Product Details

• Actors: Tom Kenny, Bill Fagerbakke, Rodger Bumpass, Clancy Brown, Dee Bradley Baker
• Writers: Stephen Hillenburg
• Producers: Paul Tibbitt
• Format: Animated, Color, Dolby, DVD, Full Screen, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 2
• Rated: Unrated
• Studio: Nickelodeon
• DVD Release Date: September 12, 2006
• Run Time: 30 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (28 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000FZETKM
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #33,473 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• For more information about "SpongeBob SquarePants - Season 4, Vol. 1" visit the Internet Movie Database (IMDb)

Editorial Reviews

SpongeBob SquarePants Season 4 – Volume 1 DVD Box Set - is the crown jewel of the Nickelodeon adult DVD Program. It contains the first 20 episodes of Season 4 along with exclusive special features!

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

66 of 76 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Spongebob finally jumps the shark, August 8, 2006

By 

calvinnme - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)    (TOP 50 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: SpongeBob SquarePants - Season 4, Vol. 1 (DVD)

The first three seasons of Spongebob were great. It was an absurd masterpeice of the highest order that made Ren and Stimpy look like "Washington Week in Review" in comparison. It had comedy that kids could relate to as well as something for us adults, mainly in the characters that resemble people we see in real life every day: the eternal optimist (Spongebob), the psychotic best friend (Patrick), the "foreigner" just trying to adapt to new surroundings (Sandy), the "accomplished neophyte" that lacks any real skill (Squidward), and the cheapskate (Mr. Krabs).

Unfortunately, in its fourth season, Spongebob jumps the shark, probably due to the departure of creator and marine biologist Stephen Hillenburg. The cartoon inhabitants of Bikini Bottom have become just exaggerated caricatures of their past incarnations - they are cartoons of cartoons. The clever dialogue and straightforward storylines of past seasons have been replaced with slap-stick physical comedy and overly complex storylines that are boring for children and too inane for adults.

So why, you might ask, am I giving it three stars? Because it still has its moments. In particular, I really loved "Patrick Smartpants" which was nothing short of a series classic. Patrick and Sponge Bob are jellyfishing when Patrick runs off a cliff and loses his head, which Sponge Bob (accidentally) replaces with brain coral. Patrick then becomes a genius, discussing classical music with Squidward and complex physics and calculus with Sandy. I also liked the half hour episode, "Have You Seen This Snail? (Where's Gary?)" in which SpongeBob tries to beat a paddle-ball world record and forgets to feed Gary -- for 10 days. Gary runs away to downtown Bikini Bottom where he is taken in by a kindly old woman who indulges him in every way possible. This is fine with Gary until he finds out why he is being fattened up, and promptly returns home to a lonely and penitent SpongeBob.

There were other good episodes, but the bad episodes are pretty awful. For example, I found myself just plain bored with "Dunces and Dragons", in which Spongebob and Patrick get transported to medieval times, and the season openers "Fear of A Krabby Patty" and "Shell of a Man" were so bad they were just plain embarrassing to watch. Also, although this show has always had some mild adult humor built into it, mainly in the form of witty dialogue, the episode "SquidBob TentaclePants" is way too scary for small children. It is very much like the 80's version of "The Fly" - where SpongeBob and Squidward get spliced together in Sandy's transporter machine. The results of these animated Frankenstein-like mixtures might be funny to adults, but I can see it inducing nightmares in small children. Graphic horror is just not what you expect when you tune in to SpongeBob.

All in all, I think these first twenty episodes of season four form a "take it or leave it" kind of season, which is just not how I would have ever expected to describe any season of SpongeBob.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars What happened?, November 18, 2006

A Kid's Review

This review is from: SpongeBob SquarePants - Season 4, Vol. 1 (DVD)

I love Spongebob and i have the three seasons on DVD, but this is bad. I don't know why the episodes are so bad. The re are a few good ones, like krusty towers and uh, well... thats mostly it. Some of my friends like to watch spongebob with me, but i feel embarrassed when i watch these with them. The storylines can be hard to follow and there are corny songs in some episodes. Very few episodes are funny at all. If you compare classics like "Pickles" and "Band Geeks" to these new episodes, there's no comparison. Patrick smartpants and karate island are waaaaaay overated. Also, on the best day ever thing on Nick, I was in utter disbelief that with the exception of the camping episode, all of the top ten was season 4. NO ONE i know likes these new episodes. I feel like the "best day ever" was an advertisement, not honest voting results. I'd chose ANY episode from season 1 over #5 "Ghost host". Also, whats with this vloume one crap. We should be charged WAAAAAAY less for low quality AND quantity (amount of episodes). Did Hilenberg run out of ideas? Dunces and dragons's humor was the kind where you could tell they were trying to be funny, but you either didn't get the joke or it just wasn't funny. I think I have made my point clear. I 100% recommend seasons 1, 2, and 3. I 100% DON'T recommend this garbage. Another thing, these new episodes like "bummer vacation" not on vol. 1 are just as bad.

Oh, i gave it 2 stars because despite my heavy critisism, it's not THAT bad.

23 of 27 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A rip-off or worth owning? Either way, the first part of Season 4 comes to DVD!, July 1, 2006

By 

Norman "Norman II" (Escondido, CA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: SpongeBob SquarePants - Season 4, Vol. 1 (DVD)

On September 12, you can expect the first 20 episodes of Season 4 to come to DVD. These episodes are:

Fear of a Krabby Patty/Shell of a Man
The Lost Mattress/Krabs vs. Plankton
Skill Crane/Good Neighbors
Selling Out/Funny Pants
MM and BB VI: The Motion Picture/Enemy-In-Law
Patrick Smartpants/SquidBob Tentaclepants
Have You Seen This Snail? (aka Where's Gary?)
Dunces and Dragons (aka Lost In Time)
Krusty Towers/Mrs. Puff, You're Fired
Ghost Host/Chimps Ahoy!
Whale of a Birthday/Karate Island

Before the fourth season came on the air, rumors were floating around that creator Stephen Hillenburg left the show after making the Spongebob movie, yet if you look in the credits of the season 4 episodes, you see that he still remains in his Executive Producer post. Regardless, whether he left his post or not, SpongeBob still remains as the best cartoon on TV so far. Granted, there has been a noticeable decline coming from the first few episodes in this set, but then things started to get better and funnier as the show went on; It seemed the season took a while to find its legs.

As you can see, the SpongeBob has always been trying something new: We get an entire episode focused on Spongebob's silly laugh (see Funny Pants), and a sixth Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy episode, which although it's not as good as the other MM&BB episodes, I still find it quite funny, because it plays a joke on the stupidity of Hollywood making mediocre movies based on things we know and love; there's also not one, but two episodes that are truly 30 minutes long-Have You Seen This Snail and Dunces and Dragons-and not marred half the half-hour episode by the annoying Patchy the Pirate; Mr. Krabs does something to his restaurant, the Krusty Krab, by selling it to sludge-making food company in Selling Out, and turning the restaurant into a hotel in one of the funniest episodes ever, Krusty Towers; And we finally get to see what happens when Patrick becomes as smart as a scientist in Patrick Smartpants, and what happens when SpongeBob and Squidward "stick together" in an experimental accident in SquidBob TentaclePants, claimed by SpongeBob's voice Tom Kenny as his favorite episode. There's still plenty more content to check out in this set.

In addition, the set also includes a behind-the-scenes featurette on the voices behind the SpongeBob cast, and two animatics of the episodes Fear of a Krabby Patty and Dunces and Dragons. Although all this seems really good, I am quite confused; this set contains half the season when already the previous three DVD sets came out with three full seasons. Paramount should've waited for the show to complete its full season and realeased that full season on DVD then. But either way, I hope the set comes at a reasonable price, just like the other sets.