More than five years after being taken out of rotation, a previously banned SpongeBob SquarePants episode suddenly retured to Paramount+ earlier this week only to be removed again not long after.
Titled "Mid-life Crustacean," the episode follows Mr. Krabs as he grapples with a mid-life crisis. Fans suspect that it was originally banned because it included a "panty raid" scene in which Mr. Krabs accidentally steals his mother's underwear.
Woah, didn’t see this coming!
— Jason the Cartoon Fan (@JasonSt77097165) July 16, 2023
It looks like Nickelodeon has officially lifted the ban on the #SpongeBobSquarePants episode “Mid-Life Crustacean”, at least in terms of streaming. It’s back on Paramount+,…IF you’re accessing it through Prime Video and not its own separate app. pic.twitter.com/gA3DoE2i2V
SpongeBob SquarePants first debuted in 1999 and quickly gained a large audience among kids and older viewers alike, eventually going on to spawn multiple movies and a legion of memes. A movie based on Sandy Cheeks is currently slated for Netflix, and more spin-offs are expected as well.
The series was part of the Paramount+ in 2021, but Mid-Life Crustacean was not included. At the time, a Nickelodeon representative told IGN that it had been out of rotation since 2018 following a "standards review" in which some of the story elements were determined to not be "kid-appropriate." Asked for examples, Nickelodeon declined to comment.
Mid-Life Crustacean's brief return
Mid-Life Crustacean's unexpected return sparked excitement among SpongeBob fans, but its revival was short-lived.
"Due to a technical error, the episode was inadvertently posted for a brief period on the Paramount+ Channel on Amazon Prime Video. It has since been removed," a Paramount spokesperson told IGN.
IGN has confirmed that Mid-Life Crustaean and its companion episode, The Great Snail Race, are now listed as "currently unavailable" on Prime Video. It seems that the story of Mr. Krabs' mid-life crisis is once again in Bikini Bottom Jail.
Mid-Life Crustacean isn't the only SpongeBob episode to miss substantial time in the show's rotation. During the height of the pandemic, Nickelodeon also pulled Kwarantined Krab from the rotation owing to its thematic similarities to COVID-19. The episode ultimately returned in 2022.
In the meantime, animation fans continue to work diligently to preserve lost episodes of Pokemon, Dragon Ball Z, and other popular shows. With Mid-Life Crustacean apparently unlikely to return anytime soon, it would seem they have one more episode to save.
Kat Bailey is IGN's News Director as well as co-host of Nintendo Voice Chat. Have a tip? Send her a DM at @the_katbot.
