Joker's Prank Calls

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

About

Joker's Prank Calls refers to a series of memes that imagine Joker calling various businesses and pranking them by ordering a certain something, usually a generic, "normal" version of their specific product. Started by a viral Tumblr post, the format gained popularity on Twitter in June 2021.

Origin

On December 25th, 1993, the animated film Batman: Mask of the Phantasm premiered.^[1] In one scene of the film, Joker, voiced by Mark Hamill, calls Batman and notifies him that a drone bomb is coming his way (shown below).

Hello, anybody home? Listen, boopsie, even though you never call and never write, I still got a soft spot for you. So I'm sending you a fun gift, airmail! And there's no use jumping out the window this time, toots…

On March 30th, 2021, Tumblr^[2] user halfgayfullgayconsequences posted a still image of Joker holding the phone, captioning it, “Hello Little Caesars? 5 orders of Normal Bread please.” The post (shown below) received over 11,900 likes and reblogs in three months.

Spread

On April 27th, an unknown Redditor posted a screenshot of the Tumblr post to the /r/tumblr^[3] subreddit, where it gained over 490 upvotes in two months. On May 3rd, Twitter^[4] user @NeilNevins reposted the screenshot, with the post gaining over 4,800 retweets and 29,300 likes in two months. On May 7th, 2021, voice actor Gianni Matragrano posted a dubbed version of the meme, with the video accumulating over 75,300 views, 2,900 retweets and 10,800 likes on Twitter^[5] in two months (shown below).

The format did not see further spread until June 9th, 2021, when Twitter^[6] user @CuteCherryTree posted a Normal Pills meme based on the format that gained over 3,600 retweets and 24,600 likes in one month (shown below, left). On June 14th, Instagram^[7] user dennislikesjazz posted a dubbed version of a similar, now-deleted tweet by @lavendersheeps. The video received over 67,600 views with 11,700 likes in one month.

On June 18th, YouTuber^[8] Geekydubs posted a dub of a June 14th tweet^[9] by user @Scourgey, with the video gaining over 331,000 views in three weeks (shown below, left). The format achieved larger popularity in early July 2021, after a July 7th Twitter^[10] post by user @SquishyPsychoFA, who tweeted a meme that gained over 3,000 retweets and 22,900 likes in three days (shown below, right).

Finally, Upgrade

Finally, Upgrade refers a series of memes in which wizards and scientists discover upgraded versions of musical bands and cultural phenomena. Spawned by a viral meme in which a wizard discovers "Mambo No. 6," an upgraded version of "Mambo No. 5", the trend found a significant presence on Facebook in late February 2020. The format is a derivative of both Finally, Synthetic Watermelon snowclone and Foo Fighters vs. the Foo meme.