It's Shredder! Where?

Submission 20,395

Part of a series on Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. [View Related Entries]

About

It's Shredder! Where? refers to a scene from the 1987 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles cartoon in which the villain character Shredder walks into the Turtle's lair with a pizza box and says, "No need, dudes. I brought back some takeout. So, like, let's get down and pig out," to which Leonardo says, "It's Shredder!" making him turn around and say, "Where?" The scene became a meme on YouTube and TikTok in 2023, following a viral TikTok sound and re-animations of the scene on YouTube.

Origin

On October 18th, 1989, season 3, episode 18 of the animated Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series titled, "Cowabunga Shredhead" aired on American television.^[1] In one scene of the episode, the villain Shredder enters the Turtle's Lair with a pizza box and says, "No need, dudes. I brought back some takeout. So, like, let's get down and pig out." Shredder was hypnotized at the moment, thinking that he was Michelangelo.^[1] Then, Leonardo, shocked to see him, exclaimed, "It's Shredder!" to which Shredder said worryingly, "Where?"

On May 21st, 2023, TikToker^[2] @spongeyuteruss posted the scene, gaining roughly 3 million plays and 604,000 likes in three months (shown below, left). Due to the video's virality, TikToker^[3] @baby_mama_man then posted the first-known meme with the scene, captioning it, "when you forget you're wanted for several war crimes in walgreens," gaining roughly 6 million plays and 1 million likes in three months (shown below, right).

Spread

Going into June 2023, TikTokers began using the sound^[4] of @baby_mama_man's video. For instance, one of the first was TikToker^[5] @atfaulker5, who made a joke about being an alcoholic, gaining roughly 907,500 plays and 150,600 likes in two months (shown below, left). On July 7th, 2023, TikToker^[6] @ciggybae posted an iteration about being Zendaya's doppelganger, earning roughly 44.6 million plays and 6.8 million likes in one month (shown below, right).

On July 2nd, 2023, YouTuber^[7] EliteEvyn posted the scene, gaining roughly 2.7 million views and 203,000 likes in one month. Thereafter, various YouTubers started to make memes with the scene, including re-animations. For instance, on July 29th, 2023, YouTuber^[8] Animation Break posted an animation, gaining roughly 10,400 views in two weeks (shown below, left). On August 2nd, 2023, YouTuber^[9] Phoenix Mario posted a Five Nights at Freddy's version called "Its Springtrap, WHERE!?" gaining roughly 285,000 views in 12 days (shown below, right).

Over the course of three months, the meme's primary TikTok sound^[4] amassed over 47,700 videos using it.