What is Defeat Tom Nook?

A catchphrase about the impossible task of beating Animal Crossing's raccoon shopkeeper Tom Nook, who is a vendor and not a fightable boss.

Where did Defeat Tom Nook come from?

From an April 14th, 2020 tweet by @chickpeamcb showing a professor's email that wished students well in defeating Tom Nook, with the professor admitting they had never played the game.

What does Defeat Tom Nook mean?

It means framing a friendly in-game merchant as a boss battle, usually attributed to a parent, professor or other adult who heard about Animal Crossing but never played it.

How do you use Defeat Tom Nook?

People typically quote a relative asking about beating Nook, or write their own parody caption such as the "the animals when they defeat tom nook" video from @mystarryfriends.

Is Defeat Tom Nook still popular?

It peaked in April 2020 alongside the launch window of New Horizons and is now a classic Animal Crossing joke rather than an active trend, with The Daily Dot's recap standing as its main contemporaneous write-up.

Defeat Tom Nook

2020catchphraseclassic

Published November 9, 2026

Defeat Tom Nook is an April 2020 catchphrase born from a confused college professor who emailed students hoping they had vanquished the Animal Crossing shopkeeper, a character you cannot actually fight. The screenshot went viral on Twitter during the first weeks of pandemic lockdown, and within days users were writing parody tweets framing the mild-mannered raccoon as a boss battle their relatives wanted them to win.

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Overview

The joke depends on a simple mismatch: Tom Nook is a bespectacled raccoon merchant who sells furniture and hands out loans in Animal Crossing: New Horizons, not a final boss with a health bar1. Treating him as an enemy to be slain, as if the game were Dark Souls, is the entire bit, and the humor lands harder because the person framing it that way almost always admits they have never played the series2.

Typical posts fall into two shapes. One is the straight-faced repost of an older relative or authority figure sincerely asking about defeating Nook, usually with a short caption marveling at the question3. The other is a self-aware parody where the poster writes as if a victory over Nook is imminent or already achieved, often paired with a celebration video or a reaction image1.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

Email / Twitter (viral spread)

Creator

@chickpeamcb; the professor who wrote the original email is unnamed

Date

2020

On April 14th, 2020, Twitter user @chickpeamcb posted a screenshot of an email from a university professor that read, "I hope you're all doing well and that you've all defeated (?) Tom Nook (?) in Animal Crossing by now (I've never played Animal Crossing)." The caption noted it was 4:24 a.m. and the sender had never touched the game2. Nintendo had released Animal Crossing: New Horizons on March 20th, 2020, and the title became a comfort hit during the earliest weeks of COVID-19 lockdowns, which explains why a professor would reach for it as small talk1.

The original tweet gathered around 160,000 likes and 33,000 retweets within three days, giving the phrasing enough traction for other users to riff on it almost immediately2.

How It Spread

Later on April 14th, Twitter user @octolinghacker posted that their mom had asked whether it was possible to defeat Tom Nook, a tweet that picked up roughly 136,900 likes and 18,500 retweets in three days3. In replies, @octolinghacker said they had shown their mother @chickpeamcb's screenshot, which is how the question spread from one household to another. That same day Redditor degenbetz crossposted the original tweet to r/FellowKids, where it earned around 110 points at 99 percent upvoted4.

Twitter user @angelmendoza___ went in the opposite direction with a defense of the raccoon, writing, "why are y'all trying so hard to defeat tom nook lmao he already has kids," for about 2,200 likes and 110 retweets in two days5. Later that day @mystarryfriends posted a video of people dancing down a street captioned, "the animals when they defeat tom nook idk i never played it," which became one of the best-circulated parody clips of the format6.

The Daily Dot ran a roundup of the tweets on April 15th, 2020, bundling @chickpeamcb's screenshot, @octolinghacker's mom story, and the follow-on parodies into a short explainer and helping the catchphrase travel past gaming Twitter1.

Timeline

2020-03-20

Nintendo releases Animal Crossing: New Horizons, the game that made Tom Nook recognizable enough for non-players to joke about.

2020-04-14

@chickpeamcb tweets the screenshot of a professor's email asking if students had defeated Tom Nook.

2020-04-14

@octolinghacker posts that their mom asked whether defeating Tom Nook was possible, pushing the phrase into viral loops.

2020-04-14

Redditor degenbetz crossposts @chickpeamcb's tweet to r/FellowKids.

2020-04-14

@mystarryfriends posts a celebratory dance video captioned as "the animals when they defeat tom nook."

2020-04-15