Bumper to Bumper

Characters

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• Mrs. Puff
• Gary the Snail
• Fancy guy
• Teenage fish
• Highway Speed Patrol Officer
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  • Incidental 107
  • Incidental 64
  • Incidental 41
  • Incidental 48
  • Incidental 106
  • Incidental 8
  • Incidental 49
  • Incidental 105
  • Incidental 92

Synopsis

File:Bumper to Bumper 039a.png

"No buts, SpongeBob! You fail this test over and over."

One day at Mrs. Puff's boating school, one fish is doing the boating course perfectly with Mrs. Puff, and then it is SpongeBob's turn.

SpongeBob puts the boat to reverse, then he crashes it to the obstacles and crashes into a house. Mrs. Puff gets very furious at SpongeBob after he fails the test again. SpongeBob cries and run to his house. At home, Mrs. Puff thinks about how SpongeBob could pass his driving test, and then realizes SpongeBob is afraid of the course and that if she took him to drive on a real road, he would pass and he would eventually be out of her life forever. Mrs. Puff goes over to SpongeBob's house and tells him to forget about what she said earlier. Mrs. Puff takes SpongeBob to an abandoned road, but SpongeBob is scared.

Mrs. Puff tells him to keep repeating "Focus on the road, there is nothing but the road" to get his confidence back. SpongeBob follows her instructions and imagines himself doing crazy driving tricks and poses as he proceeds to repeat the phrase. When SpongeBob has almost passed all the tests, Mrs. Puff 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 on a dangerous shortcut and gets back on a road, but he actually gets on a 10-lane intertidal seaway and he is gripped with fear and cannot concentrate.

A police officer sees them speeding and thought they were reckless drivers because Mrs. Puff crossed the county line, which she should not have done. The police officer tells SpongeBob to pull over, but instead he accelerates. Then, when Mrs. Puff tells to stop the vessel again, he finally parks the boat safely. Mrs. Puff gives SpongeBob his driver's license and screams: "I'm free!." But the police officer does not think so. He arrests Mrs. Puff for violating her parole and 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 the episode ends.

Production

This episode was in production on April 23, 2012.

On September 20, 2012, this segment, along with "Little Yellow Book," were officially completed and delivered to Nickelodeon Animation Studio.

• File:SB 182 MASTER SLATE.png

The episode was confirmed and added to the US Copyright Office on October 25, 2012, along with its sister episode "Little Yellow Book."

Model sheets

File:SB904 CH sc016 shattered puff.psd.png

Art

Character design

• Designed by Virginia Hawes.

• File:SB SAD SITTING.jpeg
• File:SB BOAT SHOES.jpeg
• File:ROAD-SB-2.jpeg

Storyboards

• File:325-904.jpg
• File:325-904-1.jpg

Release

• This episode is available on the SpongeBob SquarePants Vol. 15, Glove World Forever!, Evil Spatula, Complete Ninth Season, Next 100 Episodes, and The Best 200 Episodes Ever DVDs.

Trivia

General

• The title card is similar to that of "Cephalopod Lodge" and "Model Sponge," except it is brown.
• SpongeBob is previously said to be "unteachable" by Captain Frostymug in "License to Milkshake," which is another season 9 episode, even being written and storyboarded by the same team.
• This episode reveals that SpongeBob is afraid of the driving course.
• The fancy guy returns as a character in a show that two fish are watching.
• This episode was originally scheduled to premiere with "Little Yellow Book" on Sunday, November 25, 2012 at 7:45pm, but was pulled at the last minute and was instead moved to November 17, 2012.
• This is the second episode in which SpongeBob's license gets ripped up after he got it. The first is "Nautical Novice."
• When this episode first aired, it was paired up with "Demolition Doofus."
  • Ironically, both are boating-related episodes.
• This is the first usage of the APM track "Jungle Baby" since "The Fry Cook Games."
• This marks the first usage of the APM track "Horlepiep" for a title card since "Boat Smarts."
• This marks the last usage of "Hawaiian Link (b)" in a SpongeBob SquarePants episode to date.
  • The track did appear again in the Kamp Koral: SpongeBob's Under Years episode "Sugar Squeeze."
• During SpongeBob's episode of psychedelic scenes due to his hypnotic mantra, SpongeBob is shown to be driving on a mobius strip, a figure with only one side, and one boundary, though it can be easily made from one strip of paper.
• When Mrs. Puff muted SpongeBob, he mouthed the word "unteachable."
• When SpongeBob jumped the missing section of road, he put the boat in to "J" more than likely meaning "Jump," which is not a real feature.
• In the German dub, this episode is called "Denk ur an die Straße," which means "Just Think of the Road."
• This is the third episode SpongeBob almost knows how to drive, following "Boating School" and "The Hot Shot."
• List of tasks on SpongeBob's list:
  1. Boating within the lines
  2. Uses turn signals
  3. Obeying speed limit
  4. Round-about navigation
  5. Vertical driving
  6. Jumping gaps
  7. 10-point turn
  8. Avoiding obstacles
  9. Safe 'n steady acceleration
  10. Bump handling
  11. Mobius drag strip
  12. Safely dock vessel
• This is Mrs. Puff's only major role in season 9.

Episode references

• When Mrs. Puff sits down on her couch, a small picture of her sitting down at the same shot can be seen next to her, making a recursive picture. This is a callback to another infinite picture in Mrs. Puff's house in "No Free Rides."

Cultural references

• The Intertidal Seaway is a parody of the Interstate Highway System.
• Two teenage fish watching a 3D movie might be a parody of Jay and Silent Bob.

Errors

• When Mrs. Puff gets thrown into the police car, she is wearing hand cuffs. When she appears at the window threatening to get SpongeBob, her hand cuffs are suddenly gone.
• When the policeman first yells at SpongeBob, he has a megaphone. In the next shot, after SpongeBob accidentally speeds up, the policeman's megaphone is suddenly gone.
• When the policeman comes 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.
• SpongeBob calls Mrs. Puff 'Ms. Puff' when he asks if he is 'unteachable' in the outskirts.

File:Bumper to Bumper 048.png

Mrs. Puff's shoes are black, when they are supposed to be red.

• Mrs. Puff's shoes are wrongfully colored black from their usual red throughout the episode.
  • This error also occurs in "Knock Knock, Who's There?"
• When Mrs. Puff tells SpongeBob to scoot over, he has a seatbelt on. Then it zooms in some and his seatbelt disappears.
• The boat that is used for the driving test in the outskirts has four wheels, when usually the boats have three wheels.

Video

File:SpongeBob SquarePants Driving Test In 3D Nickelodeon UK