It's a SpongeBob Christmas!

This is the page about the episode. For other uses, see It's a SpongeBob Christmas! (disambiguation).

Template:Episode/175

Characters

• SpongeBob SquarePants
• SpongeBob's Tastebuds
• Sandy Cheeks
• Eugene Krabs
• Patrick Star
• Squidward Tentacles
• Sheldon J. Plankton
• Gary the Snail ^(cameo)
• Karen Plankton
• Pearl Krabs
• Mrs. Puff
• ToyBob ^(debut)
• Santa Claus ^(animated)
• Santa's Elves ^(debut)
• Fake Santa
• Imaginary Santa
• Brown Seahorse ^(cameo)
• Baby
• Bikini Bottomites
• Carolers ^(debut)
• Johnny
• Driver
• Little Boy
• Patchy the Pirate ^(animated)
• Potty the Parrot ^(animated)
• Polar Bear ^(debut)
• Old Man Jenkins (cameo)

Synopsis

Patchy and Potty subplot

Please note that these scenes are not in the CBS airings. Patchy the Pirate (Parodying the role of S.D. Kluger from Santa Claus is Comin' to Town) drives a mail truck through a snowy mountain range. He stops to wish the viewers a Merry Christmas and tells them he wanted to make sure Santa Claus got his letter. He then lies saying he gave the mailman the day off, but it is revealed that he stole the truck and the mailman is tied up in the back.

Potty doubts they'll make it to the North Pole, and he and Patchy argue about which Christmas carol the directions to the North Pole are in. The truck is driven madly until Potty notices there is literally a fork in the road, which gets stuck in one of the tires and causes the truck to spin madly. Patchy then suggests that they see what SpongeBob is doing for the holidays.

Patchy drives the truck off a cliff and the mailman escapes. He and Potty get lost in the woods (since the fork got stuck in one of the truck's tires and caused it to go flat, preventing them from being able to drive it any further) and are trying to warm up by a fire. Out of a sense of hunger, Patchy hallucinates and imagines Potty as a platter of buffalo wings and nearly eats him, only to snap out of it. Potty then also hallucinates and imagines Patchy's head as a suet cake topped with birdseed and pecks on him.

At the end of the episode, Patchy and Potty make it to the North Pole, believing they finally made it to Santa's workshop. Patchy apparently meets Santa in a cave and tells him his Christmas wish is to meet SpongeBob. However, it turns out he was, once again, hallucinating and really encountered a hungry polar bear, which started chasing him. Watching nearby, the real Santa puts Patchy on the naughty list for stealing a mail truck. He and Potty then wish the viewers a merry Christmas.

Main Plot

SpongeBob passing out fruitcake

Set to December 23, SpongeBob is really excited that Christmas is almost here. SpongeBob sees his friends are preparing for Christmas as well. Squidward is stringing lights so Santa knows to "go away," and he hates Santa and he is always naughty to him. Patrick has set a trap for Santa to make him stop the clocks so they will have Christmas all year long (but he gets trapped in his own trap). Sandy is conducting a Christmas scientific experiment. Mr. Krabs is ready for the season of "getting." Meanwhile, Plankton isn't happy as he gets nothing but coal in his stocking every year, so he comes up with a new plan to ruin the holidays which involves the element he recently discovered, Jerktonium (Jt) that he pastes on the periodic table. He then sprinkles it in fruitcake which will cause anyone who eats it to become a jerk. With everyone except him acting like a jerk, Santa will have no other choice but to put him on his nice list and give what he always wanted to get for Christmas- the formula for the Krabby Patty. He feeds some to SpongeBob, but it has no effect, so he throws the keys at SpongeBob, kicks the cake dispenser and heads back into the Chum Bucket, thinking his plan has failed yet again.

While SpongeBob is busy feeding fruitcake to everyone, including Christmas carolers, children, the parade band, anchovies, Santa and the driver of the parade truck, Plankton realizes that SpongeBob is immune to Jerktonium, for the fact that he is extremely pure-of-heart and his love of the Christmas holidays are counteracting the effects of the Jerktonium. Although Plankton has "Plan A" failed, thanks to SpongeBob's goodness, he unleashes "Plan B," inventing an evil wind-up robot clone of SpongeBob, named ToyBob, to ruin Bikini Bottom. The robot throws a boat into a building and burns down the Krusty Krab sign, trapping Mr. Krabs inside. 

Later that day, as he returns from feeding fruitcake to everyone in Bikini Bottom, SpongeBob crosses paths with the carolers, who bad-mouth him. As SpongeBob passes the Krusty Krab where Mr. Krabs is (cheaply) fixing the sign, Mr. Krabs says that the repairs are going off his salary, thinking SpongeBob had destroyed the sign. Then he sees with Patrick, who also became a jerk, setting another trap for Santa and tells SpongeBob to leave. The next morning, Christmas Eve, SpongeBob finally notices that everyone is being mean. Afraid that Santa might fly by Bikini Bottom, he asks Squidward for help, who tricks SpongeBob into thinking he's not home and suggests that SpongeBob should go bug Sandy instead. Right after SpongeBob leaves, ToyBob knocks (or more specifically, bumps) Squidward's door, and when Squidward (still angrily) refuses to let him in, he grabs the door and smashes it on Squidward's head after he angrily demands for the door back.

Meanwhile, SpongeBob goes to Sandy's treedome to explain, but she is also a jerk. SpongeBob accidentally drops some fruitcake into Sandy's Christmas Magic Analyzer, which shows that it is contaminated with jerktonium. The way to cure it is with a song (Don't Be a Jerk (It's Christmas). Sandy asks where he got it from and he answers Plankton. Sandy asks again in disbelief that he would take the cake from the known to be evil plankton and just hand it out to people without suspicion, to which SpongeBob stupidly says yes. He then sings it to all the Bikini Bottomites, thus turning them all good and respectful again as they sing along(, with Squidward later joining in).

Unfortunately, after that, it was too late. Santa then comes, and tells SpongeBob that he, afraidly, is the bearer of bad tidings, and that SpongeBob and everyone else, (especially Squidward but )except Plankton, is on his naughty list, this year, but also deserve coal for being a bunch of jerks(, which shocked SpongeBob and his friends(, especially Squidward,) in confusion,) and that he is just as surprised as SpongeBob is, and then tells his friends and the others that when compared to Plankton, he's been a saint, and he didn't believe that Mr. Krabs, Patrick, and Sandy are good, too. He then gives Plankton the Krabby Patty formula as his present (which means that he has HIS ways), which was taken from Mr. Krabs secretly by the elves who then attempt to take Mr. Krabs' money in the wallet as well (which is why they think he is on the naughty list), but Pearl made him blow their cover. When SpongeBob is carried to Santa by Patrick  who (believes that is was SpongeBob's fault for all this naughtiness SpongeBob had caused and) slaps him to get him to talk clearly, he tries to explain that he had got it all wrong, but, instead, Santa tells SpongeBob that, on the contrary, he (actually) found out that SpongeBob is the worst of all (and also possibly the only one on Santa's naughty list all along), because he believes that SpongeBob caused havoc in Bikini Bottom. Immediately, ToyBob arrives and morphs into his mega mode and threatens to destroy not only more of Christmas, but also Santa. 

SpongeBob tries to protect Santa but is easily defeated when the robot throws him far away. Santa tries to hide in the Krusty Krab, but ToyBob captures him. SpongeBob saves Santa by using the fruitcake-dispenser Plankton loaned him to shoot fruitcake at it, causing it to malfunction and break down back into pieces. Santa thanks SpongeBob for saving him and tells him that he has been indeed a very good led, unlike the "owner of ToyBob." One of the elves gives Santa ToyBob's key (which is read "If found, please return to the Chum Bucket"), which reveals that it was Plankton and his Jerktonium that caused the people being jerks (as he made the mistake of writing on the key), and the destruction that ToyBob caused (which made Santa very angry to Plankton). Mr. Krabs takes back the formula and Santa has the elves dumping coal on Plankton. Santa then leaves everyone to celebrate the rest of the holidays (except Squidward). SpongeBob, who is now surprised, asks his friends, and the others, that anyone has seen Patrick. The episode ends with Patrick on the back of the sleigh and netting him, throwing him and the reindeer off course.

Production

Production

"It's a SpongeBob Christmas!" was the first full-length episode in the series that was produced in stop motion animation. Mark Caballero, Seamus Walsh, and Christopher Finnegan of Screen Novelties animated it, and Caballero and Walsh also served as its directors. [1]  [6] Production on the episode began in October 2011 at Los Angeles, California. [6] According to Chris Finnegan, it took about five months to shoot, with a couple of months on either end for research, development, and post. [7] Six sets were constructed on which sixty pounds of baking soda were used as snow, 42 pounds of glitter for the background, 22 pounds of wood chips were used to create Sandy's treedome floor and 20 boxes of cereal covered the coral rocks. [6] Caballero and Walsh had conflicts on making sure the stop motion version of Bikini Bottom will resemble the 2D world of the series. There was also the issue of making SpongeBob resemble his 2D self. 

Series' creator Stephen Hillenburg and executive producer Paul Tibbitt provided hands-on feedback on the production on a weekly basis. "They'd check out the weeklies and go back and forth with us on the various gags [...] It was really a pleasurable experience when they came to visit, because we come from the same planet. It all felt very easy and natural," Walsh said. [6]

Animation

The episode used stop motion animation which was implemented by "Screen Novelties."

Art

Videos

It's a SpongeBob Squarepants Stop-Motion Christmas

It's a SpongeBob Christmas on YTV!

Music

( ‣ ) Production music

( • ) Original music

( ◦ ) SpongeBob music

 ‣ Holiday Seasonings - Patchy driving a mail truck
 ‣ Out of Control - fork in the road
 ◦ SpongeBob SquarePants Theme Song - Stephen Hillenburg, Derek Drymon, Eban Schletter [intro]
 ‣ Magical Holiday Morning - Luke Brookshier, Eban Schletter [Title card]
 ◦ Santa Has His Eye on Me - Luke Brookshier, Eban Schletter [SpongeBob sings this]
 ‣ Some Things To Know About Monsters - Eban Schletter ["I'm way ahead of you, Karen."]
 ‣ ? - shot of fruitcake
 ‣ A Mean and Creepy Plan - Plankton explains his plan
 ‣ ? - Plankton adds jerktonium to the fruitcake
 ‣ The Fruitcake Vendor - Barry Anthony [SpongeBob eating Plankton's fruitcake]
 ‣ Happy Holiday Cheer - SpongeBob gives fruitcake to carolers
 ‣ Hot Steel and Slide Licks (e) - Jeremy Wakefield ["It's great to see people so passionate about the holidays."]
 ‣ Down in Davy Jone's Locker - "The jerktonium seems to work on these jerks."
 ‣ Super Highway March - parade
 ◦ Hot Fruitcake - Marc Ceccarelli, Eban Schletter [SpongeBob giving everyone fruitcake]
 ‣ A Mean and Creepy Plan - people fighting
 ‣ Super Highway March - Santa parade float
 ‣ Jingle Bells (Hawaiian Version) - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield ["I want a trampoline!"]
 ‣ ? - "Success!"
 ‣ Lonely Stranger - Laurie Johnson [Karen explaining how Plankton's plan is flawed]
 ‣ ? - ToyBob revealed
 ‣ Vibe Sting - Nicolas Carr ["Huh?"]
 ‣ Hot Steel and Slide Licks (Original Version) - Jeremy Wakefield [Plankton turns ToyBob's wind-up key]
 ‣ Attack of the Giant Robots - Cris Velasco ["I am ready... to destroy Christmas!"]
 ‣ Holiday Seasonings - Patchy's mail truck crashes
 ‣ Bikini Bottom Bound - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield ["Merry Christmas, fellas!"]
 ‣ Hot Steel and Slide Licks (a) - Jeremy Wakefield [Patrick gets mauled]
 ‣ Holiday Seasonings - "Ah, Christmas Eve."
 ‣ Deck the Halls - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [Frankie, Johnny greet each other]
 ‣ A Mean and Creepy Plan - Frankie throws snowball at Johnny
 ‣ Hot Steel and Slide Licks (u) - Jeremy Wakefield ["I'm gonna need some help."]
 ‣ A Mean and Creepy Plan - SpongeBob knocks on Squidward's door
 ‣ Lap Steel - Nicolas Carr ["Good idea, Squidward!"]
 ‣ Monster Bug (a) - Gregor F. Narholz [ToyBob comes by]
 ‣ Hot Steel and Slide Licks (f) - Jeremy Wakefield [ToyBob smashes Squidward's door over his head]
 ‣ A Mean and Creepy Plan - SpongeBob goes to Sandy's treedome
 ‣ The Donut Dilemma - Sandy complains that she's out of fruitcake
 ‣ Hot Steel and Slide Licks (f) - Jeremy Wakefield [SpongeBob slips on an acorn]
 ‣ Vibe Q Sting - Nicolas Carr ["Well, I'll be hornswoggled."]
 ‣ Unsettled Menace - Phillip Green ["This is terrible!"]
 ‣ ? - Sandy calls SpongeBob an idiot
 ‣ Finger of Suspicion 2 - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin ["I've eaten tons of that fruitcake!"]
 ‣ Alien Spacecraft A - Gregor F. Narholz [x-ray of SpongeBob]
 ‣ Adventure Fanfare 1 - Harry Bluestone, Emil Cadkin [Sandy calculates an antidote]
 ◦ Don't Be a Jerk (It's Christmas) - Tom Kenny, Andy Paley [SpongeBob sings this]
 ‣ Jingle Bells (Hawaiian Version) - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [Santa arrives with bad news]
 ‣ Straight from Hell - Gregor F. Narholz [ToyBob wreaking havoc]
 ‣ Mr. Swashbuckle - James McConnel [SpongeBob shoots fruitcake at ToyBob]
 ‣ It's a Hula Holiday - Sage Guyton, Jeremy Wakefield [coal dumped on Plankton]
 ‣ Magical Holiday Morning - Luke Brookshier, Eban Schletter [Santa leaves]
 ‣ Holiday Seasonings - Potty pecking Patchy's head

Release

• This episode is available on the It's a SpongeBob Christmas! and Complete Eighth Season DVDs.
• This episode is also available on Blu-ray.

Trivia

Template:Trivia

• This is the only episode of Season 8 to be in widescreen format.
• Beginning with this episode, the characters on the United Plankton Pictures Inc. logo are in a brighter shade of yellow, and the waves are enhanced.
• This is the sixth time where all of the main characters on plus Mrs. Puff and Pearl all appear in the same episode. The others are "Culture Shock," "Sleepy Time," "Christmas Who," "Party Pooper Pants" and "A SquarePants Family Vacation."
• This is currently the only episode to not use the regular animation.
• Gary only makes a cameo at the beginning, but is asleep. However, his full form is seen in some posters for this special.
• Though the opening sequence is not in stop-motion animation, there are various differences within it from the opening theme, including:
  • There is frosting around on the UK airings.
  • A wreath is around Painty the Pirate.
  • A children choir sings the theme song.
• The full episode aired on Nickelodeon UK and Ireland on December 2, 2012.
• This episode aired for the first time in Israel at September 9, 2012. This is the first time that SpongeBob first aired on Israel before US.
• This episode premiered on CBS in the US, becoming the first SpongeBob episode to premiere on a network outside of Nickelodeon, before airing on Nickelodeon, and was rated TV-PG instead of the usual TV-Y7 rating. The Patchy segments were also removed in the CBS broadcast.
• This is the fourth time the intro was changed. The first was in "Christmas Who?," the second was in "What Ever Happened to SpongeBob?," and the third was in "Truth or Square."
  • The intro is very similar to "Christmas Who?'s intro.
• The transitioning bubbles were replaced with snowflakes and one transiting scene with coal.
• This episode came out on DVD in the UK on October 20, 2012, and on November 6, 2012 in the USA.
• This is the second Christmas-themed episode, the first being Season 2's episode Christmas Who?.
• This episode was originally intended to be called "Plankton's Christmas Wish" and then "Tis The Season to Be Jerky."
  • In Israel, it is called,Plankton's Christmas Wish, instead of "It's a SpongeBob Christmas!".
• The Painty the Pirate Christmas opening sequence from Christmas Who? was used again for this special.
• This is the last episode to premiere in 2012, as well as the final episode to air from Season 8.
• SpongeBob creates a rainbow for the second time in this episode, with the first instance being in "Idiot Box."
• This is the only episode to not use hand-drawn animation, unless you count the opening theme song.
• Some of the things on Plankton's naughty deeds list include littering, world destruction, evil, misspell words, practical jokes, larceny, puppy taunting, and neglect grooming.
• It appears that SpongeBob and Squidward were the only ones that aren't affected by Jerktonium.
• This is the third episode to use stop-motion animation. The first was "Truth or Square" during the theme song, and the second was "Frozen Face-Off" where it was only used for the Abominable Snow Mollusk. However, this is the first full stop-motion episode.
• This episode was also presented in widescreen format (16:9 or 1:78:1) making it the last non-season 9 episode in widescreen. The first one was Season 6's "Truth or Square."
• The original title card had the title in red and white with "SpongeBob" inside a white oval.
• This is the second time that SpongeBob, Patrick, Squidward, and Plankton are seen in stop motion form, the first being in a Merry Nickmas short.
• The stop motion form of Plankton does not exist during the scene where Toybob was lowered from the ceiling, as it can be seen that the Plankton puppet is being shaken while the SpongeBob is lowered from the ceiling. This, however, has not been confirmed.
• Patrick mentions Fort Knox, a landmark in Kentucky. Fort Knox stores pure gold.
• The differences between the opening of this episode and "Christmas Who?" include:
  • The pineapple was decorated as well with Squidward's house.
  • The Woman choir were replaced with the Children choir.
  • During the sequence where it says SpongeBob SquarePants three times the fifth verse, it was replaced with Fa la la la la la la.
  • The word Christmas was added as the last word of the opening theme song.
  • There was no "SpongeBob Christmas Special" card like there was in the former.
• In the Korean version, the first part of the Patchy subplot was cut.
• This is the second time Plankton is seen on a unicycle. The first was "Squidward's School for Grown-Ups."
• The original background characters in SpongeBob SquarePants (ex. Nat Peterson, Fred, Nancy Suzy, etc.) weren't made.
• On November 23, 2012, premiered in the on CBS (U.S.A.), as well YTV in Canada. This was only 13 days away before it aired on Nick on December 6, 2012 in the U.S.
• In the December 7, 2013 airing, the Patchy scene at the beginning was cut and the episode just began without the scene. This happened at 8 AM UK time.
• This is the third episode where a character's name wasn't said in the episode, but was revealed in the credits. In this episode, it was ToyBob. The first time was Squidette from "Squidville" and the second time was Lord Poltergeist in "Ghoul Fools."
• This episode premiered in the United States on CBS and in Canada on YTV five years after "The Two Faces of Squidward", "SpongeHenge", "Banned in Bikini Bottom", "Stanley S. SquarePants", "20,000 Patties Under the Sea", "The Battle of Bikini Bottom", "The Inmates of Summer", and "To Save a Squirrel".
• This episode premiered on Nickelodeon was released 12 years after "Christmas Who?" premiered, ten years after Nickelodeon Party Blast was released on Xbox in the Pal Region and on GameCube everywhere, and one year after the release of the Complete Seventh Season.

Cultural references

• When Patchy flaps his hands and flies with joy, he is making a reference to Kris in Santa Claus is Comin' to Town.
• "Randolph the Red Nosed Seahorse" is an obvious parody to "Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer."
• This episode parodies the Rankin/Bass Christmas specials with their use of stop-motion animation in specials such as Santa Claus is Coming to Town, Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, The Little Drummer Boy, Jack Frost etc.
• One of the citizens wears a sweater with a pine tree symbol similar to that of the one worn on the hat of Dipper Pines, from Gravity Falls, albeit the one on the sweater is green, not blue.

Errors

• SpongeBob does not wear a helmet in Sandy's treedome.
  • In an interview with Screen Novelties, it was revealed that this is because it would have been very expensive to have a helmet on SpongeBob, and because of the time frame that they had to animate.
• When SpongeBob finishes decorating his house, the lights on the door disappear.
• Right before the commercial break, right after Patchy realizes he survived the car accident, he holds up a fork that has three tines instead of four.
• Santa Claus has always been said to visit when everyone is asleep, yet in It's a SpongeBob Christmas, he's visiting while everyone is awake.
• SpongeBob's craters are yellow throughout the entire episode. This was because it would be hard to stick them in, they could fall off.
• There was an error on Nickelodeon UK airing on November 18, 2012. Nickelodeon aired about 2 minutes of It's A SpongeBob Christmas! before switching to the episode "Frozen Face-Off." This occurred at 9AM US time.
• At first, Pearl ate the fruitcake and then became a jerk, but a little while later in the background, she isn't a jerk.
• Mr. Krabs wasn't a jerk when SpongeBob is walking around town during Christmas; however, when SpongeBob sings "Don't be a Jerk, It's Christmas," he is a jerk. The same goes for Mrs. Puff.

Videos

Trailer

A sneak-peak trailer for It's a SpongeBob Christmas! was released in mid-2012 for a preview of the episode.

It's A Spongebob Christmas Trailer

Promos

HD SpongeBob "It's a SpongeBob Christmas!" Nickelodeon Promo 1

HD SpongeBob "It's a SpongeBob Christmas!" - Nickelodeon Promo 2

HD SpongeBob "It's a SpongeBob Christmas!" Nickelodeon Promo 3

Clips

It's a Spongebob Christmas - Santa Arrives

It's a Spongebob Christmas - A Christmas Treat

It's a Spongebob Christmas - Patchy Says Merry Christmas

It's A SpongeBob Christmas "Santa Has His Eye On Me" Music Video Nick