When it comes to Minions, the little yellow guys are used to a bit of virality. As well as being a favorite among Facebook moms and aunts, the “Despicable Me” movie characters broke the internet last year as part of the ‘Gentleminion’ trend. ICYMI, this involved creators dressing in finery at the movie theatre to watch “Minions: Rise of Gru” with the boys.
With such a rich online history, Minions have become an inextricable part of popular culture — but a new, strange trend on TikTok is perplexing and concerning viewers.
To put it simply, Christian TikTokers have been sharing images of crucified Minions. Like, a lot.
At first glance, you might mistake these images as a poor-taste satire or an attempt at an “edgy” joke. But for some of the creators sharing these images, they are completely sincere.
The creepiest part of this trend is that dozens of Christian TikTokers are following the exact same premise or “script.” The video begins with these creators saying an animator was “messing around” when they created that image.
This then progresses to the creator insisting that while a Minion didn’t die for your sins, Jesus did. They then sign off with the reminder that “Jesus loves you.”
Why are crucified Minions trending?
So, what’s with all the repetition? Is it an evangelical version of a copypasta? Not quite, but you’re not far off.
“Once there’s a viral piece of content, you see tons and tons of creators replicating that exact script,” internet culture reporter Taylor Lorenz explained in an episode of her podcast.
According to Lorenz, there are certain “growth hack” Discord servers dedicated to growing your social media platform as quickly as possible. Part of this, she adds, involves the proliferation of AI-generated scripts, which creators “tweak and replicate it yourself for viral stardom.”
“My best guess is that it’s something like that, or that there was just one original creator that hit on viral gold, and people started to see that and just started copying it organically,” she said on the podcast.
Yet, while these videos are unmistakably widespread, Know Your Meme’s Don Caldwell told Rolling Stone that he’s unsure they’re having the desired effect.
“I would wager that this isn’t getting any people to convert to Christianity or renew their faith or anything like that,” he said. “I think it’s mostly based around the attention economy.”
However, as Rolling Stone reporter EJ Dickson points out, the attention economy might be a “proselytization” in and of itself. If nothing else, the minion memes have definitely sparked discussion.
