SpongeBob SquarePants (character)

SongeBob SquarePants is the main character in the animated television series SpongeBob SquarePants, which first aired on May 1, 1999 on Nickelodeon. The character was designed by marine biologist and animator Stephen Hillenburg, and is voiced by Tom Kenny.

SpongeBob is a sea sponge who lives in a pineapple in the Bikini Bottom, with his pet snail Gary. He works as a fry cook at the fast food restaurant, the Krusty Krab, alongside his neighbor, Squidward Tentacles. SpongeBob is best friends with Patrick Star, and enjoys bubble blowing and jellyfishing. SpongeBob is a boating school student at Mrs. Puff's Boating School.

Thanks to success and popularity of the franchise, SpongeBob has become a household name and the official mascot of Nickelodeon, and also appears in the current Nickelodeon Movies logo.

Appearance
'SpongeBob' is a porous yellow sponge with large blue eyes, a mouth with prominent front teeth, dimples and freckles. He resembles a kitchen sponge more than a sea sponge, as when the show was only a rough idea, Stephen Hillenburg decided that he looked funnier as an ordinary kitchen sponge. SpongeBob can morph into other shapes at will, and can grow back pieces that fall off of him. His limbs can become variable in length and shape at will and are retractable as well as detachable. In the episode, Graveyard Shift, it is revealed that SpongeBob's limbs can seemingly regenerate instantaneously. Also, they are somewhat edible, as SpongeBob was seen munching on a barrel of them whilst listening to Squidward's tale of the Hash-Slinging Slasher. He is 22, and likes to drive Squidward crazy.

SpongeBob typically wears shiny black shoes that squeak when he walks, with an almost spheric bulge at the front (although still a part of the shoe proper, unlike the balls of clown shoes). He usually wears a pair of white underwear underneath his pants, although he has been seen wearing blue, green, and red underwear with hearts on them (all at the same time, nonetheless) and even pink to honor his best friend, Patrick. At night, he sometimes wears a green bathrobe, but mostly goes to sleep with his underwear, socks and shoes. When he goes swimming at the Goo Lagoon, he wears a pair of blue swimming trunks (although he still wears his underpants, socks and shoes). He also wears a red bow tie in exchange for his necktie on special occasions.

Although sponges are invertebrates, SpongeBob has been shown to have bones in several episodes.

Personality
SpongeBob is a fun-loving, hyperactive, clueless, childish, and accident-prone sea sponge with a happy-go-lucky personality. Despite being portrayed this way, he is relatively smart and knows about what is right, an example being telling Patrick angrily not to draw his picture of calling Mrs. Puff a "big, fat, meanie" because she's a teacher. He is extremely determined and will often stop at nothing to accomplish a task. He is also somewhat dramatic to the people who are kind to him: for example, to the mailfish. He is also over-confident. Sometimes, though, he shows his devious side when trying to get Mr. Krabs and Plankton to work together. He sometimes makes mountains out of molehills, such as losing his name tag. It is also suggested that he deceived the Tattletale Strangler in an elaborate plot to get him back to jail. SpongeBob is very kind-hearted and innocent, and very rarely acts openly mean to anyone, even those who find him an annoyance and act cruelly to him. He is a very selfless and loyal person, especially towards those close to him. His selfless nature is most notably shown in "Best Day Ever", where he sacrifices his "perfect day" to help his friends. Despite his well-meaning intentions, SpongeBob's actions often annoy and cause trouble for those around him, most notably his next-door neighbor, Squidward Tentacles. SpongeBob can become scared easily and usually panics when frightened. He is afraid of the dark and clowns. He also hates hot sauce. Occasionally, SpongeBob is too ignorant to notice impending danger and his unworldly thinking may put himself or others in peril. He also cannot detect lies or malice as easily as the other characters, mainly due to his naïve nature. In "A Pal for Gary", when Gary is being violently attacked and nearly eaten by Puffy Fluffy, SpongeBob takes no action and instead accuses Gary of harassing Puffy. Another example is "Home Sweet Rubble", when it takes SpongeBob a few moments to realize that his house is in serious need or repair. Furthermore, SpongeBob also goes to great lengths to impress others and achieve his goals as seen in "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy II", where SpongeBob wrongly attacks an innocent Atomic Flounder to impress Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy. SpongeBob attempts to steal Patrick's box in "The Secret Box." He also tries to steal Betsy Krabs' underwear along with Patrick and Mr. Krabs in "Mid-Life Crustacean". In "Doing Time", SpongeBob and Patrick force the receptionist of the local bank to give them all his money. This was done in an attempt to get arrested and free Mrs. Puff from jail. In "Hall Monitor", SpongeBob enters the window of a couple's house and disturbs them while on hall monitor duties. In "The Thing", SpongeBob and Patrick break into the zoo at night to free "Smelly" from his cage. In "Safe Deposit Krabs", he and Patrick break into the local bank at night to free Mr. Krabs from the safe vault. In "The Great Snail Race", SpongeBob overexerts Gary as a preparation method for the following snail race. This causes extreme discomfort to Gary and eventually results in him collapsing on his way to the finish line; however, SpongeBob eventually noticed the error in his ways. In "Employee of the Month", SpongeBob sets up many traps on Squidward in an attempt to sabotage his Employee of the Month Award. In "Just One Bite", SpongeBob handcuffs himself to Squidward, forcing him to eat a Krabby Patty. In "Shuffleboarding", he and Patrick, while dressed as Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy respectively, go around arresting citizens for actions that do not count as crimes, such as chewing gum too loudly and being too old. In "SpongeBob's Last Stand", SpongeBob and Patrick resist the government-sanctioned construction of the Shelly Superhighway and encourage the rest of the town to join their protest through a song. The police eventually notice the boys rebelling against the government's authority and imprison them in the middle of nowhere. However, on SpongeBob's part, his arrest was for playing the sitar without a license. SpongeBob also feels the need to impress Mr. Krabs and to protect the Krusty Krab and the Krabby Patty secret formula at all costs. In "Call the Cops", SpongeBob and Mr. Krabs impersonate police officers in hopes of retrieving the secret formula. He also likes to impress his boating teacher, Mrs. Puff, despite his reckless driving. Beginning with "Boating School", an ongoing plot point is SpongeBob failing his driver's test due to his inability to drive safely. His poor driving skills have caused him to run over pedestrians, rapidly switch lanes, drive on the sidewalk, crashing into buildings and property, harm his passengers, and lastly damage his vehicle. Despite all the damage he causes, SpongeBob is never arrested or charged for his dangerous driving; instead, Mrs. Puff is, who the authorities believe is failing to educate him. These actions can often lead to SpongeBob entering by trespassing. SpongeBob and Patrick have a frequent tendency to enter Squidward's house without his consent, which reaches its epitome in "Good Neighbors" and becomes a plot point of the said episode. Additionally, in "Survival of the Idiots", he and Patrick invade Sandy's treedome during the winter with little regard to the "Keep Out" sign on her door. In "The Thing", after getting caught by the SWAT Team, SpongeBob and Patrick hide from them by trespassing into the sewers. SpongeBob also invades the sewers with Squidward in "The Sewers of Bikini Bottom", although they did it to retrieve the safe, so this can be justified. In "Toy Store of Doom", SpongeBob and Patrick stay in Toy Barrel past its open hours and hide in a dollhouse so as not to be caught by the security guard. SpongeBob's personality trait of wanting to impress others and achieve his goals has to lead to him having a history. However, due to his naïvety and gullibility, a lot of these crimes have been committed unintentionally or through the manipulation of others, mainly Squidward, Plankton, Karen, or Mr. Krabs. He has been arrested a total of seven times: for "stealing" a balloon in "Life of Crime", attempting to rob a bank in "Doing Time", failing to invite the police to his party in "Party Pooper Pants", littering Patrick's driver's license in "Driven to Tears", playing sitar without a license in "SpongeBob's Last Stand", falsely accused public disturbance in "Cave Dwelling Sponge", and unintentionally terrorizing a majority of Bubbletown in the episode of the same name. SpongeBob's innocence also makes him overly trusting and very gullible, easily manipulated by people who intend to use and/or harm him, such as Squidward, Mr. Krabs, and Plankton, and he is clumsy. In "Walking Small", SpongeBob assists Plankton in driving the attendants at Goo Lagoon away to make an unauthorized development to its property. However, this was done out of manipulation, and SpongeBob regrets his actions after learning Plankton's motive, therefore returning the beach to its previous state. In "Sandy's Rocket", SpongeBob and Patrick go around capturing everyone in Bikini Bottom and trapping them in the spaceship, believing that the entire population is formed of aliens. Even though he is generally good-natured and easygoing, SpongeBob can get angered easily. When frustrated and angered, SpongeBob can be sarcastic, rude, and condescending to his friends, even Mr. Krabs, whom he treats as a father figure. Squidward is the only character whom SpongeBob never insults when he is angry, except for the episodes "Can You Spare a Dime?" and "Breath of Fresh Squidward." In "Hooky", SpongeBob is encouraged by Patrick to ditch work during his shift, which causes the unsupervised grill to produce mass amounts of smoke. In "Hall Monitor", he lets his rank of hall monitor go to his head and becomes known as the maniac for his destruction of the city before receiving a scolding from his teacher who was arrested for it. During "Ditchin'", SpongeBob ditches boating school to attend the Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy meet and greet, which affects his driver's education and eventually gets Mrs. Puff arrested. He believed King Neptune's trident was his spatula and decided to help all of Bikini Bottom when he was destroying the town after going mad with power in "Trident Trouble." Even Santa stated in Goons on the Moon, that he is a menace despite his good nature. Despite his overall kindness, SpongeBob occasionally shows a lack of empathy for others and forces people into situations against their will. In the episode "Rodeo Daze", he kidnaps the Bikini Bottomites with bubbles in persuasion for them to save from a rodeo. Additionally, in the episode "A SquarePants Family Vacation", he sends his friends letters promising that everything they love will be at his house, only for it to be a hoax and a plea for them to view his slideshow. Although SpongeBob has several friends, and many of the citizens of Bikini Bottom often treat him quite friendly, most, if not all, citizens of the city have been shown to have some degree of dislike for him. In the episode "Gone", it is shown that a holiday called "National No SpongeBob Day" has been started by the citizens of Bikini Bottom. As its name suggests, it is an entire day dedicated to getting away from SpongeBob, where the people leave Bikini Bottom for the day. Even goes, stating that everyone needs at least one day away from SpongeBob's laughter. In the ceremony, they build a giant wooden effigy of SpongeBob, burn it down, dance on the ashes, and depart Bikini Bottom. SpongeBob is more honored than insulted by this, as he was the "inspiration" for the holiday.

General
SpongeBob is described as sweet, kind, funny, cheerful, and hard working. He has a buck-toothed grin, an expressive face and square body that compliments his pure and good nature. SpongeBob will rarely knowingly do wrong or harm to anyone except on April Fool's Day and never without remorse. However, he has been known to shout and use "bad words" such as Tartar Sauce, Fish Paste, or Barnacles) when angry or frustrated. Although he is an adult, he has a very childish nature, shown to great effect in the episode "Grandma's Kisses", at which he is at his most childish, as well as in The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie.

. SpongeBob is very easily overexcited about almost anything, like simple daily tasks and things of which he does not know of (such as when Squidward invited him to strike at the Krusty Krab, SpongeBob celebrated for it although he did not know the meaning of the word strike). This, along with his repetitive talking and loud, annoying laughter makes him a huge annoyance to others, especially Mrs. Puff, Squidward and Plankton.

Perhaps the most long-running paradox of this character is his strength. He has been known to have enormous difficulty lifting even the lightest of objects. While he cannot lift light things like stuffed animals, he can still flip Krabby Patties and has been known to tote Patrick around (which cannot be an easy task).

There is also the matter of his limited invincibility. When viciously pummeled by a bully, SpongeBob is not hurt; rather than fighting back, he continues to go through his day normally, until the bully is too worn out to keep punching. However, in "I Had an Accident", SpongeBob broke his butt in a skiing accident.

SpongeBob loves his pet snail Gary dearly and cannot do without him, as shown in "Have You Seen This Snail?". Gary usually has solutions to help SpongeBob out of his dilemmas. Gary and SpongeBob live together in a pineapple under the sea at 124 Conch Street, Bikini Bottom (this address was seen on SpongeBob's driver's license in the episodes "Sleepy Time" and "No Free Rides").

Also in multiple episodes he seems to have a knack for singing. SpongeBob is ambidextrous; in Procrastination and I'm with Stupid, he can be seen using his left hand to write. And in I Was a Teenage Gary, he remarks that he's "lefty anyway" when he loses his right arm. In other episodes he uses his right hand as his dominant.

SpongeBob has been in jail for ninety days for littering as a result of taking Patrick Star's driving license and ripping it up after Patrick got it his license after his first try (SpongeBob has never been able to obtain a license even after multiple times) as seen in the episode "Driven to Tears"

Career
SpongeBob has a career as a fry cook at the Krusty Krab restaurant, home of the Krabby Patty. He takes his job seriously and also considers it to be his passion. His first words were "May I take your order?" He was Employee of the Month 26 consecutive times, which would mean he has worked there for at least two years and two months.

SpongeBob works alongside Squidward, much to Squidward's dismay. Squidward manages the cash register for his money-obsessed boss, Mr. Eugene H. Krabs. SpongeBob, in some episodes, seems to have attained a celebrity like status in Bikini Bottom for his "masterful" fry cooking. In the episode "Squid on Strike", he is referred to as a "legend" by a young fry cook who wants to take his job and is asked to sign the boy's spatula. In another episode, he is offered a job as King Neptune's fry cook, but turns it down because Patrick was forbidden to go with him.

SpongeBob is rarely late for his job. In "Hooky" he was two minutes late because he got caught by a fishing hook, and in "Have You Seen This Snail?" he was fifteen minutes late because he was tired after searching for Gary. SpongeBob also failed to attend on time in The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, where he was several minutes late after eating ice cream all night with Patrick at Goofy Goobers, and being passed over for a promotion. However, the time at which he gets to work is inconsistent. He was once seen coming into the Krusty Krab at 3:00 a.m. and said that he always came in at that time to count the sesame seeds.He often prizes his punctuality as in "SpongeBob Meets the Strangler", where he has a party for his 100% on time percentage, and another party 20 seconds later for his birthday (although, Patrick stated that they do what the party invitations tell them to do, so it's possible they were not celebrating his birthday).

SpongeBob also served a short stint in one episode as the speedster, "The Quickster" (parody of The Flash and Quicksilver) in the International Justice League of Super Acquaintances or the IJLSA for short. Also, SpongeBob acquires an IJLSA lunchbox (As seen and stated in "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy V")

SpongeBob has also been cheated and challenged into thinking he is not a great fry cook. An example of this is in the episode when Bubble Bass, comes into the Krusty Krab and asks SpongeBob for a Krabby Patty. Bubble Bass then hides the pickles under his tongue and tells SpongeBob that he forgot to put pickles in his burger. SpongeBob is so distressed to have failed a customer that he experiences a mental breakdown in which he forgets everything and loses his confidence. However, he regains his confidence and continues as a good fry-cook.

Education
Much of SpongeBob's early education is unknown; however, it was mentioned that his kindergarten teacher was Ms. Ashley Rivera. Also, he encountered a fellow Elementary classmate named Dennis in "The Sponge Who Could Fly." He also mentioned that he was voted most clumsy in High School, and was never able to get a date for his Junior Prom.

SpongeBob has yet to keep a boating license (analogous to a driver's license), because he fails every driver's test at Mrs. Puff's Boating School, mainly due to a tendency to become nervous once behind the wheel (he has been shown to know what he's doing everywhere but inside the boat). Despite this, he perpetually and continuously attends boating school in an attempt to get his license (and because he enjoys it), much to the woe and frustration of his boating instructor Mrs. Puff. At one point, Mrs. Puff becomes so frustrated she gives SpongeBob his boating license by allowing him to do "extra credit". She then takes it back realizing how much chaos he could cause with his license. When Mrs. Puff is fired in "Mrs. Puff, You're Fired", SpongeBob's new teacher actually trains him so much, that SpongeBob can drive very well–but only if he is blindfolded. SpongeBob has failed his drivers' test many times. In "Boating School," SpongeBob failed his test only 38 times. SpongeBob has failed his boating test 1,258,058 times by "Mrs. Puff, You're Fired." (Note he failed his test twice in that episode) This implies that he has taken his test more rapidly than in his first years of boating school. Mrs. Puff says that his record was destroyed in the accident in "Mrs. Puff, You're Fired." She concludes that this is as if he never failed. In "Driven to Tears," SpongeBob says he's failed the test 58 times. It can be concluded that SpongeBob failed his test a total of 1,258,116 times total, but technically on paper he has only failed 58 times. In the SpongeBob movie he drives a hamburger-like vehicle, the Patty Wagon, very well. When Patrick points out he doesn't have a license, SpongeBob replies, "You don't need a license to drive a sandwich."

While characterized as immature, SpongeBob's mathematics are brilliant. The most noticeable instance of this is in "Squid's Day Off", where he offers the change for $1.00 in all sorts of forms, including: four quarters, ten dimes, twenty nickels, one hundred pennies, and one quarter/three dimes/seven nickels/ten pennies. Also, in Pre-Hibernation Week, he is able to calculate in two seconds flat, that there are 168 hours in 7 days, just by looking at a calendar and with no math equipment.

Leisure
He frequently gets days off at the Krusty Krab, and as a result he spends his free time with his best friend Chad King, and especially enjoys practicing karate with his other friend Sandy Cheeks (a squirrel from Texas who wears a space suit to breathe underwater). He also likes catching jellyfish at Jellyfish Fields. To date, he has caught, named, and let go every jellyfish in Jellyfish Fields at least once, except the blue jellyfish, until the end of the episode "Jellyfish Hunter" (who he calls "Friend", after the jellyfish helps him discover Mr. Krabs was using jellyfish to mass-produce special Krabby Patties in terrible conditions).

In many episodes, such as "As Seen on TV", "Band Geeks", "The Camping Episode", "Ripped Pants", The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, and most SpongeBob video games, it is suggested he has brilliant ukelele and singing skills. He also likes to blow bubbles, surf, sun bathe, play the ukulele, and watch his favorite TV show, The New Adventures of Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy. SpongeBob is such a fan of the show that, he and Patrick together brought them out of retirement. They also pretend to be Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy. SpongeBob portrays Man Sponge.

Age
Creator Stephen Hillenburg has always said that he wanted SpongeBob to remain ageless, but the show has shown varying information about SpongeBob's age. For starters, people within the series are regularly shown to call Spongebob a kid, some appearing as young as their 20s. In the season one episode "Sleepy Time", aired in January 2000, SpongeBob has a dream in which he receives his driver's license. This shows a birth date of July 14, 1986, which would make him 13. Hillenburg stated later in an interview that it was only in a dream and cannot be confirmed, joking that Spongebob is "50 in sponge years". However, the same information was seen in his temporary driver's license in the episode "No Free Rides". He has also taken a driving test more than one million times. SpongeBob mentioned in the episode "The Chaperone" that he could not get a date to his junior prom. In the movie, SpongeBob has 374 'Best Employee Awards' from the Krusty Krab on his wall, but this was likely just a throwaway gag, as everyone in the movie appears the same age. In the episode "Party Pooper Pants," one of SpongeBob's kindergarten boating school classmates is shown to be married and owns a house. SpongeBob lives by himself, though that might be a moot point in the context of Bikini Bottom's medieval-like lifestyle. Whether SpongeBob is a kid or not was also a very important part of the SpongeBob SquarePants Movie's plot. In the film commentary on DVD, Hillenburg said he's an adult that acts like a kid while the cast described Spongebob as a kid who wishes to be seen as competent despite his youth and supposed childish nature.

Controversy
SpongeBob SquarePants, like many other Nickelodeon shows, has had to endure controversy at one point or another. However, due to the show's almost "extreme" popularity, the controversy has been more or less larger than with other Nicktoons.

Trivia

 * SpongeBob could not get a date for his junior prom (as revaled in The Chaperone)
 * He is the main character to have a lot of aliases in the series
 * He is the only character to have thirteen aliases in the name of the episodes which are:
 * MuscleBob BuffPants
 * Nature Pants
 * Scaredy Pants
 * Sandy, SpongeBob, and the Worm
 * Party Pooper Pants
 * Club SpongeBob
 * SpongeGuard On Duty
 * The Sponge Who Could Fly
 * SpongeBob Meets the Strangler
 * Patrick SmartPants
 * SquidBob TentaclePants
 * Funny Pants
 * The Krusty Sponge