First publicly mentioned by SpongeBob storyboarder Kent Osborne[a] in a 2012 Hogan's Alley interview, excerpts from Behind Closed Doors were leaked online in July 2023 after an anonymous former Nickelodeon employee contacted YouTuber LSuperSonicQ with information about and a limited selection of drawings from the book.

Critical analysis of Behind Closed Doors mostly focused on the graphic crudeness of the illustrations, and spawned discussions about the purpose of such material (as well of "storyboard jams" in general) when done by artists of family shows.

In the early 2000s, storyboard artists for the show, such as Sam Henderson and Kent Osborne, would create crude illustrations of SpongeBob characters on Post-it Notes to relieve anger and amuse their coworkers.

[3] In 2012, Osborne made the first public mention of Behind Closed Doors in an explanation to Hogan's Alley:At the end of the season, all the storyboard artists would do these hilarious, crude drawings of SpongeBob on Post-It notes just to make everyone else laugh.

[4] Screen Rant's Hannah Gearan, Giant Freakin Robot's Chris Snellgrove, Hocmarketing's Van Toan, and Softonic's Randy Meeks argued that Behind Closed Doors could be "childhood-ruining",[7] echoing Colbert's reporting that SpongeBob SquarePants fans experienced "an influx of distress" when the book was revealed.