About

Mirror Cat, also known as Octopussy, is a photograph of a cat sitting beside a mirror, the reflection making it appear to have eight legs, while a normal cat stands beside it. In early July 2021, it became a meme template on Reddit where it was used as an exploitable image macro and object-labeling meme.

Origin

On July 5th, 2021, the image (seen below) was posted to the /r/aww^[1] subreddit by u/SmartVander252. Before being removed from the subreddit by moderators, it received over 38,700 upvotes and 462 comments in less than 24 hours.

The same day, the picture was reuploaded in the form of an object-labeling meme to /r/memes^[2] by Redditor u/MadLad702 (seen below). It earned over 19,500 upvotes and 400 comments in roughly 24 hours.

Spread

The image itself became popularized on Reddit’s animal subreddits, such as /r/MEOW_IRL and /r/eyebleach. It also began to trend in several different posts on /r/Bossfight,^[3] including the post (seen below) by u/YzdYzdYzd with over 10,300 upvotes and 62 comments on July 5th.

Redditor u/MadLad702 aided in the spread of the meme format to different subreddits after their original meme on /r/memes within the following two days. For example, they originally posted this meme (seen below) to /r/ToolBand,^[4] where it received 61 upvotes in less than 24 hours.

Various Examples

Template

Search Interest

External References