Template:Episode/116b
Characters
- French Narrator
- SpongeBob SquarePants
- SpongeBob RoundPants (debut)
- Man on the Tacoma Narrows Bridge
- People in the rain
- Pig
- Screaming woman
- Gary the Snail
- Patrick Star
- Patty Rechid
- Margaret SquarePants (mentioned)
- Sandy Cheeks
- King Neptune (mentioned)
- Squidward Tentacles
- Eugene H. Krabs
- Dave
- Charlie
- Debbie Rechid
- Nat Peterson
- Dale
- Dennis (citizen)
- Francis
- Frank (red shirt)
- Frankie Billy
- Fred
- Harold "Bill" Reginald
- Henry-Bart
- Ivy (gray)
- Old Man Jenkins
- Paco
- Sandals
- Abigail Marge
- Nazz-Mimi
- Nathiel Waters
- Tom
- Tina Fran
- Nancy Suzy Fish
Synopsis
The episode starts with the narrator talking about a horrible tragedy, while showing an over-water hurricane, followed by footage of the 1940 collapse of Tacoma Narrows Bridge (Galloping Gertie), with a man running from the bridge before its collapse. After that, the scene cuts to a rainy day at SpongeBob's pineapple where inside SpongeBob is looking at the calendar. The narrator says that the tragedy happened three days before, as the calendar flips back to January 7. SpongeBob is seen doing chores, including laundry, with his pants and Gary's shell. Then, Patrick calls SpongeBob to show that he can make funny sounds with his tongue for a very long time; SpongeBob asks Patrick if it can wait, but Patrick refuses, and he continues on.
Meanwhile, Gary gets his shell out of the laundry. By the time SpongeBob gets to the laundry machine, his pants had shrunk. He goes to the store to buy new ones, but Patty Rechid declares that there will not be any square pants for months. He then looks through the pants, he tries many pairs but is not interested, he then finds a pair of round pants with the same design as his normal pants.
While walking with his round pants, SpongeBob bumps into Patrick, but Patrick does not recognize him. He bumps into Sandy, who pretends that she does not know SpongeBob saying that they must call him SpongeBob FancyPants. Then, SpongeBob passes Squidward's house, and Squidward pretends not to recognize SpongeBob in order to get him to leave him alone. Being gullible, SpongeBob really thinks that Patrick, Sandy, and Squidward do not know him, so he starts making himself over, naming himself, SpongeBob RoundPants.
SpongeBob gets his job at the Krusty Krab again, and looks to Squidward for pointers. Squidward gives SpongeBob his bad routine of being a Krusty Krab employee (including not throwing the trash in the dumpster, being rude to the customers, nasally laughing like Squidward, burning Krabby Patties, taking too long in the bathroom, and even sleeping on the job). Mr. Krabs realizes what is going on, and he does not joke around when he sees SpongeBob. SpongeBob then tells Mr. Krabs that he cannot be SpongeBob SquarePants again, as he has round pants. Mr. Krabs asks him who told him this and SpongeBob states it was Patrick, who stops eating a Krabby Patty when he realized his error of not recognizing SpongeBob in the first place. Mr. Krabs then suggests that he just remove them if that is the case. Then, SpongeBob takes off his pants, while Sandy calls him "SpongeBob UnderPants," and the episode ends with SpongeBob looking at his underwear and screaming with embarrassment.
Production
Art
Music
| ( ‣ ) Production music |
| ( • ) Original music |
| ( ◦ ) SpongeBob music |
‣ Hawaiian Train - Victor Cavini [title card]
‣ Hawaiian Flower - Jon Jelmer [opening]
‣ Twilight Zone - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin [stock footage of storm]
‣ Marching to Honolulu - Kapono Beamer [laundry day]
‣ Cartoon Sting 1 - Phone call from Patrick/Much much later...
‣ Steel Sting (b) - Jeremy Wakefield ["Yeah, Patrick."]
‣ Dramatic Impact 3 - Ivor Slaney [all of SpongeBob's pants shrunk]
‣ Steel Licks - Jeremy Wakefield ["I'm gonna need to get new pants."]
‣ Ballet Shoes [#60.03] - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin [mall exterior]
‣ Steel Licks (b) - Jeremy Wakefield [they're out of square pants]
‣ Vibe Q Sting - Nicolas Carr [SpongeBob puts on long pants]
‣ ? [SpongeBob puts on another pair of pants]
‣ Unknown Track 51 - Nicolas Carr [Hippy pants]
‣ Unknown Track 26 - Nicolas Carr [rock guitar sting]
‣ Harp Ding - Nicolas Carr [SpongeBob notices round pants]
‣ Parting of the Clouds - Nicolas Carr [round pants]
‣ Vibe Sting - Nicolas Carr [SpongeBob tries them on]
‣ Skipping to School - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [Patrick does not recognize SpongeBob]
‣ Hello Blues - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield ["Patrick's so full of tartar sauce."]
‣ ? [banjo music]
‣ Hello Blues - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield ["But I know my best buddy Squidward will recognize me."]
‣ Comic Walk - Nicolas Carr [Squidward ignoring SpongeBob]
‣ Harp Ding - Nicolas Carr [SpongeBob gets an idea]
‣ Comic Walk - Nicolas Carr [SpongeBob shows pictures to Squidward]
‣ Steel Licks (d) - Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob walks away]
‣ Seaweed - Steve Belfer ["Hello, can I help you?"]
‣ Hawaiian Cocktail - Richard Myhill ["I guess I'm not SpongeBob SquarePants anymore."]
‣ The Tip Top Polka/The Cliff Polka - Chelmsford Folk Band ["Hello, sir, I'd like an application please."]
‣ Captain Lenoe's - The Folk Players [Squidward punches himself]
‣ Lap Steel - Nicolas Carr ["Here are the applications."]
‣ Happy Sack Shanty - Michael Bolger, Nicolas Carr [SpongeBob filling out the application]
‣ The Krusty Krab Jig - Michael Bolger, Nicolas Carr [Squidward showing SpongeBob the ropes]
‣ Shellfish Behavior - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob copying everything Squidward does]
‣ The Drunken Sailor - "What are you two doing?"
‣ Goofy Conversation - Nicolas Carr, Barry Anthony ["I mean, do these pants look square to you?"]
‣ Steel Sting - Jeremy Wakefield [Patrick sitting at a table]
‣ Hawaiian Adventures SpongeBob Theme - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [ending]
Release
- This episode is available on the SpongeBob's To SquarePants or Not to SquarePants, Season 6 Volume 1, Complete Sixth Season, and Next 100 Episodes DVDs.
Reception
- As of June 18, 2019, The Internet Movie Database (IMDB) gives this episode a rating of 6.0/10 based on 231 ratings by users.[1] TV.com users give this episode a rating of 7.3/10 based on 148 votes.[2]
Trivia
General
- This episode aired exactly 10 years after the first official SpongeBob SquarePants episode premiered.
- This episode aired on July 17, 2009, three days after SpongeBob's 23rd birthday.
- Although this episode premiered in 2009, it was made in 2008 according to the credits.
- This episode was the first to premiere in The Ultimate SpongeBob SpongeBash.
Title card on Amazon and a several countries.
- This episode's title is sometimes shortened by a word. This is because:
- On the To SquarePants or Not to SquarePants DVD-credits, this episode is listed as "To SquarePants or Not to."
- In Southeast Asia, Turkey, and Poland, this title card only says: "To SquarePants or Not to" because the original title is considered too long. This also happens on the Amazon Prime Video version.
- During the live-action intro in this episode, footage of the 1940 Tacoma Narrows Bridge collapse is used, which was also used in "Two Thumbs Down" as part of the segment when SpongeBob breaks his thumbs.
- In this episode, the French Narrator says "SpongeBob SquarePants CHANGED his pants!" like it was a surprise, but SpongeBob has changed his pants many times when he wakes up. He is even shown in this episode pulling multiple pairs of pants out of his washing machine.
- Irony: SpongeBob could have just hung up the phone with Patrick, and he could have checked on his pants in the washer.
- Gary the Snail has buttocks under his shell in this episode and in "Welcome to the Bikini Bottom Triangle," but in "Shell Shocked," he only has organs and a slug body.
- The jeans that SpongeBob took out from the sale had holes in them, indicating it was already used.
- Or it could be a design.
- The round pants SpongeBob wears in this episode are quite similar in appearance to his pants in "The Sponge Who Could Fly" after being inflated, though they are much smaller and obviously not inflated.
- It is unknown why Patrick thought SpongeBob was a stranger throughout the episode, but it is possibly due to his low level of intelligence. It is suggested Patrick realized his mistake after SpongeBob and Mr. Krabs pointed this out to him.
- Sandy pretended to not recognize SpongeBob because she was possibly teasing him as she kept calling him with different last names ("SpongeBob FancyPants" and "SpongeBob UnderPants").
- Squidward tried to get SpongeBob to go away, so he pretended not to recognize him.
- When SpongeBob was saying what goes on a squirrel's head is similar to "Squirrel Jokes."
- When SpongeBob talked about what goes on inside a squirrel's head, an image of a chattering squirrel is shown and SpongeBob cringes afterwards. This scene has become a fad on YouTube, with random scenes replacing the squirrel image.
- The picture shown by SpongeBob when he forgot where the last picture took place actually took place in the episode "Choir Boys" when Squidward was singing in the shower at the very beginning of the episode. However, SpongeBob was not seen in front of the shower in "Choir Boys" for some odd reason.
- When SpongeBob takes out the first pair of pants when he was in the store, and when Mr. Krabs walks out of his office, the man in the front of the order line has the same pants as the first pair SpongeBob took out in the store.
- This is the first episode in which Squidward is seen reading the House Fancy magazine.
- This is the second appearance of SpongeBob's laundry room, the first was in "Dumped." Although, it looks different in this episode than it did in that episode.
- This episode premiered on David Hasselhoff's 57th birthday and ten years after the premiere of "Bubblestand" and "Ripped Pants."
- There are 2 books based on this episode called SpongeBob RoundPants and Mr. FancyPants!.
- There's also an online game based on this episode called RoundPants Runaround.
- In the Croatian dub, the episode name is "Skockani ili Ne" translating to "SquarePants or Not."
- In the Greek dub, the episode name, "Τετραγωνοπαντελονής ή Όχι," can be translated to the same one in the Croatian dub.
- The time card "Much, Much Later" is similar to the title card of "The Algae's Always Greener."
Cultural references
- The title is a play on the Shakespeare quote "To Be or Not to Be?"
Errors
SpongeBob with green eyes
Yellow eyes
- When SpongeBob walks away from the dryer, his eyes are yellow for a frame.
- When Squidward pretends he doesn't know SpongeBob, SpongeBob pulls out photos to jog Squidward's memory but it is unknown how those pictures were inside those pants if they were new and the original ones shrunk.
- Patty Rechid says that it will take months for SpongeBob to get new square pants, however three days later (at the beginning of the episode's narration), he is wearing square pants again. Although he could've went to another store that had square pants.
- The first time Sandy pretends not to recognize SpongeBob, he just shrugs and says "Course it was just Sandy, and Neptune knows what goes on inside a squirrel's head." The second time she pretends not to recognize him however, SpongeBob does not take the situation lightly.
- After SpongeBob says, "I'll have to start all over again!," he just filled out an application and got the job. In the pilot episode, "Help Wanted," however, he did not ask for an application. He had to complete a challenge first.
Part of the flag is briefly white.
- When Mr. Krabs says "I'm used to Squidward sleeping on the job, but I expect more from you, Mr. SquarePants," the yellow flag behind Mr. Krabs' eyes turns white for a split-second.
- When SpongeBob is talking to Mr. Krabs and says "They're round," his eyes turn green for a split-second.