizza" is his employee, but then casually continuing to eat him anyway is some classic subtle humor.

SpongeBob returns to the party once again, this time as a piano salesman. This plan fails even quicker, with the girls dropping a piano at the end. Finally, he comes there as himself, begging to be let in and get to prove how fun he really is. The fact that Pearl has to tell her friends not to pour hot oil on him is darkly comic. He gets 10 seconds to prove his worth, but they are still satisfied and throw him down into the root beer cellar. Poor guy.

But (un)fortunately, he gets the idea to drink as much root beer as he possibly can, thinking it will be the ultimate chance to show he knows how to party. He drinks a bit too much however and turns into a terrifying blubbering creature which the Pearl and the others think is a zombie. And just like in the horror movie, the house also gets destroyed.

Fed up with her dad after his repeated attempts to control the slumber party, she steals his money to host a private beach party as punishment. SpongeBob trying to cheer Krabs up by offering him a root beer is amusingly endearing.

Grooming Gary:

Hellbent on making Gary win The Bikini Bottom Pet Show, he tries to prop him up as much as he can, which the snail is less than happy about.

This is not the most memorable ever, but still amusing enough for its runtime. The pretentious owner and SpongeBob's naivety over how Gary doesn't want to be part of the competition makes for some solid gags. I think they strike a decent balance making SpongeBob oblivious, but not to the point where he is unbearable. He is clearly not hurting Gary on purpose, and his euphoria over how happy of a day it will be if he and Gary win makes his overeagerness understandable.

Plus what he does is nothing compared to the other owners. One of them putting on very ill-fitting sunglasses over his snail's eyes looks incredibly painful. The over-the-top cruelty displayed is funny, albeit in a shocking way.

SpongeBob and Patrick go to the contest together, but only one of them gets to come in. Patrick's meltdown over being kept behind the red rope is the starfish at his wacky best.

After getting his protests ignored for too long, Gary steps up to the podium and starts ranting about the injustice done to him and the others by their owners. I was worried he was going to start talking, but thankfully it's all in snail language. This results in an entertaining over-the-top riot where every snail retaliates and starts attacking their owners. One of them getting too small sunglasses put on the same way he did it to his snail. SpongeBob realizes his mistake and apologizes to Gary. After the winner is announced he thinks that Gary is the one who won. But instead it was actually Patrick, who got in by dressing as a snail. He barks like a dog since apparently he forgot how they sound. I'm not that big on this ending gag. It felt stupid more than anything else.

Overall, Grooming Gary is a somewhat underrated segment which is not quite as hard to watch as it could've been. It never goes too far in showing Gary's agony, and SpongeBob is characterized just fine. It lacked a bit in humor however, and the story doesn't progress at the quickest pace. The Slumber Party is the clear standout, but this one is all right too. 8.5/10

(The Slumber Party: 9.4/10
Grooming Gary: 7.6/10

 

[Fear Of A Nerdy Patty]

Who R Zoo?/Kwarantined Krab

Who R Zoo?

SpongeBob gets kicked out of the zoo after getting too close to the animals. Instead of pouting however, he decided to build a zoo on his own - made out of bubbles.

This is a fairly mediocre segment. While the plot sounds fun on paper, the problems that seem to permeate the newer seasons are present here: the music is way too loud and frequent, the facial expressions are needlessly exaggerated and often used in place of actual jokes.

And when I mean that the music overpowers the lines, I'm not kidding. There were times where a character said something I completely missed due to not being able to hear a word. I thought the point of crisper audio was to make the dialogue clearer.

SpongeBob is also overexcited to an annoying degree, where it seems like he's on caffeine pills all the time.

Still, a few chuckles manage to come through all the noise. I liked Plankton being terrified of the zoo animals with Karen dismissively calling them cute only to be attacked and start panicking herself. Patrick hiding inside of SpongeBob's body was one of the few visual gags that worked.

Other than that, there's not much that stands out.

Kwarantined Krab:

A health inspector comes to The Krusty Krab to see if everything is in order. When he arrives he has a shocking announcement to make: One of the people currently residing there are sick! Everyone are put under quarantine. Which one of them could be infected?

Oh yes, folks. I'm covering the infamous banned episode that Nickelodeon doesn't want you to see. The only reason I'm even able to talk about it right now is because someone was actually able to find an English version of it. With all that controversy aside, is it worth watching in the end?

Well, it's certainly a better attempt at an infection panic story than Fungus Among Us. What makes it work so well is that instead of focusing on how gross the disease is, the humor mostly stems from the interplay and reactions from the characters. Mr. Krabs shows to have a screw loose right away, where he tells a story of how he once locked a sick crewmember on his ship in the freezer. When SpongeBob asks if he was ever let out, Krabs vaguely answers that "someone" probably did. Amusingly dark joke.

Plankton, who was hiding in one of the cups, doesn't care about the quarantine and heads out of the resturant. Only to immediately get blasted with a flamethrower. Mr. Lawrence nails the joke with his usually hilarious screaming.

Mr. Krabs is so intent on reusing his old trick that he asks the other five left at the place (SpongeBob, Patrick, Pearl, Squidward and Mrs. Puff) if any of them would be willing to volunteer for a trip to the freezer. Jesus, Krabs. The ever so noble SpongeBob relents after seeing everyone fighting with each other. The mood becomes melodramatic and he asks them to remember him as full of life. Mr. Krabs interrupting by shutting the door made me chuckle. Mrs. Puff says she can't look, but asks if it still can be described how it's like to be there. That's very cold. No pun intended.

We get a funny reveal where it turns out that the freezer is a giant fun winter wonderland where SpongeBob can ski and do all sorts of fun things.

Patrick is tempted to join the sponge after seeing that he's having ice cream. He comes back, but Krabs is horrified at how infected he looks. He forcefully throws him back into the freezer. Shortly after, Pearl calls out Squidward for scratching his arm and says he's the sick one. Following her daddy's paranoid footsteps, it seems. The best part though has to be how Mrs. Puff gets thrown in just for yawning. Noboby can make a single bodily movement without suspicion at this point.

Finally, Pearl gives Krabs money back from the mall since she didn't spend all of it. If you thought he was crazy before, right now he's so frantic about the Clam Flu that he berates her for accepting change covered with germs. Well, maybe on second thought he's being sensible. There are things in the world more important than money.

Inside the freezer, Mrs. Puff makes Pearl come to the realization that it's Mr. Krabs who has the Clam Flu. Squidward demands they take action, but SpongeBob wants to stay. Until the ol' squid reminds him he'll never be able to make Krabby Patties again.

Once the five of them band together to catch Mr. Krabs we get an energtic chase sequence. Unlike WRZ?, the quick pacing and hectic music fits since the story's been naturally building up to a crazy finale.

The character animation of Mr. Krabs as SpongeBob tries to retrieve him from under the grill is pretty funny. His worn demeanor looks even more demented when his body's scrunched.

After a while, Mr Krabs crashes into a window and a garbage can falls down on Mrs. Puff. Due to her inflatable nature, she managed to spread garbage across the entire resturant. The health inspector comes by and is about to tell them that he actually held the chart upside down and no one there is sick at all. But when he sees everyone got infected by *other* diseases instead he not only quarantines the resturant, but instructs his workers to drop it somewhere safer. It falls down on The Chum Bucket. I feel like they could've ended on a stronger joke than that. We've already seen Plankton's eatery destroyed as a final punchline before.

There are a few issues such as the unfunny (though I guess somewhat necessary) grossout moments, and the pace while much calmer could nevertheless stand to be toned down a little. But overall, I enjoyed Kwarantined Krab. The coincidences to the ongoing pandemic will unnerve some people, but if you can look past that this is still nothing more than a wackily entertaining SpongeBob toon. While the apprehension towards airing it on TV is unsurprising, it was unfair to exclude it from the latest season box set. Hopefully these final words will be outdated in the future with the hopes that this episode no longer gets treated the way Mr. Krabs treats his crew: Like the plague. 6.6/10

(Who R Zoo?: 5/10
Kwarantined Krab: 8.3/10)