The Ugly Barnacle

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The Ugly Barnacle is a novel written by Patrick Star.

Plot summary

Template:Spoiler warning

The novel depicts a story about a barnacle who was so ugly that everybody around them passed away.

Trivia

Tropes

This short story provides examples of:

  • ThirteenIsUnlucky: The actual story, discounting the "The End" tag, is exactly thirteen words long, and you can't get much unluckier than having everyone die.
  • AccidentalMurder: Possibly; we don't know if the barnacle's killing of everyone was intentional or not.
  • AcclaimedFlop: Easily one of the most memorable moments from WesternAnimation/SpongeBobSquarePants, yet Patrick never received any money for his work. This was most likely due to negative reception early on by Spongebob.
  • ActionSurvivor: Someone must've survived the Ugly Barnacle for this story to be able to circulate.
  • AdaptationSpeciesChange: The German version is called "Der hässliche Blaubarsch" (The Ugly Blue Perch).
  • AffectionateParody: Subverted. This story isn't even remotely affectionate towards Literature/TheUglyDuckling.
  • AlasPoorScrappy: Yes, the barnacle is really ugly, but you have to feel sorry for him when you get to his implied death.
  • TheAloner: If the barnacle didn't die in the end, he probably became one of these.
  • AllStarCast: The story was narrated by none other than WesternAnimation/SpongebobSquarepants Patrick Star. No Pun intended, since he is the only narrator.
  • AlternativeCharacterInterpretation:
    • Is the barnacle a pitiful TheWoobie woobie, or pure evil?
    • Does "Everyone" refer to everybody in the immediate vicinity, everyone in town, everyone in the world, every single living thing that has ever existed, ArsonMurderAndJaywalking or a AmbiguousSyntax single person named Everyone? We never get the answer.
      • According to the Spanish translation, "Everyone" is not the name of a single person. note While verbs in English often share conjugations (the way verbs change depending on who does the action, like "We are") in all tenses, in Spanish, this is far less common, and only happens to the first person singular and the third person plural (which doesn't even happen in the past pretrerit form, so that should eliminate further confusion). The translation used is "todos se murieron," which is the third-person plural conjugation. So "todos" (everyone) is everyone in the world./note
      • Does "everyone" include non-sentient creatures, such as protozoa?
  • AmbiguousEnding: We don't know exactly what happens to anyone in the story: the barnacle's victim(s) could have easily just come back to life. Plus, the story doesn't tell us anything about what happens to the barnacle at the end, nor exactly how "everyone" died.
  • AmbiguousSituation: A number of tantalizing details are left out. We aren't told, for instance, how or why everyone dies, nor whether or not that includes the barnacle itself. Similarly, the barnacle's relationships with the rest of the cast are quite vague.
  • AndManGrewProud: One interpretation of the barnacle, of how it became ugly enough to kill everyone and of how, and why, we still tell its harrowing tale.
  • AngstWhatAngst: The barnacle doesn't dwell very long on his ugliness, or the horror and guilt from killing everyone, assuming he wasn't a villain or among the casualties. Then again, neither does Patrick Star.
  • AnimalisticAbomination: The titular barnacle. He's apparently so ugly that he can kill everyone just by being ugly!
  • AntagonistTitle: If you interpret the Barnacle as a villain or a VillainProtagonist..
  • AntiHero: WildMassGuessing Possibly. If the barnacle was meant to be the good guy, he qualifies, since ugliness isn't usually seen as a hero's trait, much less lethal ugliness.
  • AntiVillain: The Barnacle is possibly a TragicVillain, who kills everyone as a response to harassment for his ugliness.
  • AnyoneCanDie: And everyone does in the end.
  • ApatheticCitizens: Nobody did anything to prevent getting killed en masse by the barnacle's ugliness.
  • ApocalypseHow: Either Species Extinction or Total Extinction, depending on whether "everyone" includes non-sentient life or not.
  • ApocalypseWow: See above.
  • ArtifactOfDoom: Another interpretation of the barnacle.
  • ArtisticLicenseBiology: The barnacle is referred to as male, yet most actual barnacles are hermaphrodites.
  • AssholeVictim: Either everyone else or the barnacle can be this, depending on whom you interpret as the villain.
  • AssPull: We're given no foreshadowing at all that everyone could die because of the Barnacle's ugliness.
  • AudienceAlienatingEnding: Patrick told SpongeBob the story with the intention of cheering him up, due to SpongeBob's own ugliness. This probably explains why SpongeBob was not amused by the TwistEnding.
  • AuthorAppeal: Patrick lives underwater - that's probably why he chose a barnacle as the ugly character.
  • SugarWiki/AwesomeMusic:
  • TheBadGuyWins: The ending could be this (since everyone, which may exclude the barnacle, dies), assuming the barnacle is evil.
  • BadPowersBadPeople: Possibly. One possible way the barnacle could have killed everyone is by using some sort of evil superpower that may be connected to his ugliness.
  • BeautyEqualsGoodness: And conversely, ugliness equals evil. Possibly InvertedTrope inverted if one considers the Barnacle to be the hero of the story and everyone else to be irredeemable bullies, or that there was NoAntagonist and the Barnacle killing everyone MyGodWhatHaveIDone was an accident. Alternately, it could be an ExaggeratedTrope exaggeration by showing the aforementioned counterpart to the trope.
  • BeigeProse: The barnacle's plight is narrated in the most blunt manner possible.
  • BeyondTheImpossible: It shouldn't be possible for someone to be so ugly that everyone dies, yet that's exactly what happens.
  • BigBad: The barnacle's ugliness. Possibly, the Barnacle himself.
  • BittersweetEnding: Another interpretation of the ending. Everyone died but at least they don't live in a world with an ugly barnacle.
  • BlackComedy: To some, the story is a hilariously nihilistic take on children's stories.
  • BlueAndOrangeMorality: The titular barnacle kills everyone but its goals, personality and backstory are so unclear that it can be determined as being a hero, villain or neither.
  • BookEnds: The first three and last three lines are identical.
  • [[Bowdlerise]]: In the Italian translation, everyone runs away.
  • BreakthroughHit: This one helped Patrick Star become a Household Name.
  • BrokenBase: It is either a haunting reminder of our own mortality, a needlessly dark children's story, or a great example of BlackComedy.
  • BrownNote: The most common interpretation of how everyone dies is that it was some horrific side effect of seeing the barnacle.
  • BrownNoteBeing: The mere existence of it and its own ugliness could be the reason why everyone died.
  • ButtMonkey: Presumably, if the Ugly Barnacle's ugliness killing everyone is to be seen as a comedic misfortune.
  • CerebusSyndrome: The beginning of the story seems upbeat and implies the Barnacle will overcome his ugliness but then everyone dies.
  • CharacterTitle: The titular Ugly Barnacle.
  • ChekhovsGun: Early in the story, it is mentioned that the barnacle is ugly. The barnacle's ugliness kills everyone later on.
  • CosmicHorrorStory: If mere barnacles are enough to make everyone die, imagine NightmareFuel what other things in the ocean are able to do... Not a lot, since they're all dead.
  • CrapsackWorld: In the Barnacleverse, the existence of a single unattractive crustacean is enough to trigger the Apocalypse.
  • CriticalDissonance: Many fans of the story were rather mad when SpongeBob claimed that the story was un-helpful to him.
  • CrossesTheLineTwice: An ugly barnacle? Not funny. A barnacle so ugly it causes everyone to die? Hysterical!
  • CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass: Sure, the Ugly Barnacle may be unattractive but he ends up killing everyone.
  • CruelTwistEnding: Without giving too much away, the ending is pretty merciless.
  • CurbStompBattle: Nobody had any chance of stopping the Barnacle from killing everyone.
  • DarkerAndEdgier: The second part of the story is much darker than the first part.
  • DarkParody: It's a parody of Literature/TheUglyDuckling, in which everyone dies.
  • Deconstruction: Of the traditional fairy tale where the hero can overcome his or her challenges through believing in him or herself. Instead, everyone died.
  • DiabolusExMachina: The first part of the story implies that the barnacle will overcome its ugliness by the end. Unfortunately, the ugliness proves to be so lethal that it kills everyone.
  • ADogNamedDog: The Ugly Barnacle's just called, well, "the ugly barnacle".
  • DoingItForTheArt: Patrick had no monetary motivation for telling this story. He did it purely to inspire his best friend. EpicFail It didn't help at all.
  • Doorstopper: Possibly one of the harshest inversions of this trope in the history of fiction.
  • DownerBeginning: "Once there was an ugly barnacle..."
  • DownerEnding: "He was so ugly that everyone died. The end."
  • DrivenToSuicide: One of the EpilepticTrees many interpretations of how everyone died is that they killed themselves because they didn't want to see an ugly barnacle.
  • DroppedABridgeOnHim: On pretty much everyone at the end, succumbing to the Barnacle's mere ugliness. And, depending on your definition of "everyone", this may include the barnacle itself.
  • EldritchAbomination: How else to describe a being that can apparently kill everyone by its mere appearance and/or presence?
  • TheEnd: The words that conclude the story.
  • TheEndingChangesEverything: Admit it, you thought it was going to involve the barnacle overcoming its ugliness, didn't you?
  • TheEndOfTheWorldAsWeKnowIt: Seeing as how everyone was killed by the barnacle's ugliness, this may very well be the case for the rest of the world as a whole.
  • EnemyToAllLivingThings: The barnacle is very much so, because of his ugliness.
  • EsotericHappyEnding: Implied by Patrick's cheery expression at the end is that he's supposed to think it's a happy story. This is despite everyone dying in the story.
  • EveryoneCallsHimBarkeep: The barnacle isn't given a name NamelessNarrative within the work, being given an adjective and ADogNamedDog species name.
  • EveryoneIsJesusInPurgatory:
    • Some contend that the barnacle's ugliness represents sin, and that it kills everyone shows how sin kills everybody.
    • Another interpretation holds that the Barnacle is TheAntichrist, with his ugliness being a metaphor for the wickedness he will bring to the world. "Everyone died," then, is a brutally quick description of the End Times.
  • ExactlyWhatItSaysOnTheTin: It's a story about a (maybe the) barnacle that is ugly.
  • EverybodyDiesEnding: The ugly barnacle was so ugly that everyone died.
  • EverybodysDeadDave: Everyone dies at the second sentence of the story.
  • EyelessFace: RealLife Barnacles do not have eyes, or even any kind of identifiable facial features, so the reader can assume that the same applies to The Ugly Barnacle, and may be part of what makes it ugly enough to kill everyone.
  • FanonDiscontinuity: There is said to be a group of fans of the story that refuse to acknowledge that everyone died from the barnacle's ugliness, preferring that nothing bad happened due to the barnacle's ugliness.
  • FingerPokeOfDoom: The Barnacle's mere appearance is enough to kill everyone.
  • FlatCharacter: Though he's still the most developed character in the story, the Ugly Barnacle has no other known characteristics besides being ugly. We don't learn his real name or if it even had a name.
  • FridgeBrilliance:
  • FridgeHorror: There is a story called "The Drain" where everyone involved dies also revealed to be AllJustADream. It also includes other characteristics similar to The Ugly Barnacle, such as brevity, disproportionately high stakes, and it being told by SpongeBob and Patrick. What if this similar story is merely a corrupted version of The Ugly Barnacle, warped to create AnAesop? What if this Drain is the only barrier between the living world and the world of the ugly barnacle?
  • FridgeLogic: If the Ugly Barnacle was so ugly, everyone died, does that mean its own ugliness caused itself to die?
  • SugarWiki/FunnyMoments:
    • The analysis, reviews, everything that is longer than the work itself.
    • The work also has that black humour to it... which did not help at all!
    • This very sentence is longer than the whole of the story, and that did help at all.
    • There was a time when The Ugly Barnacle was listed on the TheEpic epic page. It had to be removed, but still.
    • Everyone died! ComicallyMissingThePoint Ha, that's funny! Right? DudeNotFunny Right?noteIt might actually be, depending on your taste of BlackComedy./note
    • The story itself. One of the funniest jokes in SpongeBob to date. It was really cool to see such a one-off joke gain such a following.
    • In the Spanish version of the story, the way Patrick says Fin (The End) and El Percebe Feo (The Ugly Barnacle) is really funny.
  • FurryConfusion: The barnacle in the story is presumably anthropomorphic, yet ordinary barnacles exist in the universe this story is set in.
  • GainaxEnding: The story starts off so happy, and then everyone dies.
  • GambitRoulette: Assuming that the barnacle's actions were deliberate, there was really no way to guarantee that it would be potent enough to kill everyone.
  • GenericDoomsdayVillain: The barnacle himself counts if he is indeed a villain, on account that his end result of killing everyone pretty much spells an ApocalypseHow scenario for the world.
  • GeniusBonus: A barnacle is a type of marine-dwelling arthropod that actually exists in real life. Not only are they considered a nuisance by sailors, but they are, in fact, not pleasant to look at.
  • GenreShift: The viewer was promised an uplifting tale of someone overcoming their appearance issues. They get it...for one sentence.
  • Gonk:
  • GoMadFromTheRevelation: Possibly the fate of everyone before dying, since the barnacle was ugly enough to kill people by its mere ugliness.
  • GreyAndGrayMorality: We're never told whether the Barnacle was good or evil, nor are we told the allegiance of Everybody. This means that depending on how you look at it, it could be a great victory, a great tragedy, or neither that Everybody died.
  • TheGrotesque: The Ugly Barnacle.
  • GutPunch: The second line completely changes the tone of the story.
  • HappilyEverAfter: Subverted Trope. Patrick wrote the story to cheer SpongeBob up, so it seems as though it will have a happy ending, but everyone dies instead.
  • SugarWiki/HeartwarmingMoments:
  • TheHeroDies: Assuming he was a hero. Patrick did say that everyone died, so shouldn't that include the barnacle itself? It's not specified who the hero is, but assuming one existed, we can safely assume he/she died.
  • HeroicBSOD: SpongeBob is in a deep depression over believing that he's ugly.
  • HeroKiller: Assuming he's not meant to be TheHero, the barnacle is this.
  • HoistByHisOwnPetard: Assuming "everyone" includes the barnacle, his ugliness was enough to do himself in.
  • HopeBringer: Painfully subverted for The Ugly Barnacle.
  • HopeSpot:
    • At first, it seems the barnacle will be able to overcome its ugliness. Then he turns out to be so ugly, that he kills everyone, possibly crushing the barnacle's hope.
    • When SpongeBob first heard the opening lines, he was expecting a story that would cheer him up. Sadly, the story went in the DownerEnding opposite direction.
  • HoYay: It may not look like it, given the nature of the story, but you can definitely see something going on with the barnacle and the rest of the world. It is highly unlikely that the entire world's population banished because of its ugliness because, you know, you can't affect something with your appearance if you can't see it. Therefore, and somehow, everyone lived with the barnacle surrounding him, making it one of the biggest examples of subtext in a story, since both characters have lived at each other's side and have died while looking at their physical appearance and because of it. This also makes it a rather crude example of NoYay, though.
  • InformedDeformity: We're told that the protagonist is ugly, and we're told of the ramifications of his ugliness, but it is never made clear exactly what features he has that make him so ugly. It's possible that if we were told, we would die.
  • InvincibleHero: It's difficult to do anything with a "hero" who can and did go up against anyone and kill them.
  • InvincibleVillain: If the barnacle was in fact a VillainProtagonist, then any hero would not be able to stand against it, for he would just kill them along with everybody else.
  • IronWoobie: Assuming that he had to go through all the trauma.
  • ItSeemedLikeAGoodIdeaAtTheTime: The most likely reason Patrick told SpongeBob the story to comfort him over his ugliness, since he obviously didn't anticipate his friend being upset about the ugly protagonist killing everyone with his ugliness.
  • ItsShortSoItSucks: If the amount of attention it has on TV Tropes is anything to go by, this is a strong inversion.
  • ItWasHisSled: Good luck finding someone who knows about the "Something Smells" episode without knowing the story first.
  • JerkassWoobie: One interpretation of the titular barnacle states that he killed everyone as a result of harassment.
  • TheJuggernaut: Nobody was capable of stopping the barnacle, thus, everyone died.
  • KeepCirculatingTheTapes: Patrick has never told the story again after SpongeBob's negative reception. The one time he said it in "Something Smells" is the only evidence left of Patrick telling the story.
  • KilledOffForReal: Everyone at the end dies, and there is no mention of them coming back.
  • KillerRabbit: The barnacle. Were you really expecting it to kill everyone in the story's second sentence?
  • TheLawOfConservationOfDetail: Absolutely no non-essential details are given about the cast.
  • MemeticBadass: He could kill everyone just by being ugly. His name is probably only "The Ugly Barnacle" because no mortal can ever know his true name and survive.
  • MikeNelsonDestroyerOfWorlds: There's never any evidence that the barnacle intends to kill everyone.
  • AMillionIsAStatistic: Everyone dies.
  • MindScrew: After the ending, we're left with a great big pile of unanswered questions. Just how did the Barnacle's ugliness kill everyone? Did the Barnacle himself die? Literally nothing is ever explained.
  • Minimalism: Only thirteen words are in this story.
  • SugarWiki/MomentOfAwesome:
    • It's heavily implied that just looking at the barnacle has the power to instantly kill everyone. Admit it. That's a badass power.
    • Patrick's smile at the end has to count as one. Not only that, but just the mere fact that Patrick can recount the tale of an Apocalypse with a cheery voice and smile!
    • THE STORY'S ENTIRE EXISTENCE.
    • The fact that a one off joke on Spongebob warranted all these Website/TVTropes pages is pretty epic.
    • If the barnacle was so ugly that everyone died, then who told the story? Somebody almost as badass as a barnacle capable of killing (almost) everyone, that's who!
      • Guess who is this guy who told the story, who knew it because he was there? It's {{Spoilertext| [[CrouchingMoronHiddenBadass Patrick Star}}]].
  • MoodWhiplash: At first, it sounds like a charming fairy tale. At first.
  • MoralEventHorizon: One interpretation of the death of everyone is that the barnacle deliberately killed them.
  • MorePopularSpinoff: This story's page on Website/ThisVeryWiki has been given more attention than the page for the episode it was in.
  • NauseaFuel: The Barnacle, probably. His very appearance is said to be deadly.
  • NiceJobBreakingItHero: Assuming he's meant to be TheHero, the barnacle breaks it and kills everyone.
  • NighInvulnerability:
    • Considering that you can't even go near the barnacle without dying...
    • Inverted: Everyone (single person named Everyone "or" just every single person) is pretty weak if he/she/they can get killed by a creature's ugliness.
  • NightmareFetishist: Patrick apparently enjoys how the story has the barnacle kill everyone.
  • NightmareFuel: Yes, you too could be so disgustingly ugly that your loved ones all die. Not just your loved ones - everyone.
  • NightmareFuelStationAttendant: Patrick can be a bit unnerving, what with how cheerfully oblivious he seems to be toward the story's dark ending.
  • NoDeadBodyPoops: There is no mention of anyone soiling themselves when everyone dies.
  • NoDialogueEpisode: At no point in the story does a character speak.
  • NoHuggingNoKissing: The story features no romance at all, and instead focuses on the tragedy of everyone dying.
  • NominalImportance: The story's protagonist, the ugly barnacle, is the only character to get a name.
  • NoNameGiven: The main character is simply known as "the barnacle" or "the ugly barnacle".
  • NonstandardCharacterDesign: Most people in the universe of The Ugly Barnacle are so nondescript that they are glazed over in one word ("everyone"). The titular barnacle, by contrast, is described as being {{Spoilertext|[[EldritchAbomination so ugly}} that EverybodyDiesEnding everyone died.]]
  • ObliviouslyEvil: How some people view the barnacle.
  • OffstageVillainy: Assuming that the barnacle is evil.
  • OhCrap: Presumably the thoughts of everyone before they died.
  • OmnicidalManiac: One interpretation of the barnacle itself.
  • OneSceneWonder: In the SpongeBob episode the story was told in.
  • ParanoiaFuel: Somewhere, there might be a barnacle, or even another creature, that is so ugly that it will somehow end all life on Earth.
  • PersonOfMassDestruction: The Barnacle caused the death of everyone, and the minimalist structure implies the effort was also minimalist.
  • ProtagonistTitle: The titular barnacle is also our only character, therefore a protagonist by default.
  • TheScapegoat: The story does not actually say that the barnacle, or its ugliness, was responsible for everyone dying, so this is another interpretation.
  • TheScrappy: The barnacle in-universe. He's so ugly that everybody died presumably because they looked at him.
  • SelfmadeOrphan: The barnacle's parents were not sheltered from the slaughter.
  • SesquipedalianLoquaciousness: ["A Marine Crustacean of the Subclass Cirripedia Which, To Its Own Misfortune, Was Quite Repugnant"], the adaptation for Verbose audiences.
  • ShootTheShaggyDog: "Once, there was an ugly barnacle. He was so ugly that everyone died. The end."
  • ShortStory: The story is only 15 words long, and has exactly 59 letters.
  • SlasherSmile: Patrick gives a creepy grin after he finishes telling the story.
  • SlidingScaleOfBeauty: The Ugly Barnacle is Lovecraftian
  • SlidingScaleOfIdealismVsCynicism: This is possibly the most cynical story ever written for children. Despite the initial hope of the Barnacle succeeding, his sheer ugliness results in the extinction of all life.
  • SoundtrackDissonance: The soundtrack would suggest this to be a much more upbeat story than it is.
  • Spinoff: WebVideo/TheVerboseBarnacle is a longer, classier version of the original story that manages to stick to the source material very well.
  • SpiritualSuccessor: To the saga of Kevin the Hamster.
  • StarfishAliens: Perhaps the reason why the barnacle was so ugly was that it was from a different planet? Everyone can be quick to assume that anything not like them is ugly.
  • SubvertedKidsShow: In the bluntest way possible -- it seems like a fairy tale, but kills off all the characters.
  • SuddenDownerEnding: For at least half the story, the mood is somewhat upbeat and promising in that the barnacle can find a way to overcome or accept its ugliness. And then everyone, including possibly the barnacle itself, dies, as it turns out that the barnacle was just that ugly.
  • SuperWeight:
    • Type 0: Everyone.
    • Type 5: The Ugly Barnacle, as it managed to kill everyone.
  • SurpriseCreepy: You probably thought this was a more traditional tale in the vein of Literature/TheUglyDuckling until everyone died from the barnacle's ugliness, right?
  • SurprisinglySuddenDeath: One of many interpretations on how everyone died from the barnacle's mere ugliness, was, simply being exposed to the mere sight of the barnacle, and then just dying in an instant.
  • SwordOfDamocles: The threat of the barnacle is enough to stop anyone from doing anything. Ever.
  • TakeOurWordForIt: The story doesn't explain how the mere appearance of the Barnacle, who is vaguely described with the subjective term "Ugly", is able to kill everyone, unless the word wasn't meant to be taken literally and was meant to imply something more sinister or dangerous about the barnacle, most likely a physical feature of it.
  • TearJerker:
    • Everyone died. Everyone. You. Your friends. Your family. PunctuatedForEmphasis Every. Single. One.
      • It gets worse than that! The story doesn't specifically say it was everyone from a specific frame in time. Just "everyone". Which means anyone who ever existed on any plane of time or space is dead because of this barnacle.
      • It's also possible that the world died slowly. After all, FridgeHorror it didn't say how fast or how peacefully everyone died...
    • The fact that the story didn't help at all.
    • It ended. It's all over.
    • TheWoobie The barnacle was so ugly that it never had any friends. How can you not weep over his plight? Combined with him JumpingOffTheSlipperySlope, he's quite the WoobieDestroyerOfWorlds. How the mighty can fall...
    • Once, there was an ugly barnacle. Once, and never again...
    • There was an ugly barnacle. But not anymore...
  • TooBleakStoppedCaring: Whether Everyone AlternateCharacterInterpretation deserved it or not, they're all dead, and possibly the barnacle too, whether it deserved it or not. Even the FramingDevice is momentarily subject to this, as it didn't help SpongeBob at all.
  • TrailersAlwaysLie: It was set up in a way to make it seem as if it is an uplifting tale about someone overcoming the stigma of being ugly. Instead, we get an Everyone Dies Ending.
  • Troperiffic: At the time it was moved to JFF, the story (despite being only 13 words long, 15 if you count TheEnd) had 144 tropes, plus another 41 under YMMV, 36 character tropes, and 9 on the Trivia page, approximating to 17 tropes per word. There were more subpages of The Ugly Barnacle than there are words in the story.
  • TrueArtIsIncomprehensible: Inverted. The story explains exactly what gives the reason why everybody died.
  • TwistEnding: Be honest: Were you expecting the barnacle to kill everyone?
  • UglyCute: FanArt depicting the barnacle as TheWoobie will often depict it as having a slightly cute aesthetic despite his ugliness.
  • UltimateLifeForm: Arguably, the barnacle, as it was able to kill everyone.
  • UnpopularPopularCharacter: The barnacle is considered so ugly that everyone dies in-universe, but he's pretty well-liked by fans.
  • UnwittingInstigatorOfDoom: One interpretation of the story is that the deaths the barnacle caused were all an accident.
  • VillainProtagonist: Possibly.
  • VindicatedByHistory: When Patrick originally devised the story, SpongeBob found it offensive and unhelpful. The Ugly Barnacle has since gone on to become a celebrated work of fiction, considered unmatched in its literary canon.
  • WalkingSpoiler:
    • Knowing too much about the Ugly Barnacle gives away the twist that he kills everyone.
    • It's hard to bring up "everyone" without bringing up their death.
  • WeHardlyKnewYe: They all die the exact moment they are introduced in the story, so it's hard to feel sorry for them.
  • WhamEpisode: The story starts off calm and unassuming. The second sentence changes everything in a DarkerAndEdgier fashion with an EverybodyDiesEnding.
  • WhamLine: One near the very end that completely changes the direction the story was heading.

-->He was so ugly that everyone died.

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