The Hankering

"I'm hooked on chum, okay?!"

- Mr. Krabs

"The Hankering" is the second segment of the twentieth episode of season 12, and it is paired with "A Cabin in the Kelp." In this episode, SpongeBob finds out Mr. Krabs has a secret liking for chum, which Plankton exploits in a scheme to get the secret formula.

Characters

 * Eugene H. Krabs
 * SpongeBob SquarePants
 * Sheldon J. Plankton
 * Sal
 * Karen Plankton
 * Squidward Tentacles

Plot
Mr. Krabs comes out of his office, extremely hungry. He shuts down the restaurant and runs off, while SpongeBob follows him as he dropped a coin. He ends up somewhere in the middle of nowhere, where Mr. Krabs is waiting for a meal. When he realizes he was ordering chum, SpongeBob asks what's going on. Mr. Krabs tells a story about how one time during his navy days, he missed his mealtime and when he got back to his ship, all that was left was chum. However, when he ate it, he fell in love with it and has had a chum monkey ever since.

He tells SpongeBob to promise to keep this a secret, and afterwards asks for more chum. However, Sal, the owner of Slop Pail, closes it down to become a movie star, leaving him with nowhere to get chum. Back at the Krusty Krab, he asks SpongeBob to make chum, but because of how gross it is, he's unable to make it. He does make several kinds of chum made out of different ingredients, but Mr. Krabs doesn't like any of them.

With nowhere else to go, he starts digging for chum near the Chum Bucket, only to get spotted by Plankton and Karen. Eventually they find out he has an obsession for chum, so Plankton uses this to get the secret formula out of him in exchange for a lifetime supply of chum. Mr. Krabs accepts the deal and brings the formula to him, despite SpongeBob's warnings.

Unfortunately, it was all a trick and Plankton uses the Chum Bucket glove to smash the two. However, Mr. Krabs gets out and attacks him, leading to the formula to fall inside the chum. Plankton goes inside it to retrieve it, while SpongeBob tells his boss to eat all the chum so he can obtain the formula. After doing so, he gets the formula back but had accidentally ate Plankton in the process. While they're waiting for him to get out, they watch Sal's latest movie at Reef Cinema.

Music

 * Happy Crusty Crew - Title Card