By Nick Nitkowski

I was a huge Spongebob Squarepants fan as a kid. I remember when it first premiered on television. From that very first episode, I was a fan and I couldn’t wait for the next new episode or TV special. Since its premiere, Spongebob has become something of a global phenomenon. Thus making the show Nickelodeon’s biggest cash cow. The show was created by Stephen Hillenburg who passed away from Lou Gehrig’s Disease in November of 2018. He made it known before his passing that he wanted the show to end after the first Spongebob Squarepants movie, but Nickelodeon unsurprisingly refused to end the show and to this very day, the show continues. Many fans notice a drop in quality, myself included. They even dished out more movies “Sponge out of Water” and “Sponge on the Run.” Now they’ve made another film focused on Sandy Cheeks, Spongebob’s squirrel-friend exclusive to Netflix before iapparently y leaked online beforehand. 

I’m not going to beat around the bush, this movie is awful. So much so that it is a very clear indicator that the entire Spongebob IP should have ended a very long time ago. As soon as I started it, I knew I was going to hate it. I clocked it at three minutes and 26 seconds and I already hated what I was witnessing. Yet, I pressed on as best I could. It did not get any better.

While Sandy Cheeks is more the forefront of this film, Spongebob is of course also highly involved in the story. He has now become a very annoying character. His antics are no longer fun or even amusing. IIn fact, hedoes things in this movie that are borderline stupid, like being oblivious to oncoming danger, and creepy, like tickling random peoples’ feet in a swimming pool. 

 There are also some llive-actionactors involved in this thing playing evil scientists attempting to capture Spongebob and his friends to recreate and mmass-producethem to sell to kids as aquatic pets. The leader of this endeavor is played by Wanda Sykes. And while she is a very talented and funny comedian, there was nothing enjoyable about her character in this film. And, of course, her cohorts are nothing more than blank-faced buffoons throughout this movie’s runtime. 

There are some choices made with these live-action characters that are just horrendous. They attempt to do some visual effects, like ssuperimposingWanda Sykes’ head onto the body of a little girl in a flashback scene that is just insultingly bad. They even reveal a twist with this character that does not look convincing at all, yet I’m sure the people in charge of this thing probably made the excuse of “Ah, it’s for kids. Kids won’t care how it looks.” Toddlers, maybe. But everyone else? They’ll notice and acknowledge the quality in kind. 

In addition to the awful CGI effects of this movie, it pretty much goes hand-in-hand with the animation style of the film which isn’t very appealing to the eye. It felt like a lower quality of 3D animation othanthat used in the last Spongebob movie “Sponge on the Run.” It was just hideous on all counts. That’s all I can really say about the animation style. I do feel that I should mention that I throw no shade at the animators who worked on this film as I feel that they are just told what to do by the executive while working with a budget that is cclearly iniscule for that of a well-established studio. 

Overall, this was a horrible movie that no one of any age should be subjected to. The story is terrible, the animation quality is ugly, the acting is awful, and full transparency, I couldn’t even finish the movie. At the time of my writing this, Ihade no idea how the movie ended. I bowed out. I threw in the towel, I gave up. I firmly believe that even the most hardcore Spongebob fans will have difficulty finding anything enjoyable about this film. In time, I’m sure that I’ll gladly forget about the experience I had with this film. Spongebob used to be great. It used to be fun and funny and unique. I still look at all the older episodes fondly. But much like a sponge that stayed too long in the sun, it is all dried up at this point and should have ended with its creator.

Streaming on Netflix

1/2 star