McDonald’s new Grimace milkshake has sparked an entire movement around treating the beverage like the murder weapon from a Japanese horror game. Zoomers and other TikTok users were pretending to die after slurping up the purple goop and now they’re pretending the Grimace Shake is what also killed their favorite anime and gaming characters.
It’s tough to figure out exactly why a particular moment in our absurd, profit-driven culture becomes a lightning rod of memes and posting, but here we are with McDonald’s commemoration of Grimace’s birthday. For anyone who doesn’t know, the big purple guy is literally just a humanoid taste bud, not a post-apocalyptic mutant formed from the irradiated detritus of old Big Macs. And now his milkshake is taking over even the nerdier corners of the internet.
If there’s an infamous death in gaming, anime, or beyond, you can bet it’s now been made even better, and/or defiled, depending on your point of view, by the Grimace Shake meme. They’re a perfect collision of specialized fan lore and complete context collapse:
https://twitter.com/embed/status/1673608863080411140
Aerith drank the Grimace shake 😔 pic.twitter.com/fz0GpX2HhP
— Jessica Cogswell 🌸 (@awildjessichu) June 27, 2023
Happy Birthday, Grimace! pic.twitter.com/dnxIEVE2nn
— Sonic the Hedgehog (@sonic_hedgehog) June 27, 2023
Thinking about Yamcha drinking the Grimace shake pic.twitter.com/i02AFKUMhn
— Anh Dang (@anhdangerous) June 27, 2023
Link drank the Grimace Shake 😨 pic.twitter.com/grkKc9LELv
— Nintendo Life (@nintendolife) June 28, 2023
Oh no Ghost tried the Grimace Shake pic.twitter.com/RwDzUzBAMC
— squid🦑🔞 ceo of yaoi (@SOLDIERcallboy) June 28, 2023
https://twitter.com/embed/status/1673902989692510210
Megatron overdoes on the grimace shake pic.twitter.com/Qyc6L8RNUh
— maxx (@battleupsaber) June 28, 2023
Happy birthday Grimace! pic.twitter.com/6nQKZk8Z8K
— Solar Flair (@SolarFlairYT) June 28, 2023
Grimace Shake #FF16 pic.twitter.com/AFZzR0ipah
— 🎃𝔸𝕆𝕀𝕂𝕌ℝ𝔸🎃 (@aoikuraFF) June 28, 2023
WHAT IS HAPPENING WITH THE GRIMACE SHAKE pic.twitter.com/z0yfABo6eZ
— crystal!💗 (@CrystalAvenger) June 27, 2023
https://twitter.com/embed/status/1674074147285090305
Good morning pic.twitter.com/ijZZN0DC1t
— Sho (@Shoyoumomo_) June 28, 2023
https://twitter.com/embed/status/1674422972017430529
NO JUNKRAT, DON'T DRINK THE GRIMACE SHA–
oh you're fine, you survived radiation exposure pic.twitter.com/Me7CoH2JvK
— applecider.bsky.social // (@appleciderwitch) June 28, 2023
HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRIMACE!!! pic.twitter.com/8993viwecr
— Joecanvas🇵🇭 (@joecanvas) June 28, 2023
JOSHUA- NOT THE GRIMACE SHAKE! NO JOSHUA! NOOOOO pic.twitter.com/WHJPOP99Nq
— eleni 🦇 (@elenimut_art) June 28, 2023
happy birthday grimace pic.twitter.com/Dbew2ucCuT
— rocky (@bigchunkyrocks) June 29, 2023
Did you drink the Grimace shake? pic.twitter.com/H43uT6kURc
— MegaRockEXE (@megarock_exe) June 29, 2023
I’m sure the Golden Arches couldn’t be more pleased. Is all this meming making you thirsty for what a company spokesperson confirmed was just a mixture of sugar, water, corn syrup, and a mysterious unnamed “natural flavor” that’s vaguely berry-ish in nature? A review over at Cleveland.com describes the Grimace milkshake as “not thrilling but nice” and like “if someone dropped a Wild Berry Pop Tart into a fairly standard vanilla milkshake and then hit the pulverize button on the blender.”
Coincidentally, that’s how I would describe most video games. Grimace, on the other hand, needs to fall back down the online memory well and take his foul concoctions with him.
Update 6/30/2023 10:42 a.m. ET: Added more Grimace memes because this is what the giant purple squishmallow demands.
