Binley Mega Chippy

About

Binley Mega Chippy refers to a British, fast-food fish and chips (chippy) restaurant that became the subject of ironic memes on Twitter and TikTok in early 2022. The trend relates to other British irony trends like Blokecore and Well At Least Our Schools Are Not A Shooting Range and is similar to memes made about Cash Pope, another restaurant with a liminal aura.

History

Binley Mega Chippy is a take-out, fast-food restaurant located in Coventry, U.K.^[1] serving fish and chips, doner kebab, fried chicken and more. It has been in operation since 2004.^[2] Throughout the 2000s, the restaurant became a local hotspot. On January 29th, 2009, Twitter^[3] user rutty_uk was the first to post about the restaurant online, stating, "Been to Binley Mega Chippy. Have Pukka Pie and Chips. Steak and Kidney. Lush." The tweet has received no likes over 13 years but is nonetheless its first mentioning.

Going into 2012, Binley Mega Chippy received more and more tweets^[4] about it. On April 12th, 2012, Bloggertropolis user Steve wrote a blog^[5] about the restaurant titled, "I've Been To Paradise But I've Never Been To Binley Mega Chippy." One excerpt from the blog reads:

But last Saturday, on a drive back from Coombe Abbey, I passed a building whose sheer majesty and triumphal ambience put all these other places to shame. A palace of ruby and gold wherein must surely reside ancient gods of high renown. It sent shivers down my spine as if a strange wind had blown across my face. Indeed the air seemed to thicken as if with the odour of some hot exotic oil.
Binley Mega Chippy.

The restaurant has its own website^[13] as well as many reviews on the website Restaurant Guru.^[14]

Binley Mega Chippy TikToks / Memes

The online buzz regarding Binley Mega Chippy didn't surface en masse until early 2022 on TikTok. On April 26th, 2022, the TikTok^[6] account craigs.kebab.house posted a photo slideshow of multiple chippy restaurants in the U.K. showing among them Binley Mega Chippy. Over the course of one month, the video received roughly 81,600 plays and 10,800 likes (shown below).

On May 18th, 2022, the TikTok^[7][8] account binleymegachippyfan53 posted two Binley Mega Chippy TikToks. The first one used both the AUGHHHH sound and the Carmen Winstead sound and earned roughly 3,100 plays and over 200 likes in eight days (shown below, left). The second video asked if the character Yuji Itadori from the manga series Jujutsu Kaisen would enjoy Binley Mega Chippy, earning roughly 3,300 plays and over 200 likes in eight days (shown below, right).

The aforementioned account continued to post Binley Mega Chippy TikToks going into the end of May 2022, essentially starting the trend of ironic content. On May 19th, 2022, the TikTok^[9] account binleymegachippyfan53 posted a video that referenced Prince Phillip and included the images of Prince Phillip Leaving the Hospital. It earned roughly 268,400 plays and 31,000 likes in one week (shown below, left).

Binley Mega Chippy Song

Other TikTokers picked up on the trend, changing their usernames to reference Binley Mega Chippy. For instance, on May 25th, 2022, the TikTok^[10] account welovebinleymegachippy posted an Ironic Breaking Bad meme that used Walter White Breaks Down. The video received roughly 75,100 plays and 10,800 likes in less than a day (shown below, right). The aforementioned video also used a Binley Mega Chippy theme song as its sound which was first posted by binleymegachippyfan53 on May 25th.^[11]

News outlet The Tab,^[15] talked to the person behind the binleymegachippyfan53 TikTok account about the origin of the song. The person, named Alex, told them he used TikTok's text-to-speech function to create the song and then added the “tenor singing voice.”

Binley Mega Chippy "Morbius Meal"

Additionally, the Twitter account BinleyMegaChip started posting memes in May 2022. For instance, on May 23rd, 2022, the account posted a tweet^[12] including a fish and chips meal called the "MORBIUS MEAL" which comes with a Mug Root Beer. The tweet received over 240 likes in three days (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References