The Funniest SpongeBob Episode is the Most Unexpected… and Bonkers
I thought Crazy Taxi was the closest thing to GTA that I grew up with. Then, I saw Hans get run over.


CONTENT WARNING!
This post contains sensitive material that may not be suitable for all readers. The material in question includes:
- Bad language
- Violence
- Suggestive content
Table of Contents
A Healthy Escape From Stupidity The Land That I Understand Lost in a Sea of Diamonds One More Super-Duper Year A (Relatively) Pure Moment in Time
A Healthy Escape From Stupidity
Rest assured, this post will be about SpongeBob shortly, but after this brief two-post escape from the world of gaming, I can safely announce that I’m ready to return after this. Of course, I think taking breaks like this as a way of exploring other artistic mediums is important to do from time to time, even if I still hold a strong fondness for video games as works of art as well as coping methods for mental health issues like my own. However, I decided on my Batman: Arkham post here that I’d wait and see Suicide Squad: Kill the Justice League first-hand when it comes out before giving it a hard time, and now that it’s been out… well, let’s just say, I’m glad I’ve taken the time to write this and the previous post here, because I’ve pretty much decided from the videos I’ve seen that I really don’t even want to spend money on it. Granted, it’s been out for a few weeks now, so I really can’t say any more about the beyond-ludicrous premise, limitless plot armor, or insensitivity towards a recently deceased voice actor that hasn’t already been said a thousand and one times other than… well… that I agree with the Kevin Conroy/Arkham Batman complaints, so before moving onto today’s topic, I’ll briefly touch upon an aspect of the game that isn’t talked about all that much. Now that the Arkham version of Harley Quinn has also become her own strong, independent bloodthirsty lunatic, I have to ask: could there possibly be a timeline where she doesn’t decide to kick Joker to the curb for good? Especially since this is the same timeline where she was wearing a literal veil, building morbid Joker shrines, and coddling a clown-themed ventriloquist dummy after his death like it was her and Joker’s child?
I know I’m straying away from the topic I’ve chosen for today’s post, so I’ll finish by saying that her complete and total lack of remorse during this game’s events for the atrocities she committed at his side, like that was all just a temporary phase or something, was so infuriating to me that I couldn’t help but compare her arc in this timeline with that of Arthur Morgan in Red Dead Redemption II. God bless that game for subverting the “video games are just lots of jumping around and shooting” generalization that the recent Arkham spinoff has only served to reinforce.
The Land That I Understand
I’ve honestly been conflicted about calling the TV episode I’m here to write about the “funniest” in its series. I had it in mind to call it the best, but the last thing I’d want anything on this blog to be is misleading. To establish some context, I’ve suggested my checkered history with SpongeBob SquarePants in previous posts, but I still very well may have underscored my personal connection to it. Yes, I can appreciate its first three seasons, first movie, and even early season four episodes like “SpongeBob Meets the Strangler” and “Have You Seen This Snail?” for their near-perfect comedic execution, but my adoration for them extends well beyond that. Just like the Definitive Childhood Sonic Trilogy I dove into ad nauseam a couple posts ago, this show has always offered a welcoming atmosphere that even the most batshit of slapstick comedy fails to minimize. This is primarily thanks to the animation; upbeat and oftentimes soothing hula, lounge, and sea shanty soundtrack; and near-ceaseless enthusiasm of the protagonist himself—he rarely fails to find joy and contentment in jobs and activities that others find droll and tedious.
Aside from playing a key role in cultivating my love for marine life and wildlife in general as a kid, its humble beginnings became just as much of an unending institution for my family as it has for anyone else’s—it introduced humor and episode premises that anyone of any age range can laugh at and relate to. This sentiment is no doubt shared mutually across the internet, although I still find my autism-fueled emotional connection hard to communicate, as it almost feels like the show has been in the process of becoming more synonymous with memes than nostalgia or general artistic appreciation. I mean, the end credits theme of the first movie, “Ocean Man” by Ween, is treated as nothing more than a joke nowadays when, in actuality, it’s an uplifting tune that encapsulates the series’s charm and atmosphere I’ve remained so transfixed on.
So, with that out of the way, let’s move onto the zany shit!
Lost in a Sea of Diamonds
When factoring in the widely-held opinion that practically every episode from the first three seasons of SpongeBob is quotable in its own right, trying to crown a much less iconic season two episode as the funniest is going to sound pretty hyperbolic. Therefore, let me clarify that “No Free Rides” might not necessarily be my favorite episode, though it does come damn near close. It’s actually neck-and-neck with “Krusty Krab Training Video”—not only does that one very well may hold the title of best episode, but it sure as hell stands as the most unique episode for following its own separate format. It’s probably also a close second as the funniest due to the way it satirizes company training videos as well as its Tim & Eric-style editing, but even then, it’s pretty standard for this series when it comes to the pacing and intensity of its humor. While “Chocolate With Nuts” will probably always be hailed as a prime example of SpongeBob humor at its finest—and while my family will always cherish “Jellyfish Jam” more than any other episode due to its clever incorporation of music into the plot—it really isn’t any less subdued than the majority of the first three seasons. In fact, “Sleepy Time” from season one is slotted into my top three episodes with “No Free Rides” and “Krusty Krab Training Video” for being the one I’d go to sleep watching as a kid due to its calming tone, dreamlike surreality, and relatively low-key humor. Of course, if this episode stands as peak SpongeBob for sitting on one pole of the intensity scale, the episode we’ll focus on today deserves just as much praise for sitting on the opposite end. Indeed, “No Free Rides” has become an all-time favorite of mine for the sheer, unbridled insanity that makes up almost its entire eleven-minute runtime.

This shouldn’t be too big a surprise, as I promised on my anime post here that I’d be discussing a SpongeBob episode that utilizes the art of nonstop heightened comedy better than any anime I’ve seen (by choice or not, but in most cases not). Yes, “No Free Rides” consistently maintains a sense of chaos, but that doesn’t mean it’s unfocused or nonsensical, as it also maintains an airtight plot with no more than four characters and one short cameo. When it comes to characters, though, there’s always been a plethora of fantastic character-focused episodes centered on members of the main cast. “Big Pink Loser” and “New Student Starfish” are two of the best Patrick episodes; “Squidville”, “Band Geeks”, and “SB-129” are among the best Squidward episodes (in hindsight, I do respect that “Squilliam Returns” punishes Squidward for his jealousy-fueled dishonesty, which was the same sense of justice that “Band Geeks” sidestepped); “Mid-Life Crustacean” and “Krabby Love” are Mr. Krabs at his best, even if the latter mainly earns its status for SpongeBob’s glorious freakout towards the end; “Texas” is classic Sandy, although I still prefer “Squirrel Jokes” for the moral dilemma it’s centered around; and there might actually be a tie between “Plankton’s Army” and “The Algae’s Always Greener” as the best Plankton episode and my top fourth or fifth episode. Some of the best episodes are based around less major cast members—all the Mermaidman and Barnacleboy episodes (especially the fifth) are great, having been some of the last acting roles for both Ernest Borgnine and Tim Conway—but if “Doing Time” is the ultimate Mrs. Puff episode, “No Free Rides” is a close second for making her the main protagonist over SpongeBob.
Oh, right. This post is supposed to be about that episode. We should probably move onto its contents before I lose the thread again. If the quality of the scan shown in all the screenshots and videos throughout this post bothers you, they come straight from the First 100 Episodes box set. You can order that box set here if you adore the beginning of the series as much as I do.
One More Super-Duper Year
Much of the show’s early success can be attributed to the mind behind the show. Stephen Hillenburg—God rest his soul—and his associates knew exactly what the show needed to work and appeal to a general audience, and its later fall from grace came due to (a) his decreased involvement and (b) the signing-on of new writers who didn’t understand the material. In its hay day, however, it knew how to land a first joke, and holy shit, does “No Free Rides” start off like an H-bomb. It opens with SpongeBob having another disastrous driving test with Mrs. Puff and Hans the French narrator announcing that this is his last test of the year. He continues on by saying that, should this test fail, he’d be in boating school for another year, a dire point that he screams frantically as SpongeBob drives the boat directly into him. When the naïve novice expresses his confusion to his instructor, Mrs. Puff shrugs, tells him he only hit another pedestrian, and subtracts twenty points from his score. So, here we are—barely ten seconds into the episode, and it’s already hit a home run with its comedy. This begins a running theme with the episode, which is how shockingly far it pushes the severity and maturity of its humor without disturbing its audience. Case and point, it doesn’t rely on pus-oozing splinters or toenail-ripping like the demented writers of Ren & Stimpy did with later episodes. Even though Mrs. Puff tells him the test is over, he tries to earn back his lost points with predictably destructive results. He yodels in victory upon learning that he’d earned six points out of six…
…hundred.
While SpongeBob cheers over the next year of boating school, Mrs. Puff is left dreading it until she comes up with the desperate… I mean, ultimate solution: extra credit. What follows is one of the episode’s most iconic moments, when she assigns him a mere ten-word essay detailing what he’d learned in boating school, and seven of those words are “What I learned in boating school is…” Just a few characters later, he breaks his pencil and takes about twelve seconds to sharpen it, taking very careful glances at the tip as Mrs. Puff stares on anxiously. He then breaks it again, goes up to sharpen it again, rinse repeat until Mrs. Puff takes it away and gives him a pen. After finally finishing, he panics and scribbles out his answer that he claims isn’t ready, driving his instructor half-insane.
“It’s so simple! Only ten words! ‘What I learned in boating school is…’ Blankety! Blankety! BLANK!”
– One of the 89% of Bikini Bottom residents to want the yellow bastard dead.
His desk ultimately crumbles underneath him as Mrs. Puff tries to force the last three words out of him. The paper tears in half as she attempts to snatch it from him, but when she pauses to read both halves, she finds that absolutely none of what he’d just written is even legible. Yet, she tosses both halves away, decides that the answer doesn’t matter, and grants him his license, thus casting him out of her life forever. Her relief only dissipates when he proclaims that Bikini Bottom has a new driver on the road, after which a vision of the potential future flashes before her—one in which SpongeBob runs down pedestrian after pedestrian in blissful ignorance, eventually plowing through a wholesome birthday celebration and setting the entire city ablaze. The realistic fish head reporter (who isn’t voiced by Doug Lawrence, oddly enough) pins the blame on his instructor over the news before getting run down himself. What? Did I do an inadequate job of suggesting the utter lunacy that makes up this whole episode?
She skeptically shakes this nightmare away and returns home later that evening, only to meet SpongeBob and both his parents in front of a giant celebration cake. She stands scowling in chagrin, with the framed photo behind her capturing the very moment she walked through the door like the result of some catastrophic time paradox, as Mr. and Mrs. SquarePants unveil their son’s new boat. Realizing her mistake, she vows to get rid of his boat and revoke his license before it’s too late.

Back at his place, SpongeBob is tucked into bed, but once his parents are gone, he slips out his bedroom window and into his new boat, thus commencing a strangely seductive moment where he notices his boat is cold and gives it his own two socks to warm it up. After he falls asleep in the driver’s seat, Mrs. Puff sneaks out of the brush wearing a ski mask and hopes she still knows “how to do this” while reaching into her pocket… but instead of anything that’ll let her ignite the engine, she makes a balloon animal, beams in satisfaction, and tosses it away as she starts up the boat and drives off. SpongeBob soon wakes up, realizes what’s happening, probes the thief on why she’s wearing a ski mask when she clearly isn’t skiing, and deduces her true identity: a boat jacker. Then, we get one of the funniest things to ever happen in a cartoon, which is when he pulls out a can of pepper spray and squirts it in the wrong direction, directly into his eyes. Despite being knocked out of the boat by the very well-disguised thief, he uses his unicycle to catch up with her, but when this fails, he uses both arms like rubber sticky hands to latch onto the windshield. He skids behind the boat on his shoes like he’s water-skiing, only to be dragged into three horrifying everyday street hazards that grind him down to a paste until he lets go entirely: giant clams, cheese graters, and worst of all, educational television.
Well… okay, I guess there’s at least one worse trap he could be dragged into.

Seemingly in the clear, Mrs. Puff turns on the radio, with the DJ for the station KRUD (get it?) promising plenty of the biggest “YOU WON’T GET AWAY WITH STEALING MY CAR!” hits. Alas, SpongeBob emerges from the dashboard, wrestling with her over the boat until it goes diving off an escarpment, directly towards a parked police cruiser. Right before the crash, he tears off her ski mask and finds his instructor underneath, triggering a suitably bonkers reaction shot as both vehicles make impact. In the end, the two call each other over the phone, with Mrs. Puff apologizing for her irresponsible actions. SpongeBob understands that his license will have to be revoked, and Mrs. Puff recommends another instructor’s driving class that starts Monday morning. SpongeBob turns down the offer, however, now revealed to be visiting her in prison and letting her know that she’s been promised an early release under one condition: FREE DRIVING LESSONS! Say, you remember when these stories used to end with the right characters getting punished?
A Pure Moment in Time
Yes, the show’s humor has always been known to get pretty absurd, even in “Krusty Krab Training Video”—I mean, an annoying kid gets a brick thrown at his head in that, as well as clones of SpongeBob getting squashed by a row of hands with flyswatters. Even then, on the other hand, “No Free Rides” feels so unrestrained compared to that, like the writers smashed a handful of adderall and chugged it mixed into a can of Red Bull for one episode. “Doing Time” was another Mrs. Puff episode that made a valiant effort to compete, with Mrs. Puff ripping the goddamn faces off a pair of security guards (not to mention the nice, soft room MADE OF SPONGE! shortly after that), but its funniest moments are still fairly subdued. Just take SpongeBob and Patrick trying to get themselves arrested so they can break Mrs. Puff out of jail by robbing a bank, only to make a legal withdrawal when their threats fail to land, or the cynical way that the “freedom” of the outside world is portrayed once they actually make it into prison.
Yet, with all the insanity packed into this one underrated season two episode under our belt, one final message is worth ending on before we transition back into the realm of video games. Many early SpongeBob episodes pushed the envelope of kids cartoon humor and even got legitimately terrifying at times—there’s nothing original I’m able to say about the infamous closeup from “Wormy” other than the little-known fact that it was sourced from an episode of Bill Nye, of all places—but one thing that I’ll always give them immense credit for was knowing how much was too much. The heart of the show remained intact, as well as the purity of major characters like SpongeBob and Patrick as a direct contrast from the more cynical and detached of Bikini Bottom’s denizens. From there, flash-forward to episodes like “Good Neighbors” and “Boating Buddies”, where these characters were morphed into infantile stalkers while the humor became unbearably grotesque and mean-spirited. I was exposed to plenty of crap at the time that probably didn’t do my mental health many favors—read my post about Bill Maher’s Religulous here for a prime example—but none from the early years of SpongeBob. It respected the intelligence and tolerance levels of kids like me, and that’s a legacy that even chaotic shitfests like “No Free Rides” can be credited with leaving behind.

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