About

Moon's Haunted is a catchphrase based on a viral tweet from late 2018. It has since been associated with discussions about the video game Destiny, which features plot points about the moon, which is infested with an alien race known as the Hive.

Origin

On October 29th, 2018, Twitter^[1] user @Dustinkcouch tweeted, "nasa employee: oh hey u guys are back early
astronaut: moon's haunted
nasa employee: what?
astronaut: *loading a pistol and getting back on the rocket-ship* moon's haunted." The post received more than 364,000 likes and 105,000 retweets in less than one year (shown below).

Spread

About two weeks later, on November 14th, Tumblr ^[2] user seamachine used the dialogue for a comic based on the video game Destiny, featuring the in-game player character Guardian. The post received more than 10,000 notes in less than one year (shown below, left).

On December 12th, Redditor ^[3] InterestingSometimes posted the comic in the /r/gaming subreddit. The post received more than 6,000 points (92% upvoted) and 250 comments in less than one year.

Several months later, on June 6th, 2019, a reveal trailer was released for the video Destiny 2: Shadowkeep, which takes place primarily on the moon.^[7] That day, seamachine posted a second comic using the phrase.^[4] The post received more than 870 notes in one week (shown below, center).

The following day, seamchine posted the image on the /r/destiny2 subreddit,^[5] adding an image from the video game to the top of the comic. The post received more than 1,000 points (99% upvoted) and 45 comments in one week (shown below, right).

That day, Redditor^[6] WiseScratch posted "Bungie: if you get Matt Mercer to say 'moon's haunted', I'm buying $20 in silver." The post received more than 5,400 points (98% upvoted) and 385 comments in one week.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References