The Slumber Party:
After Pearl forces her dad out of the house to enjoy a slumber party, Mr. Krabs orders SpongeBob to spy on her.
This is one of the season's highpoints for sure. Immediately you start chuckling at the sight of Mr. Krabs falling asleep in front of the TV looking like a worn-out middleage bachelor, and it only gets better once he tries to control Pearl's sleepover. His idea of snacks are a bunch of crackers with a glass of water, and additional ketchup packages as condiments. Then he puts up a giant sign outside listed with a ton of authoritarian rules. Some of these rules are amusingly ridiculous, such as "No rhubarb and strawberry pies" and "No exchanging of underwear garments". Pearl understandably gets infuriated by this and kicks him out.
Mr. Krabs goes over to SpongeBob's house to ask for help. SpongeBob mistakenly thinks he's come over for a sleepover and literally shoots up into the air like a rocket with joy. The animation in that sequence is enjoyably energetic.
The cheesy horror movie SpongeBob and Krabs watch on TV with teenagers turning into zombies is appropriately cheesy and silly. But the old crab is more horrified by the destruction of property than the actual zombies, which leads him destroy SpongeBob's house as demonstration of how it could happen to him too. The lack of self-awareness on his part and SpongeBob somehow not minding that his home got turned into a total wreck makes this the most hilarious part of the entire episode.
We then cut what we assums is SpongeBob in disguise calling herself Girly Teengirl, claiming to come from Farawayville. Pearl and her friends chase away her away, which leaves her running off in tears. Krabs and Sponge then arrive, wondering who that was. Tom Kenny's delivery on SpongeBob's response "I don't know, but she is uuuugly" gave me a big laugh.
The actual plan is for him to pose as a pizza delivery salesman, which leads to Pearl and the gals putting him down in the box as a pizza. He gets sent back to Mr. Krabs. Krabs not realizing the "pizza" is his employee, but then casually continuing to eat him anyway is some classic subtle humor.
SpongeBob returns to the party once again, this time as a piano salesman. This plan fails even quicker, with the girls dropping a piano at the end. Finally, he comes there as himself, begging to be let in and get to prove how fun he really is. The fact that Pearl has to tell her friends not to pour hot oil on him is darkly comic. He gets 10 seconds to prove his worth, but they are still satisfied and throw him down into the root beer cellar. Poor guy.
But (un)fortunately, he gets the idea to drink as much root beer as he possibly can, thinking it will be the ultimate chance to show he knows how to party. He drinks a bit too much however and turns into a terrifying blubbering creature which the Pearl and the others think is a zombie. And just like in the horror movie, the house also gets destroyed.
Fed up with her dad after his repeated attempts to control the slumber party, she steals his money to host a private beach party as punishment. SpongeBob trying to cheer Krabs up by offering him a root beer is amusingly endearing.
Grooming Gary:
Hellbent on making Gary win The Bikini Bottom Pet Show, he tries to prop him up as much as he can, which the snail is less than happy about.
This is not the most memorable ever, but still amusing enough for its runtime. The pretentious owner and SpongeBob's naivety over how Gary doesn't want to be part of the competition makes for some solid gags. I think they strike a decent balance making SpongeBob oblivious, but not to the point where he is unbearable. He is clearly not hurting Gary on purpose, and his euphoria over how happy of a day it will be if he and Gary win makes his overeagerness understandable.
Plus what he does is nothing compared to the other owners. One of them putting on very ill-fitting sunglasses over his snail's eyes looks incredibly painful. The over-the-top cruelty displayed is funny, albeit in a shocking way.
SpongeBob and Patrick go to the contest together, but only one of them gets to come in. Patrick's meltdown over being kept behind the red rope is the starfish at his wacky best.
After getting his protests ignored for too long, Gary steps up to the podium and starts ranting about the injustice done to him and the others by their owners. I was worried he was going to start talking, but thankfully it's all in snail language. This results in an entertaining over-the-top riot where every snail retaliates and starts attacking their owners. One of them getting too small sunglasses put on the same way he did it to his snail. SpongeBob realizes his mistake and apologizes to Gary. After the winner is announced he thinks that Gary is the one who won. But instead it was actually Patrick, who got in by dressing as a snail. He barks like a dog since apparently he forgot how they sound. I'm not that big on this ending gag. It felt stupid more than anything else.
Overall, Grooming Gary is a somewhat underrated segment which is not quite as hard to watch as it could've been. It never goes too far in showing Gary's agony, and SpongeBob is characterized just fine. It lacked a bit in humor however, and the story doesn't progress at the quickest pace. The Slumber Party is the clear standout, but this one is all right too.
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