Earth Just Lost Her Best Defender

Editor's Note: This entry contains spoilers for Avengers: Infinity War; read at your own caution.

About

"Earth Just Lost Her Best Defender" is a memorable quote uttered by the character Captain America in the 2018 Marvel superhero film Avengers: Infinity War. Since the release of the film, the phrase has been used as a reaction image macro to express feelings of remorse over another, both sincerely and ironically.

Origin

On April 27th, 2018, the film Avengers: Infinity War was released in the United States.^[1] In the film, when the character Captain America is informed that Iron Man (portrayed by Robert Downey Jr and Chris Evans, respectively) has disappeared, he responds, "Earth just lost her best defender" (clip below).

Spread

Following the release of the film, fans began using the image as a reaction in reference to the film. For example, on May 6th, 2018, Twitter ^[2] user @bingthisway posted the quote and image of Captain America saying the line. The post received more than 350 retweets and 880 likes in one year (shown below, left). Three days later, Twitter^[3] user @tonysassb tweeted the image with the caption "Can we all appreciate Steve's character development: he went from 'I know guys who are worth ten of you' to implying that earth's greatest hero was Tony, I'M CRYING." The tweet received more than 800 retweets and 1,300 likes in one year (shown below, center).

Several months later, Redditor ^[4] BattleUpSaber posted the image as a reaction to the cancelation of the Marvel television series Daredevil. The post received more than 160 points (98% upvoted) in less than one year (shown below, right).

On December 21st, iFunny ^[5] user Legendary posted a variation with the caption, "When the person who always asked the teacher personal questions to get them to monologue gets suspended." The post received more than 67,000 upvotes in less than six months (shown below).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References