As you probably already know, the 20th anniversary of the hilarious cartoon “SpongeBob SquarePants” was Wednesday, May 1st, 2019. SpongeBob fans everywhere in some way were showing appreciation for and honoring the beloved show (and character).
SpongeBob has made such a huge impact on adults and children alike. From meme culture to fashion trends, the eccentric yellow fellow has certainly left his footprint. Arguably, one could say SpongeBob SquarePants is officially up there with the classics like Looney Tunes. This shows it doesn’t have to take cartoons 50+ years to become classics.
But what’s so good about SpongeBob? Why do so many people love it? And why do so many others claim to despise it?
Well, let’s start with the humor. SpongeBob is chock full of both silly gags for the kids and jokes that appeal to adults, such as the hardships of growing up and getting drunk at a bar. (Of course, adult jokes are always subtle, as the show has a rating of TV-Y7.) Some jokes are beyond clever, others hit you on a deeper level —joke or not. Like with any show, the scripting can make or break it. The crew behind SpongeBob really made it, and some of their great witticisms are on T-shirts and memes. And don’t forget, they’re daily quoted!
The characters are brilliant. We’ve got the very kind-hearted and equally naive titular character, SpongeBob SquarePants, an energetic and eager-to-please workaholic with a positive vibe and a unique laugh. Then there’s his best friend, Patrick Star, a lovable doofus who, despite his lack of expertise, is usually there to offer SpongeBob advice and encouragement. Next, there’s pessimistic Squidward Tentacles, who can be full of himself and a big jerk, but deep down just wants appreciation for his “many talents”. Other characters include cheap and greedy businessman, Mr. Krabs, vengeful villain, Plankton, intellectual Texan, Sandy Cheeks, and many more.
From SpongeBob and Patrick adopting a baby scallop to Squidward scrambling to get a band of talent-void fishfolk together, SpongeBob SquarePants’ plots are utterly hilarious —and they’re executed well. Not only that, but the animation is artsy, too. There are a lot of close-up scenes in SpongeBob (some pleasant, some absolutely gut-wrenching), and most, if not all, involve some sort of hand-drawness or painting, with season 1 being done in entirely cell animation.
People of the SpongeBob SquarePants fandom tend to feel like best friends, honestly. Fellow SpongeBoobs will no doubt get your reference to season ___, episode ___, and will probably start quoting with you. It’s just so amazing that adults, teenagers, and children alike can walk into a room full of people, say “Wumbo!”, and have over half of the room get it. The show is just so quotable, in my opinion, and evidently the opinions of others. If you’re in the SpongeBob fandom, you know it all too well.
SpongeBob is just one of those shows that’s really good. But why, then, do so many people find it annoying, or keep their kids from watching it?
After the franchise’s first feature film, “The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie”, practically every tasteful person of the SpongeBob fandom would agree that the show’s quality dropped significantly. Season 4 was in the okay zone, season 5 plummeted, and season 6 hit rock bottom (though I found a select few episodes from that season that I, admittedly, thought weren’t half bad). As for seasons 7-8, fans like to refer to it as the “Dark Age”, because yes, it was just that bad. Because of this, SpongeBob began to lose some of its original fans. Fans of the good-quality, season 1-4 SpongeBob could not stand the new brand of entertainment: childish gags, extreme character changes (SpongeBob became a toddler trapped in an adult’s body, Patrick became a troublemaking cretin, and Squidward became truly cruel and insensitive, just to name a few), and lets not forget those more-grotesque-than-the-first-few-seasons-and-completely-over-the-top close-ups. To sum it up, SpongeBob was void of everything that made it funny.
If fans didn’t find the Dark Age of SpongeBob to be even remotely decent, then you could expect parents to dislike it tenfold. It’s not even just the bad seasons that turned parents away. Certain shows just don’t appeal to everybody.
First of all, parents —adults in general— often don’t care for children’s cartoons. The theme song alone is enough to turn people away. Nevermind that many adults do watch it, it’s still geared towards a younger audience. Many parents want their kids watching “educational television” and don’t want to introduce words like “idiot” and “stupid” into their children’s vocabulary, and rightly so. A show like SpongeBob is purely for entertainment, and with a TV-Y7 rating, you might expect some name-calling.
If you’re more about those morals (and I am, too), then Mr. Krabs’ greed is probably not something you’d want your kids exposed to. Even if his greediness is not presented as a good thing, per se, Mr. Krabs doesn’t see that, and therefore isn’t the best role model. Another example of a bad role model could be Squidward, as he is often very inconsiderate, and hurling insults.
Many people also find the show obnoxious, with its constant laughing and screaming. Episodes can be loud, fast-paced, and very eccentric. But that’s what serves to add that bit of “nautical nonsense” to the bright underwater world of Bikini Bottom.
When we really get down to it, SpongeBob is not for everyone, and it never will be. Some will love it, some will hate it, some will watch it from time to time. I could argue that they're missing out on a truly golden cartoon, and that they’re hardly going to get the inside jokes, the references, the quotes... --And that's okay. Some just don't/can't watch SpongeBob SquarePants, but as long as my porous friend is prospering in his 20th year, I now don’t see it as necessary for me to recruit anymore people to his fanbase.
Thank you, Stephen Hillenburg.
Thank you, SpongeBob.
