Encyclopedia SpongeBobia
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Encyclopedia SpongeBobia
If you were looking for the article about the parrot from SpongeBob Comics No. 4, then see Polly.
*caws* Potty want cookie dough.
 
— Potty, "Christmas Who?"
Character

Potty the Parrot is one of the supporting characters and is also Patchy the Pirate's pet parrot who acts as the co-host of SpongeBob SquarePants. The name "Potty" is a parody of the popular parrot saying, "Polly wanna cracker." Potty is a crudely designed marionette with strings who is usually obnoxious and annoying toward Patchy.

Potty's gender is ambiguous. In the books SpongeBob Airpants: The Lost Episode and Oh, Barnacles!, female pronouns are used for Potty throughout, like "Potty flapped her wings."[2] Potty lays eggs in "Christmas Who?" and "The Sponge Who Could Fly," which only female parrots can do. Potty's name is a play on Polly, a female name. However, Patchy says, "his" when referring to Potty in "Friend or Foe." When asked about Potty's gender in 2017, Vincent Waller said: "It is only a puppet, with no telltale signs of gender."[1]

Potty has a raspy voice. Potty's voice was originally provided by the series' creator, Stephen Hillenburg from 2000 to 2004. Paul Tibbitt took over the role from 2007 to 2012. Since the season 10 episode "Feral Friends" in 2017, the character has been voiced by Doug Lawrence.[6]

Description[]

Character concept[]

Potty on Patchy's shoulder promo photo

Potty on Patchy's shoulder.

Patchy-and-Potty-scan

Potty is a small green parrot with a flower-shaped collar, a tuft of red and yellow feathers for "hair," and big googly eyes.

Potty is a marionette parrot character in the series and the co-host with Patchy the Pirate. Potty appears alongside Patchy whenever he hosts a special episode. Potty is usually shown to be sarcastic and snarky towards Patchy, forming a rivalry between the two. However, after their squabbles, they usually forgive each other and remain friends.

Relationship with Patchy[]

Spongebob-Potty-the-parrot-devil

Devil Potty.

Despite being labeled as Patchy's best friend, Potty is a frequent pest to Patchy, and is sometimes an antagonist in the live-action segments, although they usually make up by the end of the episode.

In "Shanghaied," Potty shoots Patchy out of a cannon.

In "Ugh," Potty ruins Patchy's caveman show by becoming a futuristic cyborg and bringing in a robot. At the end of the show, Potty gives Patchy a pet T. Rex as an "apology present."

In "Friend or Foe," Patchy and Potty get into a fight while working as fry cooks at The Poop Deck, temporarily ending their friendship, which makes Patchy upset. Patchy compares this to how Plankton and Mr. Krabs became enemies, starting the main story of the episode.

As revealed in "Truth or Square," Patchy imagines his conscience as two miniature versions of Potty: a devil Potty and an angel Potty. The devil Potty encourages him to do wrong things, while the angel Potty encourages him to do moral things.

In "It's a SpongeBob Christmas!," Patchy finds Santa's workshop, but it turns out to be a polar bear's cave, while Potty manages to find the real Santa's workshop and laughs at Patchy, along with Santa.

In "Feral Friends," Potty bites Patchy's hand after agreeing to forgive him.

Destruction[]

Potty has been damaged and/or destroyed on multiple occasions, but always returns in the next scene or episode.

In "Christmas Who?," Patchy cuts the strings that Potty is attached to, causing the puppet to fall to the ground. Later in that same episode, Patchy pulls on the strings, causing what seems to be a cast member to fall from the ceiling. Again in the same episode, Potty eats too much cookie dough and breaks apart from the weight, leaving only Potty's head intact.

At the end of the "Patchy's Pick" segment from "Shanghaied," Potty is blown up by dynamite.

Trivia[]

Potty-puppet-movie-storyboard

A rough storyboard for the first movie, showing Potty's string puppet and Patchy.

SpongeBob Airpants final page with Potty's gender

Page from SpongeBob Airpants describing Potty as female ("flapped her wings").

  • In the animatic version of The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie that's included on the special features of the DVD release, Patchy and Potty's string puppet were meant to appear. In the final film, Potty was replaced by a real-life parrot and Patchy was replaced by a different pirate captain who, unlike Patchy, does not wear a hook on his hand. However, the real-life parrot is still voiced by Stephen Hillenburg and used the same exact voice as Potty.[7]
    • According to Vincent Waller, the Patchy and Potty replacements in theatrical movies were "because the movie folks don't really understand [Patchy and Potty's] appeal. Intentionally low production values scare them."[8]
  • Patchy and Potty are the only major live-action characters in the series.
  • In the Croatian dub, Potty's name is Pero, which translates to "feather" and is a common name for a bird in Croatia.
Polly Closed-Cation Error

Closed-captions error.

DSCF6483

YTV captions error.

Jonathan Silsby credited as the string puppeteer for Potty in The Sponge Who Could Fly

Jonathan Silsby listed in "The Sponge Who Could Fly" credits as the string puppeteer for Potty.

  • Jonathan Silsby was credited as the string puppeteer for Potty from 2000 to 2004. Since then, the controller of Potty's strings has been uncredited.
  • In 2015, Vincent Waller stated on Twitter there were no plans of making Stephen Hillenburg voice Potty again.[9][10] Stephen Hillenburg's death on November 26, 2018 solidified this.


References[]

  1. ^ a b Vincent Waller on Twitter: "It is only a puppet, with no tell tale signs of gender."
  2. ^ a b SpongeBob Airpants: The Lost Episode: "Squawk!" Potty flapped her wings and squawked loudly. "Lost forever!"
  3. ^ Oh, Barnacles!: If you try to punish the parrot, she'll fly away faster than you can say..."
  4. ^ "Christmas Who?" and "The Sponge Who Could Fly:" Potty lays eggs, which only female parrots can do.
  5. ^ "Friend or Foe:" "If I could only hear his voice."
  6. ^ a b https://twitter.com/VincentWaller72/status/839237394159149056
  7. ^ https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=378&v=7tLx4n811hg
  8. ^ https://twitter.com/VincentWaller72/status/652969019788541952
  9. ^ https://twitter.com/VincentWaller72/status/642034807615041536
  10. ^ https://twitter.com/VincentWaller72/status/708189299598974976
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