I Used the Stones to Destroy the Stones

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

About

"I Used the Stones to Destroy the Stones" is a memorable quote uttered by the character Thanos in the 2019 Marvel superhero film Avengers: Endgame. The line comes after another Avengers: Endgame meme: Gone. Reduced to Atoms.

Origin

On April 26th, 2019, the film Avengers: Endgame was released in the United States.^[1] In the film, the Avengers confront the character Thanos (portrayed by Josh Brolin) about the powerful Infinity Stones, which could bring back the fallen, whom Thanos killed in Avengers: Infinity War. Thanos explains that he "used the stones to destroy the stones."

Spread

On April 30th, Redditor ^[2] SYKKO posted an image of Thanos with the line as the subtitle. The image was captioned, "When you use Task Manager to end Task Manager." The post received more than 1,400 points (99% upvoted) and 10 comments in less than two months (shown below, left).

On May 27th, Redditor^[3] EpicRicardo posted a variation in which the image is juxtraposed with a drug dealer tip line and the Thanos line is altered to read "I used the stoners to destroy the stoners." The post received more than 76,000 points (96% upvoted) and 365 comments in less than one months (shown below, center).

Several days later, on June 8th, Imgur ^[4] user ammogirlt400 posted the image below a video about a coffee cup that is made from coffee grounds. They altered the Thanos line to read, "I used the coffee to hold the coffee." The post received more than 79,000 views and 1,700 points in three days (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Template

Search Interest

External References