Bumper to Bumper

Characters

• SpongeBob SquarePants
• Gary the Snail
• Mrs. Puff
• Charles

Time Cards

• Meanwhile... (deleted version)

Synopsis

One fish is doing the boating course perfectly with Mrs. Puff, and then its SpongeBob's turn. Mrs. Puff gets very angry at SpongeBob after he fails the test again. Soon, Mrs. Puff realizes SpongeBob is afraid of the course and has him drive on an abandoned road where he passes his test and gets a license. Mrs. Puff tells him to keep repeating "Focus on the road, there is nothing but the road" to get his confidence back. SpongeBob follows his instructions and imagines himself doing crazy driving tricks and poses as he proceeds to repeat the phrase. Mrs. Puff later tells him to safely dock the vessel as the last step, but due to constantly repeating the phrase, SpongeBob has mesmerized himself into a daze and cannot focus on what he is doing. He soon drives out of the road and freaks out. SpongeBob gets back on a road, but is on a highway and is he gripped with fear. And police had seen them and thought they were reckless drivers because Mrs. Puff crossed the county line which she shoudn't have done. At the end the police officer rips up SpongeBob's license. As Mrs. Puff goes to jail she says "SpongeBob, I'll get you for this! I'll get you!" and it ends.

Trivia

• Nickelodeon featured SpongeBob's "Biggest Boating Blunders" which is a marathon with many boat-related episodes leading up to this episode, such as Doing Time, Boating Buddies, and No Free Rides.
• When Mrs. Puff sat down on her couch, a small picture of her sitting down at the same shot can be seen next to her. This is a possible reference to the episode No Free Rides, where the same visual gag occurred.
• Charles returned as a character in a show that two fish are watching.
• This episode was originally scheduled to air with Little Yellow Book on November 25, 2012, but was pulled at the last minute and moved to November 17, 2012.
• Once again Mrs. Puff's master plan to pass SpongeBob is fatally flawed.
• The title card background music is the same as Season 3's New Student Starfish and Season 4's Mrs. Puff, You're Fired.
• This marks the seventh time Mrs. Puff has been jailed, her other arrests occurring in Hall Monitor, No Free Rides, Doing Time, Summer Job, Ditchin', and Oral Report.
• This is the 2nd time SpongeBob's license got ripped up after he got it. The 1st time was in Nautical Novice.
• This is the last Season 9 episode to air in 2012.
• This is the third time SpongeBob almost knows how to drive. The others were Boating School and The Hot Shot.
• Second time SpongeBob gets mesmerized into a daze, causing him to not think properly. The first was Earworm.

Goofs

• When Mrs. Puff was thrown into the policecar, she was wearing hand cuffs. When she appeared at the window threatening to get SpongeBob, her hand cuffs were suddenly gone.
• When the policeman first yelled at SpongeBob, he had a megaphone. In the next shot after SpongeBob accidentally sped up, the policeman's megaphone was suddenly gone though it was never shown when he put it away.
• When the policeman came up to Mrs. Puff, the security cuff on her ankle disappears (also mentioned missing during the exam), then when she looks down at her ankle, it reappears.

APM Music Identifecation

• Horlepiep - Title Card.
• Chase Cue 1 - SpongeBob and Mrs. Puff driving crazy.
• Pell-Mell - Played during the 3-D show.
• Hawaiian Link (b) - SpongeBob sad.
• Graveyard - Mrs. Puff drives SpongeBob to the deserted area.
• Tales from the Swamp C - "Driving test?!"
• Rescue - SpongeBob driving off the road.