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"The Secret Box" is the 17th episode of the first season of the American animated television series SpongeBob SquarePants. It originally aired on Nickelodeon in the United States on March 15, 2000. The series follows the adventures of the title character in the underwater city of Bikini Bottom. In the episode, SpongeBob got stranded in an aphotic zone called Rock Bottom.

The episode was written by Paul Tibbitt, Ennio Torresan, Jr. and David Fain, with Tom Yasumi serving as animation director. The episode received positive reviews upon release.

Plot summary
SpongeBob and Patrick board a bus to get home from Glove World, a glove-themed amusement park. They accidentally board a wrong bus, which then takes them to a 90-degree cliff. The cliff leads to a sort of aphotic zone called Rock Bottom, inhabited by multiple strange deep-sea animals.

Patrick gets on the bus to go home but accidentally leaves SpongeBob behind. After several unsuccessful attempts to get on the bus, SpongeBob heads to a bus station and waits in a very long line. By the time he gets to the front, he finds out that the last bus to leave for the night is already gone, and he is stuck there until morning. He gets scared by a raspberry sound coming from nowhere, and he dashes back to the cliff. The raspberry sound's maker reveals himself to be a friendly-looking anglerfish creature, who has SpongeBob's balloon from Glove World. The creature blows up the balloon, ties it to SpongeBob's wrist, and allows him to rise up the cliff and back to Bikini Bottom. The episode concludes with Patrick on his way back to Rock Bottom, thinking SpongeBob is still there.

Production
"Rock Bottom" was written by Paul Tibbitt, Ennio Torresan, Jr. and David Fain, with Tom Yasumi serving as animation director. The episode originally aired on Nickelodeon in the United States on March 15, 2000, with a TV-Y7 parental rating.

Series head writer of the second season Merriwether Williams said the episode's story is "so simple." She remarked "To me, it's one of the best episodes. It just stayed with one idea." The episode was about "how he [SpongeBob] keeps missing the bus and how that makes him feel." Williams cited the episode as "so small that you could explore gags and opportunities for gags." The episode was an example of "a good outline" in the series where the storyboards and humor were done easily. Williams said "it was great for the board guys." She added "In many ways, my job was to create situations where the board guys could be funny, to create a situation that could be funny, and let them go for the actual, specific jokes."

"Rock Bottom" was released on the DVD compilation called SpongeBob SquarePants: The Complete 1st Season DVD on October 28, 2003. On September 22, 2009, the episode was released on the SpongeBob SquarePants: The First 100 Episodes DVD, alongside all the episodes of seasons one through five.

Reception
"Rock Bottom" received very positive reviews from media critics. Nancy Basile of the About.com gave the episode a positive response and ranked it No. 4 on her "Best SpongeBob SquarePants Episodes" list. Basile said "The raspberries and SpongeBob's increasing frustration make this an hilarious episode." She cited the episode as a "running up against Murphy's law over and over again" and said "so it's very relatable." Basile's favorite scene was "SpongeBob tries to extract a snack from the vending machine before the bus across the road drives away."

Emily Estep of WeGotThisCovered.com ranked the episode No. 5 on her "Top 10 Episodes of SpongeBob SquarePants" list. She said "While Rock Bottom is mostly a goofy episode, it's also one of the scarier episodes of SpongeBob." She also said the episode has "the ideal balance of cuteness – SpongeBob's glove hat, his temper tantrum at the bus stop and his clever attempts to fool the buses – and sheer terror – like SpongeBob running from a mysterious character, saying, 'Well, that place will be there tomorrow. I guess I'd better keep walking. Running. Better start running. Running. Sprinting! Yes, I just gotta keep sprinting!' (Before he hits a wall; 'Sitting, sitting, bleeding.')" Estep remarked she mentioned made the episode "so well-remembered." Bill Treadway of DVD Talk gave the episode a 3 out of 5 rating.

Other media
The episode "Rock Bottom" served as an inspiration for the SpongeBob SquarePants Rock Bottom Plunge ride. The ride based on the series first opened on March 15, 2008 at the Mall of America's Nickelodeon theme park re-branded from the Mall of America's Park at MOA, formerly Camp Snoopy, to Nickelodeon Universe in the Minneapolis-St. Paul suburb of Bloomington, Minnesota.

The SpongeBob SquarePants Rock Bottom Plunge features vertical lifts and 90-degree turns providing the riders a 60-plus foot drop, a maximum speed of over 40 miles per hour and a 4.4 maximum G-force rating. The ride time is approximately two minutes and is the shortest Gerstlauer roller coaster built yet.