- In "Pickles", after Bubble Bass makes fun of SpongeBob for forgetting the pickles, he always has his tongue tucked inside his mouth when he laughs. This is because he is hiding the pickles under his tongue to throw him off.
- In "Sandy's Rocket", before SpongeBob and Patrick enter Squidward's house (mistaking him for a disguised alien), Patrick has his net-launching gun pointed at himself, before SpongeBob turns it around. In the climax when they suspect each other are aliens, Patrick ends up shooting himself instead of SpongeBob.
- In "Nature Pants", Mr. Krabs, Sandy, and Squidward all surmised SpongeBob would realize living with the jellyfish is a harsh and unbearable lifestyle and he'd crawl back to civilization sooner or later.
- In "I Was a Teenage Gary", the doctorfish's description of Gary being a snail, as well as Snail Plasma being the only cure for him, gives a vague foreshadowing of the side effects of what happens to SpongeBob after getting accidentally injected.
- In "Valentine's Day", Patrick crushing a rock heart while thinking SpongeBob's inside is the first sign of how dangerous and berserk he can get when he wants something.
- In "The Paper", SpongeBob tells Squidward the eponymous paper can be fun and entertaining "in the right hands"; as it turns out, Squidward is not creative like SpongeBob, and thus cannot do all those fun things he came up with.
- The climax of "Hooky" has a few vague hints that the hook that hooked SpongeBob was a Batman Gambit set up by Mr. Krabs to scare him into never playing on the fishing hooks again:
- Squidward was not present in the Krusty Krab when SpongeBob ran there, hinting he's the one controlling it.
- Mr. Krabs sounds mildly confused when he sees SpongeBob hooked, compared to when he was shocked to see SpongeBob and Patrick playing on the hooks before, hinting SpongeBob is not really in danger.
- After seeing SpongeBob hooked, Mr. Krabs does not tell Pearl and her friends to look away while he takes off his pants and underwear, implying he set it up for him to be embarrassed.
- The hook SpongeBob encounters is in the middle of the road instead of amongst the field of other hooks, as if it wanted SpongeBob to ride it.
- The hook stays on SpongeBob the entire time he ran to the Krusty Krab, compared to the other hooks which immediately reeled in once SpongeBob and Patrick sat on them before floating back down. Also, the hook only tugs on SpongeBob whenever he denies Mr. Krabs.
- "I'm With Stupid":
- Patrick's parents are initially impressed that their son immediately recognizes them (their first line is, "Wow, son! You actually recognized us this time!"), and Patrick doesn't bother to defend himself. As it turns out, they're not his parents. Patrick doesn't realize this because, as hinted at, he frequently forgets what his real parents look like.
- Gary questions on why SpongeBob is going to act stupid for Patrick, and he replies, "What could go wrong?" Something will go wrong indeed — Patrick begins to believe SpongeBob really is stupid.
- In "Patty Hype", when SpongeBob reveals the Pretty Patties, he says, "It's painted meat!"; this likely foreshadows the consequences of the Pretty Patties and he likely used actual paint on them, and paint is dangerous to consume.
- In "Dumped", there are a few vague hints toward the reveal that Gary was only interested in the cookie in Patrick's pocket:
- Gary is shown stuck to Patrick's tummy several times, and he is often shown looking down at his pants (where the pocket with the cookie is).
- When Patrick tells SpongeBob to put Gary down and Let Him Choose, Gary appears to be not listening to Patrick.
- In "The Smoking Peanut":
- Clamu does not cry the instant SpongeBob throws the peanut at her; she frantically searches around her enclosure before bawling. This is a visual clue that the peanut is not what's making her cry.
- In the beginning, Mr. Krabs is shown swiping loads of souvenirs at the zoo on its free day; in the end, it's revealed Mr. Krabs is the real culprit for Clamu's breakdown.
- In Frankendoodle when SpongeBob and Patrick are playing Rock–Paper–Scissors with bubbles, SpongeBob wonders why Patrick always uses paper. Later on in the episode, SpongeBob discovers paper is how to defeat DoodleBob.
- In "The Secret Box":
- During SpongeBob's heist to get the secret box from Patrick, he's stuck in the sleeping Patrick's arms. Patrick proceeds to pull on SpongeBob's tongue while muttering about the secret box, foreshadowing the function of the string inside.
- After being flung into the wall, a picture of SpongeBob and Patrick falls on SpongeBob's head and splits into two halves, with SpongeBob on one side and Patrick on the other. This serves as a literal visualization toward the consequences of stealing the box following when Patrick wakes up, and the imminent end to the duo's friendship.
- When SpongeBob looks in the box and sees the string inside, the farthest end of the string seems to be fastened to the box. As Patrick reveals after SpongeBob leaves, pulling the string opens a secret compartment holding SpongeBob's embarrassing Christmas photo.
- In "Graveyard Shift", the first sign of the Hash-Slinging Slasher approaching is the lights flickering on and off; when that begins to happen (and with Squidward not even touching the light switch), a switch is heard clicking, meaning someone is messing with it rather than the electricity shorting out. The ending reveals it was Nosferatu doing so.
- "Rock-a-Bye Bivalve" has a few hints that Patrick doesn't really have a job:
- After Patrick eats breakfast, he announces he has a job, which SpongeBob wasn't aware of.
- Patrick doesn't mention anything about his job, specifically what his job is and what he does doing it. In addition, he comes home with no paychecks.
- When Patrick promises SpongeBob he will be home at 6:00, he walks down the road to the left; while the Krusty Krab is that way, Patrick's rock is also in that direction.
- When Patrick comes home late, he has a lampshade on his head, something not associated with office parties.
- In "Missing Identity" when SpongeBob gets dressed, eagle-eyed viewers will notice the front folds of his shirt are missing. Also when Patrick says hi to him, note that his back is turned when he passes Patrick.
- "Mid-Life Crustacean" gives a few hints toward SpongeBob and Patrick's night out being normal everyday stuff:
- The "secret cool-guy handshake" is just a normal handshake with common greetings.
- When Mr. Krabs asks SpongeBob and Patrick to meet him at 8:00 tonight, SpongeBob says they like to be fashionably late. They arrive at 8:01.
- In "Fear of a Krabby Patty" before Plankton (as Dr. Peter Lankton) uses hypnosis on SpongeBob, he refers to it as "my most powerful method of curing you." This is the method that ends up curing SpongeBob's fear of Krabby Patties, as it gives him a dream where he faces his fears.
- In the beginning of "The Original Fry Cook", SpongeBob tells Squidward, "I'm not in it for the money," when doing his job. The climax reveals Mr. Krabs not giving Jim a raise (because of his cheapness) is the reason why Jim left the Krusty Krab.
- The reveal that Mr. Krabs and Plankton were once best friends as revealed in "Friend or Foe", was hinted at a few times the past seasons:
- In Welcome To The Chum Bucket, Mr. Krabs reveals to SpongeBob that he's been playing cards with Plankton at the Chum Bucket for fifteen years.
- In "Krabs Vs. Plankton" when SpongeBob asks Plankton why he went into the Krusty Krab the same day he supposedly got injured, he acts like he was visiting his "old friend" Mr. Krabs.
- "Spy Buddies" has several implications that Mr. Krabs and Plankton pretended to be each other:
- In the beginning, Plankton's shadow is seen three times as large, sneaking into the Krusty Krab and unlocking Mr. Krabs' safe, then SpongeBob turns on the light to reveal it's Mr. Krabs, who nervously says he's checking the formula.
- When SpongeBob gets a call through Patrick's pants-o-phone, Mr. Krabs tells SpongeBob he's not paying them to goof off. SpongeBob reminds him he never pays him, to which Mr. Krabs corrects himself hastily.
- When SpongeBob and Patrick crash into the Chum Bucket, Plankton sounds mildly confused when Patrick accidentally reveals their secret mission. Also, Plankton offers them various generic fast food meals when he would normally offer chum meals.
- When Plankton summons Karen to come, she does not show up once throughout the rest of the Chum Bucket scene, a dead ringer that this is not really Plankton.
- In "Blackened Sponge", when SpongeBob tells Sandy that he got his black eye from Jack M. Crazyfish, she reacts in shock to that name, hinting that he's a real person and not a figment of SpongeBob's imagination, which is confirmed when he shows up at the Krusty Krab later on.
- In "Patty Caper", there are several instances that foreshadow Mr. Krabs is the one who stole the secret ingredient:
- During SpongeBob's meeting with Mr. Krabs in his office, he shows the bottle to the secret ingredient for the formula. As it turns out near the end, Mr. Krabs stole his own secret ingredient to avoid paying.
- After SpongeBob sees the hole in the briefcase for the secret ingredient, he utters, "A thief must have cut a hole, and swiped the secret ingredient! But who?" Mr. Krabs immediately shows up right after saying this.
- When Mr. Krabs yells at SpongeBob to get back to work following the discovery of the ingredient's disappearance, he leaves without asking SpongeBob for the secret ingredient nor any clarification if he got it from the truck.
- Note that Mr. Krabs looked briefly shocked from hearing SpongeBob's description of the thief, just before framing him.
- In "Nautical Novice", SpongeBob mentions the Museum of Boating gets taken out to port once a year for inspection. The ending reveals the boat was moving because it was being pulled by a fish in a tugboat.
- In "Barnacle Face", Pearl has been breaking out in barnacles, so she tries to scrub her barnacles with her soap, with no avail. But when SpongeBob took a look at the soap, he comments how the soap "smells so wonderful," in addition to recognizing it as "familiar" and "delicious." Which would later reveal, that the soap Pearl uses is made out of Krabby Patties!
- In "Plankton's Regular", there are a few hints that Nat was paid by Karen to eat Plankton's chum to stop his complaining:
- The second time Nat eats chum, he looks obviously disgusted before proclaiming his love for it.
- Before Nat's second visit to the Chum Bucket, he does not arrive until eight hours later, at closing time.
- When SpongeBob's disguise as Karen fails and he asks Nat if chum is all he's going to eat, Nat stammers, "Yeah! Th-that's right!" when he confirms his thought.
- Note how Nat reacts to Mr. Krabs' brand of chum hinting he doesn't really like Plankton's.Nat: It's the second foulest thing I had ever tasted!
- "One Coarse Meal" has a few hints toward the reveal the "Pearl" tormenting Plankton is Mr. Krabs in disguise:
- When Pearl first appears, she shows no interest in Plankton. She acts more bossy than malicious.
- Mr. Krabs asks Pearl if he could borrow one of her dresses, to hers and SpongeBob's confusion.
- At one point, "Pearl" emits a laugh that sounds very much like Mr. Krabs' voice.
- In "Demolition Doofus" when Mrs. Puff violently strangles SpongeBob for cracking a joke about her deflated condition, he very briefly laughs and says, "That tickles!". This gives the viewers a clue toward his Nigh-Invulnerability as an invertebrate and a bad driver once he enters the derby.
- In "Are You Happy Now?" after Squidward falls off a mountain, Squidward tells SpongeBob he will not be involved in his happiest memory. SpongeBob actually does become part of a forged happiest memory when Squidward manically destroys all the paper mache SpongeBobs at the Krusty Krab.
- "Bulletin Board":
- The anonymous "P-Star 7" has the same exact initials and name pattern as "Patrick Star"; the "7" also refers to Patrick's name being seven letters long.
- When Patrick comments that the Krabby Patties taste like baseball gloves, SpongeBob is surprised, but then Patrick says he didn't write it yet.
- In "SpongeBob's Bad Habit", SpongeBob starts his habit of Rapid-Fire Nail Biting immediately after Squidward tells him about his life, foreshadowing that he subconsciously internalized the habit from Squidward.
- In "The Ballad of Filthy Muck", whenever Filthy Muck is around SpongeBob, he hardly says any words outside of giggling and mumbling, cluing in that Filthy Muck is a separate being from Patrick.
- There are various hints and clues throughout "Allergy Attack!" toward the reveal that it's really Squidward's cologne that SpongeBob was allergic to.
- SpongeBob breaks out in hives right after Squidward has left the ordering window.
- Gary does not contract any of SpongeBob's allergy symptoms during the scenes at the pineapple.
- Every time SpongeBob returns to work after his allergies clear, he gets sick again after he passes Squidward.
- Squidward is the only one in the Krusty Krab who did not break out.
- "Wiener Takes All" has a few hints of a darker twist:
- In the manager’s office, there is an employee of the month board which starts off as normal fish but then becomes only robot workers.
- Weenie J. Wiener is a rather strange character from the get-go, from his appearance perfectly resembling a hot dog, his motions looking rather mechanical, his perpetually happy expression, and the fact he doesn't look or act like a normal fish are all hints that there's something mysterious about his character that is being hidden.
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Foreshadowing/SpongeBobSquarePants
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