Wait... is he talking to me? Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we’re counting down our picks for times “SpongeBob SquarePants” has peeled back the curtain. Beware of episode spoilers ahead!
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00:00 "Hey, if we're underwater, how can there be a..."
00:02 [Splash]
00:04 Welcome to WatchMojo, and today we're counting down our picks for times SpongeBob SquarePants has peeled back the curtain.
00:12 Beware of episode spoilers ahead.
00:15 "There you are, you stinkin' bilge rats!"
00:17 Number 20. Nothing good on TV.
00:22 Not being able to find anything interesting on TV is pretty terrible.
00:26 "You just haven't found your purpose in life, that's all."
00:29 SpongeBob probably agrees with us.
00:32 In "Stanley as SquarePants," SpongeBob's incredibly clumsy and disruptive cousin pays him a visit.
00:38 "Cousin Stanley!"
00:40 "Cousin SpongeBob!"
00:41 [SpongeBob laughing]
00:43 He makes SpongeBob's life chaotic, to say the least.
00:47 During the episode, he destroys his TV while channel surfing.
00:51 SpongeBob later says it's okay though, since there's never anything good on.
00:55 He then further emphasizes this by staring right into the camera and saying it again.
01:01 "There's nothing good on TV anyway. Nothing."
01:04 It's not only a neat fourth wall break, but also an interesting self-own.
01:09 Does SpongeBob himself think his own show's quality isn't up to par?
01:13 Don't beat yourself up there, buddy.
01:15 You're still one of the most popular kid shows for a reason.
01:18 "Stanley, I cannot keep covering for you!"
01:21 "Ahhhh!"
01:24 Number 19. Everyone sees stars.
01:28 We know school can be difficult, but it should never be this painful.
01:32 "Graphic school!"
01:33 When Mr. Krabs and Plankton join SpongeBob in boating school,
01:39 they drive Mrs. Puff to near insanity.
01:42 In fact, she gets so fed up with them that she beats Mr. Krabs and Plankton over the head with a tree.
01:48 Bright stars then swirl around their heads as a way to represent their concussions.
01:53 But they're all able to actually see them.
01:56 SpongeBob concusses himself so he can get his own set of shining stars too.
02:01 "Oh, I want some!"
02:02 SpongeBob, if you want to see stars so badly, maybe just invest in a telescope.
02:12 Or just look at Patrick. It'll save you a headache.
02:15 Number 18. Potty's puppeteer.
02:19 It may be a short moment, but it's hard to forget these seven chaotic seconds once you see them.
02:25 Season 2's Christmas-themed episode features an appearance from everyone's favorite pirate, Patchy.
02:30 "Hi! I'm Patchy the Pirate!"
02:33 Along with Patchy is his puppet parrot, Potty. That's a real tongue twister.
02:38 But when Patchy pulls Potty down, the puppet's strings are snapped.
02:42 What you might not expect to see next is the man puppeteering the bird falling to the ground as well.
02:48 "Fine feathered little neck pain!"
02:50 It's a hilarious moment that reminds you, oh yeah, that's a puppet.
02:55 Our sincerest thoughts and prayers remain with the puppeteer.
02:59 Number 17. The crew help Patchy.
03:03 The making of SpongeBob SquarePants is a real collaborative effort.
03:07 "It was much easier to hit a baseball!"
03:10 In "Uh," we get to briefly see some of that teamwork on screen.
03:14 "Doesn't dice, doesn't!"
03:15 A segment involving Patchy in a dinosaur rider costume goes awry when he gets stuck in it.
03:21 "Hey kids! Now you're probably wondering, hmm, what's Patchy doing in a cave?"
03:25 He then accidentally topples over and several members of the crew have to rush in to help him.
03:31 "Get me out! Help! Help!"
03:33 Everything from the crew's arrival, to the please stand by sign,
03:39 to Patchy picking up where he left off made this a hysterical wall break.
03:43 Thankfully, no dinosaur costumes were seriously harmed in this episode.
03:47 "Like I was saying, prehistoric times were the greatest!"
03:50 Number 16. Patrick cracks the screen.
03:54 There's breaking the fourth wall figuratively,
03:56 and then there's breaking the fourth wall literally.
03:59 "Nitwitting," an episode that sees SpongeBob get inducted into Patrick's secret society of nincompoops.
04:05 "It's the Empty Head Society. It's a place where guys like me can give their...
04:13 powerful intellects a much-needed rest."
04:17 Reminds us that Patrick's one of the best at his craft.
04:20 At the end of the episode, he, along with the rest of his peers, break into song.
04:24 "We call it the nitwitting."
04:27 [Song]
04:32 Patrick then closes things by rushing towards the screen.
04:36 This causes him to crash straight into it.
04:39 He's been known for doing some dumb things.
04:41 Still, we can't help but be astonished by what he pulled off here.
04:45 Not even the fourth wall is safe from Patrick.
04:48 Number 15. All out of time cards.
04:52 When SpongeBob and Patrick paint Mr. Krabs' house as punishment,
04:56 they're told they can't let any paint spill or drop.
05:00 "Even one drop on anything but wall,
05:03 I'll have your rear-ends cut off and mounted over me, Fire Blaze!"
05:10 As SpongeBob attempts to start painting the wall,
05:13 he's so wracked by nerves that hours go by without him even starting.
05:18 "Well, here we go."
05:20 This passage of time is shown by various cards,
05:23 which are a pretty common staple of the show.
05:25 But the cards are then revealed to be held by Patrick,
05:28 who begs SpongeBob to start since he's running out of them.
05:32 "Can you move it along? I'm all out of time cards."
05:34 The first reveal of Patrick holding all of the cards is such a hilarious gag
05:39 that you don't expect it at first.
05:41 It further illustrates that SpongeBob really has to hurry up.
05:44 Number 14. SpongeBob imitates the narrator.
05:49 There's a saying that imitation is the most sincere form of flattery.
05:53 Unfortunately, SpongeBob takes this saying far too literally.
05:57 "I'll get to those orders as soon as possible. Or never. Whichever comes first."
06:01 He imitates Patrick, Sandy, Plankton, and even the show's iconic narrator.
06:08 "Eighty thousand impressions later."
06:11 "Would you please stop imitating me? It is starting to get very annoying."
06:15 We have a feeling that the narrator ultimately wasn't flattered by SpongeBob's imitation.
06:20 Regardless, we have to at least commend SpongeBob's commitment to the bit.
06:24 "Are we having fun yet, Squidward tentacles?"
06:27 He even used a French accent and everything.
06:32 It's not every day that the narrator is actually worked into the episode's plot.
06:36 "Hi, howdy. Greetings. Oh, a wag."
06:38 "Yeah."
06:39 Whenever the show does involve him though, you just know it's always a treat.
06:44 Number 13. Squidward meets his voice actor.
06:48 When Squidward ends up stranded on the moon, he tries to form an exit plan.
06:53 At one point, while planning his route, he pops his head out of a crater and
06:57 looks right into the office of his voice actor, Roger Bumpus.
07:01 "Maybe this is the way out."
07:03 We don't think anyone expected that Squidward would end up here.
07:07 The moment also ends up terrifying both Squidward and Roger.
07:11 And yeah, that seems fair.
07:13 "Third time's a charm."
07:14 If the character you've been playing for decades magically shows up,
07:22 you'd be terrified too.
07:24 Let's just hope Squidward didn't lose his voice after this ordeal.
07:28 Number 12. What goes on in SpongeBob's head?
07:32 Ever wanted to get a glimpse into the inner workings of SpongeBob's mind?
07:36 The episode "Squilliam Returns" offers just that.
07:39 A short scene brings the viewer right inside SpongeBob's brain.
07:43 We see dozens of mini SpongeBob's working tirelessly around the clock under a stern supervisor.
07:49 "Just got an order from the boss."
07:51 When Squidward tells SpongeBob to forget everything that's not related to fine dining,
07:56 SpongeBob takes that order very seriously.
07:59 The mini SpongeBob's begin to scramble and shred their memories.
08:03 As the supervisor berates one of these workers,
08:06 they explain that they're all just metaphors and not actually real.
08:10 "We don't even exist. We're just a clever visual metaphor
08:13 used to personify the abstract concept of thought."
08:16 What makes this deconstruction even funnier is that the boss threatens to fire the worker,
08:20 who begs him not to.
08:22 Real or not, maybe these guys should unionize.
08:26 Number 11.
08:27 Did you know Plankton put the brain in the robot?
08:30 After SpongeBob is forced to start working at the Chum Bucket,
08:33 Plankton is determined to get SpongeBob to make him a Krabby Patty.
08:37 "I command you to make me a patty this instant,
08:41 or I'll be forced to remove your brain and implant it in my robot, chef!"
08:47 At first, he tries to make him feel at home.
08:49 Eventually, he decides it'd just be easier to turn SpongeBob into a robot to get what he wants.
08:55 'Welcome to the Chum Bucket' makes two things very clear.
08:59 One, these characters know how to sing.
09:01 "A stove is a stove, no matter where you go."
09:07 "A patty is a patty."
09:11 Two, Plankton knows how to put a brain inside of a robot.
09:15 In fact, he tells the audience this while trying to get his SpongeBob robot to make him a Krabby Patty.
09:20 "Or should I say robot Bob, Sponge... Chef Pants. I put the brain in the robot, you know."
09:28 But the robot still refuses. Sorry Plankton, guess we can't always get what we want.
09:33 Number 10. The Confused Family.
09:36 "I did it! I made it outside! Nothing can stop me now!"
09:40 Remember this ending where SpongeBob, Sandy, and Patrick encounter someone in a gorilla suit?
09:45 SpongeBob asks what the ape is doing underwater in the first place,
09:49 and the primate hastily rides off into the sunset on a horse.
09:52 Sure, why not?
09:53 "George, they're onto us!"
09:54 "Let's get out of here."
09:57 However, immediately afterward, we zoom out to a real-life family sitting on their couch
10:04 watching the episode and looking even more confused than we are before finally shutting the TV off.
10:09 It's like the show itself predicted the audience's reaction to this bizarre ending
10:18 and decided to beat their viewers to the punch.
10:20 It works perfectly with the family's hilarious reaction
10:23 and shows that the series rarely takes itself too seriously.
10:26 Number 9. The Trusty Slab.
10:29 "A trusty slab? Sounds familiar."
10:33 While on a tour of the surface, SpongeBob and Patrick end up visiting an eerily familiar restaurant,
10:39 the Trusty Slab.
10:40 If it wasn't already obvious, this is the surface world/live action counterpart of the Krusty Krab,
10:46 and its employees are all human equivalents of SpongeBob, Squidward, and Mr. Krabs.
10:50 "No, wait! Uh, how do you, uh..."
10:53 "Sir, could you please order something?
10:58 There are a lot of people waiting here. Some of us have lives."
11:01 Naturally, there's also a live-action Patrick and Sandy as trusty slab customers
11:06 and a humanized Plankton as the restaurant's biggest rival.
11:09 All these humanized duplicates are portrayed by the characters' voice actors,
11:13 and they not only showcase their acting skills outside the recording booth,
11:17 but also how they perfectly replicate their characters' mannerisms.
11:20 "Jimbo! Get a restaurant full of hungry customers out there. Where are their burgers?"
11:25 "Mr. Slabs, you know that I can't serve a slabby patty until it's cooked just right."
11:33 If only SpongeBob and Patrick could see the connection as we can.
11:36 "I love this guy!"
11:37 Number 8. You've Just Struck Another Pedestrian.
11:41 Ah, the French narrator. The seldom-seen Jacques Cousteau-like voice that helps set
11:46 the scene at the beginning of an episode and reads the time cards.
11:49 "Here we are again at the Bikini Bottom Boating School.
11:53 Today is once again the day of SpongeBob's boating school exam."
11:58 However, it can be a dangerous job. For example, while setting the scene for SpongeBob's boating
12:03 test, he accidentally ends up right in the little square dude's path. SpongeBob quickly
12:07 approaches and then BAM! He accidentally runs over the poor narrator. We even get a brief shot
12:12 of the unconscious storyteller and his camera. "Now importantly, this is the last test for the
12:17 year. And if SpongeBob does not pass this one, it means another whole year of boating school!"
12:24 Thankfully, the narrator survives the accident, but it just goes to show that not even he can
12:31 escape the series' zany slapstick. He's definitely a lot safer as a disembodied voice.
12:36 "What happened?" "Oh, nothing, SpongeBob. You just struck another pedestrian."
12:41 7. SpongeBob Rides the Bubbles
12:44 Another staple of the series is all the bubble wipes, where a huge wall of bubbles floats
12:49 across the screen as we transition from one scene to another. While it's definitely a dazzling sight,
12:55 in the episode "Born to be Wild," it has an even more practical use. SpongeBob fears for
13:00 Bikini Bottom's safety when a biker gang starts riding into town. "Silent Nation! Don't you know
13:06 who the Wild Ones are, son?" "No, I don't know who you are either." "Why, they're the most
13:12 ferocious, bloodthirsty biker gang under the sea!" He needs to warn everyone and decides to take the
13:18 shortcut. What is the shortcut, you may ask? Hitching a ride on the bubble wipe, which takes
13:23 him directly to the next scene inside the Krusty Krab. It's comforting to know that SpongeBob can
13:28 rely on going meta in a state of emergency. "I gotta warn everybody! I'd better take the shortcut!"
13:35 "Mr. Krabs!" "SpongeBob? Where in the blue barnacles did you come from?"
13:38 "There's no time for that, Mr. Krabs!"
13:40 Number 6. The narrator quits
13:42 A newly unemployed Squidward has been living with SpongeBob until he can get back on his feet.
13:47 And while SpongeBob is saintly optimistic, the French narrator isn't so patient. He reads two
13:52 title cards showing how Squidward's been mooching off of his neighbor for months. "Three weeks
13:57 later." But on the third card, so much time has passed that the producers had to hire a new
14:02 narrator once Frenchy got tired of waiting. "So much later that the old narrator got tired of
14:06 waiting and they had to hire a new one." Thankfully, Frenchy comes back a few episodes later. But you
14:12 know it's bad when even he can't stand Squidward's freeloading anymore. Coincidentally, it was at
14:16 this sudden departure that SpongeBob finally snaps and tries to shoo his lazy neighbor away.
14:22 Way to stand up for Frenchy, little square dude. "No! No! It's already contaminated by the bad
14:27 lemon! It won't work!" "Hmm. That's two things in this house that won't work."
14:34 Number 5. Squidward's pain
14:36 Every so often, a character will have no one else to talk to but themselves. But they'll look
14:41 directly towards the camera to keep us in the loop with what's going on. "Now I'll be able to get a
14:46 Krabby Patty the simplest way possible. By ordering one." In one instance, after Squidward gets his
14:52 eardrum shattered from a cruel prank, he looks directly at the camera and confirms that he's in
14:57 horrible pain. He assures us that he's not faking it. But we were already convinced. The poor guy
15:02 had tears in his eyes for Neptune's sake. "Two large Krabby Patties please. With fries!"
15:09 "I'm not faking it, you know. That really hurt." Considering what Squidward tends to go through on
15:22 a daily basis, it's easy to feel sorry for him. But it's kinda sad watching him reach out to the
15:27 audience for sympathy like this. "A bill? And what is this for?" "It's for my ear replacement
15:33 surgery." Number 4. Underwater physics
15:36 With their new life on the run, SpongeBob and Patrick take a brief moment of comfort
15:40 around a campfire. "I wanna go home." "We can never go home, Pat. We're wanted men.
15:46 We'll spend the rest of our lives running." However, Patrick quickly points out what a lot
15:50 of us are wondering. How can they start a fire if they're underwater? Before Patrick can even
15:55 finish the question, the fire immediately goes out. "But at least it's warm around the fire."
15:59 "Hey, if we're underwater, how can there be a…" Being a zany, surreal cartoon means that the
16:06 series doesn't have to obey the laws of physics. But it's a lot funnier when they decide to point
16:10 out their own inconsistencies. And the perfect timing for this joke's punchline made it even
16:15 better. This wouldn't be the last time the series calls out its own logic, but it never
16:19 stops being hilarious. "I'd sure like to go to this party, but I can't read the invitation."
16:25 "Me neither." "Whoever sent this obviously has no idea about the physical limitations of
16:30 life underwater." Number 3. Squidward's 11 minutes of misery. "Squidward, you and your nose
16:36 will definitely not fit in." "Oh, what do you two zeroes know about fitting in?" Thanks to his
16:42 burning curiosity, Squidward ends up trapped in the middle of kelp forest with SpongeBob and Patrick.
16:48 "Welcome, Squidward. Welcome, Squidward." "Shut your half-wit pie holes! I do not know,
16:53 nor will I ever want to be a member of your stupid club!"
17:02 Realizing he's now living his worst nightmare, the cephalopod asks himself why every 11 minutes
17:11 of his life is full of misery. "Oh, why must every 11 minutes of my life be filled with misery? Why?"
17:20 Any longtime viewer knows that SpongeBob's adventures usually have an 11-minute runtime,
17:25 and Squidward always seems to know that 11 minutes is all it takes for something to go awry.
17:30 "He took off his pants." "I'll give him a week." "I'll give him 11 minutes." There's a lot more
17:36 truth to his whining, since in a lot of episodes, our poor grouchy neighbor ends up suffering in
17:40 one way or another. It tugs at the heartstrings to see that he's able to count the minutes of
17:45 his own misery. "Should I have the spaghetti or the turkey?" "Neither." "Oh, then how about the soup?"
17:52 "I don't think so." Number 2. The Talking Ceiling. Throughout the Krusty Krab's training video,
17:59 the omniscient narrator explains the ins and outs of the restaurant to potential new employees.
18:04 "You are now employed by one of the most successful restaurants in Bikini Bottom,
18:09 but it didn't get that way overnight, because the store closes at six." Aside from a few small
18:15 interactions, no one really questions the narrator's existence until Patrick enters the scene.
18:20 "Now we move from behind the scenes to the front lines, where we'll examine the most important
18:26 aspect of the industry, the customer. Or, as we like to say, the Krustomer." "Who said that?
18:32 Are you a ghost?" The minute he hears the narrator speak, Patrick is frightened by the
18:37 Talking Ceiling, and tries to warn Squidward, only to have his concerns brushed off. "Are you
18:42 gonna order something or just make friends with a paneling?" We can't say we blame Patrick. Wouldn't
18:47 you find some disembodied voice coming from the ceiling kind of unsettling? Not all of them are
18:52 as soothing and iconic as the French narrator. "Does this mean I get to make a Krabby Patty now?"
18:57 "No, you can't make a Krabby Patty without understanding the phrase 'poop'." Regardless,
19:02 it's always a treat to hear the voiceovers acknowledged by the characters, even if it is
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19:23 Number 1. Mr. Krabs vs. The Orchestra
19:26 "Sure, that lad's a bit overeager, but you gotta learn to roll with the punches,
19:31 go with the flow, and don't bring anything on a boat that you ain't prepared to lose!"
19:37 While clam fishing, SpongeBob accidentally hooks Mr. Krabs' millionth dollar on his line.
19:44 Suddenly, dramatic Jaws music starts playing, and Krabs is terrified at what will happen.
19:48 "Oh no. SpongeBob, quick, reel it in! Can't you hear the music? That's a four-four string
19:56 ostinato in D minor! Every sailor knows it means death!"
19:59 Frantic, Krabs manages to find a live-action orchestra playing the music, and begs them to
20:04 stop, to no avail. Later on, he actually manages to use the orchestra to draw out the monstrous
20:10 clam and save his beloved dollar. Having the characters acknowledge the background music is
20:14 hilarious enough, but to try and stop it or use it to their own advantage is ultra-meta. It's like
20:20 they want to change the whole episode's narrative. It almost makes us wonder how much control the
20:33 characters have over their lives. Is there an epic fourth wall break we missed? Let us know
20:39 in the comments. Did you enjoy this video? Check out these other clips from WatchMojo,
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