Mr. Krabs (seasons 6-10)

Eugene Harold Krabs, commonly refered as Mr. Krabs, is one of the ten main characters in the Nickelodeon animated series, mh:besttvshows:SpongeBob SquarePants. He is the money-obsessed founder of the Krusty Krab and the business rival of Plankton. Although he's one of the series' main "protagonists", Mr. Krabs has been frequently depicted as anti-heroic and even villainous at times, eventually going so far as to become the direct antagonist of several episodes. He is voiced by Clancy Brown.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) The way he's written and portrayed is all over the place. He's supposed to be a hero among SpongeBob and Patrick, yet most of the time he's portrayed as an unfair, villainous boss. For example, he tricked SpongeBob into writing lies about people in Bikini Bottom in "The Krabby Kronicle", and he once used SpongeBob to even mislead children and scam their money into a clown in "Krabby Land". The worst thing about this is when Plankton is supposed to be the villain, yet he treats his wife (who assists him in the Chum Bucket) and any customers way better than Mr. Krabs.
 * 2) He is as villainous as, if not worse than, Plankton. In the infamous Season 7 episode, "One Coarse Meal", he tortured Plankton to the point where he started feeling suicidal, when in reality Plankton was hardly doing a thing. And he did it for fun. This was his worst moment in the series.
 * 3) He broke the law and violated workers rights countless times, such as making his employees work twenty-four hours a day once. In fact, he's broken more laws than Plankton ever has.
 * 4) Following this, he runs a restaurant with overworked and underpaid employees that barely work for any wage.
 * 5) *He also doesn’t always care for the health and well-being of his employees. While he lets Spongebob have a sick day when he becomes ill, an injury is a different story. The greatest example of this is “Squid Baby”, in this episode, Squidward had a brain injury that causes him to behave like an infant. He still has Squidward work despite not being able to, he also DOES NOT LISTEN to Spongebob and Patrick when they try to explain this to him.
 * 6) He goes completely insane whenever he has to give away as much as a penny, even willing to rip a person's arm off if they didn't drop the penny as seen in the Season 3 episode "Born Again Krabs".
 * 7) He pathetically makes huge molehills out of mountains for stupid reasons, such as when the Chum Bucket started getting a regular customer in "Plankton's Regular".
 * 8) He believes that he has full control over SpongeBob's personal life, as seen in "Karate Choppers".
 * 9) Speaking of which, he hardly ever cares for other people, and he even wanted to get Squidward "out of the picture" just to sell his paintings for a higher price in "Out of the Picture". So "heroic"! Even worse, he tried to murder Squidward with a hammer. This wasn't even the only time where he considered killing his employees for money.
 * 10) * He once sold SpongeBob off to the Flying Dutchman for 62 cents in "Born Again Krabs", before Squidward called him out for it.
 * 11) * And there's that time where he bet his money to let Neptune win in "Neptune's Spatula" while lying that he had faith in SpongeBob.
 * 12) He also committed animal cruelty, particularly when he harvested jellyfish and extracted jelly from them in "Jellyfish Hunter", weakening and even killing a lot of them., and also used Gary as a magnet to steal cents from a local arcade game room.  In fact, he seems to casually get away with crimes throughout the series or at least not get the proper punishment for them, from imprisonment (several episodes) to stealing ("The Smoking Peanut") to trying to get Plankton to straight up kill himself ("One Coarse Meal") right up to downright attempted murder (Out of the Picture).
 * 13) He sometimes gets no punishment for his actions.
 * 14) He can be a huge thief. He once stole an pearl from a zoo oyster, which was revealed to be an egg with a baby clam inside. And instead of apologizing, Mr. Krabs says, "But it's Free Day!".
 * 15) *He also once stole money from the entire city of Bikini Bottom with Spongebob’s pet Gary in episode “The Cent of Money”.
 * 16) He treats SpongeBob and Squidward like slaves instead of employees, even to the point where he refuses to pay them, and make them pay him instead, even for breathing and existing. He sometimes goes as far as physically abusing them, especially Squidward.
 * 17) * Despite that, owing to his naivety, SpongeBob overly patronizes him like a saint, and follows his orders without question. Even then, there are times where he had to stand up against his boss to stop him from furthering his schemes.
 * 18) * Twice, SpongeBob angrily called Krabs a "crustaceous cheapskate", showing that while he does like his boss, he does know when his boss goes too far and had every right to be upset.
 * 19) He has a very strict set of rules for his customers. It’s mandatory to order a side of fries, napkins and refills cost extra, and there are absolutely no freebies for anyone – royalty or not. In fact, according to Mr. Krabs, all the money brought into the Krusty Krab must be spent. Even the people who aren't hungry are dragged in and forced to order food. Sure, there's a money back guarantee, but it's so small it's almost impossible to see. No matter what it takes, Krabs will make sure that nobody even goes near his restaurant without emptying their wallets. One time, he even charged his customers $1.00 per footstep in the restaurant.
 * 20) If he comes across a moldy or rotten patty left out in the open for too long, his first instinct is to reheat it and resell it. You think that's disgusting? Krabs has also been known to reuse buns that have been flushed down the toilet. Someone needs to tell him that while wasting food is bad, trying to vend a tainted patty to save a few nickels and dimes isn’t worth the risk of poisoning customers. If anything, Krabs should probably lose more money dealing with lawsuits and medical bills. How did his restaurant not get sued and/or shutdown for this???
 * 21) * He also sold "Spongey Patties", which are just Krabby Patties rotten for periods, which poisoned his costumers and getting himself arrested.
 * 22) *He also suggests that Spongebob changes Squidward’s dirty diaper in the “back where the food is prepared.” This is highly unsanitary and violates health codes.
 * 23) He doesn't seem to care about the lives of his customers, as seen in "Mutiny on the Krusty", where he had his own customers pull the Krusty Krab back to Bikini Bottom while leisurely sitting on the roof with SpongeBob, laughing.
 * 24) * In "Spongebob's Place", he digs a circular trench around the Krusty Krab and places molten lava on it when the customers almost leave.
 * 25) His greed is so overblown it borders through obsession or even insanity.
 * 26) * Whenever an opportunity of profit presents itself towards him, he instantly grabs it without thought and transforms his business into whatever the opportunity is given, only to backfire at the end. Such examples are but not limited to publishing newspapers, selling jelly patties, cashing in on SpongeBob's popularity, pawning the Krusty Krab in exchange of forming a band (in which he does so through theft of other people's possessions), or even outright turn his restaurant into a prison. Often times, he changes the rules or eliminates them altogether, throwing away all moral high ground he might have.
 * 27) * He once tried to marry money while trapped in a safe, to the point that it caused him to have hallucinations.
 * 28) *He at one time had been so obsessed with a single penny in "Penny Foolish" that he believes SpongeBob picked up that he even tresspasses and breaks in his employee's house. He didn't got it out of his system despite that it was only a chewing gum (in turn a wet paper bill), as he kept digging randomly through SpongeBob's front yard just to find a penny.
 * 29) * Speaking of royalties, it is because of this rule that he nearly got killed by King Neptune after being frozen, alongside being accused of theft.
 * 30) * He often puts money on a higher pedestal than even himself, making him a borderline nihilist.
 * 31) * He will commit even counterfeiting to further his desires.
 * 32) * He literally and shamelessly embraces his greed. That's the bottom line.
 * 33) Despite his genuine love for his daughter Pearl, their contrasting personalities often clash, resulting in more harm than good.
 * 34) * Due to his greedy nature, he goes to extreme lengths to please her while protecting his money, like feeding her in "Growth Sprout".
 * 35) * He often neglects his daughter's needs or wants, such as an allowance or an expensive item. Instead, he makes or comes up cheaply-made or crude substitutions to please her, often backfiring.
 * 36) * Due to his greed, again, it prevents him from being open-minded about Pearl's desires.
 * 37) * He acts like a stereotypical "Dad thinks his kid's still a baby" kind of parent, to Pearl's own embarrassment.
 * 38) * There are times where he outright neglects her well-being, such as using Krabby Patties to make soap, which caused barnacles to appear on Pearl's face. If Krabs wants to make bars of soap instead of buying them, why can't he just use safer, more fragrant materials?
 * 39) * There's also a time where Krabs literally locks up Pearl inside his own house under Squidward's care in "Whale Watching", which is considered child abuse and illegal detention, even for a kid's cartoon.
 * 40) He can also be awful to his girlfriend, Mrs. Puff, as well. Particularly in Summer Job, where he spends the entire episode blackmailing and treating her terribly after forcing her to work at the Krusty Krab in exchange for not telling anyone about how she destroyed part of the restaurant after driving into it.
 * 41) He often has Squidward as a lapdog and a scapegoat for some problems he encounters. He often uses him as a shield when something is about to harm him, like when he tried feeding Squidward to a flock of hungry pelicans.
 * 42) In Season 7, he became his absolute worst because he got flanderized to become more and more greedy and abusive than he already was before and after these seasons. In fact, these seasons generally depict Plankton as a huge "butt-monkey" in most of the situations where Mr. Krabs is at his worst and Plankton is completely harmless.

Good Qualities

 * 1) He is not completely heartless, as he sometimes shows compassion for his employees.
 * 2) His design is still good, since they were made by Stephen Hillenburg, who also does good character designs for his characters.
 * 3) Time and time again he realizes that his greed would be his own undoing, causing him to usually revert whatever alternate business he had back to where it was before. He often also realizes the error of his ways, giving away his employees for parsimonious reasons, such as when he sold SpongeBob for 62 cents, only to reject the money out of regret and he also improved in Season 9.
 * 4) He indeed does posses other interests in life than money, such as doing everyday outings, but usually, his parsimony overshadows it all.
 * 5) He shows genuine friendship with other people, like SpongeBob, his old Navy mates, as well as formerly his rival Plankton.
 * 6) Though his parsimony is overblown and seemingly unmitigated, his genuine love for his girlfriend Mrs. Puff temporarily surpasses it, to the point where he has SpongeBob buy expensive items.
 * 7) He usually has a good reason on why he doesn't want Plankton to take at least one Krabby Patty. Plankton is evil and wants to conquer the whole Bikini Bottom (or in Plankton's words, the world) after he runs Krabs out of business, which is his top priority. Despite his Napoleon complex, his machines potentially help him achieve his goals, as seen in the first film. But it still did not excuse his atrocities he inflicted on his rival.
 * 8) He does show genuine affection for his mother, and his daughter Pearl, however, his parsimony results in a strained relationship with the latter.
 * 9) He occasionally apologizes for his actions, but not so much after Season 5.
 * 10) Despite that he still hasn't redeemed himself from flanderization in recent years since Season 9 unlike the rest of the SpongeBob SquarePants cast; he is now much more tolerable than he was in Seasons 6-8.
 * 11) His laugh is amazing, and Clancy Brown portrays him amazingly and memorably.
 * 12) The idea of a pirate-influenced crab running a restaurant is still interesting.
 * 13) He's a decently funny character at times.
 * 14) His backstory of working in the Navy gave him more depth.
 * 15) His superhero design as Sir-Pinch-A-lot is very great.
 * 16) There are times where he actually cares about SpongeBob and Patrick and teaches them important things. Some examples are when he warned them about the fishing hooks in "Hooky" and scolded them for swearing in "Sailor Mouth".
 * 17) * He also helped SpongeBob in the episode, "Shell Shocked", where he lends him his own shell to Gary after SpongeBob accidentally broke it as well as all the other shells in Angry Jack's.
 * 18) * He also taught SpongeBob how to drive in the episode, "Tutor Sauce" because the latter failed his boating school, despite that his tutoring methods are illegal. In that same episode, a rare generous side of him is shown towards his daughter Pearl, as he willingly gives his daughter Pearl some money in order for her to buy shoes.
 * 19) SpongeBob SquarePants would likely not be as great as it is without him and there is no denying that he is a fan favorite despite his flaws.

Reception
Critical reception for Mr. Krabs was intiailly positive but has been mixed as the series progressed, with most criticism directed at his parsimony and the lack of realistic consequences he faces for it. In 2014, Spanish professor Pancracio Celdrán criticized the positive portrayal of Mr. Krabs' stinginess in front of young audiences. Economist Sarah Newcomb described Mr. Krabs as a negative stereotype, writing in the Wiley book Loaded that "King Midas, Ebenezer Scrooge, Mr. Burns, and Mr. Krabs are the same recycled character, representing the person who cares for money above all." Polish scholar Barbara Czarniawska disliked the heroic portrayal of Mr. Krabs in the second SpongeBob film, despite being "a ruthless capitalist who exploits his customers and his workers alike." She later criticized how the show seemingly normalized the character's use of "legal forms of manipulation and exploitative power relations in business." Conversely, political activist Howie Klein of The Huffington Post offered a more positive interpretation of the character, saying in 2006 that Mr. Krabs is not "exactly an evil villain; he's just a greed-obsessed Republican type." Klein interviewed SpongeBob's voice actor Tom Kenny on the topic; Kenny compared Krabs to oil businessman Erle P. Halliburton, then called the character a comedic representation of "unchecked, unthinking, unregulated capitalism. Everything [to Krabs] is about the bottom line, not about what's socially responsible."

In his 2011 book SpongeBob SquarePants and Philosophy, political scientist Joseph J. Foy discusses Krabs' antagonistic side over several chapters. Foy argues that Krabs, not Plankton and Karen, is the true evil character in the series. He also notes his problem with Mr. Krabs' character that "Krabs never seems to learn from the suffering he undergoes, or from witnessing the pain and struggles he inflicts on others."

In an article for Complex, Debbie Encalada praised the SpongeBob series as a whole for challenging social norms; Mr. Krabs' portrayal as a single father to Pearl was specifically highlighted as an example of the show's "subversiveness by subtly challenging the idea of the nuclear family." Newsday 's Meghan Giannotta wrote positively of the character in a 2016 article: "Mr. Krabs ... may be known for being cheap, but he's also determined and a good friend and father. He'll do whatever it takes to make his daughter Pearl happy and he goes to extreme measures to help protect his fast-food business." In a review of the season four episode "Have You Seen This Snail?," television critic Tom Shales described Krabs as "good-natured" and as one of "the things people love about SpongeBob." Paul Mavis of DVD Talk named the Krabs-centric episode "Krusty Krab Training Video" one of the series' best, calling its humorous portrayal of Mr. Krabs' backstory the highlight.

Basketball player LeBron James has stated that if he "could be any character on the show, [he] would be Mr. Krabs." Cartoonist Michael Cavna commented on James' high opinion of Krabs, writing in The Washington Post that he found it intriguing how "the gazillionaire NBA hoopster cites his respect for ... the show's resident tightwad." Mr. Krabs is also the favorite SpongeBob character of football running back Cedric Benson.

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Trivia

 * Mr. Krabs has many internet memes associated with him.
 * In a theory based on SpongeBob and his friends representing "The 7 Deadly Sins", Krabs is considered to be the "Greed" as several examples were shown in many episodes that always shows how much he loves so much for his money, even in the most ridiculous ways possible.