Squidward's Suicide ( Original 2004 Tape)

The Title Card. (albeit, in low quality)

**Squidward's Suicide** is a lost season 4 episode of SpongeBob SquarePants. It is Andrew's second cartoon and he got help from Dylan Grant, Paul MacLoued and Trent Hindley. It is contained on an old Video Home System (VHS) tape and was watched by the Nickelodeon staff back in 2005. The tape was found at a scrap yard in California, hidden in a filthy plastic bag. The episode was sent to Nickelodeon Studios In California as the rough cut of Fear of a Krabby Patty, the Season 4 prèmiere.

## The Tape

On the top left is lebelled "Spongebob" and Squarepants is written below it. Next to "Spongebob Squarepans" is written "Squidward's" and Suicide is written under it. At the bottom left is labelled "Nick 2005" and at the bottom right is written "Viacom Inc."

## The Plot

The episode begins with a title card saying "Squidward's Suicide," and then the opening credits read five names - Madison Richards, Justin Bringsfield, Brad Vangersift, Virginia Hawes and Derek Le'strange. The names were put in to disguise the original creators. Substequently, the five people written in the opening credits were arrested.

We are given a view of Conch Street from a distance. The screen zooms in on the houses as the production music plays, precisely "Hawaiian Happiness". After a few seconds, the view changes to a closeup view Squidward's house. Squidward is playing his clarinet near his window. Spongebob can be heard laughing outside. Squidward stops playing, and looks out his window. He yells to Spongebob to knock it off as he has a concert to practice for that night. Spongebob says sure thing, and Spongebob goes to see Sandy with Patrick.

The bubbles pop up, and the ending of the concert can be seen. Squidward is in center frame, and he looks scared. As the shot goes to the crowd, everyone starts booing Squidward, but they all have realistic eyes as they boo him. Not real shots of eyes, but more real than even CGI. Even Spongebob was booing, very unlike him.

Squidward looks very afraid, and the scene switches to Squidward sitting on the side of his bed looking depressed. There is absolutely no audio. After thirty seconds, Squidward covers his face and starts sobbing softly. There is a faint noise in the background, it is the sound of a gale blowing through a forest. Another strange sound is a deep, odd laughter. Soon the screen twists in on itself and goes back to normal.

After 20 seconds, the screen twitches and blurs and twists and a single frame flashes over the screen. If one were to rewind it, the result is absolutely horrible. It is a real photo of a dead six year old boy, mangled and cut open and all. Squidward is now crying realistic blood. After 20 seconds, the screen twists again, and another frame pops up. This time a six year old girl is shown horribly disfigured and mutilated, and is, like the other kid, on pavement.

Squidward goes silent as does all sound. Squidward uncovers his eyes. They are realistic and bulging. Blood is running down his face. He stares at the viewer for about ten seconds, then starts to cry again. It is earsplittingly loud. The laughter and wind return. Squidward's crying is now mixed with screams. This happens for about a minute and a half or so, and 15 seconds before the end of the scene, a sequence of five frames flashes over the screen. They depict a short "video" of a hand reaching into another boy's chest around the age of the boy in the first photo, and then holding his eye. The eye even blinks for two the final two frames.

At the end of the long, horrifying stare of Squidward, the scene zooms out and Squidward has a shotgun in his hands. He puts the gun to his mouth, and fires. The final five seconds consists of Squidward's lifeless body lying on the bed, His brain exposed, one eye out of his head, blood dripping from all of this, and blood on the wall. The tape then ends abruptly.

## Aftermath

On August 28, 2019, the tape was found buried and hidden in a dirty plastic bag at a scrap yard in California. It was found by a man named Sam Brown who had been interested in the case.

Attempting to play the tape would result in just a white screen with a loud buzzing at first.

The playback after the first attempt at cleaning the tape was very hard to make out and the tape was a lot distorted.

After the second attempt, the playback was better, the picture however was hard to make out but not as much as the previous playback, you can kind of tell what's going on even thought the bad quality and the distortion.

The forth attempt was better, but the screen was still distorted. Althought, some parts of the episode looked almost clean.

The fifth attempt was way better, even thought the distortion still on the screen.

The sixth attempt was almost great. There was just a little distortion. Althought, the tape was easy to make out.

The seventh attempt was the best one. It was completely clean. The quality was low but it was watchable. It was later released by Mike

## Gallery

01-27-13 - Squidward's Suicide Tape CleanedThe tape