Karate Island

If you were looking for the article about the DVD, then see Karate Island (DVD).

If you were looking for the article about the place, then see Condo Island.

Characters

• Gary the Snail
• Template:Data:Links
• Realistic Fish Head
• Humans
  • Karate artists Template:Single appearance
• Sandy Cheeks
• Master Udon Template:Debut
• Other "karate masters" Template:Single appearance
• Karate Island's best fighters Template:Debut
• Template:Data:Links
  • Incidental 154
  • Fred
• The Tickler Template:Debut
• Lipp Cervas Template:Debut
• Filthy Phil Template:Debut
• Squidward Tentacles Template:Cameo
• Pat Morita ^{(special thanks dedication at the end)}

Synopsis

In the beginning of the episode, SpongeBob is waxing Gary, when the local mailman shows up at Template:Data:Links, and he hands him a videotape delivery. SpongeBob plays the tape on his TV, which states that he has been crowned "King of Karate," and tells him to attend to Karate Island to be crowned.

File:Karate Island 071.jpg

SpongeBob meets Master Udon.

SpongeBob is about to leave when he encounters Sandy, to whom he happily explains that he is the King of Karate. Sandy is suspicious of this, so she accompanies SpongeBob on the boat ride. The boat stops at Karate Island, where the sensei, Master Udon, greets SpongeBob but ignores Sandy. SpongeBob, to prove his Karate skills, asks to fight Master Udon's best guards. Three guards arrive, and when they fight SpongeBob, they seem to be easily vanquished despite not even being touched by SpongeBob. Sandy notices this, adding to her suspicion. SpongeBob is officially crowned "King of Karate," and he sits on his throne and requests Sandy to sit beside him in a lounge chair. Sandy tries to warn SpongeBob, but then leaves when SpongeBob becomes arrogantly proud and accuses her of being jealous of him. After she leaves, SpongeBob is shocked when he is suddenly locked into his "throne," and Udon takes a pen out of his robe. Sandy then hears SpongeBob's cries for help, and goes back to save him, now wearing a yellow jumpsuit.

Sandy fights through Master Udon's tower, fighting an opponent on each of the Four Floors of Fear with an unusual "power." She avoids being tickled, kissed, and overwhelmed with stench by the use of jelly-filled donuts, a hair dryer, and her impenetrable air helmet, then crashes through the top floor's entry way, the trapdoor where SpongeBob is being held hostage by Master Udon. Udon then drops a bamboo cage on Sandy and reveals that the pronouncement of SpongeBob as King of Karate is just a scam to lure him to the island. Udon is actually a real estate agent, and the island is really Condo Island instead, and he also stated that if there was a real Karate Island, he would be a millionaire. He refuses to let SpongeBob go until he agrees to buy a time-share condo on the island and allow his equity increase until he becomes "King of Condos." SpongeBob shouts in horror and Sandy quickly breaks out of her cage with meditation, strange hand movements, and weird muttering. Master Udon rips off his robes to expose a highly muscular build while Sandy rips off her jumpsuit to expose a similar build. They begin fighting by charging at each other, but they miss and Sandy defeats Udon by kicking him out of the room into the water below and frees SpongeBob.

File:Karate Island 215.jpg

SpongeBob apologizes to Sandy for acting like a jerk at Karate Island and she forgives him.

As they leave the island, SpongeBob apologizes to Sandy for acting like a jerk to her, and he thanks her for saving him from buying a condo, for which she forgives him and tells him that is what friends are for. SpongeBob then asks if he is not the king of karate after all, but Sandy tells him that he is in her book. Then she explains to him about real estate as the boat leaves shore. After they leave, Squidward arrives on "Clarinet Island" to be crowned "King of Clarinets," implying he was scammed as well, and is looked down upon by Master Udon, still alive.

The episode ends with a dedication to Pat Morita.

Production

This episode was confirmed on March 6, 2006 as "Karate-Island."

Deleted scene

File:Karate Island 222.jpg

The "Dedication to Pat Morita" scene.

The episode originally ended with a dedication to Noriyuki "Pat" Morita (1932–2005), who voiced Master Udon in this episode and died on November 24, 2005 due to kidney failure, about six months before the episode premiered in the United States. Morita was best known as Mitsumo "Arnold" Takahashi from the TV show Happy Days, Mr. Miyagi in The Karate Kid, and the Emperor of China in Walt Disney Animation Studios' 36th animated feature film, Mulan and its direct-to-video sequel Mulan II. The dedication card at the end of this episode was removed from American television airings after the Best Day Ever marathon and has also been removed from all digital and streaming releases on Amazon Prime Video, Paramount+, and iTunes. However, this episode has the dedication left intact on the Polish, Canadian, Australian, Belgian, French, Turkish, Spanish, German, Greek, Russian, Asian, Filipino, Latin American, Malaysian, European, all DVD releases including this episode, and the Netflix version (albeit cut short). The dedication used to be left in the UK and Ireland airings, but has since been removed.

Release

Broadcast

• This episode and its sister premiered during Nick Friday Night.

Distribution

• This episode is available on the Karate Island, Season 4 Volume 2, The Ultimate Box Set, Sportingly Sandy, First 100 Episodes, Best of SpongeBob, Double Feature Volume 1, Double DVD Fun, The Ultimate SpongeBob Box Set, SpongeBob SquarePants Vol. 6, Rockin' Bikini Bottom, Complete Fourth Season, Extreme Kah-Rah-Tay (digital version only), From the Beginning, Part 2, The SpongeBob SquarePants Collection, The SpongeBob SquarePants 8 Season DVD Collection, Favorite Episodes Volume 2, 2-Season TV Pack, The Third & Fourth Seasons, The Best 200 Episodes Ever, and The Best 300 Episodes Ever DVDs.

Reception

• Template:Rank
• Jennette McCurdy rated this episode as her favorite SpongeBob SquarePants episode in The Ultimate SpongeBob SpongeBash marathon's Celebrity Favorites.
• Template:Rank2

Trivia

General

• This episode originally had the packaging number of 71a and was paired with "All That Glitters," but it was eventually rearranged.
• This episode has an animated title card which usually does not happen.
• The title card background is similar to those of "Nature Pants," "MuscleBob BuffPants" and "The Lost Mattress," though this one is green and there are a lack of flowers on it.
• The stock footage of the trains crashing was also used in "Two Thumbs Down" as part of the segment when SpongeBob breaks his thumbs.
• Gary breaks the fourth wall by looking directly at the audience after SpongeBob does a karate chop on the ground, jumps off but his arm still sticks in the ground.
• The yellow jumpsuit that Sandy was wearing later appears in the video game The Cosmic Shake, the crossover app game Super Brawl Universe, and the film Saving Bikini Bottom: The Sandy Cheeks Movie.
• In the scenes where Sandy fights the French Tickler on the first floor of the Four Floors of Fear building, his dialogue and lip movements are clearly mismatched, likely an intentional gag based on the mismatched dialogue and lip movement caused by poor dubbing processes of English versions of older martial arts films.
• Sandy's air helmet protects her from Filthy Phil's body odor, but in other episodes, it does not protect her from any smell at all.
• Near the end of the episode, when Master Udon falls into some water, Sandy says, "You're in the soup now, Udon!" Udon is actually named after a type of noodle soup commonly served in Japan.
• It's unknown how SpongeBob manages to get out of the chair that he was cuffed to.
• For years, there were rumors that in the original airing of this episode, there was a small amount of blood on Master Udon's face after getting beaten up by Sandy. Vincent Waller eventually debunked this on Twitter in 2018.
• Although this episode was copyrighted in 2006, Pat Morita completed almost all of Udon's dialogue before his death.
  • Pat Morita voiced Master Udon for the most part, however his line, "I am Master Udon" was provided by Tom Kenny. Kenny also provided Udon's screams and grunts during his fight against Sandy. Morita died before he was able to record these.
• This is the first episode for three things:
  • The first episode where "Clownfish Capers" plays.
  • The first episode to use sound effects on a title card along with the title card music. The sound effect that played was karate chops.
  • The first episode to reveal that Sandy is ticklish.
• This is the second episode for a few things:
  • The second episode to have the title card shown in the actual episode, in this case during the tape announcing SpongeBob's impending "coronation." The first is "Krabby Land."
  • The second episode where Sandy wears her bikini and air helmet without the rest of her diving gear outside the treedome. The first is in "Procrastination."
  • The second episode to have a dedication for another person (Pat Morita in this case), after "Graveyard Shift" (which was in dedication to Max Schreck, who played Nosferatu); the third and fourth would be "Snooze You Lose" and "Krusty Katering," (dedicated to Barry Anthony) respectively.
• In the video game SpongeBob's Atlantis SquarePantis, during the SpongeBob's Director's Commentary for the level "Squidward Super Shooter!," SpongeBob mentions Sandy fighting against Master Udon. Specifically, the first exercise Sandy performed in her exercise program was traveling back to Karate Island and sparring with Master Udon.
• There is a video game based on this episode for the LeapFrog Didj and LeapFrog Leapster Explorer named Fists of Foam.
• On the November 22, 2006 airing, this episode was paired up with "Wishing You Well."

Dub facts

• In the Greek dub, Squidward says, "Είμαι εδώ! Είμαι ο βασιλιάς του Καράτε και είμαι εδώ!" which means "I'm here! I'm the king of Karate and I'm here!" but he should say, "Κλαρινέτου" (Clarinet) instead of "Καράτε" (Karate)

Cultural references

• The painting of a boat inside Gary's shell is a replica of the painting over the Simpson family's couch.
• This episode contains many references to the films Game of Death, Enter the Dragon, and Kill Bill. Sandy's yellow jumpsuit is a reference to the jumpsuit that both Bruce Lee and Uma Thurman wore in their respective films. Also, the concept of fighting an opponent on each floor is also present in both of these films. SpongeBob and Sandy being invited to an island is also a similar plot to the one in Enter the Dragon.
• Filthy Phil may be based on Bacterian from Dragon Ball.
• Sandy's and Udon's muscle growth is loosely based on Younger Toguro's 100% muscle growth in the manga and anime series Yu Yu Hakusho.
• Two hand signal parodies are seen in this episode:
  • When Sandy is getting out of the cage, she uses a series of hand signals, which refer to the popular anime/manga Naruto.
  • Her last hand signal is an Aura Hand, a reference to the Japanese TV series Hikari Sentai Maskman.

Errors

File:The Tickler white pants mistake in Karate Island.png

• In one scene, The Tickler has white pants instead of brown pants.
• When Sandy throws jelly-filled donuts at The Tickler, the first shot of the plate shows that there are barely any left, but the second shot shows the plate full of donuts again.
• When Sandy slaps Master Udon's face and kicks him in the face, she is shown with four toes, but she usually only has three.

Videos

File:Nickelodeon Split Screen Credits (May 7, 2006)

Promo

File:If SpongeBob Was An Action Cartoon! 🥋🏝 - SpongeBob- Reimagined

Names in other languages

Language	Name	Meaning
French	L'île karaté	Karate Island
German	Der König des Karate	The King of Karate
Hungarian	Karate-sziget	Karate Island
Italian	L'Isola del karate	Karate Island
Japanese	カラテ・アイランド Karate Airando	Karate Island
Russian	Остров карате Ostrov karate	Karate Island
Spanish (American)	Isla karate	Karate Island
Spanish (European)	La isla del kárate	The Island of Karate