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Made with DeviantArt muro

A SpongeBob SquarePants picture I wanted to make ever since I finally had the guts to catch up on the series.

I've been a fan of SpongeBob ever since it first came on the air. I stopped watching it on a regular basis around the fifth season because I was sidetracked with other interests. For a while, I was very reluctant to continue watching SpongeBob because of all the infamously bad episodes and also because I encountered some people on the Internet who never liked SpongeBob at all, post-movie or otherwise.

However, I was finally able to embrace SpongeBob once again after learning that the latest seasons were gradually getting back on the right track, that the new movie Sponge Out of Water that was helmed by original creator Stephen Hillenburg did well enough to even win back the praise of disillusioned fans, and that Hillenburg will also resume working on the show, starting with Season 10.

One thing I've noticed about the SpongeBob fandom is that certain characters are polarizing, mainly because they did rather mean-spirited things in some of their episodes. I am aware that even SpongeBob himself wasn't a saint, but I'd prefer to avoid discussing the cesspit of immoral trash that is A Pal for Gary.

1. Mrs. Puff

Mrs. Puff, as you may know, is SpongeBob's driving teacher. She's rather polarizing because she dreads having to see SpongeBob, but some people see her disdain for the porous manchild as justified because SpongeBob always makes things hard for her and continuously fails his boating exam.

One of her worst offenses, however, would be in the episode Demolition Doofus, where SpongeBob accidentally injured Mrs. Puff in a way that made her unable to inflate, leaving her horrifically emaciated. What's wrong was that she felt that the best course of action would be to enter SpongeBob into a demolition derby in hopes that he would get killed.

When SpongeBob manages to survive, Mrs. Puff takes it on herself to murder SpongeBob. She fails and her sac miraculously starts inflating again. SpongeBob, of course, isn't exactly an innocent victim here, either, because he insensitively states that Mrs. Puff looks better deflated.

And in the pre-movie seasons, there was also Mrs. Puff being completely incompetent in dealing with SpongeBob getting bullied by Flats the Flounder and threatening to kick his butt when she thought SpongeBob beat up Flats.

I'm sorry to say that I can barely remember any redeeming qualities from Mrs. Puff other than owning a pet snail in The Sponge Who Could Fly or appreciating Mr. Krabs' attempts to court her in Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love.

2. Patrick Star

Patrick Star is yet another divisive character. Some like him because of the comic relief his idiocy supplies, and some despise him for being outrageously selfish in the post-movie seasons.

This wasn't helped at all in the episode The Card, where he flat-out says to SpongeBob "You can't expect my usual brand of stupidity. I like to mix it up, keep you on your toes!" Some have interpreted the line as indicating that Patrick is a sociopath who only pretends to be dumb so he can avoid punishment for his actions.

And of course, there's Rule of Dumb, where Patrick is mistakenly believed to be King of Bikini Bottom and he uses his alleged regal status as a crutch to take people's stuff and make them miserable. I especially hated the part where he took a baby's pacifier. A good way for me to feel no sympathy for a character would be if they deliberately made a child cry.

But they are at least trying to get Patrick to redeem himself. One episode, for example, had Patrick feeling remorse because he believed he stole a donut from SpongeBob, but it turns out that the donut was actually meant for Patrick the whole time and that SpongeBob wanted to give it to him as a gift.

3. Squidward Tentacles

Squidward is yet another character where the fanbase has mixed opinions.

While it is true that SpongeBob and Patrick are often bothering him and such, there are some episodes, especially in post-movie seasons, where he's a complete jerk to SpongeBob and Patrick when they haven't done anything, or worse, when they're actually trying to make amends for annoying Squidward.

One despicable example would be Little Yellow Book, where Squidward steals SpongeBob's diary and reads it aloud to humiliate him. SpongeBob forgives him and reveals his other diary. Squidward takes that one, too, and while he gets punished by being pelted with tomatoes, he straight up states that he doesn't care.

Not to say that Squidward has proven himself to be a nice guy, and I recall quite a lot of scenes where he was shown to actually care for SpongeBob.

We all know the famous example where a rude customer refused to take the Krusty Krab Pizza because he didn't get his Diet Dr. Kelp (which he didn't even ask for) and made SpongeBob cry. Squidward's response was to ring the jerk's doorbell and slam the pizza into his ungrateful face!

There are plenty of other examples of Squidward's kindness that I'd like to point out, though. One of my favorites would be in Krab Borg, where they mistook Mr. Krabs for a robot impersonator because SpongeBob had nightmares from a cheesy movie about robots taking over the world. When Squidward slaps Mr. Krabs while interrogating him, it makes SpongeBob cry and Squidward actually stops what he's doing to ask SpongeBob what's wrong.

And in the SpongeBob B.C. special, when SpongeBob and Patrick's prehistoric ancestors SpongeGar and Patar got struck by lightning, Squidward's caveman counterpart Squog screams out "Patar! SpongeGar!", clearly showing concern for their well-being.

And let's not forget Squidward regretting his actions when he mocked SpongeBob in the April Fools' Day episode and the first Christmas special, or even when he thought SpongeBob ate a bomb disguised as a pie.

4. Mr. Krabs

Eugene H. Krabs, owner of the Krusty Krab, has earned some hatred because a lot of his actions are quite horrid.

If it's not trying to drive Plankton into committing suicide in One Coarse Meal, then surely people were outraged when he told lies about everyone in The Krabby Kronicle or when he used Gary to take people's money in The Cent of Money.

What some of his defenders aren't remembering, however, is that even in the pre-movie seasons, Krabs was kind of a bastard, like when he charged SpongeBob and Patrick for standing and even EXISTING in Squid on Strike. That would be like executing a person because they had to tie their shoe.

Thankfully, Mr. Krabs stopped being so selfish and such by the episode Free Samples, where he competes legitimately and doesn't force his customers to overpay. Unfortunately, that episode also has its downsides, which I'll discuss in the next character entry.

5. Sheldon J. Plankton

Plankton, owner of the Chum Bucket, is notable for being one of the few villains on the show. He always tries to steal the Krabby Patty secret formula, or at least run Mr. Krabs out of business.

Plankton has a lot of fans because while he is evil, he has moments of sympathy and is also a hilariously entertaining Large Ham.

While many find him more likeable than Mr. Krabs, there are times where Plankton is a bit of an a-hole.

This is where we bring up Free Samples. Honestly, it was the first episode that made me hate Plankton, but only for that one episode (Plankton's Pet more than made up for Plankton being so mean).

To clarify, the episode Free Samples, while having Mr. Krabs tone down his greediness and caring more about money than other peoples' well-being, did so at the expense of having Plankton do everything he can to sabotage Mr. Krabs' attempts at legitimately selling more krabby patties and also has a scene where he insults a whole family!

Bear in mind that these are just my opinions and you do have the right to disagree with me.

SpongeBob SquarePants (c) Nickelodeon

Description
Made with DeviantArt muro

A SpongeBob SquarePants picture I wanted to make ever since I finally had the guts to catch up on the series.

I've been a fan of SpongeBob ever since it first came on the air. I stopped watching it on a regular basis around the fifth season because I was sidetracked with other interests. For a while, I was very reluctant to continue watching SpongeBob because of all the infamously bad episodes and also because I encountered some people on the Internet who never liked SpongeBob at all, post-movie or otherwise.

However, I was finally able to embrace SpongeBob once again after learning that the latest seasons were gradually getting back on the right track, that the new movie Sponge Out of Water that was helmed by original creator Stephen Hillenburg did well enough to even win back the praise of disillusioned fans, and that Hillenburg will also resume working on the show, starting with Season 10.

One thing I've noticed about the SpongeBob fandom is that certain characters are polarizing, mainly because they did rather mean-spirited things in some of their episodes. I am aware that even SpongeBob himself wasn't a saint, but I'd prefer to avoid discussing the cesspit of immoral trash that is A Pal for Gary.

1. Mrs. Puff

Mrs. Puff, as you may know, is SpongeBob's driving teacher. She's rather polarizing because she dreads having to see SpongeBob, but some people see her disdain for the porous manchild as justified because SpongeBob always makes things hard for her and continuously fails his boating exam.

One of her worst offenses, however, would be in the episode Demolition Doofus, where SpongeBob accidentally injured Mrs. Puff in a way that made her unable to inflate, leaving her horrifically emaciated. What's wrong was that she felt that the best course of action would be to enter SpongeBob into a demolition derby in hopes that he would get killed.

When SpongeBob manages to survive, Mrs. Puff takes it on herself to murder SpongeBob. She fails and her sac miraculously starts inflating again. SpongeBob, of course, isn't exactly an innocent victim here, either, because he insensitively states that Mrs. Puff looks better deflated.

And in the pre-movie seasons, there was also Mrs. Puff being completely incompetent in dealing with SpongeBob getting bullied by Flats the Flounder and threatening to kick his butt when she thought SpongeBob beat up Flats.

I'm sorry to say that I can barely remember any redeeming qualities from Mrs. Puff other than owning a pet snail in The Sponge Who Could Fly or appreciating Mr. Krabs' attempts to court her in Why Must I Be a Crustacean in Love.

2. Patrick Star

Patrick Star is yet another divisive character. Some like him because of the comic relief his idiocy supplies, and some despise him for being outrageously selfish in the post-movie seasons.

This wasn't helped at all in the episode The Card, where he flat-out says to SpongeBob "You can't expect my usual brand of stupidity. I like to mix it up, keep you on your toes!" Some have interpreted the line as indicating that Patrick is a sociopath who only pretends to be dumb so he can avoid punishment for his actions.

And of course, there's Rule of Dumb, where Patrick is mistakenly believed to be King of Bikini Bottom and he uses his alleged regal status as a crutch to take people's stuff and make them miserable. I especially hated the part where he took a baby's pacifier. A good way for me to feel no sympathy for a character would be if they deliberately made a child cry.

But they are at least trying to get Patrick to redeem himself. One episode, for example, had Patrick feeling remorse because he believed he stole a donut from SpongeBob, but it turns out that the donut was actually meant for Patrick the whole time and that SpongeBob wanted to give it to him as a gift.

3. Squidward Tentacles

Squidward is yet another character where the fanbase has mixed opinions.

While it is true that SpongeBob and Patrick are often bothering him and such, there are some episodes, especially in post-movie seasons, where he's a complete jerk to SpongeBob and Patrick when they haven't done anything, or worse, when they're actually trying to make amends for annoying Squidward.

One despicable example would be Little Yellow Book, where Squidward steals SpongeBob's diary and reads it aloud to humiliate him. SpongeBob forgives him and reveals his other diary. Squidward takes that one, too, and while he gets punished by being pelted with tomatoes, he straight up states that he doesn't care.

Not to say that Squidward has proven himself to be a nice guy, and I recall quite a lot of scenes where he was shown to actually care for SpongeBob.

We all know the famous example where a rude customer refused to take the Krusty Krab Pizza because he didn't get his Diet Dr. Kelp (which he didn't even ask for) and made SpongeBob cry. Squidward's response was to ring the jerk's doorbell and slam the pizza into his ungrateful face!

There are plenty of other examples of Squidward's kindness that I'd like to point out, though. One of my favorites would be in Krab Borg, where they mistook Mr. Krabs for a robot impersonator because SpongeBob had nightmares from a cheesy movie about robots taking over the world. When Squidward slaps Mr. Krabs while interrogating him, it makes SpongeBob cry and Squidward actually stops what he's doing to ask SpongeBob what's wrong.

And in the SpongeBob B.C. special, when SpongeBob and Patrick's prehistoric ancestors SpongeGar and Patar got struck by lightning, Squidward's caveman counterpart Squog screams out "Patar! SpongeGar!", clearly showing concern for their well-being.

And let's not forget Squidward regretting his actions when he mocked SpongeBob in the April Fools' Day episode and the first Christmas special, or even when he thought SpongeBob ate a bomb disguised as a pie.

4. Mr. Krabs

Eugene H. Krabs, owner of the Krusty Krab, has earned some hatred because a lot of his actions are quite horrid.

If it's not trying to drive Plankton into committing suicide in One Coarse Meal, then surely people were outraged when he told lies about everyone in The Krabby Kronicle or when he used Gary to take people's money in The Cent of Money.

What some of his defenders aren't remembering, however, is that even in the pre-movie seasons, Krabs was kind of a bastard, like when he charged SpongeBob and Patrick for standing and even EXISTING in Squid on Strike. That would be like executing a person because they had to tie their shoe.

Thankfully, Mr. Krabs stopped being so selfish and such by the episode Free Samples, where he competes legitimately and doesn't force his customers to overpay. Unfortunately, that episode also has its downsides, which I'll discuss in the next character entry.

5. Sheldon J. Plankton

Plankton, owner of the Chum Bucket, is notable for being one of the few villains on the show. He always tries to steal the Krabby Patty secret formula, or at least run Mr. Krabs out of business.

Plankton has a lot of fans because while he is evil, he has moments of sympathy and is also a hilariously entertaining Large Ham.

While many find him more likeable than Mr. Krabs, there are times where Plankton is a bit of an a-hole.

This is where we bring up Free Samples. Honestly, it was the first episode that made me hate Plankton, but only for that one episode (Plankton's Pet more than made up for Plankton being so mean).

To clarify, the episode Free Samples, while having Mr. Krabs tone down his greediness and caring more about money than other peoples' well-being, did so at the expense of having Plankton do everything he can to sabotage Mr. Krabs' attempts at legitimately selling more krabby patties and also has a scene where he insults a whole family!

Bear in mind that these are just my opinions and you do have the right to disagree with me.

SpongeBob SquarePants (c) Nickelodeon