Dune Sandworm

About

Dune Sandworm refers to the sandworm, also known as Shai-Hulud, from the Dune universe, which was photoshopped into a series of image macros after the release of the Dune (2021) movie that uses an image of a sandworm as an exploitable. The first sandworm meme was posted to Instagram in early September 2021. Such memes became prevalent on Twitter and Reddit, among other platforms, starting in late October 2021. Most memes involving the sandworm make jokes about it being hole-adjacent, as well as using it for object-labeling.

Origin

Dune was released to theaters and streaming services on October 21st, 2021. However, the earliest known sandworm meme using a sandworm image from the 2021 movie was posted by Instagram^[1] account @cultofdoom on September 7th, 2021 (taken from a trailer). The meme (shown below) received many likes, however, the exact number is unknown because @cultofdoom has chosen to not display the number on the post.

Spread

On October 22nd, 2021, the day after the film had officially been released, sandworm memes began appearing on Twitter. Twitter^[2] user @awards_watch posted the first known sandworm meme on the platform on the 22nd. The tweet (shown below, left) received roughly 32,900 likes over the course of 14 days. Twitter^[3] user @yasirmustapha replied to @awards_watch with their own sandworm meme. The meme (shown below, right) received 183 likes over 14 days.

Sandworm memes began appearing on Reddit soon after. On October 23rd, 2021, Redditor^[4] DTill posted the first known sandworm meme on the platform to the /r/dunememes subreddit. The image (shown below, left) has actor Shia Labeouf's face photoshopped onto it. The Reddit post received 64 upvotes over 13 days. On October 24th, Redditor^[5] oprogrammer posted another sandworm meme to /r/dunememes, this time referencing the 'Island Boy' Freestyle in it. The meme (shown below, right) received 19 upvotes over 12 days.

More sandworm memes were posted across platforms going into November 2021. Some utilized references to other memes like Two Soyjaks Pointing ^[6] and Bussy, ^[7] among others.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References