Henchman Energy / IT'S DA BAT!!

Submission 12,267

Part of a series on Batman. [View Related Entries]

About

Goonposting, also known by the catchphrase It's Da Bat!!, refers to a series of memes that exploit tropes about goons and henchmen in films, comics and video games. Inspired by viral jokes about UFC CEO Dana White and comedian Joe Rogan, the trend gained prevalence on social media at the time of the release of the 2022 film The Batman.

Origin

On October 18th, 2011, the action-adventure video game Batman: Arkham City was released.^[1] In this, as well as other video games within the Batman series, goon NPC opponents often scream "It's the bat!" and "It's the freaking bat" upon noticing Batman (clips shown below).

It's da freaking bat!

On July 12th, 2017, Twitter user @Bro_Pair shared a now-deleted tweet^[2] in which he humorously described UFC CEO Dana White as a henchman from Batman who yells "Oh no! It's da bat!!" in a Brooklyn accent (screenshot shown below).

Spread

In the following years, the post saw viral spread online through reposts. For example, on October 10th, 2018, Facebook^[3] page The Comic Dads reposted the screenshot, with the post gaining over 100 reactions and 1,500 shares in three years.

In July 2021, YouTube user Tim Cosgrove made a similar comment on an unknown YouTube upload of Joe Rogan's ice bath video, writing that Joe Rogan reminded him of a henchman who yells "It's da bat!" The comment received over 2,700 upvotes in one week. On August 2nd, 2021, iFunny^[4] user ornerywtfv16 posted a screenshot of the comment to the app, where it gained over 47,000 smiles in nine months (shown below).

In the following weeks, the screenshots of the comment were widely shared online, with August 3rd posts on Reddit^[5] and Tumblr^[6] going viral.

Memes about goons and henchmen, largely influenced by It's Da Bat!! jokes, saw a spike in prevalence in the weeks around the release of the film The Batman in March 2022. For example, on March 6th, 2022, Twitter^[7] user @capybaroness made a humorous tweet that gained over 7,200 retweets and 82,400 likes in three weeks (shown below, left). On March 21st, 2022, Twitter^[8] user @halfway_zen shared an Oomer Wojak parodying tropes about goons and henchmen, which gained over 8,800 retweets and 82,000 likes in five days (shown below, right).