The Story Behind Spongebob's "Are You Happy Now?"

There are many stories behind the mysterious episode, "Are You Happy Now?" But I can tell you the true story behind it all.
I have worked for Nickelodeon studios for, let's say, a decade. Specifically, it was from late season 3 to season 10. Honestly, I've forgotten because it seems like forever. I worked behind the scenes as a storyboard artist but never played a main role in writing or directing episodes. Of course, a lot of things happen in my day-to-day time at work, but there are just some episodes that I genuinely felt uncomfortable in doing. There was of course the infamous The Splinter, but there's this one episode that I just loathed doing, trying to avoid working on it.
Surprisingly, I'm sure you all may recognize it. It's "Are You Happy Now?" from Season 8. Now, Season 8 was a very weird season for us and probably for you too. It was of course the last standard definition season, and the fact that some episodes were being premiered at the same time as Season 9. But there was a serious problem with this particular episode that caused many people to leave when the season was finished.
See, we have a very weird and confusing way of counting episodes. There's production order, pairing order, and airing order. For the sake of organization we simply go by the pairing order. I know what you're thinking, it's like the Simpsons. Well, yeah, true, but I can tell you that this is probably the case for every single show, especially Nickelodeon shows. Let me just say that it confused us more than it confused you.
There's production numbers that get skipped, and then there's this weird anomaly in one of the Season 8 episodes. Restraining SpongeBob, in particular, had production code 814a. Not 814, but 814a. More confusingly, there is no 814b. Why is that? Well, the answer is harder than you think. See, episode 814b actually DID exist, but was scrapped at one point and replaced with a newer episode with the same name. "Are You Happy Now?" was the episode. Production numbers were skipped either because of oversight or the episode was produced but canceled at a later date, and this was an example. 
What I found more interesting is that this was around the time my coworker Nate Cash left the series, leaving Marc Ciccarelli to replace him. In case you've been living under a rock, Marc is also one of the showrunners of modern SpongeBob. He was also one of the writers and directors of the newer version of "Are You Happy Now?".
After we finished the episode, Nathan just disappeared out of nowhere. He just left and no one even knew exactly why he left, but he just did. When I asked my co-workers about what happened, I got conflicting stories, either saying that he left, was fired, or had no idea of what happened. Others just told a story that didn't make sense at all. 
Recently, I worked on a few episodes on Tiny Tunes' Looniversity with him (he's also the executive producer for that show), and while he didn't recognize me at first, we soon began to remember each other and went on full-fledged conversations with him during our break time. We were talking about our years on SpongeBob and it so happened that the "Are You Happy Now" episode came to my mind, but when I brought it up he was at first confused and had no idea what I was talking about. After a while, he told me to see him after work and maybe he would be better able to explain the full story, but said that he just didn't have the time to explain it.
After my day at storyboarding for that show, Nate came up to me and said that he, indeed, worked on "Are You Happy Now?" for his last episode on SpongeBob. He also told me that he left because he felt that SpongeBob wasn't getting better and his name was being put on horrible episodes like The Splinter, Truth or Square, You Don't Know Sponge and so many other episodes. He also told me that he was the one who came up with the infamous suicide jokes as a protest against how Nickelodeon has changed for the worse. These suicide jokes actually made it to the modern episode.
I initially responded saying that was a bit extreme, but he did say that Nickelodeon deserves its reputation and said that Cartoon Network has been a much better place for him. He ended by saying that he remembered having a copy of the original episode and would look for the original cartoon, and then if he found it then he would call me up to his office to show the footage if I agreed to. I confidently agreed and said to find the drafts that he wrote for this episode if he had any. He said he would find some and then bid goodbye for the day.
The next day, I went on with my work day and then during my break I was watching the newer version of the episode when Nate called me over. He told me that he was able to find the original episode and had a copy of the episode that he exclusively made for me to see and keep. He also warned me that the episode could contain disturbing things but I still wanted to watch it out of curiosity. From there, he showed the episode in its original state as I began to take a few notes about it.
The first thing I noticed was the title card, which instead of playing happy upbeat music had a sad and slow tune and the faces had sad faces and were colored darker blue. Also, Nate Cash was credited instead of Marc Ceccarelli, given that he worked on this particular version of the episode. Other than that, most of the episode is the same, but the voice acting was a bit different. Nothing noticeably different, but it didn't align with the current incarnation of the episode. Much of the story with Squidward trying to discover his happiest memory is the same, despite bad things happening to him and then ultimately deciding that he can't get happy. At the "Two Weeks Later" time card, Nate stopped the episode and made a brief comment talking about how that actually made it through the final version.
Eventually, like the original, SpongeBob gets concerned and tries to get Squidward's attention. Just like the new version, he's clinically depressed and borderline suicidal, but something different was about this episode and I couldn't tell what but something felt off. It looks as if Squidward apparently attempted suicide already. But other than that, everything else was the same, even the joke about Squidward trying to kill himself with carbon dioxide poisoning only to pull out brownies was there. He checks his fax machine, which then explodes. A bubble transition happens, and SpongeBob and Gary are there at the door of Squidward's house. Unlike the new version, Spongebob doesn't look like he was assembled from paper shreds.
Then the infamous cutaway gag to Squidward seemingly trying to hang himself. Indeed, he actually does hang himself. When he hangs himself, he kicks the chair beneath him, but the entire house begins to collapse and a cartoon-like explosion happens. It then cuts to SpongeBob, who looks genuinely sad about Squidward and thinks of something that could hopefully cheer him up. A bubble transition occurs, and at the Krusty Krab he sets up a party for Squidward full of 100 papier-mâché SpongeBobs, just like in the new version. Except, he not only destroys the figurines with the chainsaw, but he also murders SpongeBob too. He laughs maniacally as the episode ends.
I was just surprised. Not about the content but about how much of the episode actually made it in. It wasn't overly disturbing, but it was pretty unsettling. Nate told me that he wrote the disturbing scenes mostly "as a joke" and he himself was also kind of surprised that those scenes actually made the cut in some form. He said that his coworkers thought that what he was doing was wrong, but he brought up the episode "One Coarse Meal" as an excuse to justify his work. He made a funny remark about how those scenes were a metaphor of saying that he just couldn't take it anymore doing SpongeBob and had to do the extreme to get himself out of it. I couldn't resist but chuckle.
And he concluded saying that he indeed got fired and never came back to SpongeBob ever again, then went on to say that he couldn't believe the episode was this close to being aired on television and was recycled into a newer episode. He told me to keep the DVD and not give it away, stating that it "could cause some really bad problems." He then let me go and said that I should go back to working. And for sure I did enjoy the conversation as bad as the episode he made was.
Now I was excited. I just knew that there was more behind the production of the episode that Nate didn't tell me. Yeah, apparently this episode and its sister, Planet of the Jellyfish, was supposed to air earlier on but was abruptly changed because of how this episode went. When they made the new episode they got rid of Nate Cash's name, gave it a new production code (833) and modified a lot of the episode to make it more kid-friendly while keeping much of the adult innuendo that Nate wrote.
There's got to be more behind the story of the episode. Maybe the other three people that worked on the episode know, but sadly I don't have any of those three people in contact. Maybe someday, I'll go back there and find out the whole story, but I doubt anyone will remember, and if they do, they probably will make up stories and lie about it.
Maybe this whole thing might remain a mystery, but at least I know most of the story. For now.
Category:SpongeBob
Category:Theory
Category:Nickelodeon
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