It Just Works

About

"It Just Works" is a catchphrase that has appeared in memes related to Apple, Todd Howard and JoJo's Bizarre Adventure stand character King Crimson. In memes about Todd Howard, the phrase is often used as an ironic caption for images and videos of bugs in Bethesda video games. In memes about King Crimson, the phrase is used to refer to many people's inability to comprehend the ability of the character.

Origin

Apple

"It just works" has been a mantra of Apple's CEO and founder Steve Jobs and one of the underlying principle's of the company for several decades.^[1][2] The phrase has been said by Steve Jobs in multiple interviews and product presentations over his career (compilation video shown below), being used by Steve Jobs to summarize Apple's vision of selling technology that requires minimum technical understanding from its user and "just works."

It just works. Seamlessly.

King Crimson

In the early 2012, the phrase "it just works" achieved popularity in the JoJo's Bizarre Adventure fandom, becoming associated with the stand King Crimson due to many people's inability to comprehend the stand's complicated "Time Erasure" ability. As many users asked questions about the ability, and others attempted to explain it, sometimes with graphs and illustrations, "it just works" became a commonplace reply, with users then creating memes based on the phrase.

For example, On October 22nd, 2012, an anonymous 4chan poster uploaded^[3] an image parodying an Apple advert containing the phrase with King Crimson's head superimposed over the logo (shown below, left). On September 17th, 2014, Know Your Meme^[4] user Bullet Rabbid posted an Expand Dong version of the meme to the site (shown below, right).

Todd Howard

On June 14th, 2015, Bethesda director Todd Hoard presented then-upcoming role-playing video game Fallout 4 at the E3 gaming expo. During the presentation,^[5] as Howard showcases how building settlements in the game works, he comments "it just works" twice (24:31 mark).

And one of the great things about having a fully dynamic game engine is all of it just works. In real time. Rip it apart, build the way you want.[…]
And then you run wires that connect them all, and again – it just works.

Spread

From June 2015 and onward, the phrase has been primarily associated with Todd Howard and video games developed by Bethesda, being used as an ironic comment on bugs and other gameplay issues in them, For example, on November 6th, 2015, an anonymous 4chan^[6] user posted an image macro captioned with the phrase and with Todd Howard's face superimposed over that of Steve Jobs (shown below left). On March 3rd, 2021, Tenor^[7] user OscarMcGouch posted a reaction GIF of Todd Howard captioned with the line (shown below, right).

On June 10th, 2019, music collective The Chalkeaters posted "It Just Works," a parody song about Todd Howard that accumulated over 18 million views on YouTube^[8] in four years (shown below).

It just works, it just works
Little lies, stunning shows
People buy, money flows, it just works
It just works, it just works

In September 2023, the meme saw a surge in popularity following the release of the 2023 role-playing video game Starfield.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References