Fear of a Krabby Patty

"Fear of a Krabby Patty" is a SpongeBob SquarePants episode from season four. In this episode, the Krusty Krab opens up for 24 hours as part of Plankton's plan to get the Krabby Patty secret formula from an exhausted SpongeBob.

Characters

• Medley Fishbowl ^(cameo)
• Martha Smith
• Dave
• Fred
• Eugene H. Krabs
• Squidward Tentacles
• SpongeBob SquarePants
  • Dream SpongeBob
• Sheldon J. Plankton
  • Dr. Peter Lankton ^(debut)
• Karen Plankton
• Dennis
• Henry-Bart ^(cameo)
• Nat Peterson ^(cameo)
• Incidental 11 ^(cameo)
• Thaddeus
• Old Man Walker ^(cameo)
• Sadie
• Tom
• Dream Jellyfish
• Dream Shelley
• Gary the Snail ^{(written on bowl in SpongeBob's dream room)}
• Krabby Patty ^(debut)

Synopsis

Mr. Krabs is painting a sign that says "New Business Hours: 6 AM to 11 PM." He then shows it to SpongeBob and Squidward. Squidward criticizes that this new policy is unfair, while SpongeBob suggests some earlier times that they can go to work at before Squidward promptly shuts him up. As he is hanging the sign on the window, Mr. Krabs finds out that Plankton reopened the Chum Bucket for 23 hours a day. Afterwards, he announces that the Krusty Krab will be open for 24 hours a day to be better than the Chum Bucket, much to the dismay of Squidward and the excitement of SpongeBob. This is Plankton's plan to force SpongeBob to crack and tell him the Krabby Patty secret formula. However, after several days of nonstop service, SpongeBob is still going strong and wide awake, despite Squidward and Mr. Krabs failing in that regard. As a result, Plankton calls the restaurant, placing an order for 10,000 Krabby Patties under the disguise of Peter Lankton. Mr. Krabs tells SpongeBob to make the patties and never stop to take a break, which the latter naturally takes on with as much enthusiasm.

After 43 days of sleepless nonstop service, SpongeBob finally cracks, and cannot finish the order because everywhere he looks, he sees killer Krabby Patties. Plankton then throws a flyer at SpongeBob's head, saying "Dr. Peter Lankton, Psychiatrist, specializing in Krabby Patty phobias."

SpongeBob goes to the Chum Bucket, which is disguised as Dr. Lankton's office, and meets Dr. Peter Lankton, who is really Plankton in new clothes and a fake mustache and beard. Plankton tries several methods to get the formula out of SpongeBob, all of which end with him getting crushed by a piano by SpongeBob.

Finally, Plankton tries hypnosis to get SpongeBob to tell him the formula and he succeeds in making him fall into a deep sleep. Unfortunately for Plankton, he cannot get SpongeBob to wake up and tell him the formula, even after trying several loud and annoying sounds in an attempt to do so. Meanwhile, SpongeBob dreams that he is jellyfishing when a giant Krabby Patty appears, catches him with a jellyfish net and eats him up. He then finds himself in his bed, and a giant Krabby Patty enters the bedroom. The patty turns out to be friendly and gives SpongeBob a cookie pizza and chocolate milk, thus curing his fear. SpongeBob wakes up and says he is cured, and goes back to the Krusty Krab as Plankton begs him to return and reveal the formula to him, insisting that hypnosis and therapy do not work, and that he is still very sick but to no avail.

When SpongeBob gets back to work, he tells Mr. Krabs that he is okay, and that all he needed was a little sleep. Krabs says that there will be no more 24 hour shifts, "...because 23 hours will be plenty!" They laugh a little but Mr. Krabs promptly tells SpongeBob to get back to work at the end of the episode.

Production

Art

Deleted Scene Storyboard: The Krabby Patties taking SpongeBob in cave

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Deleted scenes

On the storyboard featured on the Fear of a Krabby Patty DVD, they show Plankton waiting for SpongeBob instead of him having to get him up immediately after sitting down. There was another one when a bunch of Krabby Patties from a cave bring SpongeBob to his bed after he gets eaten by a Krabby Patty in his dream. Yet again, SpongeBob says another "K-R-A-B-B-Y-P-A-T-T-Y says I" during the day/night montage. Also, SpongeBob talks to Krabby Patties more in the storyboard animation. Squidward having bags in his eyes was originally going to be the end theme.

Music

 ‣ The Rake Hornpipe - Robert Alexander White [opening]
 ‣ Dramatic Impact 6 - Ivor Slaney ["The Chum Bucket open 23 hours?!"]
 • Hello Blues - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob pinching himself]
 ‣ Zelle 501 - Gerhard Trede ["Open 24 hours, eh?"]
 ‣ Keel Row - Brian Peters ["I don't care if we stay open till the day after the end of time."]
 • Solo Steel 4 - Jeremy Wakefield ["Mr. Krabs, can I go home yet?"/"You could learn a few things from that boy."]
 • Solo Steel 3 - Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob kisses the Krabby Patty.]
 ‣ Hercule Poirot - Gerhard Trede ["Drat! He's not collapsing from exhaustion."]
 ‣ Lap Steel - Nicolas Carr [Krabs crushes Plankton]
 ‣ ? ["Kick it into high gear! We got a big order!"]
 ‣ Idyll in the Clouds - Ludo Philipp ["Now, make me 10,000 patties!"]
 ‣ Worker's Symphony - Hans May [images floating by]
 ‣ Twilight Zone - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin [SpongeBob hallucinates Krabs as a giant Krabby Patty/SpongeBob hallucinates Krabs as a giant Krabby Patty again]
 ‣ House of Horror - W. Merrick Farran [SpongeBob screams.]
 ‣ Twilight Zone - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin ["Stay back! I'm warning you!"]
 ‣ House of Horror - W. Merrick Farran [SpongeBob sees giant patties everywhere/SpongeBob screams again/"I want to live!"/Squidward is shown exhausted/"Everywhere I look, I see killer Krabby Patties."]
 ‣ Footsteps of Horror - W. Merrick Farran [SpongeBob screaming]
 ‣ Planet Surface - Gregor F. Narholz ["What does this mean?"]
 ‣ ? [Krabs thinks SpongeBob should see a psychiatrist]
 ‣ Fear 1 - Louis Clark ["Dr. Peter Lankton, Psychiatrist."]
 ‣ Lap Steel - Nicolas Carr ["Well, this looks like the place."]
 ‣ Like Strange - Kenny Graham [Chum Bucket disguised as psychiatrist's office]
 ‣ Games Played in the Dark - Richard A. Harvey [Plankton with a beard]
 ‣ ? - rimshot
 ‣ Towerstreet 17 [#29] - Gerhard Narholz [SpongeBob closes his eyes]
 ‣ The Killing Ground (a) - Richard A. Harvey ["They're coming for me!"]
 ‣ Wooden Bear - Gil Flat, Tony Tape, Florian Voelxen [word association/Words on cards]
 ‣ Mists of Illusion - Gilbert Vinter [Plankton hypnotizes SpongeBob]
 ‣ ? - cell phone rings
 • Solo Steel - Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob dreams about jellyfishing]
 ‣ March of the Aliens - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin [SpongeBob eaten by giant Krabby Patty]
 ‣ Camilla - Nino Nardini [The patty gives him gifts]
 • Solo Steel - Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob wakes up]
 ‣ The Rake Hornpipe - Robert Alexander White [ending]

Release

• This episode is available on the Fear of a Krabby Patty, Season 4 Volume 1, Nick Picks Volume 3, The Third & Fourth Seasons, The Best 200 Episodes Ever, Nick Picks Box-Set (Vol, 1-3), Complete Fourth Season, and First 100 Episodes DVDs.

Reception

• "Fear of a Krabby Patty" was ranked #11 during the Best Day Ever event on November 9–10, 2006.

Trivia

General

• Although this episode premiered in 2005, it was produced in 2004 according to the credits.
  • This is the first episode to be produced and air after The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie finished production and was released.
• This was the first episode to premiere in 2005.
• The scene of SpongeBob screaming "No! No! I want to live! I want to live!" and the scene after showing a close up of Squidward's face have become popular on the internet.
• The Krusty Krab was opened 24 hours a day, for 43 days, with no breaks.
  • This means that SpongeBob, Squidward, and Mr. Krabs stayed awake for an astounding 1,032 hours, which is logically impossible as they would have died from a severe case of sleep deprivation.
  • In the Russian dub, Squidward says they have been working for 48 days straight, meaning the Krusty Krew has been up for an even longer period of time, being 1,152 hours.
• This is the second episode where the Krusty Krab is open 24/7. The first is "Graveyard Shift."
• This is the first episode to have Paul Tibbitt as the showrunner, replacing Stephen Hillenburg. Hillenburg later returned to the position in 2015, starting with the season 9 episode "Lost in Bikini Bottom", until his death.
• This is C.H. Greenblatt's final episode on the show as a writer and storyboard director before leaving to work on Chowder.
• This is Alan Smart's first episode as an animation director since the season 1 episode "Jellyfishing."
• Once again, Mr. Krabs breaks the law just for more money: having one's employees work nonstop for 24-hour services without a 24-hour staff. Normally, in a restaurant open 24/7, there are different employees that work different times in the day. It is actually illegal for a supervisor to work their employees this long.
• In 2005, this episode and "Shell of a Man" were nominated for a Creative Arts Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program, but lost to the Comedy Central animated series South Park.
• Mr. Krabs previously made the Krusty Krab open 24 hours in one day in "Graveyard Shift." However, unlike in the aforementioned episode, Krabs stays at the restaurant with his employees and thus suffers from the same lack of sleep that they do.
• This is the first episode to be PAL Pitched in some countries.
• From June 2009 to April 2010, Charter Communications and Time Warner Cable mistakenly labeled this and "Shell of a Man" as the shopping show "SpongeBob Fun."
• In "Help Wanted," "Employee of the Month," and "The Clash of Triton," SpongeBob makes a massive quantity of Krabby Patties in seconds with no mental strain, but in this episode, SpongeBob goes insane from making 8,659 Krabby Patties over a period of nearly 34 days.
• In this episode, SpongeBob is able to lift an entire grand piano by himself. In other episodes, like "Help Wanted" and "MuscleBob BuffPants," he is barely strong enough to lift a weight of stuffed animals.
• Old Man Walker breaks the fourth wall by asking why is he moving.
• Plankton's eye seems to be much smaller in the last half of this episode, due to his beard.
• Plankton is revealed to have a cell phone.
• When Mr. Krabs forgets how many days it has been he looks tired and wrecked, but after he sees SpongeBob make some really bad patties he seems refreshed.
• The drive-thru that was installed in "Driven to Tears" is seen when Mr. Krabs announces Day 10 of non-stop service.
• In the Polish dub, the episode's title is "Kraboburgerofobia," which translates to "Krabby Patty Phobia."
• It is unknown how Gary would manage to survive without SpongeBob being home to feed him for such a long period of time, unless he fed himself somehow or rummaged through the refrigerator and pantry to eat normal food.
• The French title of this episode is "Ouverture Non-stop!" or "Opening Non-stop!"
• This episode was paired with "Sandy, SpongeBob, and the Worm" during the Massive Monster Mayhem Marathon.
• This episode's premiere was simulcast on Nicktoons.
• Starting with this episode, the cast list in the credits is listed separate for both segments instead of altogether.
• This is the first time hypnosis is used/mentioned. It happens again in "Barnacle Face" and "SpongeBob's Bad Habit." Hypnosis was also used in the books The Amazing SpongeBobini and Bikini Bottom Mysteries, and the video game Revenge of the Flying Dutchman.
• Irony: Plankton's last attempt to get SpongeBob to tell him the formula is hypnotize him to sleep so he can subconsciously tell it to him, yet this is what cures his fear of krabby patties moments later.

Cultural references

• In SpongeBob's dream, the Krabby Patty tells him that he will always be with him in his arteries, a reference to the 1982 Universal big movie E.T. The Extra Terrestrial, complete with the glowing finger. 
• The episode's title card is similar to the start of the Heisei Godzilla movies.
• When Plankton and SpongeBob say two different ways to say the words "potato" and "tomato," it is a reference to the song "Let's Call the Whole Thing Off" from the 1937 film Shall We Dance.

Errors

• In the Greek dub, at the beginning, Mr. Krabs says "The Chum Bucket will open for 24 hours" instead of saying "The Krusty Krab will open for 24 hours." It was a mistake from the Greek voice actor.
  • In Russian dub of this episode, Squidward says that they are working for 48 days instead of 43.
    • Also, when Mr. Krabs says that they are working for 15 days, the Russian dub says 10; 30 days instead of 23; 35 instead of 30.

• In the scene where SpongeBob is dropping trays at the window, the anchor on Squidward's work hat disappears.
• When SpongeBob gets up from his trauma, his tie is missing and it reappears seconds later.

• The front door when Mr. Krabs enters the kitchen is far away from the grill.
• Despite Robot Krabs saying that the Krusty Krab opens at 9:30 in Imitation Krabs,  Mr. Krabs' sign says that it opens at 6:00.

Running gags

• Plankton constantly getting hit with a piano including the one where SpongeBob turned the cards into another piano.
• SpongeBob hallucinating people as killer Krabby Patties.

Videos

Fear of a Krabby Patty Premiere Promo (partial) (May 2005)

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