The Bikini Bottom Horror

Fan Comic
Title:	The Bikini Bottom Horror
Artist:	stillinthesimulation
Date(s):	September 2019 -
First Published:
Medium:	Digital
Genre/Style:
Fandom:	Spongebob
External Links:	Original Reddit post, Archived version personal website reddit repost w/ commentary
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

The Bikini Bottom Horror is a Spongebob fancomic by stillinthesimulation.

Story info

When I started this comic I had no intention of carrying a storyline out for over 70 pages. I drew this page on a piece of scrap paper while I was on a lunch break at work. The intention of this page was mostly shock value. There was a popular subreddit at the time called r/imsorryjohn that was based on eldritch depictions of Garfield tormenting John in disturbing artworks of cosmic horror. I wanted to do the same thing but with SpongeBob characters. I decided the horror wouldn’t have to be that fantastical but rather based on the far more chilling realities of these strange organisms.

I live on Vancouver island and have always had a deep appreciation for our marine ecosystems. Snorkelling through our cold but beautiful kelp forests, is a fantastic way to get a close up appreciation for these bizarre animals. It’s not uncommon to see sea stars attached to mollusks and pushing a jelly-like object through their shells. This is their stomach and while it looks less proboscis-like than my depiction here, it does enter the prey to digest it externally. This disturbing fact kickstarted the series that would go on to become The Bikini Bottom Horror.

I, like many of you, grew up watching SpongeBob SquarePants and developed a love for the zany stories, the colourful characters, and the clear love for the wonders of the ocean that creator, Stephen Hillenburg translated from his history as a science educator to his stories. While my comic is in many ways a dark and twisted aberration of his vision I tried to keep a that the characters needed to remain relatively true to themselves, and if they deviated too much, it needed to be justified by dramatic events unfolding. But again, at this point, I wasn’t expecting anything more than this one page.

I posted this page to the subreddit and it took off way more than I had expected. It made it to the front page of Reddit with over 60,000 upvotes by the end of the day. I was blown away by the positive response as well as the many comments asking for more.

Fandom

there was this one horror (and kaiju-superhero mix) spongebob comic where patrick eats his friends

it was honestly great
it gave all the characters powers thematic to their real life inspirations
it wasn't remotely realistic but it was pretty fun

allseeinggoggles 

Waiting for these conic pages felt like I was a kid again. Like waiting for a new episode for series like pokemon, bakugon, and Star Wars: the clone wars. It's also awesome how you could make each page stand on its own, making it worth the wait for the next plot point. Thanks for making them!

jeshtheafroman 

This entire series was a master class in horror: taking something familiar, adding some facts that we might not want to consider in our everyday lives, and showing how those facts can twist our understanding of the safe and familiar. This is a recipe for true horror.

That these are popular kids characters helps with the hook and shock value, but it's Eldritch horror and I love it. I know nothing about SpongeBob outside of memes, but I still got that sick little feeling in my gut I get when the horror movie manages to get under my skin, and I consider myself to have a high tolerance for this kinda stuff. Bravo.

Morc35 

Links

• r/TheBikiniBottomHorror, ^{Archived version} -- subreddit for reposting the comic with an active fan discussion community