Bran Flakes refers to a scene from the Spongebob Squarepants episode As Seen on TV in which Spongebob encounters the background character (also known as a mob character) Old Man Walker. The fish tells Spongebob that he recently saw him on a commercial, to which Spongebob is elated. Unbeknownst to him, Old Man Walker had actually seen a commercial for the cereal Bran Flakes and mistook Spongebob for the cereal box in the ad.