Alligator Kick / Black Guy Kicking Alligator

Confirmed 79,077

Part of a series on AI Art. [View Related Entries]

About

Alligator Kick, also known as Black Guy Kicking Alligator, is an AI-generated image of a large, shirtless Black man kicking an alligator in the face in a swamp at night. The original image was created by the Facebook account Uncle Mike's Photography in late September 2023, gaining viral reposts on X / Twitter going into October 2023. Discourse about the image and AI art, in general, ensued online as meme creators paired the image macro with different captions. The template also trended on Reddit where meme creators object labeled the image. Eventually, internet users named the man Gumbo Slice in reference to images of him with pizza. Gumbo Slice is a play on the name Kimbo Slice, as in, the famous fighter.

Origin

On September 30th, 2023, the Facebook^[1] page Uncle Mike's Photography posted a series of AI-generated images that showed a shirtless Black man in a dark swamp with alligators. One of the images showed the man kicking an alligator in the face (shown below). Over the course of two days, the post received roughly 13,000 reactions.

Spread

Later on September 30th, 2023, three of the images, including the Alligator Kick image, were reposted by X^[2] user @FightsStuff, who captioned them, "A story," gaining over 98,700 likes in two days (shown below, left). Soon after, users on X^[3] started to caption the Alligator Kick image, such as X^[3] user @twohealthbars on September 30th, who wrote, "this is what Tekken looks like," gaining roughly 156,400 likes in two days (shown below, right).

Memes also ensued after X^[4] user @YallLuvCris posted the image on September 30th, 2023, writing, "I wanna know the backstory to this 😂," gaining roughly 162,500 likes in two days (shown below, left). X^[5] user @NxtDeterio then quoted the aforementioned tweet on September 30th, mentioning AI drawing hands, gaining roughly 26,500 likes in two days (shown below, right).

Viral quotes and usage of the image persisted on X^[6] going into October 2023. Also, during the same timeframe, the meme started to spread on Reddit as meme creators object labeled the bodies in the image. For instance, on September 30th, 2023, Redditor DinoRoman posted an object labeled iteration to /r/memes,^[7] gaining roughly 16,400 upvotes in two days (shown below).

Usage of the template also persisted on Reddit, such as in /r/PrequelMemes, ^[8] going into October 2023.

Gumbo Slice

Soon after the virality of the Alligator Kick image, Redditors on /r/midjourney^[9] created the nickname Gumbo Slice for the man in the images. The nickname is a play on the name "Kimbo Slice," as in, the famous fighter. Trending in October 2023, AI art images of Gumbo Slice trended en masse on X / Twitter and Reddit, among other sites, spawning redraws, fan art and other types of memetic content.