When one thinks of Patrick Star, scary isn’t a word that normally relates to the pink starfish living in Bikini Bottom. Since the beginning of SpongeBob SquarePants, Patrick has long been the best buddy of the titular fry cook, becoming so popular that he even received his own spin-off series in The Patrick Star Show. In a surprising twist, the voice actor responsible for one of Nickelodeon’s most hilarious characters had a shocking role as a terrifying figure. In the late 1990s, actor Bill Fagerbakke portrayed an HBO villain who might have died, but his nefarious presence is sure to be remembered.
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Bill Fagerbakke began voicing Patrick Star in 1999 with the SpongeBob SquarePants episode, “Help Wanted,” which kicked off the series. One year earlier, the actor took on the role of prison guard Karl Metzger in HBO’s often-overlooked drama series, Oz. Focusing on a prison attempting to experiment with a new way for prisoners to live, Metzger, as a character, was secretly working with the white supremacists of Oz. With the group asking Karl for quite a few favors, the prison guard was causing chaos in the “Emerald City,” with those running the institute slowly but surely figuring out his game. Unfortunately for Karl, his time ran out.
The Threat of Karl Metzger
Debuting the show’s second season, Karl met an untimely end in the third season premiere in attempting to kill one prisoner, Beecher. Tobias Beecher was considered a “POV” character amongst the cast, finding himself in prison due to striking a child while drunk driving. With Metzger trying to grill Beecher for information, Tobias begins slashing the guard with his fingernails, which he had been secretly filing down to become deadly weapons. Karl might have been killed to kick off season three, but this didn’t stop corrupt prison guards and terrifying prisoners from helping to make Oz one of HBO’s biggest shows for its time.
Obviously, Metzger didn’t make any return appearances to Oz following his death, but the HBO series still had plenty of gas left in the tank. The show ran for six seasons, in total, ending in 2003. Throughout most of the seasons, countless characters were introduced in terms of both prisoners and guards, though a vast swath of them didn’t make it to the end of the series. Unfortunately, despite its success, Oz never returned for a revival as HBO has never returned to the small screen. With so many shows often given a reboot to great acclaim in recent days, the concept of Oz would make for a good comeback as there aren’t too many shows these days focusing on prisons.
Patrick Star’s Horror History
Oz is far from the only live-action role that Bill Fagerbakke has been a part of. In the past, the voice of Patrick had parts to play in films such as Jennifer’s Body and Halloween II, while also playing a significant role in the television series, Stephen King’s The Stand. Of course, Fagerbakke has had some significant parts to play in the animated world to boot, albeit not ones that weren’t so scary. Over his career, Bill took on the role of Broadway in Disney’s Gargoyles, while also holding roles in series such as Aaahh!!! Real Monsters, Jumanji, Batman Beyond, and countless others. Even though he has been playing the part of Patrick for decades, it doesn’t seem as though Fagerbakke will end his part in Bikini Bottom anytime soon.
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