SBC's Top 50 Worst Episodes Ever 2015 Edition

[Supergameman]

Looks like A Pal for Gary is going to make #1 again, just like last time.

[Metal Snake]

Stuck in the Wringer: Still don't hate this one too much. I've personally found Patrick to be more obnoxious in other episodes, and I still find a part or two of it amusing, like that scene at The Krusty Krab.

 

One Coarse Meal: Sorry guys, I never found this one to be unbearable. There's stupid b.s. in it, yes, I see more wrong with it today than back when I first watched it, yes, but I can still watch it.

[SpongeyKid]

Mehh. Two boring and lackluster episodes at most. I'm not gonna say I hate/despise them, but they're still bad nonetheless.

 

And for One Coarse Meal, was what Krabs did really that bad?

 

First of all, I don't really think Plankton wanted to kill himself. And as for Krabs' actions, It's great to think of it as an older brother taking advantage and scaring their little brother. Just a little fun on Krabs' part.

 

I don't think Krabs wanted to drive him to suicide, and again, I don't think Platon wanted to actually kill himself.

[MMM]

Splinter hasn't been on this list, yet has it?

[Jjs Goodman]

Splinter hasn't been on this list, yet has it?

 

It has, it was #8.

[Joe Biden]

Predictions:

2. Fungus Among Us

1. A Pal for Gary

[Cha]

*sees there's only two left*

 

[PatBack]

I actually don't think Wringer is that bad, but OCM? Definitely.

[Less_SpongeBob]

....

Edited May 6, 2018 by More

[PatrickFan1]

I think, #1 will be "A Pal for Gary". I remember no poorer episode and "Fungus Among Us" will be the number 2. 

[Clappy]

Just waiting on commentaries guys. Sorry for the wait. Aiming to have the final two up by the end of the weekend.

[Guest]

I think, #1 will be "A Pal for Gary". I remember no poorer episode and "Fungus Among Us" will be the number 2.

Fungus Among Us BETTER.

[Clappy]

Now that I got everything all together, minus one more commentary that will be added on afterwards.  I would like to thank you all, especially those who participated.  The countdown wouldn't have been the way it turned out without participation from all of you.  I am definitely open to doing this again some time....well at least not for another year or two.

 

So let's get this over with.  A lot of you made predictions about how this would turn out and a lot of speculation over the past few days especially...and a lot of you were right.

 

 

 

2. Fungus Among Us

 

 

298 points.  15 out of 23 lists. (3 #1's Clappy, Nuggets, & Rev)

 

SpongeBob is asleep, and Gary has no food, so Gary wakes up SpongeBob. SpongeBob attempts to feed Gary, but the food is disgusting to Gary. Instead, Gary would rather eat some contagious sea fungus on the floor, which SpongeBob considers very rude. SpongeBob tries to clean up the ick, but gets it on himself. He tries to clean it off, but it only spreads. He also tries not to scratch it because it is itchy, yet he still itches. At the Krusty Krab, he flicks off some contagious sea fungus on his nose, but it grows on the wall and grows back and bigger on him. He tries scraping it off his arm into the trash, but the same thing happens. Squidward sees SpongeBob in his state and calls the SWAT team. When the team is carrying SpongeBob away in a cage, some contagious sea fungus flies off of him and lands on Squidward's head. After Squidward itches it, when giving a Krabby Patty to Old Man Jenkins, it gets onto him. Meanwhile, the SWAT team has SpongeBob quarantined in his house with a bubble around him with the contagious sea fungus having taken a turn for the worse. Patrick comes in and pops SpongeBob's bubble, but blows another one around SpongeBob. Back at the Krusty Krab, the contagious sea fungus is spreading like crazy! It is all over the food, and the customers get infected. SpongeBob arrives in his bubble, having taken another turn for the worse. The health inspector snaps at Mr. Krabs for thinking everyone was healthy, and everyone prepares to attack SpongeBob for spreading the contagious sea fungus. SpongeBob cries icky tears that get on everybody in the Krusty Krab when the bubble pops. Gary then arrives licking the contagious sea fungus off of Mr. Krabs. The episode ends with Gary "de-icking" the Bikini Bottomites for $5.00 to Mr. Krabs' profit.

 

Clappy: Thank you SBC!  This went from 5 to 2 this time around.  It may not be number one but that it nearly doubled in points compared to last time is a step in the right direction.

 

Now my commentary won't be nearly in depth as Nugs, but I've got a lot to say.  Normally gross out doesn't bother me.  It's annoying more than anything else.  This was the only time that gross out humor went too far.  I am not going to lie to you guys, this episode made me puke the first time I ever watched it.  I couldn't take the gross out.  Granted I was already at home sick from school when I initially watched this and it didn't help that stomach was nauseous.  Either way, that didn't help matters.  But let's not reflect on this one incident in my life.  There are far worse reasons as to why this is my least favorite.

 

After having seen this time and time again, this doesn't even feel like a SpongeBob episode anymore.  This feels like a very bad horror movie.  How the hell did this episode get plotted, written, animated, directed, etc.  Not once did anyone think let's torture SpongeBob for nearly eleven minutes and have everything that could possibly go wrong ruin his life?  Over what?  A fungus that evolves at a scientifically inaccurate rate?  Just watching SpongeBob get infected with the Ick, listening to Squidward act more like a jerk than usual, watching Patrick at his absolute dumbest, watching SpongeBob get quarantined, attacked by the townsfolk.....just pure torture.  I don't know what the hell this is, but this is not the cartoon I grew up watching for nearly sixteen years.  

Wumbo: This one scored somewhere around the middle of my list. Kind of surprised to see it as high as #2, but I freaking hate it so here are my thoughts:

 

This episode, for me, is one of those infamous ones in bad SpongeBob episodes. I remember turning this episode off midway through as a kid while watching it on one of my DVDs. I think it was around the scene where SpongeBob was in that quarantined room and he was big and green and disgusting. I have had my problems with SpongeBob before, but this was the first SpongeBob episode where I just flat out thought "This is garbage and this is not worth my time." Look, I'm all for gross-out humour if it's done well. But when you have SpongeBob all puffed-up and green in a quarantined room and there's no joke to go with it...

 

Yeah, there's the problem. There are no jokes in this episode. Name me a funny moment from "Fungus Among Us". Come on, I dare you. You can't, because the only memorable thing about this episode is "the ick". Gross for no reason other than to be gross. And that just doesn't make for enjoyable TV on any level. Maybe #2 is a little high, but I totally get the hatred for this one and join right in on it.

Nuggets: Throughout most of this list, the episodes on here have been very bad, but understandably so. Putting myself in the writers' shoes, I can understand how a plot may have been well-meaning, but veered off course due to many things. Some episodes, like To Love A Patty and Clash of Triton, deserve to be on here, because of failed execution of a promising premise. Others, like Squid's Visit and Pet or Pests, are founded on un-solid premises in the first place. There's nothing to do or redeem when you're given trash, and thus, they've ended up here too. And then, some are here that shouldn't even be on this list at all (I swear if you put Pranks A Lot on your list it's time to reevaluate why you watch TV). But, the majority of this list, each episode, if you put yourself in a writer's place, you can see where an idea seemed promising before something went wrong. View the episode as a car on a path, and the bad ones where the production, or the car took a swerve, if you will.

 

Fungus Among Us is one giant swerve. It never had a clear path in the first place.

 

Not only is Fungus Among Us a swerve, it is a swerve off of a highway into the middle of Atlanta traffic in the middle of rush hour. It is a circular swerve that takes out hundreds of cars in the period before it crashes off the highway. It is a swerve that crashes straight into a gasoline truck, setting the highway and hundreds of cars ablaze, killing many. It makes the road ahead look firey and uncertain, a hellish blaze of evil staring you in the face. Suicide drivers take note of the crash and it's destruction and look at it as a map to destroy future highways. 

 

But the road behind this car is totally clear. Serene, even.

 

Season 5 starts out with one of the best character studies the show has ever had, with great development. This backstory continues into the next segment, although it is slightly weaker. The following segment is even weaker, with a strange, stitched together main segment, and two mediocre 5 minute shorts (although Waiting should not be on this list, no sir). Then, everything absolutely falls apart.

 

Like I said, most of the episodes on this list have an understandable swerve point. With To Love A Patty, it was the moment they decided to make SpongeBob sing a song with that patty. With Squid's Visit, it was the absolute second Cervas and Alexander decided to parody absurdist horror films. Here, though, there is no swerve point. Nothing about this works, from the plot, to the execution, to the direction.

 

The plot is every pitfall of modern SpongeBob. It's another contagion plot, much like Season 4's Once Bitten, but even that admittedly bad episode did something creative and had it be a subversion plot. Here, the contagion is played straight and is all the worse for it. Why is this even a thing? The "ick" would make more sense in a fish tank (since I assume the ick is in fact the gunk buildup that shows up in fish tanks? Was that what they were going for?), but it just suddenly exists. How it spreads isn't clever. It is not funny. The SWAT team in an episode of SpongeBob? What? Squidward is more of an ass than usual. Patrick is at his dumbest. The Bikini Bottomites and their mob mentality are taken to their illogical extreme and become genuinely malicious in a deeply unfunny way. Nothing, nothing, nothing works.

 

A big part about this is that the episode is just gross.

 

"But Nuggets!" You cry. "You told everyone to get over the Splinter and the toenail scene-"

 

Haha, yes I did, hypothetical detractor, and you still should do that as soon as possible. The difference is, those, at the very least were done for humorous purposes - this, was not. This was done just... To be gross. And it's probably the highest level of just all-out "yikes" level gross stuff the show had ever spit out up to that point. Gross nasty fuzzy gunk, and the episode's climax features SpongeBob crying into a pool of said gunk and tears and it's just deplorable. The episode and the characters are cruel to SpongeBob for no reason and I cannot stress how stupid and awful that is.

 

This episode isn't a disappointment, it isn't even understandably bad. It is so wrong in it's intentions, so truly awful, so incredibly horrendous, that it is just one man's fatal, fatal misunderstanding of a show. In one episode, Richard Pursel managed to instill a change, spark an idea in the heads of the writers, that SpongeBob was not a show based on characters and humor, but rather a plot-driven show where stupid, ridiculous, gross shit could happen and characters could change for the sake of a joke or on the drop of a hat.

 

No, man. SpongeBob isn't Ren and Stimpy, and it never was. This is quite possibly the most open rip-off of that show, aside from Trenchbillies, and it is possibly a writer's WORST debut episode to date. FUA is just a car that refuses to start, a horror show that refuses to end, unabashedly awful at every turn. Even the title makes me cringe.

 

And finally.

 

What.

 

The F***.

 

Is this.

 

 

This is my number one. Pure, unadulterated garbage.

 

THIS SPOT IS RESERVED FOR OMJ'S COMMENTARY

 

 

 

 

1. A Pal For Gary

 

 

334 points.  17 out of 23 lists. (5 #1's Patrickfan, Patty Sponge, Wumbo, 4EG, & Katniss)

 

SpongeBob is feeding Gary. He accidentally drops the food and chaos ensues. Then, SpongeBob goes to work. Gary tries to come with him but SpongeBob cannot bring pets to work and leaves Gary.  Gary then turns on the TV, uses his leash as a lasso to grab a cowboy hat in a cupboard, and watches a cowboy show or movie. A customer comes in with his pet worm Jan. SpongeBob explains that people cannot bring their pets. The man is just about to leave when Mr. Krabs came and told him to buy Krabby Patties. He says to the man that he is a responsible pet owner. Then, SpongeBob feels guilty for leaving Gary alone after what Mr. Krabs says, and decides to call Gary.Gary is too busy watching TV to answer the phone. SpongeBob thinks he is too sad to answer. SpongeBob then listens to the message on the answering machine. It is a message that SpongeBob and Gary made that talks about SpongeBob and Gary having fun, this makes SpongeBob feel even guiltier. He then leaves a message saying that he knows that Gary is feeling lonely and that he will be home soon. While this is happening, Gary is watching TV and having a good time.

 

SpongeBob flips the "open" sign to "closed." He sneaks out of the Krusty Krab hoping not to be noticed so he can just go home without doing any more work. However, this is stopped when Mr. Krabs notices him closing the door to the Krusty Krab. Mr. Krabs is seen covered in tar and holding a shovel. He is next to a tar maker about to retar the parking lot. He asks SpongeBob to join him and SpongeBob declines. Mr. Krabs understands and tells him to come to work 5 hours early to finish the parking lot. He spots a stand with Nudibranchs. SpongeBob sees a green one with purple eyes, huge pink lips and blue fins. He says he wants that one, but an old peddler woman (she owns the Nudibranchs) warns him that looks can be deceiving because the Nudibranchs are violent and dangerous, especially around other animals. SpongeBob ignores her warning and takes it home anyway while the old peddler woman says to herself that the people never listen. When he gets home, Gary is still watching TV. SpongeBob gets in front of the screen to show Gary his new friend, which he named "Puffy Fluffy," then leaves to make enchiladas.

 

While in the kitchen, Gary is chewing his toy in front of Puffy. Puffy then growls and scares Gary to go behind the couch while Puffy chews his toy apart. Puffy, about to bite Gary, sees that SpongeBob is coming back and turns himself back to a nice Nudibranch. SpongeBob gets Gary's bowl and makes a slash on it with marker. On the other side of the slash, he writes "Puffy Fluffy." Gary starts to eat when Puffy Fluffy Growls at him again. Then Puffy eat every single piece of food in the bowl. SpongeBob sees that Gary is hiding from Puffy again. Gary then jumps on SpongeBob while Puffy looks like he has absolutely no idea why Gary is on SpongeBob. SpongeBob tells Gary he is going to sleep with Puffy Fluffy tonight. When he puts Gary in the bed, he hisses at Puffy. During the night, Gary wakes up and sees Puffy's skin on the bed. He walks in the kitchen to see a huge eel eating in the refrigerator. The eel is revealed to be Puffy Fluffy. He now has five tongues with a mouth on each. Puffy then attacks Gary and SpongeBob does not wake up.

 

In the morning, SpongeBob wakes up and discovers the situation and finds out that Gary is about to be eaten. Gary is relieved when SpongeBob enters the kitchen, only to be shocked when, instead of helping him, his owner starts to scold him for his destruction and how he's still treating Puffy Fluffy, even when the eel is clearly about to eat him. SpongeBob continues to lecture Gary until Puffy Fluffy's tongues grab onto SpongeBob, who's still scolding his snail even as he's about to be eaten. It is up to Gary to save his master. Using a leash as a lasso, he whips at Puffy Fluffy, driving it away from SpongeBob's pineapple home. SpongeBob chases after the beast crying for it not to go, then turns and admonishes Gary for chasing Puffy Fluffy away, to which he gets a ruthless glare. SpongeBob brings Gary to work, so he is not lonely and also SpongeBob does not blame Gary anymore, and then Mr. Krabs gives Gary a spatula to help work. Gary meows in a disappointed tone.

 

Clappy: Surprised?  This repeated as number one again.  Call it predictable, but let me put it this way.  So what if it is?  The amount of hate this gets is warranted.  You have a problem with it when you didn't make a list?  You could have made a difference.

 

That little comment aside, I have no problem with this as number one.  It made my list.  Wasn't in my Top 10 though because that enchiladas joke is gold and Gary watching his westerns amuses me.  Honestly, the first few minutes weren't that bad tbh until SpongeBob gets overemotional about Gary.  Soak that in for a minute because everything afterwards just heads straight to the crap shoot.  I can't decide who's the real monster in this episode:  Puffy Fluffy or SpongeBob.  Yeah Puffy Fluffy makes Gary's life a living hell, but SpongeBob not only does that too, but steals Puffy Fluffy, ignore Gary's pleas for help when he was so worried about him in the beginning, and then...that climax when SpongeBob tells Gary to put Puffy Fluffy down....that left me speechless.  Such an awful moment in SpongeBob history.

 

But yeah, a terrible episode that deserves all the hate it gets.

Wumbo: Well, it's the community's worst episode and it's my worst episode. I don't even know if I have anything to add with what's been said time and time again, but I just want to say that this was another milestone for me in bad SpongeBob episodes. Once I hunkered down and watched through the entirety of Fungus Among Us, yeah, it was crap. But it was mostly just forgettable and gross, like maybe the writers were having an off day and they had to get out something quick for the deadline so they just went the cheap route. Okay. Not good by any means, but I wouldn't necessarily call it an episode that ruins the sanctity of SpongeBob or anything like that. It doesn't do anything harmful to anyone's character, and in the end, you forget about it until you have to watch that awful ick nonsense again. Awful episode, but not enough to permanently stain a series.

 

This episode is almost enough to stain the entire series; it is that bad. This was the first, and so far only, episode to make my jaw drop with just how staggeringly wrong it was. Everything was done terribly. SpongeBob's character was all wrong. He's naive, yes. He's innocent, yes. But he is not stupid, and he is likable. This episode made him stupid and unlikable, with no character redemption at the end. Gary's treatment is all wrong. This snail is not supposed to be some hero fighting for his life - he's a pet. SpongeBob is supposed to take care of him, and SpongeBob's complete butchering is what leads to this storyline with Gary that nobody wanted. Puffy Fluffy is all wrong. This thing is butt-ugly. I never want to look at it, or hear it, or know of its existence again. And the moment my jaw dropped was when all these shocking elements came together and SpongeBob found Puffy Fluffy about to eat Gary. And what does he say?

 

"Gary! You put Puffy down right now!"

 

Wh-j-k-b-m-l- That is NOT funny, NOT endearing, and NOT SpongeBob. This episode failed to beSpongeBob SquarePants. It was ugly, it was mean-spirited, it was confused, it just sucked. Glad to see this hit the #1 spot like it did last time, and I hope it will for years to come.

Nuggets: Darn you, Richard Pursel.

 

Like Fungus Among Us before it, A Pal For Gary is another example of a deep misunderstanding of the show, courtesy of the same writers that wrought FUA upon us. There honestly isn't much to say about this that hasn't been said before. I personally hate this one, but find it not an entire 11 minutes of pure trash- the first half of the episode is actually rather... Enjoyable, dare I say? Which makes the complete 180 it takes once Puffy Fluffy is introduced that much worse. It is like the trajectory of SpongeBob's decline in miniature- Starts out with a great, character driven situation that gets funnier and funnier as it goes along, then culminates in the peak (that "enchiladas" joke is the best thing about the episode. Don't know why they decided to do that but God it's great and deserved to be in a better episode), declines a bit, and then the episode takes a steep fall into garbo-land. 

 

Like I said, not much to say. The final half kills any goodwill the first part had. It isn't funny. It isn't being done for a reason. It's not doing ANY favors for any characters, and the moral is basically "SpongeBob is braindead and his animal is smarter than him", which is like... Okay? Cool? It's just stupid. Puffy Fluffy is a horrendously detailed drawing that's more disturbing than anything, him as a plot concept could've worked if this episode didn't work it's hardest to invoke horror movie themes (that it needs to STOP drawing upon). There's something good in here, deep down, I believe, it just went WAY too far in a really awful direction, and thus, we're given this. It's not good. At the very least, though, it had a chance to be.

 

But that almost makes it worse.

 

Katniss: Oh yeah, this is my number one worst episode of SpongeBob. *runs away and hides in a bunker*

 

...Wait. You know what? I’m not going to hide. I’m perfectly happy to defend my stance.

 

Let’s talk about SpongeBob. SpongeBob has been annoying, SpongeBob has been a bit of a jerk. And SpongeBob has been oblivious. In SpongeBob Meets the Strangler, his obliviousness is funny. However, in A Pal For Gary, it’s definitely not. Is it supposed to be funny how SB doesn’t realize Puffy Fluffy’s true nature even after HE HIMSELF was attacked by the pet, and instead blames Gary for the whole thing? Because I think the yellow fella was at peak idiocy in this episode and it frustrates me.

 

Unlike with SpongeBob Meets the Strangler, I can’t laugh at what’s happening to Gary. I can’t laugh that much in this episode period, except for that enchiladas gag, really. And I will say that Gary saving SpongeBob was pretty cool. However, these small moments can’t make up for the other parts of the episode that epically fail.

 

A Pal for Gary is the SpongeBob episodes that’s disappointed me the most. Yes, even more than my most disliked special, The Clash of Triton. This episode is a low point for the show. And it deserves to be high on this list once again.

[So Sejima]

I honestly don't find either eps that bad, APFG it's just people hate it so much I feel kinda sorry for it, as it could've been way worse. *looks at the slumber party of all eps that didn't make it* Replace SpongeBob with Patrick and it's Pet Sitter Pat. Plus I don't care about gross out so FAU doesn't bother me that much honestly, same with the Splinter, it's more bland than anything. Now I'll be off hiding safely in my bomb shelter.

[Wumbo]

Boo these episodes. Boo them both to heck.

 

Nice job on the countdown, Clappy! Very well put together and it was a blast going through and reading.

[So Sejima]

Boo these episodes. Boo them both to heck.

 

 

Couldn't resist please don't kill me.

[Metal Snake]

Fungus Among Us is just a mostly boring episode to me (only part of it that made me laugh was when that gentleman fish slapped Mr. Krabs), but A Pal For Gary...yeah. I still can't stand it. I would've liked to have seen a different #1, but...I totally understand.

[Guest]

THERE IT IS. FUNGUS AMONG US. BY FAR THE BIGGEST PIECE OF TRASH SB HAS EVER PRODUCE. I HOPE TO NEVER WATCH THAT SH*T AGAIN.

So yeah. 1 and 2 were my 1 and 2 except 2 was 1 and 1 was 2.

[4EverGreen]

"Fungus Among Us" and "A Pal for Gary," may they BOTH rot in HECK for all eternity!

[SG19]

In Fungus Among Us, the scene where Patrick plays "pirate" with Spongebob and rips his bubble was mildly amusing. Otherwise...