If Astroboy/Doraemon/Hello Kitty are the Mickey Mouse of Anime and Japan, Goku is the Superman, Sailor Moon is the Wonder Woman, what characters or shows would be the Spongebob of Anime and Japan?

I think you are stuck in a dichotomy, an oppositional concept, a narrowing of vision. So what is the American equivalent of Godzilla, Devilman, Mazinger Z, Kamen Rider, Ultraman, Sentai Hero, and Gundam? Also, Pokemon, Digimon, and Yokai Watch. Also Ghost in the Shell, Berserk, and Vagabond. Uh.. Naruto? Kimetsu? Wow i am nerd. Attitudes toward watching movies in theaters are also quite different between the U.S. and Japan. We watch movies quietly and still, as if it were a funeral (everyone is quiet at funerals, right?). The mentality of the people and the nature of the market are so different that it does not seem very productive to extract something from the U.S. and Japan and compare them.

I think the power of American content creation is the best in the world. There is no doubt about it. But Japan is also quite competitive. There are dozens of manga magazines published every week. There are 20~30 titles per issue, and new episodes are published every week. The most popular of these manga are turned into anime. Approximately 300 anime are aired each year. If they are popular, they become a series and continue next year.

Japan has been repeating this cycle for 50~60 years. In other words, various characters have changed their roles as heroes and heroines from generation to generation. (Conversely, we are stuck in a very unfortunate system because we are too careful in how we spend our money, which prevents us from producing quality blockbusters such as Hollywood movies.) Then, we may not forget video games. Mario, Pikachu. Sonic was also born in Japan.

Chibimaruko-chan and Crayon Shin-chan were originally artistic manga in the emerging genre of surrealistic gags, although they were more directed toward children when they were made into anime. Both characters are children, yet as calm as adults, more oblique than teenagers, and more hauteur than tired old men. Comedy seems to depend a lot on national character. We probably cannot laugh at each other's jokes. If we exchange comedians from our respective countries, the audience will surely be blank.

My point is that finding a "Japanese Sponge Bob" is a bit difficult.