Me and My Gru (Crew)

There are a lot of topics to choose from with Roe vs. Wade being revoked, Biden tweeting to gas companies to lower gas prices (lol), and the stock market continuing to do a lot of nothing. Media outlets have turned to half-assed, reused articles that are probably reprints of older models (Don’t quote me I’m just talking) and it’s getting boring. Headlines have remained negative for the past 6 months and will likely stay that way until the end of the year. Thankfully, I’ve got a different piece I’d like to write about, one that fits my persona. Anyone that follows my Twitter account knows that it is a blend of options trading, charts, vague signals, and memes. Recently, the memes tend to outpace options trading since the market continues to take a downturn. I’ve touched on the power of memes once or twice in previous articles and am a firm believer that social media and low-tier comedy have a driving force in both markets and society. Over the past few weeks, there has been a prime example all over Tiktok, Instagram, and Twitter as the “Minions: Rise of Gru” premier has become a highly anticipated box office release. 

These platforms have been home to videos of “gentlemen” meeting at the theater to enjoy a splendid evening filled with popped corn, expensive candy, and the minions. These “gentlemen” are dressed in full suits or as minions in these videos as if they were attending a red carpet event. It isn’t the first time the minions have been a meme. Originally, these twinkie-shaped characters were posted around Facebook by moms and other individuals who weren’t as edgy as the up-and-coming meme lords we know today. Their meme consisted of the minions standing in front of a blank canvas with the text “Exercise, I thought you said extra fries”. This meme circulated on Instagram for a few months to mock the comedically challenged Facebook users but eventually, the minions were adopted by a new generation. This brings us to Yeat, a 22-year-old rapper from Irvine California. Yeat rose to fame in 2021 after his “4L” mixtape was released. His music seems to be a joke but in all honesty, it probably isn’t. Aside from that, his songs have been used in numerous Tiktoks and his following has now grown to 7.2 million monthly listeners on Spotify. He later came to release the song “Rich Minions”, a song made for “Minions: The Rise of Gru”. The song can be found in almost every video depicting a group of gentlemen about to enjoy the film. The meme has gotten out of hand…in a good way. 

Illumination’s “Minions: The Rise of Gru” has had a star-spangled banger of a weekend this 4th of July, projecting $129.2 million dollars over the four-day holiday weekend. If this movie achieves its projections, it will be the highest-grossing film released on Independence Day weekend, taking over Paramount’s “Transformers: Dark of the Moon”. The film was originally set to pull in about $60 million over the weekend but with such a wide net being cast, those numbers have doubled. The worldwide debut is expected to be $196.6 million. According to RelishMix social media analytics, “Top engagement comes from 219.8M views on YouTube and a robust new TikTok channel for the movie itself, with 175.6M views. Reposting rates on YouTube are outpacing norms at a rate of 28:1. The long-running Facebook with 32.1M fans and the studio’s social network of 45.2M with more key performance indicators are tracking strong,” reports RelishMix. Nothing but positive chatter on social for Rise of Gru, with “fans plopping in playful sound effects, zingers, emojis, and excitement for the film’s opening, as they give out pre-ratings for Minions at 10 of 10″ (Deadline) The hype around the minion’s movie has dropped sales for “Top Gun: Maverick” this weekend, alongside “Lightyear” and “Elvis” taking a hit. It is an incredible thing to witness as meme lords have somehow created something out of nothing. I had the pleasure of viewing the film over the weekend and can say I wasn’t disappointed. It will be interesting to see if any other film companies try to promote through social media in a meme format. It will come off as cringe unless they’re able to do it right. Thanks for reading and have a safe 4th.