About

T As In Troy? refers to an exploitable meme from the Disney film High School Musical 2 in which the lead character Troy Bolton (played by actor Zac Efron) gifts a "T" necklace to his girlfriend Gabriella Montez (played by Vanessa Hudgens). The scene shows Gabriella asking Troy if the necklace is "T as in Troy," to which Troy answers, "Well, I … yeah." Troy's stuttering and hesitant reply is often edited to reflect a different, humorous and more biting response to Gabriella, also commonly changing what the "T" stands for and using the original dialogue as a phrasal template.

Origin

The Disney film High School Musical 2 was released on August 17th, 2007, and followed the story of high school lovers Troy Bolton (Zac Efron) and Gabriella Montez (Vanessa Hudgens) as they deal with turbulence in their relationship.

Toward the start of the film, Troy gifts Gabriella a "T" pendant necklace. Gabriella asks Troy if the necklace is "T as in Troy," to which Troy answers, "Well, I … yeah."

YouTuber^[1] "ZanessaLiveInLove101" posted a low-quality reupload of the scene on April 27th, 2008. The post gathered over 13,000 likes in 16 years. YouTuber^[2] mariamsvogue also posted a higher-quality upload of the scene on January 5th, 2022, gathering over 30,000 views in three years.

One of the earliest "T as in Troy" memes was originally posted to Tumblr by an unknown account, showing Troy Bolton saying "No, T as in Titties." Twitter^[3] user @childhoodRUlNED reposted the meme on June 2nd, 2013, with a subsequent 9GAG^[4] Twitter reupload gathering over 1,000 likes in 12 years.

Spread

On February 28th, 2014, Twitter^[5] user @ChildhoodShows posted a version of the "T as in Troy" meme, showing Troy replying, "No bitch, T as in thyroid cancer." The post gathered over 8,000 likes in 10 years.

The meme lulled in the 2010s before seeing a resurgence in the late 2010s, with Tumblr^[6] user @peeterparkr posting a version of the meme in which Troy expresses his admiration of the Marvel character Tony Stark (Iron Man) on May 9th, 2018, gathering over 13,000 notes in seven years.

In May 2019, Vanessa Hudgens^[8] reposted a meme to her Instagram Story, showing Troy saying, "T as in Ted Bundy," a reference to Zac Efron playing the notorious serial killer in the 2019 Netflix film Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile.

THe Instagram^[7] page @feminist posted a version of the meme that shows Troy saying, "No Gabriella, T as in take the Coronavirus seriously." The April 2nd, 2020, post gathered over 200,000 likes in five years.

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References