Flat / Squished Squidward Face

About

Flat Squidward Face or Squished Squidward Face is an image from SpongeBob SquarePants of a wax replica of Squidward's squished face after being sat on by Patrick, leaving the imprint of Patrick's posterior on the face. The image comes from season one episode 23, "Squidward the Unfriendly Ghost." It first became the subject of memes as early as 2013, becoming increasingly popular over the following years.

Origin

On September 25th, 1999, season one episode 23 of SpongeBob SquarePants aired on television.^[1] In the episode, SpongeBob and Patrick believe they've killed Squidward after knocking a wax sculpture of him over. Patrick attempts to revive him by giving him CPR, but instead inflates himself like a balloon and floats up into the air, then comes down on the wax Squidward's face, flattening it and leaving an impression of his posterior (shown below).

On August 13th, 2013, u/camille00023 posted the image of Squidward's squished face to /r/spongebob,^[2] writing, "Just one of those days," garnering over 200 upvotes in 11 years. On March 20th, 2014, an image macro of the face captioned "booty had me like" was posted to /r/funny,^[3] garnering over 2,100 upvotes in 10 years (shown below). These are the earliest known memes to use the image.

Spread

On April 22nd, 2014, X^[4] user @FunnyPicsDepot posted the image, writing, "When Kanye 69s w/ kim. 😵" garnering over 3,500 likes in 10 years (shown below). It was reposted to /r/funny^[5] the next day, garnering over 1,700 upvotes in the same span of time. It was posted to /r/funny^[6] again that November, garnering over 14,000 upvotes in the same span of time.

On February 15th, 2017, Buzzfeed^[7] shared a meme using the image in an article. On March 29th, 9GAG^[8] user ladydewberry posted a version of the meme about 2B crushing Squidward's face, garnering over 16,000 upvotes in seven years (shown below, left). On January 20th, 2020, a Netflix are you still watching version of the meme was posted to /r/BikiniBottomTwitter^[9] that gained over 4,100 upvotes in four years (shown below, right).

On April 17th, 2021, u/trincinema posted a rug based on the image to /r/BikiniBottomTwitter,^[10] garnering over 1,700 upvotes in three years. On September 5th, X^[11] user @friedurethra posted an image of an ashtray shaped like the image, garnering over 260,000 likes in three years (shown below).

On November 1st, 2022, X^[12] user @boiledlemon posted a series of Cyberpunk Edgerunner fan art featuring a rendition of the image that gained over 13,000 likes in two years (shown below).

On February 9th, 2024, X^[13] user @Mattlly posted the image, writing, "Respond with a character who can do this to you," garnering over 2,100 likes in four days. On February 12th, X^[14] user @ quote-reposted the image, writing, "Is this even a real spongebob scene what is the context why is squidward freaky," garnering over 42,000 likes in a day.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References