After the first SpongeBob movie was released in 2004, the millions of SpongeBob SquarePants fans all over the world have been begging for a sequel. Finally on February 6th their wishes were granted when “The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water” was released in theaters.
Directed by Paul Tibbitt, the movie had a budget of around 74 million dollars. With this money the animators were able to produce an amazing spectacle. The movie is full of colors and beautiful visuals, which can be absolutely eye popping if you watch it in 3D. So if you’re going to watch this movie in theaters watch it in 3D, it’s definitely worth the extra 5 bucks. The movie exceeded its expectations, making over 82.8 million dollars worldwide. However if you are not a SpongeBob fan the movie probably won’t win you over.
On May 1st 1999 the world had changed when SpongeBob first aired after the Kids Choice Awards. Going into its second season SpongeBob had gained an extreme amount of popularity. By 2001 it was the number two children’s program even though 40 percent of the show’s audience was between 18 to 34 years old. In 2002 the series single handedly made Nickelodeon the most watched cable channel during the day. With all of SpongeBob’s success they had to make a movie, that movie came in 2004.
The first SpongeBob SquarePants Movie was an absolute success grossing over 140 million dollars and receiving a 10/10 on IMDb. After the movie, the creator of SpongeBob Stephen Hillenburg stepped down from his position. This proved to be a huge turning point for the series in a negative way. With new developers and writers SpongeBob went from being the happy, smart and misguided character that we all love to a complete moron, like Patrick.
Unfortunately in the new movie this is the SpongeBob SquarePants we see. Even though the movie was visually pleasing its jokes were not. The jokes didn’t really have a flow and it seemed like the writers ran out of ideas. Probably the best part of the movie was the “above water” part, which you see in the trailer. Sadly the out of the water stuff comes in towards the end of the movie and it’s only for about 20 to 30 minutes.
In all, it was a decent movie deserving a score of 7/10 by IMDb. However we have to understand that SpongeBob is just not the same. You can really see the newer seasons of SpongeBob in the new movie and we can all agree that they are not that great. So, in conclusion “The SpongeBob Movie: Sponge Out of Water” was nowhere close to being as good as the first SpongeBob movie, but it is a great movie for kids and for the family so I do recommend it, especially in 3D.