About
Sanctuary Guardian is a soundtrack composition from the 1994 video game Earthbound (Mother 2: Giygas Strikes Back) which plays during the boss battles. Starting in late February 2020, the composition gained popularity in ironic demotivational poster edits, usually playing when something weird is being said or something unusual happens, accompanied by captions such as “WHAT,” “HOW”, etc.
Origin
On August 27th, 1994, role-playing video game “Mother 2: Gyigas Strikes Back:Lhttps://knowyourmeme.com/memes/subcultures/earthbound-mother was released in Japan. On June 5th, 1995, the game was released in North America as EarthBound. During the battles with six out of eight Sanctuary Guardians, the boss enemies of the game, music track Sanctuary Guardian plays (music video shown below). The composition is a remix of “Battle With a Dangerous Foe,” the boss music from the original Mother game released in 1989.
Prior to February 25th, an unknown user posted an ironic demotivational poster meme based on a clip of Martin Cabello III saying “you’re fucking dead,” which used the composition. On February 25th, YouTube user boto reuploaded the video. On February 26th, the clip was uploaded by Twitter account @StrangestMp4, gaining over 312,500 views, 6,700 retweets and 29,500 likes in three months (shown below).
— Strangest Videos Online (@StrangestMp4) February 27, 2020
On the same day, Twitter user @Diram290 posted an uncropped version of the meme, with the full caption being “WHAT, you are actually dead.”
Spread
On March 7th, 2020, Instagram user succc.exe posted the earliest known derivative meme based on the format, editing a viral clip of cat named Comet walking on its hind paws (shown below, left). The edit received over 65,300 views and 17,300 likes in three months. On March 16th, Instagram user cinemaparamount posted an edit of Sonic the Hedgehog clip in which character Dr. Robotnik saying, “look what came out of my egg sac.” The post received over 7,600 views and 1,200 likes. In mid-March 2020, both succc.exe’s and cinemaparamount’s edits received viral spread online with multiple reuploads on Twitter, YouTube and Reddit.
On March 16th, 2020, MaxMoeFoe retweeted the original Martin Cabello edit, gaining over 2,700 retweets and 17,100 likes. The format gained further traction in late March 2020; for example, on March 25th, YouTuber IceyPino posted a STFU I’m Listening to meme based on the song (shown below).
The format maintained its popularity through April 2020, with multiple viral edits being posted online on YouTube, Instagram and Twitter. For example, on April 10th, Instagram use rikkasmywaifu posted a Rikka Takanashi meme which was widely circulated online. On April 27th, 2020, Twitter account @TomAndIsabelle2 posted an Animal Crossing version of the meme which received over 1,500 retweets and 5,300 likes in one month.
Awesome, He Finally / Scatman’s World
Scatman’s World is a song by American musician and singer Scatman John. First released as a second single from 1995 album of the same name, the song has since appeared in multiple memes and gained significant popularity in meme edits on iFunny and Instagram in July 2019, particularly of ironic Awesome, He Finally genre.
Various Examples
Search Interest
Know Your Meme Store
External References
Source: https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/sanctuary-guardian