Dead God at the Bottom of the Mariana Trench

About

Dead God at the Bottom of the Mariana Trench refers to a series of memes, including image macros and videos, suggesting that there is a dead God "forgotten by our books" at the bottom of the Mariana Trench. The meme originated on iFunny in July 2022 via the Oh That's Real Nice format and spread over the following months through reposts and other memes referring to the purported dead god.

Origin

On June 23rd, 2012, Deviant Art^[1] artist hydris posted a piece of art depicting a giant, dark-eyed fish lying at the bottom of the ocean, titled, "deep sea monster," garnering over 16,000 views in 12 years (shown below, left). On July 29th, 2022, iFunny^[2] user mokoma posted a version of the "Oh That's Real Nice" image macro format using the artwork by hydris captioned, "Oh that's a dead god, there is a dead god forgotten by our books lying motionless at the bottom of the Mariana Trench," garnering around 100 smiles in two years (shown below, right).

Spread

The meme gained viral spread over the following months via reposts. For example, on August 6th, 2022, it was reposted by Instagram^[3] user new.incognito.tab, garnering over 28,900 likes in two years. On August 9th it was reposted to /r/196,^[4] garnering over 2,500 upvotes in the same span of time. On August 26th, X^[5] user @doomedsarcoma posted artwork inspired by the meme, writing, "that's a dead god," garnering over 15,000 likes in two years (shown below).

On August 31st, YouTuber^[6] Memetastic posted a voice over of the meme that gained over 45,000 views in two years. On January 5th, 2023, X^[7] user @DarkOddCon posted the original meme, garnering over 104,000 likes in a year. On October 15th, TikToker^[8] @fathermoai posted a meme about reviving the dead god at the bottom of the Mariana trench, garnering over 16,000 views in three months (shown below).

On January 3rd, 2024, u/Kookyburra12 made a post to /r/OutOfTheLoop^[9] asking about the memes, garnering over 200 upvotes in a day. After 24 hours, the top comment by u/TheWizardMus,^[10] with over 600 upvotes, suggests that the meme is inspired by eldritch fiction, writing:

There's been a connection to the deepest parts of the ocean and eldritch fiction since its earliest works by H.P. Lovecraft, the entire genre is based on mystifying and amplifying the fears of the unknown and the bottom of the ocean is the last major unexplored Frontier on earth. The meme is referencing that trope of ancient entities beyond our understanding at the bottom of the ocean. Plus the fish that live down there look weird so they make good "unnatural creature" pictures.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References