About
Don’t Turn Me Into Marketable Plushies refers to a series of memes which imagine various fictional characters protesting against being turned into plushies, and then being turned into ones against their will.
Origin
On April 29th, 2020, Twitter user @skurletonVA posted a dubbed meme which imagined SpongeBob SquarePants character Plankton protesting against being turned into a marketable plushie and then being turned into one despite his pleas. The meme (shown below) received over 5,300 retweets and comments, 18,100 likes and 115,300 views in two months.
more plankton bullshit pic.twitter.com/jzQ5ammg82
— Gehrig Schreiber (@skurletonVA) April 29, 2020
Spread
Also on April 29th, 2020, Twitter user @Nessnesn64 posted the earliest derivative meme, combining the new format with I Don’t Wanna Be Bread. The post received over 2,500 views in two months.
In May 2020, the format received limited spread online with only a few viral memes being posted. For example, on May 2nd, Twitter user @bonniemvo posted a Five Nights at Freddy’s version to Twitter and Reddit, with the meme gaining over 3,200 views on Twitter and 3,600 upvotes in /r/fivenightsatfreddys subreddit in two months (video shown below). The meme has been reposted online multiple times, prompting more similar FNaF memes posted on YouTube on May 26th and May 30th.
— Bonnie M (@bonniemvo) May 2, 2020
The format saw more active spread in June 2020; for example, on June 22nd, Instagram user jumplamp007 posted a Family Guy meme that received over 12,100 views and 2,900 likes in two weeks (shown below, left). The massive surge in the popularity of the format was triggered when on June 28th, Twitter user and Redditor helpmetonyr posted a George Floyd version of the meme (shown below). Although the original posts did not get traction, a June 29th repost by Instagram user liltripie (shown below, right) received over 13,100 views and 3,300 likes, with a same-day repost by iFunny user Blank333 gaining over 3,600 smiles in nine days.
In late June-early July 2020, the format achieved major spread online on Twitter, Instagram, iFunny and other sites.
Various Examples
— Internet Janitor🌹 (@InternetJanito1) July 6, 2020
Search Interest
Know Your Meme Store
External References
Source: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/dont-turn-me-into-marketable-plushies