About

The "Do You Know Mike Wazowski?" Prank refers to a TikTok trend in which people prank their dad, husband, uncle or mother (etc.) if they remember a person named Mike Wazowski, a.k.a. the green character from the animated Pixar movie series Monsters Inc. The prank works because "Wazowski" sounds like a Polish or Italian name and the men and women being asked the question are usually older and of Italian or Polish decent. Because of their old age, it also means that they're likely unfamiliar with Monsters Inc. The trend started in 2024.

Origin

On March 31st, 2024, TikToker^[1] @allieggarcia posted a video from her Snapchat in which she was asking an older man (presumably her father) if he knew a Mike Wazowski. Her father thought about it and wondered if he was from Staten Island, New York. Over five days, the video received roughly 10.1 million plays and 1.5 million likes (shown below).

Spread

Her video was spread across social media by various Barstool accounts, such as the Instagram^[2] account of @barstoolu on April 2nd, 2024, whose repost gained over 27,400 likes in three days.

Soon after, others did the prank on their own friends and relatives, such as TikToker^[3] @jultavvvv on April 1st, 2024, whose video gained over 2.3 million plays and 112,300 likes in four days (shown below, left).

On April 3rd, 2024, TikToker^[4] @saragaudesi posted a video asking her dad who Mike Wazowski was, gaining over 2.3 million plays and 347,700 likes in two days (shown below, right).

TikTok^[5] videos involving the prank continued going into April 2024.

Various Examples

Search Interest

Unavailable.

External References