I'm one of the unenlightened souls who have never gotten around to watching the "SpongeBob SquarePants" TV cartoons that
so many kids and adults are fond of these days, but now that I've seen the movie, I may have to start watching it, at least in small doses. Is it always so energetically merry, so unabashedly, single-mindedly silly? I'm not sure I could take it on a regular basis. Watching 82 minutes of it in a theater made me as giddy and hyper as if I'd eaten a pound of cotton candy and washed it down with crack. SpongeBob SquarePants (voice of Tom Kenny), as you know, is a man-child sponge who lives in a pineapple under the sea, sort of the Pee-Wee Herman of the ocean. His best friend is Patrick (Bill Fagerbakke), a rather dumb starfish. Others have made speculations about these two, but I shall not. As the film opens, SpongeBob is hoping to be made manager of the new Krusty Krab restaurant that is opening next door to the Krusty Krab restaurant in which he already works. But there is precious little time to worry about such matters, because the evil Plankton (Doug Lawrence), who runs the Chum Bucket across the street, has plans to steal Mr. Krab's recipe for his famed Krabby Patty sandwich and run him out of business. To that end, he steals the crown of King Neptune (Jeffrey Tambor) and frames Mr. Krab for it. Before Mr. Krab is executed for the crime, it is up to SpongeBob and Patrick to journey to the dangerous Shell City, whence no traveler has ever returned, and retrieve the stolen crown.
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