Guardians of the Galaxy Funny Birthday Memes

Editor's Note: This entry contains spoilers for Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2; read at your own caution.

About

I Know That Sounds Bad refers to a series of memes based on a Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 scene in which character Star-Lord learns that his father Ego is responsible for his mother's death and proceeds to immediately attack him. In the memes, Ego to admit to a certain misdeed and gets attacked.

Origin

On May 5th, 2017, American superhero film Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 premiered in the United States.^[1] In one scene of the film, character Star-Lord / Peter Quill, played by Chris Pratt, learns that his father Ego, played by Kurt Russell, gave his mother a tumor to kill her. Upon learning this, Pratt immediately attacks Ego by shooting several times.

- It broke my heart to put that tumor in her head.
- What..?
- Alright, I know that sounds bad-

On October 2020, Instagram^[2] user owen_kung reposted the earliest known meme which used the video as a reaction image, captioned "When someone says they like futanari" (shown below). The original author of the meme is currently unconfirmed. The post received over 18,600 views and 3,600 likes in six months

Spread

In early October 2020, the video was widely circulated online. For example, on October 6th, 2020, Funnyjunk^[3] user worldatarms reposted the video, with the post gaining 30 likes. On October 10th, 2020, Instagram^[4] user sora.gif.v2 reposted the meme, with the repost gaining over 8,100 views and 2,600 likes.

Prior to October 10th, 2020, an unknown user created a version of the video captioned "when someone says they like Danganronpa (video could not be discovered). On October 10th, 2020, Instagram^[5] user malosemblem posted a recaptioned version of the video, a Fire Emblem meme that received over 1,600 views and 500 likes in six months (shown below, left). On October 20th, 2020, Instagram^[6] user grandmas.butt reposted the meme, with the reupload gaining over 109,000 views and 24,800 likes in six months. An October 21st, repost by Instagram^[7] user pampam.mp4 gained over 125,000 views and 17,200 likes in the same period.

The format did not see active spread until January 26th, 2021, when Instagram^[8] user patrickwarburtonfan53 posted a meme that gained over 27,800 likes in two months (shown below, right). January 31st and February 4th reposts by Instagram^[9] ^[10] users tspro and scrubby.bubby received additional 41,600 views and 4,800 likes and 54,400 views and 11,700 likes, respectively.

In early February 2021, Among Us version of the meme created by an unknown user received viral spread.^[11] ^[12] On February 8th, TikTok^[13] user realmoist acted a meme that used audio from the format, with the video gaining over 503,000 views and 90,000 likes in one month (shown below).

The format achieved viral popularity after on March 7th, 2021, TikTok^[19] user hdlemon99 posted a Harambe meme that received over 88,100 views and 15,500 likes in two weeks. On March 10th, TikTok^[14] user steezeollie posted posted another Harambe meme that gained over 258,700 views and 45,500 likes in two weeks (shown below, center). On the same day, TikTok^[15] user graysonmcbride27 reused the joke, with their version of the meme gaining over 1.5 million views and 338,700 likes in the same period (shown below, right).

On March 11th, 2021, Redditor^[16] syxgott1220 reused the joke in a meme posted to the /r/pyrocynical subreddit that gained over 9,600 upvotes.

Following the viral spread of the Harambe versions of the meme,^[17] ^[18] the format saw a surge in popularity on all platforms, most notably iFunny, TikTok and Twitter.