Barnacle Boy

“	Will you stop calling me "boy?"	”
	— Barnacle Boy to Mermaid Man, "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy"

Character

Gallery

Appearances

TimTemplate:Data:References (or Kyle)Template:Data:References Stangler, better known by his superhero name Barnacle Boy, is the sidekick of Mermaid Man. He is a superhero and a parody of both Aqualad and Robin. He is said to be 68 years old.Template:Data:References He first appears in the episode "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy."

Barnacle Boy's voice actor, the late Tim Conway, passed away in 2019. Along with Mermaid Man and Grandma SquarePants, he is one of the three supporting characters who have been retired from the series. He became retired from the series alongside Mermaid Man ever since the late Ernest Borgnine's death in 2012. He and Mermaid Man now appear in non-speaking appearances or as toys. His younger self is voiced by Burt Ward.

Appearance

File:Barnacle Boy (Old) Color.JPG

Barnacle Boy's model sheet.

Barnacle Boy is an elderly human with light tan skin. He is tall, thin, bald, has a round head, a very large nose, puffy ears, wears a sailor hat, a black mask, and a turquoise neckerchief. He also wears dark blue rubber gloves, boots, a red T-shirt, and rubber black speedo.

Young

File:Young Boy Color.JPG

Young Barnacle Boy's model sheet.

As his younger self, instead of a black mask, he wears glasses and is much taller. Instead of dark blue rubber gloves and boots and a black speedo, he wore light blue gloves and boots, a dark blue speedo and a gold belt with a clam buckle. His nose is also smaller. He also has short black hair.

Personality

Barnacle Boy is always portrayed to be rather irritable. He often gets frustrated when his partner, Mermaid Man, becomes absent-minded due to old age. It also usually upsets him when everyone around him is treating him like a child although he states he is "68-years old superhero." The juvenile treatment that he suffers from triggers his brooding and disposition.

Biography

File:YoungerBarnacleBoy.png

Barnacle Boy when he was younger.

Despite being a senior citizen, Barnacle Boy is still treated like a child by his mentor, much to his disdain. In "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy V," when Mermaid Man orders a Pipsqueak Patty for Barnacle Boy at the Krusty Krab, they get into an argument, which ultimately results in Barnacle Boy becoming a villain and forming a group called "E.V.I.L." (Every Villain Is Lemons) with Man Ray and the Dirty Bubble. After a protracted fight with Mermaid Man and the "International Justice League of Super Acquaintances" which E.V.I.L. wins, he and Mermaid Man patch things up. Barnacle Man (as he prefers to be called) gets a little more respect now, although much to the joy of themselves and their friends, Barnacle Man is unable to fully consume a full-sized Krabby Patty.

As the younger of the duo, he is more sane and self-aware than Mermaid Man. However, Barnacle Boy is also more cranky. He often calls Mermaid Man an "old coot." He is revealed to be 68 years old in "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy V."

Abilities

Barnacle Boy possesses powers similar to Mermaid Man, though he lacks the belt powers. Barnacle Boy also has "Sulfur Vision" - a form of heat vision - which Mermaid Man has never been shown to have. Like Mermaid Man, his powers do not work as well as they used to, mostly due to old age.

Role in video games

Operation Krabby Patty

Barnacle Boy makes a cameo with Mermaid Man in Boating School #101 and has a picture signed with an autograph.

SuperSponge

Template:Data:Links wants Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy to sign a photograph for Template:Data:Links's birthday. However, they want to get rid of SpongeBob and send him on random tasks around Bikini Bottom.

Employee of the Month

Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy are in Rock Bottom when Patrick and Mermaid Man have a soda drinking contest. Patrick ends up winning, but Mermaid Man gets injured and SpongeBob finds help to get him in the invisible boatmobile.

Later, Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy leave Rock Bottom. At the end of the game, they are at Neptune's Paradise with SpongeBob.

Battle for Bikini Bottom/Battle for Bikini Bottom: Rehydrated

In the console versions of the original Battle for Bikini Bottom, and all versions of Rehydrated, Barnacle Boy appears in the Mermalair where Template:Data:Links's robots have invaded. He is also present in Rock Bottom and Kelp Forest.

If the player goes into the Rock Bottom museum for the first time as SpongeBob, it is revealed that Barnacle Boy has a son, a daughter-in-law, and four "screaming" grandchildren.

Nicktoons Freeze Frame Frenzy

Him and Mermaid Man makes a cameo in Nicktoons Freeze Frame Frenzy as an out of place character the player must photograph.

Lights, Camera, Pants!

Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy appear during a new episode being directed by Gill Hammerstein. In it, the duo is falsely accused of destroying the Sand Stadium when it was stolen by the Sneaky Hermit. However, when they are sent to Bikini Bottom Jail, the prison warden tells them what is happening and frees them so they can catch the villain, thus accidentally letting the Dirty Bubble and Man Ray go free.

Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy go to Goo Lagoon and the Krusty Krab to find clues. When they go to the Chum Bucket, they discover that Man Ray and the Dirty Bubble are using the mayor's child as their captive in an attempt to help the Sneaky Hermit's plans. They reluctantly make a truce with the villains and work together to find the Sneaky Hermit with some help from an expert hunter from Jellyfish Fields.

They manage to track down the hermit and foil his plan of putting Bikini Bottom on his back so he can have a home. When the crisis ends, they return to the Sand Stadium to continue to watch the musical performance.

Nicktoons: Android Invasion

Him and Mermaid Man are mentioned after SpongeBob rescues Manny Rivera/El Tigre for Zim's telephone booth.

SpongeBob's Truth or Square

He and Mermaid Man appear in the Mermalair and SpongeBob's bedroom.

SpongeBob's Boating Bash

Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy appear when SpongeBob and Patrick want to borrow the invisible boatmobile.

They later appear when SpongeBob gets his "license" from Seymour Scales. Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy later arrest Seymour for being a fraud.

They are also unlockable characters who drive in the same boat during the races.

SpongeBob SquigglePants

He appears in some of the Comic Book nano-games.

Nicktoons MLB

Him and Mermaid Man are seen as a card.

SpongeBob Simulator

He appears as a playable character.

In-universe merchandise based on him

File:The Card 050.png

The Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy trading cards.

In the episode "Ditchin'," a Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy origin comic book is shown. One panel features a man resembling Barnacle Boy and a woman resembling Mermaid Man in a spaceship. The woman has two children in her arms resembling Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy, implying that the heroes are brothers.

More merchandise can also be seen in "Mermaid Man Begins," thus causing a dispute on his and Mermaid Man's backstory. In "The Card," 54 trading cards have also been made as entertainment for fans. Toys were manufactured as part of a Krusty Krab promotion in "Mermaid Man vs. SpongeBob."

Enemies

Barnacle Boy and Mermaid Man have several supervillain enemies. Their two most notable foes are Man Ray and Dirty Bubble. Other villains include the Atomic Flounder, who is now retired, the Sinister Slug, the Jumbo Shrimp, Kelp Thing, and the Moth, a humanoid moth who steals light, as seen in "Night Light." Mermaid Man claims to have been trying to catch the Moth for 57 years due to his very small size.

The Mermalair features a "villain containment chamber," where villains such as Man Ray and Prawn are imprisoned in frozen tartar sauce, as seen in "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy III" and the video game Battle for Bikini Bottom.

Similarities to DC and Marvel superheroes

• The invisible boatmobile is a parody of the invisible plane of Wonder Woman and the Batmobile of Batman.
• His friends and enemies are similar to Batman and Aquaman's friends and enemies such as Mermaid Man, Elastic Waistband, Miss Appear, and Man Ray, being parodies of Aquaman, Batman, Plastic Man, Elongated Man, Wonder Woman, and Black Manta.
• In "Back to the Past," Barnacle Boy's younger self is voiced by Burt Ward, portrayed Robin from the Batman franchise.
  • Similarly, Adam West, who voiced Mermaid Man's younger self, portrayed Batman in the TV series.
• Barnacle Boy's teammate, Mermaid Man, is a parody of Aquaman and Batman.
• Barnacle Boy and Mermaid Man's superhero group, The International Justice League of Super Acquaintances, is a parody of the Justice League of America.
• He is very similar to the DC and Marvel superheroes, Aqualad, as well as Robin.

Trivia

• On the title cards and the DVD episode listings, his name is spelled as "Barnacleboy."

File:SpongeBob-Experience-stole-fanart-by-Enterpraiz.png

Fanart used without permission for Barnacle Boy.

• The SpongeBob SquarePants Experience, a book by animation historian Jerry Beck, uses this fanart by DeviantArt user EnterPraiz for Barnacle Boy's image. EnterPraiz did not release his fanart under Creative Commons, so it seems Jerry Beck took the fanart without permission and without checking to see its license.
  • Barnacle Boy's arm on the fanart is even obviously airbrushed to remove the other side of it, where EnterPraiz put Mermaid Man and his artist signature.
• Barnacle Boy has a bad case of dandruff.Template:Data:References
• Barnacle Boy seems to enjoy eating meatloaf.Template:Data:References
• Barnacle Boy is retired but still fights crime.
• In the Romanian dub, in early episodes, he is described as "The Cayman Boy."
• A kid appears to be dressed as Barnacle Boy in "The Legend of Boo-Kini Bottom."
• He has hair growing out the wrinkles on his liver spots.
• Barnacle Boy had become a superhero during the 1960s-like era.
• He has a case of cauliflower ear, in which the ear becomes swollen and deformed. This condition is commonly seen in elderly people.
• In the Russian dub, Barnacle Boy had his name changed several times. Initially, in the first three Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy-centered episodes, his name was "Очкарик," which roughly translates to "Glasses Boy," then in "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy IV," his name was "Прилипала," which roughly translates to "Suction Boy." In "Mermaid Man and Barnacle Boy V," his name was "Юнга," which roughly translates to "Sea Cadet" and in "Mermaid Man & Barnacle Boy VI: The Motion Picture," his name was "Малыш-Ковбой," which roughly translates to "Cowboy Kid."
• In the German dub, Barnacle Boy is called "Blaubarschbube," which translates to "bluefish boy." This is not the only instance in SpongeBob where "barnacle" is translated as "Blaubarsch," the other being The Ugly Barnacle (ger. Der hässliche Blaubarsch).
• Barnacle Boy's real name is Tim, which is a nod to the first name of his late voice actor Tim Conway.
  • Mermaid Man's real name, Ernie, shares the same attribute to his own voice actor, Ernest Borgnine.
• In the Danish dub, he has two names which change during the seasons. In season 1 to 2, he is called "Andeskælsdrengen," which means Barnacle Boy. From season 3 onward, his name was changed to "Klæbedrengen," which means "sticky" or "Glue Boy."
• In the Croatian dub, he speaks with a Bosnian dialect.
• His voice actor, the late Tim Conway, had previously starred along with the late Ernest Borgnine on McHale's Navy.
• "Karen for Spot" is the first episode in the series where Barnacle Boy appears without Mermaid Man.
• He makes a cameo in the SpongeBob's Birthday map in Just Dance 2025 Edition.

See also

• Barnacle Boy (Man Ray timeline)
• Barnacle Bill

References

ar:الحلزون الصغير de:Blaubarschbube es:Chico Percebe fr:Bernard l'Ermite ja:フジツボボーイ pl:Skorupin pt-br:Mexilhãozinho ru:Очкарик zh:大洋遊俠