by 2.5 million viewers, but it marked an increase from the first season finale, which was watched by only 1.77 million viewers. "It Came from the Nightosphere" also marked gains when compared to the same timeslot a year prior; for instance, 732,000 kids aged 6–11 watched the episode, an increase by 35 percent when compared to the previous year. "It Came from the Nightosphere" was highly praised by critics. Tyler Foster of DVD Talk called it "a pretty decent example of all the notes the show can hit." He was particularly pleased with the way "the rift between Marceline and her dad is handled with a nice seriousness that fits right in alongside absurd gags about penguins". He also noted that "any episode that includes a song is a plus in my book." It was also called the "real highlight" of the eponymous DVD release by Charles Webb of MTV Geek. IGN writer Matt Fowler later referred to the episode as a "classic". In a separate review, he later wrote that the episode "has come to represent the best of Adventure Time, and Marceline's , with her angst-y anti-daddy song and her Freddy Krueger-esque sweater has launched a thousand cosplays." Writers of Spin ranked "The Fry Song" as the forty-fourth best original song performed by fictional characters in any medium. James Grebey called its subject matter deep and from a place of uncontrolled emotion, and characterized it as mature but also eccentric. Ward was very happy with the episode. He complimented storyboard artists Muto and Sugar, saying that the former "has a hilarious slapstick set-up-the-punchline kind of style of comedy" and the latter "is amazing at executing these super romantic, emotional goosebump-kind of feelings". He was particularly pleased with the ending, noting that "I love that goose-bumps feeling in a climactic scene with music rising. In that episode you're talking about, there is that rising action toward the end, and then LSP […] cuts in and says 'drama bomb!' in the middle of it to sort of, like, cut its legs out. Which I think is a lot of fun." "It Came from the Nightosphere" was later nominated for a 2011 Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Short-format Animated Program, although it did not win. Media release "It Came from the Nightosphere" DVD release The episode first saw physical release as part of the eponymous 2012 It Came From the Nightosphere