The Original Spongebob Pilot

So, Spongebob Squarepants has always been a childhood favourite of mine since I was about 5. The series revolves around a happy-go-lucky anthropomorphic sponge as the titular character, who goes on these wild and wacky adventures with his starfish best friend Patrick. He also has a job at a restaurant called the Krusty Krab with his boss, Mr. Krabs. I won’t bore you with the rest of the details of this story because I can tell you just want me to get on with it. Apparently, a rumour, or even urban legend has been spreading around recently about this episode of the show that has never been aired or even seen in public before.

The details by all accounts appear to have the animation, sound effects and even voice acting done by different people instead of the usual cast I’m familiar with. Rumour has it that the episode was supposed to be the original pilot of Spongebob. You thought the already lost pilot from 1997 was the original? No. This one appears to be dated November 24, 1996, which is a year the other pilot was made. In fact, it’s so rare that people have said only three tapes of the same episode were ever made. According to news studies, 9 people have been confirmed to have committed suicide over the following 6 days after seeing the first 2 tapes, of which were destroyed only a week earlier, and now only a single tape remains.

For weeks I have been trying to find this tape through any means necessary; YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, even Lost Media Archive, but no. Until now, I have pondered the reason why this tape was never released to the public, and since I know now it’s time, I tell you as well. It was a stormy season – about a few months ago. This day it wasn’t as intense like it had been in the past few, and I was relieved that it hadn’t. My mother had gotten me and my little brother tickets to a Nickelodeon conference, and we both enjoyed the showing. While I was taking Dave (my little brother) back to Mom’s car, out of the corner of my eye I spotted someone who had been on stage for the whole conference just about to unlock the door to his car.

I told Dave I would be right back before walking to the brown-haired man. When I got to him, I asked about any future SpongeBob episodes, and he replied in a joyful manner that there would be many more episodes to come. However, when I asked him about the original pilot episode that I had mentioned in the beginning, his entire face turned white. I saw him get out a sheet of paper, and the guy asked me for a writing instrument. I handed him a pen and he started writing a few numbers. When he was done, he told me to contact this number for the only remaining tape and to never mention it to anyone. I thanked him and walked back to the car with the folded-up piece of paper in my shirt pocket.

Upon arriving home, I watched TV for about an hour, until I remembered that I still had the number in my shirt, so I unfolded it, grabbed my cell, and dialled the number. When it answered, the voice on the other end appeared to sound like some sort of person who smoked on a daily basis. I asked him about the episode, and he shrugged it off like it didn’t exist. Eventually I got him to crack when I told him the proof that it existed. He told me that he has the obscure tape in an old box located in his basement, and that he would mail it to me by tomorrow for 10 dollars. I accepted the offer, and I agreed that I would pay him through mail.

After returning from a boring flow of lessons, I arrived at home to see an orange box on my doorstep, with the words: “SPONGEBOB FIRST PILOT” poorly scribbled on with marker. I thought to myself that I could finally rest from the endless searching of this episode. As soon as I unwrapped it, there was a note attached to the tape that read: “DO NOT RELEASE AT ALL COSTS”. I ignored the “warning” and ripped it off. I went to my VCR player, and stuck the VHS in. Grabbing the remote, I changed the input settings to VHS and the tape had started instantly. To my surprise, it contained no more than just loud static that startled me at first, but then made me irate at the fact that I could have been scammed out of my own money. Instead of just instantly returning it to the shoddy guy who I phoned yesterday, I burned the contents of the tape into an empty disc that my computer had already had in, for some reason. When it was done, the process had generated two files, of which I dragged to my media folder:

README.txt 

PILOTEPISODE.mp4

I clicked on the README document and it said this:

'The video that has come with this document was the first pilot episode of Spongebob, made in 1996. It has been said that none of the original cast members worked on this episode, so the animation may turn out more different than usual. It was never shown in public for obvious reasons. I am telling you now, do not watch this episode. You have been warned.'

I punched my brain for ignoring this file, but curiosity killed the cat as I had already started watching the mp4. The intro was, of course, not the regular intro that you would see nowadays, but instead a cruder and more simplistic intro that was reminiscent of the mid to late 1990s. After it ended, the scene cut to Spongebob with a cheerful look while lying on his bed. “Gee Gary, do you know what time it is today?” Gary meowed like any cat, or snail in this cartoon would. “It’s time I get a job at the fantastic restaurant, the Krusty Krab!” Spongebob was drawn in some sort of cubist art style, like the document said, none of the original cast worked on this episode, so I knew that would be normal in this video. Except....something was off during the episode. It wasn’t the cubist art style, nor was it the difference of voice actors, but I swore that I could hear a faint crying noise in the background, like very faint that you could just barely hear it.

Anyways, Spongebob was seen getting out of his bed and walking to his bedroom door, when suddenly this abrupt loud noise came out of nowhere, and there was static covering the screen of VLC media player. I couldn’t make out anything, but it just looked like it was normal, then it just cut to Spongebob casually strolling out of his pineapple house. Unusually, Patrick the starfish wasn’t present when Spongebob was walking across the road, not even his rock, because on most occasions he will pop out of nowhere and have a conversation with Spongebob, before heading off. After fading out to black, the scene showed the Sponge facing backwards. “Finally, after such a long time, I can finally fulfil my lifelong destiny as a fry cook...” The camera then panned out to show the main structure of the Krusty Krab. We then see a shot of Mr. Krabs and Squidward talking, when suddenly Spongebob opened the main doors of the establishment, complete with a heavenly glow and a choir. Squidward then protests, “Aagh! Where did this idiot come from?” Mr. Krabs then commands him to hush. Spongebob, without saying a word, walks towards the front desk. I was thinking to myself, “How is this any different to the pilot?” Spongebob then trips on that nail from the 1997 pilot, but instead of flopping around in a cartoonish style, he impales himself on a sharp pike of wood from the ceiling, which I knew was never in the series at all. Blood splatters on the floor.

After a few seconds, the same loud noise from before blasts out from my speakers, and instead of a regular screen like before, we get treated to... possibly one of the most disturbing images I've ever seen. It was a distorted image of Spongebob. He had no eyes at all, and was bleeding from the sockets. His tie appeared to be cut in half, and his white shirt had scuff marks on it. The sponge appeared to be standing in some sort of desert-field with a sky that looked like a .gif straight from Google. He had a mouth that appeared to look like one of those Cheshire cats' grins, and it was bleeding from the top and bottom. The distorted Spongebob did none, other than stare at the viewer for about 2 seconds. What was most disturbing about it was that every 2 seconds that passed, it would cut to black, and he would just move closer to the screen. I wanted to close the video, so I repeatedly pressed the X button, but to no avail, it wouldn’t close. Alt + F4? No. Even task manager didn’t work, so I had no other choice to watch the video. Eventually Spongebob got so close to the screen it literally looked like he was pressed against it. This time he stared at me for 5 seconds instead of the usual 2. I waited for something to happen, until the screen went bright red, and this horrifying, ear killing scream ruptured my speakers; it sounded like one of those screams from a typical flash game or those old pop ups on YouTube or other websites.

I was lucky that the screeching noise only lasted for 3 seconds, as my ears were aching at this point. I was horrified that this was the original pilot to a kid friendly show I've known since I was 5. Back to the point... the next scene depicts Squidward, who appears to be on his couch with the waterworks turned on. This was once again, unusual, because when I watched the series with Dave, the squid usually has absolutely no remorse in any way. He appeared to be sitting next to a fish who I hadn’t even seen before in the series. The fish said something, but the constant static drained it out and turned the sentence into garble. Squidward continued sobbing for about a minute until he suddenly just stopped. The video devolved into a putrid mix of vomit inducing colours for some time, until then that horrid, painful screeching noise returned to my speakers, all while showing a deformed image of Squidward, identical to the deformed Spongebob from earlier.The episode then warped to a distorted scene of what appears to be multiple police officers gathered around some sort of chalk outline of Spongebob. By the time that image appeared, I could hear garbled crying and gagging noises that would last for the 6 seconds the image was on. When the time was over, I could see Squidward standing at the edge of a cliff. The camera zoomed out to reveal that it was a particularly deep cliff. In my mind I was yelling at him not to do it, but I knew it wouldn’t work because my monitor separated us. The distressed squid then took the leap off the cliff, and after about a few seconds, I heard a gruesome splatter, with Squidward’s entrails and giblets flying everywhere.

I was petrified at what I was seeing. After about 12 seconds of nothing happening, the video cuts to a poor rendition of Mr. Krabs standing on a chair, with a noose tied around his neck. He appeared to be writing something on a scrunched-up piece of notebook paper. Krabs wrote for about 7 seconds before throwing it in another direction before kicking the chair he was standing on. I kid you not, those sounds were almost realistic. They sounded like a grown man, who appeared to be in his mid 30s, choking to death. The choking noises were excruciatingly long, that I just couldn’t take it anymore. I wanted the video to stop, but alas, it was useless trying to do anything. I could see the corpse of Mr. Krabs hanging slowly in the darkness. Static covered my screen for some time, until I gazed upon another disturbing image. The image consisted of Spongebob, Squidward and Mr. Krabs standing together with a background of red flowers behind them. They had no facial features at all other than their eyes, which were now soulless black dots which appear to be bleeding like before. The characters just stared menacingly at me, while white text appeared above them:

"THE DAYS OF MAN ARE BUT AS SHED BLOOD AND TYRANNY"

The disturbing image was stuck on my screen for about 25 seconds, before the video finally ended with:

By William Tungsten.

When I closed VLC, I was surrounded in questions, why was this made? Who is William Tungsten? Suddenly, I heard a loud crashing noise from outside, and the power went out in a flash. I was startled because of what had happened outside, so I went to my window to check it out. It appeared that the night time storm had knocked down one of the power lines. I ran to my phone, and I saw on my notifications that power will be fixed until tomorrow. My dad came in my room with an oil lantern and asked if I was fine, before further saying that Dave had to sleep with me tonight. The next day, when the power situation was sorted, I immediately rushed to my computer and sent an email to Nickelodeon.

The week after, I got a response email.

Dear Mr. Rutin, 

'We sincerely apologise for the content you have viewed. The tape was, of course, never meant to be released to the public due to its disturbing content, and that it would be too graphic for children. William Tungsten was the executive producer of the original pilot from 1996. He was a normal employee, but this was the last cartoon he made due to severe depression and anxiety issues. After handing it in to us it was said that he shot himself in the staff toilets. After, we had to close for multiple days on end because of a reported ‘foul odour’ coming from the toilets. We can promise you that we will never release this tape to the public, and we recommend that you seek help.'

For many days after I would experience nightmare about the disturbing images from that episode, but today I have since recovered. The tape is still in my bottom drawer, but I'm obviously never viewing it again. I’m telling you this to warn you about what it was. After all, everybody wants to know a secret if it’s been heard about, right?