Nickelodeon decided to make a new spin-off series of Spongebob, however, Stephen Hillenburg specifically said he did not want to have any spin-offs. He had been seen on multiple occasions explaining that. Paul Tibbit, a good friend of Hillenburg, and also the executive producer who took over the original show after he left in season 4, also confirmed this via Twitter that he would not want this to happen. He said “I do not mean any disrespect to my colleagues who are working on this show.  They are good people and talented artists. But this is some greedy, lazy executive-ing right here, and they ALL know full well Steve would have HATED this. Shame on them.” Nick specifically waited until he died to do this because they knew he would be against this. They are disrespecting Stephen Hillenburg’s legacy and it is disgraceful.