The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie

The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie hit theaters November 19, 2004: eighty-two minutes of “the Bob” jumping from TV to the big screen, a cornerstone for a lot of childhoods. With the current Odyssey adaptation in the air, this is a look at one of the best adaptations of that story.

Yes, you can say it is not an Odyssey adaptation. Technically right. Not a one-to-one. It still runs a lot of the same beats and set pieces. SpongeBob’s Odysseus. King Neptune’s Poseidon. Mindy’s Athena. The Cyclops is the Cyclops. The rhymes are there if you look.

Before later SpongeBob features, the 2004 film opens on a very special morning. Mr. Krabs is opening a second Krusty Krab and needs a manager. SpongeBob assumes the promotion is his, then makes a fool of himself when Squidward gets it. Too much of a kid, Krabs says. Crestfallen exit. Meanwhile Plankton, stuck after plans A through Y, gets Plan Z from robot wife Karen: frame Krabs for stealing King Neptune’s crown. After a night of Triple Gooberberry Sunrises, SpongeBob walks into Neptune confronting Krabs, volunteers for Shell City, and gets six days while Krabs is frozen. He and Patrick have to fetch the crown, save the town, and save the boss.

Show voice actors carry over, so the jump from series to film feels seamless, plus celebrity guests: Scarlett Johansson, Jeffrey Tambor, Alec Baldwin, and David Hasselhoff as David Hasselhoff. The extras land as characters, not just famous faces. Except Hasselhoff. He is Hasselhoff.

The movie leans on knowing who these people are. Rudimentary grasp is enough: naive childish hero, dumb best friend, grumpy coworker, money-obsessed boss, evil competitor. That gets you through. Prior series time deepens the appreciation.

Bias check: I grew up on SpongeBob and this movie. Strong affinity. Most people who did probably have the same. Jokes and lines became 2010s memes and mutual quotes. It helped put “Ocean Man” in the bloodstream. Cornerstone 2000s kid culture. Rose-tinted nostalgia is real. As an adult I have rewatched this and the early seasons, and I can say it is still a lot of fun. I might like this movie and those seasons more now than I did as a kid.

It is absurdist comedy: a crowd chanting “bald,” protagonists driving a sandwich, a whole musical about being men after fake mustaches, hamboning with the local monsters. It uses animation for outlandish reactions live action could not touch, and it is genuinely fun. Under the absurdity sits a grounded adventure about a kid saving the day: written off as too juvenile, then proving childishness does not make you incapable. He wins with a musical parody of “I Wanna Rock” turned into “Goofy Goober Rock.” The film balances sincerity and absurdity better than most kids’ entertainment. A lot of current comedy drowns in irony, wink-winking that goofy and dumb is fine because we admitted it. Lame. This movie is absurd, knows it, leans in, and feels more genuine for it.

Not every joke lands. Most do. It has that late-’90s / early-2000s sharp charm that has dulled over two decades. Monumental cinema? No. It is The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie. It does what it sets out to do: about ninety minutes of fun for you and your kids. Kids’ movie as kids’ movies should be: enjoyable for parent and kid both.

Eight out of 10. If you last saw it as a kid, rewatch. I have not seen the later SpongeBob films and do not care to; from what I hear they are not as good. This one is. And if you feel compelled to lecture that it is nothing like the Odyssey in a demeaning tone, you have no joy in life.