The Confused Mr. Krabs meme is a reaction image of Mr. Krabs from the animated television program Spongebob Squarepants with a confused look on his face amidst a spinning environment. The image often accompanies jokes online in which the poster is confused, scared, or disoriented.
The Confused Mr. Krabs screenshot is from the Spongebob episode, “Patty Hype,” which first aired on February 24th, 2001. The premise of the episode involves Spongebob quitting the Krusty Krab and starting his own very popular rival, Pretty Patties.
When Mr. Krabs witnesses the success of Pretty Patties, he bargains with Spongebob to take it over. However, at that moment, a mob of angry customers descend upon Pretty Patties, demanding refunds for the unintentional side effects the patties have had on their bodies.
The meme first appeared online via Twitter on January 31st, 2016. User ishatahmed posted an image of Mr. Krabs from the final scene of the episode with motion blur added and the caption: “When you just wake up from a nap and your parents already yelling at you".
The tweet (since deleted) received 6,352 retweets and 7,370 likes.
A few days after the initial tweet, Twitter aggregator WORIDSTARHIPHOP recreated it, passing the meme off as its own on February 2nd. The post received over 1,600 retweets and 2,700 likes. From there, several other prominent Twitter accounts posted the image with different captions. On February 3rd, for example, freddyamazin posted a version on Twitter that garnered 2,600 retweets and 6,200 likes.
The format remained popular through March of that year, particularly on the subreddit /r/blackpeopletwitter, where the image became common. Several popular examples earned over 1000 points apiece, the most popular of which came from justgoblaze, who earned 3,969 points (with a 90% upvote) in less than 24 hours.
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