SDCC 2024: Reflecting On SpongeBob SquarePants’ Past, Present & Future After 25 Years

It’s the 25th anniversary of SpongeBob SquarePants and Screen Rant is proud to celebrate alongside the cast and crew at San Diego Comic-Con. The show first debuted in 1999 on Nickelodeon with the pilot episode titled “Help Wanted.” True to its name, the cartoon sponge applies for a job at the Krusty Krab restaurant, home of the iconic Krabby Patty. This sets in motion a series of events that would entertain viewers of all ages for years to come.

The show eventually evolved into a franchise, and its first official film,The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, earned a theatrical release in November 2004. SpongeBob has been developed into several movies since, and the series was renewed by Nickelodeon for a fifteenth season in 2023. After all 26 installments air, it will bring the cartoon to an impressive 345 episode total. The newest film, The SpongeBob Movie: Search For Squarepants, will hit theaters on December 19, 2025.

Screen Rant sits down with Tom Kenny, Bill Fagerbakke, Carolyn Lawrence, Rodger Bumpass, Clancy Brown, Mr. Lawrence, Marc Ceccarelli, and Vincent Waller at San Diego Comic-Con to chat about SpongeBob SquarePants’ impressive legacy, The Patrick Star Show, and their hopes for the characters’ futures.

The Moment Tom Kenny & Rodger Bumpass Realized SpongeBob SquarePants Was A Phenomenon

“What I remember was the air fresheners with SpongeBob on them.”

Screen Rant: You look around at San Diego Comic-Con, and you can see all the massive SpongeBob SquarePants promotions and advertisements. What was the first moment you can remember where it became clear this was really blowing up into something bigger than most shows?

Tom Kenny: It was sort of incremental. When you’re on a show, when you start seeing stuff, that’s when you know that maybe the show has some potential to have some legs. So I remember when I first started seeing
SpongeBob
plushes in Toys R Us or a backpack here or there. You see a kid with a SpongeBob T-shirt on like, oh it’s maybe this is happening. But I mean, we weren’t like “The world domination has begun!” It was just like, “Hey, great, maybe we’ll get another few months.

Rodger Bumpass: It was car air fresheners. What I remember was the air fresheners with SpongeBob on them.

Tom Kenny: When you see macaroni and cheese, fruit roll-ups, and SpongeBob boxers in the Men’s department, it’s like, “This bodes well.”

SpongeBob Actors Discuss The Influences Behind The Patrick Star Show

“It’s an incredible thing to be involved with.”

Screen Rant: Bill, you’ve also gotten to take Patrick to an even wackier place in the last few years with The Patrick Star Show.

Bill Fagerbakke: It’s a bit out there [
Laughter
]. It is really fun. It’s an incredible thing to be involved with.

Mr. Lawrence:
Monty Python
was a big influence on how we wanted to make
The Patrick Star
show. It’s a sketch show.

Tom Kenny: Yeah, it’s like
Rocky & Bullwinkle
. It’s a sketch show. You had Mr Know-it-All and then you had the Bullwinkle Adventure and then Peabody and Sherman. It’s these segments.
The Patrick Star Show
is definitely intertwined with threads of segments, more so than one through-line narrative for the episode.

Carolyn Lawrence & Tom Kenny Are Still Surprised By The Sandy Cheeks Movie

Screen Rant: Carolyn, we’re also getting the Sandy Cheeks movie!

Carolyn Lawrence: I can’t believe it. It’s so funny, whenever anyone says that, I’m like “What?! Really!?”

Screen Rant: What excited you the most about getting to take Sandy on this kind of adventure?

Carolyn Lawrence: It was amazing because I learned, 25 years in, that you’re still learning things about your characters. Things still come up that are new to you. I was reading the script, and I was like, “Oh, she does that?! Oh, that’s really cool!” That’s part of the excitement for me as a performer, and also hopefully for the people watching.

Tom Kenny: That movie has photorealistic [animation]. It mostly happens in the real world with live-action.

Carolyn Lawrence: I could watch it and be like, ”
Wow
.” I got lost in it. I stopped realizing — my brain accepted the live-action and the animation as the same thing. They marry really well.

Tom Kenny: Sandy takes SpongeBob to Texas with her. That car chase is great. It’s like
Sandy and the Bandit
. It’s amazing.

Clancy Brown & Mr. Lawrence On Mr. Krabs & Plankton’s Comedic Rivalry

Screen Rant: Clancy, what’s it like playing a comedic character who’s almost funnier to root against than to root for?

Clancy Brown: They just tell [the scripts] to is and we do it [
Laughter
]… You just get in touch with your inner K-R-A-W-B-S.

Screen Rant: Lawrence, you famously had to fight for Plankton in the early days of the show and his inclusion in the show. What was it about the character that convinced you had to do more Plankton?

Mr. Lawrence: There’s something great about just a guy across the street causing basically a cola war between the two restaurants. So there’s something fun about a guy who’s megalomaniacal but living sort of next door in his basement. He’s such a great antagonist because —

Clancy Brown: He’s so little.

[
Laughter
]

Screen Rant: I also wanted to bring up that SpongeBob and Patrick got to commentate on the NFL this past year! What other sports would you want to let this cast be the announcers for?

Tom Kenny: Cricket. I would love to call him cricket game just for you. No, I think I would say curling. I would like to do curling because it involves sweeping, SpongeBob likes to clean, so the brooms are great.

Mr. Lawrence: Cornhole! Mostly because I just wanted to say cornhole. [
Laughter
]

Carolyn Lawrence: Women’s basketball. That would be cool.

Rodger Bumpass: I’d like to do Competitive Quiche. [Squidward] could be the Quiche Boss. [
Laughter
]

More About SpongeBob SquarePants

A square yellow sponge named SpongeBob SquarePants lives in a pineapple with his pet snail, Gary, in the city of Bikini Bottom on the floor of the Pacific Ocean. He works as a fry cook at the Krusty Krab. During his time off, SpongeBob has a knack for attracting trouble with his starfish best friend, Patrick. Arrogant octopus Squidward Tentacles, SpongeBob’s neighbor, dislikes SpongeBob because of his childlike behavior.

Check out some of our other SDCC 2024 interviews here:

Source: Screen Rant Plus