Murder Hornet Invasion

2020Event meme / reaction jokes / exploitabledead

Also known as: Murder Hornets · Asian Giant Hornet Memes

Murder Hornet Invasion is a May 2020 reaction-meme wave sparked by New York Times reports of invasive Asian giant hornets in Washington state, embodying absurdist pandemic-era dread.

Murder Hornet Invasion is a wave of memes that erupted in early May 2020 after the New York Times reported on the arrival of Asian giant hornets in Washington state. Coming at the height of COVID-19 lockdowns, the news about two-inch-long hornets that decapitate honeybees hit the internet like a punchline nobody asked for. The meme captured a collective 2020 mood: the year was already a nightmare, and now nature was sending murder hornets.

2020 memescovid 19 memesabsurdist humor memesanimal memes

Overview

The Murder Hornet Invasion meme refers to the avalanche of jokes, tweets, and image macros that followed a May 2020 New York Times report on Asian giant hornets (Vespa mandarinia) being found in the United States for the first time1. The world's largest hornets, capable of growing over two inches long, kill roughly 50 people per year in Japan and can wipe out entire honeybee colonies by decapitating tens of thousands of bees in hours2.

The memes weren't really about the hornets themselves. They were about the absurdity of 2020. With the COVID-19 pandemic already dominating daily life, the sudden appearance of an insect nicknamed "murder hornet" felt like the universe was running a disaster randomizer. Most jokes followed the format of listing 2020's escalating catastrophes, with murder hornets as the latest (and most cartoonishly villainous) addition6.

On May 2nd, 2020, New York Times journalist Mike Baker published an article titled "'Murder Hornets' in the U.S.: The Rush to Stop the Asian Giant Hornet"1. The piece told the story of Washington beekeeper Ted McFall, who discovered thousands of his bees with their heads ripped from their bodies. The culprit: Asian giant hornets, which use shark-fin-shaped mandibles to massacre entire hives1.

The hornets had actually been spotted months earlier. Washington's Department of Agriculture first confirmed a dead Asian giant hornet in December 20193. But the NYT article, with its vivid descriptions and alarming nickname, was the match that lit the meme fire.

The hornets had gotten some online attention before the invasion memes took off. On November 25, 2018, YouTuber Coyote Peterson posted a video of himself getting stung by an Asian giant hornet on the Brave Wilderness channel, which pulled in more than 7.4 million views in under two years4.

Origin & Background

Platform
New York Times (news article), Twitter (viral meme spread)
Key People
Mike Baker, Community-created
Date
2020

On May 2nd, 2020, New York Times journalist Mike Baker published an article titled "'Murder Hornets' in the U.S.: The Rush to Stop the Asian Giant Hornet". The piece told the story of Washington beekeeper Ted McFall, who discovered thousands of his bees with their heads ripped from their bodies. The culprit: Asian giant hornets, which use shark-fin-shaped mandibles to massacre entire hives.

The hornets had actually been spotted months earlier. Washington's Department of Agriculture first confirmed a dead Asian giant hornet in December 2019. But the NYT article, with its vivid descriptions and alarming nickname, was the match that lit the meme fire.

The hornets had gotten some online attention before the invasion memes took off. On November 25, 2018, YouTuber Coyote Peterson posted a video of himself getting stung by an Asian giant hornet on the Brave Wilderness channel, which pulled in more than 7.4 million views in under two years.

How It Spread

The memes went nuclear within hours of the NYT article dropping. That morning, Baker tweeted a link to his piece, describing the hornets' stinger as feeling like "red-hot thumbtacks being driven into my flesh." The tweet grabbed over 24,000 likes and 12,000 retweets in two days.

Writer Scott Wampler quote-tweeted the article with "lmao God is just straight-up done with our bullshit," pulling 19,000 likes and 5,600 retweets. On the same day, Twitter user @LeahCsMovies posted an Anthony Adams (Spice Adams) laughing reaction with the caption "Everyone: What else could possibly happen in May?" That post blew up to 833,000 views, 43,000 likes, and 14,000 retweets.

Instagram account @grapejuiceboys contributed a Don Draper Life Cereal Pitch parody about the hornets, earning 48,000 likes in under 24 hours. By May 3rd, Reddit user wilymon shared a photo of the hornets in someone's palm on a subreddit, pulling 55,000 upvotes with 91% approval and nearly 5,000 comments. Related posts on /r/Wellthatsucks and /r/natureismetal each crossed 15,000 points.

The phrase "murder hornet" trended on Twitter throughout the weekend as the internet collectively processed yet another 2020 curveball. Multiple outlets covered the meme wave, including BuzzFeed, Mashable, The Daily Dot, and Distractify.

A common thread across the jokes was treating 2020 as a disaster checklist or a particularly cruel game of bingo. One popular tweet format imagined a conversation between an angel and God, with God casually adding "murder hornets" to the year's lineup. Others riffed on legal technicalities ("They are only murder hornets if they're convicted") and geographical wine jokes ("They're only murder hornets if they come from the Murdèr region of France, otherwise they are just sparkling manslaughter bees").

How to Use This Meme

The murder hornet meme typically works in a few formats:

The 2020 disaster escalation: List increasingly terrible events from 2020 (pandemic, economic collapse, civil unrest) and add murder hornets as the latest entry. Usually delivered through existing templates like Drake, expanding brain, or the "angel and God" dialogue format.

The "what's next?" reaction: Use any reaction image or template to express overwhelmed disbelief, captioned with something about murder hornets being the final straw.

The personification of 2020: Frame 2020 itself as a hostile entity that keeps adding new threats. Murder hornets function as the punchline to the question "what could possibly go wrong next?"

Legal/wordplay jokes: Riff on the word "murder" in the name, applying courtroom language, true crime tropes, or classification humor to the hornets.

The format works best when the joke focuses on human helplessness against an absurd cascade of problems, rather than the hornets themselves.

Cultural Impact

The murder hornet meme crossed over into mainstream news coverage almost instantly. NBC Los Angeles, CBS News, and other broadcast outlets ran segments that referenced the online reaction alongside the actual entomological threat. The meme and the news story were so intertwined that scientists had to push back against the hype. Entomologist Lynn Kimsey at UC Davis told reporters, "Your neighbor's dog is probably more dangerous," and noted the hornets may have already died in the cold.

Task & Purpose took the meme's energy to its logical extreme by asking the Pentagon whether the U.S. military had been tasked with eradicating the hornets. A defense official responded that "murder's a pretty strong term to level at an entire species, as it implies intent, which must be proven in a court of law," before adding that the military would "engage it under cover of darkness" if forced to confront the insects. The Ohio-based flamethrower company Throwflame reported an uptick in sales, with particular interest in their TF-19 Wasp drone flamethrower.

The David Suzuki Foundation used the media moment to redirect attention to the real threats facing pollinators, noting that while murder hornets posed little near-term danger, honeybees were already living in a "dystopian plot line" of pesticides, habitat loss, and climate change.

Fans of The Simpsons pointed to the 1993 episode "Marge in Chains" (Season 4, Episode 21), which depicted a flu virus spreading from Asia to Springfield followed by a swarm of "Killer Bees" escaping from a crate. While not an exact match, the combination of pandemic plus dangerous insects felt eerily close to reality.

CBS News later produced a longer feature following beekeeper Ted McFall's ongoing battle to protect his hives, reporting that Washington entomologists were experimenting with infrared cameras and even radio transmitters attached to the hornets (possible because they're large enough) to locate underground nests. The nickname "murder hornet" itself likely came from a mistranslation from Japanese that went viral after the NYT article used it.

Fun Facts

A group of hornets is sometimes called a "bike," a fact that the David Suzuki Foundation noted while covering the hysteria.

Asian giant hornets are so large that researchers can physically attach radio transmitters to individual insects to track them back to their nests.

Japanese honeybees have a natural defense against the hornets: they swarm an intruder and vibrate their bodies to raise the temperature, essentially cooking the hornet alive.

The entomologist leading Washington's response, Chris Looney, publicly disliked the "murder hornet" name, arguing it exaggerated the human health risk.

Beekeeper Ted McFall stashed one of his daughter's tennis rackets near his traps as a last resort against the hornets, citing his "pretty good serve" from high school.

Derivatives & Variations

Angel and God dialogue memes:

A popular format where an angel updates God on human progress and God casually introduces murder hornets. Multiple versions went viral on Twitter[5].

"Sparkling manslaughter bees" joke:

A wine-region riff ("They're only murder hornets if they come from the Murdèr region of France") that became a widely shared standalone tweet[5].

Don Draper pitch parody:

Instagram account @grapejuiceboys created a murder hornet version of the Don Draper Life Cereal pitch format, which earned 48,000 likes[4].

Simpsons "predicted it" posts:

Screenshots from the 1993 episode "Marge in Chains" circulated as evidence The Simpsons predicted both COVID and murder hornets[10].

Pentagon response memes:

Task & Purpose's deadpan exchange with the Department of Defense about nuking the hornets generated its own wave of shares and commentary[8].

April 2020 Disaster Predictions overlap:

The meme fed into and merged with the broader "2020 Disaster Bingo" format that was already circulating during early pandemic lockdowns[4].

Frequently Asked Questions

Murder Hornet Invasion

2020Event meme / reaction jokes / exploitabledead

Also known as: Murder Hornets · Asian Giant Hornet Memes

Murder Hornet Invasion is a May 2020 reaction-meme wave sparked by New York Times reports of invasive Asian giant hornets in Washington state, embodying absurdist pandemic-era dread.

Murder Hornet Invasion is a wave of memes that erupted in early May 2020 after the New York Times reported on the arrival of Asian giant hornets in Washington state. Coming at the height of COVID-19 lockdowns, the news about two-inch-long hornets that decapitate honeybees hit the internet like a punchline nobody asked for. The meme captured a collective 2020 mood: the year was already a nightmare, and now nature was sending murder hornets.

2020 memes covid 19 memes absurdist humor memes animal memes

Overview

The Murder Hornet Invasion meme refers to the avalanche of jokes, tweets, and image macros that followed a May 2020 New York Times report on Asian giant hornets (Vespa mandarinia) being found in the United States for the first time. The world's largest hornets, capable of growing over two inches long, kill roughly 50 people per year in Japan and can wipe out entire honeybee colonies by decapitating tens of thousands of bees in hours.

The memes weren't really about the hornets themselves. They were about the absurdity of 2020. With the COVID-19 pandemic already dominating daily life, the sudden appearance of an insect nicknamed "murder hornet" felt like the universe was running a disaster randomizer. Most jokes followed the format of listing 2020's escalating catastrophes, with murder hornets as the latest (and most cartoonishly villainous) addition.

On May 2nd, 2020, New York Times journalist Mike Baker published an article titled "'Murder Hornets' in the U.S.: The Rush to Stop the Asian Giant Hornet". The piece told the story of Washington beekeeper Ted McFall, who discovered thousands of his bees with their heads ripped from their bodies. The culprit: Asian giant hornets, which use shark-fin-shaped mandibles to massacre entire hives.

The hornets had actually been spotted months earlier. Washington's Department of Agriculture first confirmed a dead Asian giant hornet in December 2019. But the NYT article, with its vivid descriptions and alarming nickname, was the match that lit the meme fire.

The hornets had gotten some online attention before the invasion memes took off. On November 25, 2018, YouTuber Coyote Peterson posted a video of himself getting stung by an Asian giant hornet on the Brave Wilderness channel, which pulled in more than 7.4 million views in under two years.

Origin & Background

Platform
New York Times (news article), Twitter (viral meme spread)
Key People
Mike Baker, Community-created
Date
2020

On May 2nd, 2020, New York Times journalist Mike Baker published an article titled "'Murder Hornets' in the U.S.: The Rush to Stop the Asian Giant Hornet". The piece told the story of Washington beekeeper Ted McFall, who discovered thousands of his bees with their heads ripped from their bodies. The culprit: Asian giant hornets, which use shark-fin-shaped mandibles to massacre entire hives.

The hornets had actually been spotted months earlier. Washington's Department of Agriculture first confirmed a dead Asian giant hornet in December 2019. But the NYT article, with its vivid descriptions and alarming nickname, was the match that lit the meme fire.

The hornets had gotten some online attention before the invasion memes took off. On November 25, 2018, YouTuber Coyote Peterson posted a video of himself getting stung by an Asian giant hornet on the Brave Wilderness channel, which pulled in more than 7.4 million views in under two years.

How It Spread

The memes went nuclear within hours of the NYT article dropping. That morning, Baker tweeted a link to his piece, describing the hornets' stinger as feeling like "red-hot thumbtacks being driven into my flesh." The tweet grabbed over 24,000 likes and 12,000 retweets in two days.

Writer Scott Wampler quote-tweeted the article with "lmao God is just straight-up done with our bullshit," pulling 19,000 likes and 5,600 retweets. On the same day, Twitter user @LeahCsMovies posted an Anthony Adams (Spice Adams) laughing reaction with the caption "Everyone: What else could possibly happen in May?" That post blew up to 833,000 views, 43,000 likes, and 14,000 retweets.

Instagram account @grapejuiceboys contributed a Don Draper Life Cereal Pitch parody about the hornets, earning 48,000 likes in under 24 hours. By May 3rd, Reddit user wilymon shared a photo of the hornets in someone's palm on a subreddit, pulling 55,000 upvotes with 91% approval and nearly 5,000 comments. Related posts on /r/Wellthatsucks and /r/natureismetal each crossed 15,000 points.

The phrase "murder hornet" trended on Twitter throughout the weekend as the internet collectively processed yet another 2020 curveball. Multiple outlets covered the meme wave, including BuzzFeed, Mashable, The Daily Dot, and Distractify.

A common thread across the jokes was treating 2020 as a disaster checklist or a particularly cruel game of bingo. One popular tweet format imagined a conversation between an angel and God, with God casually adding "murder hornets" to the year's lineup. Others riffed on legal technicalities ("They are only murder hornets if they're convicted") and geographical wine jokes ("They're only murder hornets if they come from the Murdèr region of France, otherwise they are just sparkling manslaughter bees").

How to Use This Meme

The murder hornet meme typically works in a few formats:

The 2020 disaster escalation: List increasingly terrible events from 2020 (pandemic, economic collapse, civil unrest) and add murder hornets as the latest entry. Usually delivered through existing templates like Drake, expanding brain, or the "angel and God" dialogue format.

The "what's next?" reaction: Use any reaction image or template to express overwhelmed disbelief, captioned with something about murder hornets being the final straw.

The personification of 2020: Frame 2020 itself as a hostile entity that keeps adding new threats. Murder hornets function as the punchline to the question "what could possibly go wrong next?"

Legal/wordplay jokes: Riff on the word "murder" in the name, applying courtroom language, true crime tropes, or classification humor to the hornets.

The format works best when the joke focuses on human helplessness against an absurd cascade of problems, rather than the hornets themselves.

Cultural Impact

The murder hornet meme crossed over into mainstream news coverage almost instantly. NBC Los Angeles, CBS News, and other broadcast outlets ran segments that referenced the online reaction alongside the actual entomological threat. The meme and the news story were so intertwined that scientists had to push back against the hype. Entomologist Lynn Kimsey at UC Davis told reporters, "Your neighbor's dog is probably more dangerous," and noted the hornets may have already died in the cold.

Task & Purpose took the meme's energy to its logical extreme by asking the Pentagon whether the U.S. military had been tasked with eradicating the hornets. A defense official responded that "murder's a pretty strong term to level at an entire species, as it implies intent, which must be proven in a court of law," before adding that the military would "engage it under cover of darkness" if forced to confront the insects. The Ohio-based flamethrower company Throwflame reported an uptick in sales, with particular interest in their TF-19 Wasp drone flamethrower.

The David Suzuki Foundation used the media moment to redirect attention to the real threats facing pollinators, noting that while murder hornets posed little near-term danger, honeybees were already living in a "dystopian plot line" of pesticides, habitat loss, and climate change.

Fans of The Simpsons pointed to the 1993 episode "Marge in Chains" (Season 4, Episode 21), which depicted a flu virus spreading from Asia to Springfield followed by a swarm of "Killer Bees" escaping from a crate. While not an exact match, the combination of pandemic plus dangerous insects felt eerily close to reality.

CBS News later produced a longer feature following beekeeper Ted McFall's ongoing battle to protect his hives, reporting that Washington entomologists were experimenting with infrared cameras and even radio transmitters attached to the hornets (possible because they're large enough) to locate underground nests. The nickname "murder hornet" itself likely came from a mistranslation from Japanese that went viral after the NYT article used it.

Fun Facts

A group of hornets is sometimes called a "bike," a fact that the David Suzuki Foundation noted while covering the hysteria.

Asian giant hornets are so large that researchers can physically attach radio transmitters to individual insects to track them back to their nests.

Japanese honeybees have a natural defense against the hornets: they swarm an intruder and vibrate their bodies to raise the temperature, essentially cooking the hornet alive.

The entomologist leading Washington's response, Chris Looney, publicly disliked the "murder hornet" name, arguing it exaggerated the human health risk.

Beekeeper Ted McFall stashed one of his daughter's tennis rackets near his traps as a last resort against the hornets, citing his "pretty good serve" from high school.

Derivatives & Variations

Angel and God dialogue memes:

A popular format where an angel updates God on human progress and God casually introduces murder hornets. Multiple versions went viral on Twitter[5].

"Sparkling manslaughter bees" joke:

A wine-region riff ("They're only murder hornets if they come from the Murdèr region of France") that became a widely shared standalone tweet[5].

Don Draper pitch parody:

Instagram account @grapejuiceboys created a murder hornet version of the Don Draper Life Cereal pitch format, which earned 48,000 likes[4].

Simpsons "predicted it" posts:

Screenshots from the 1993 episode "Marge in Chains" circulated as evidence The Simpsons predicted both COVID and murder hornets[10].

Pentagon response memes:

Task & Purpose's deadpan exchange with the Department of Defense about nuking the hornets generated its own wave of shares and commentary[8].

April 2020 Disaster Predictions overlap:

The meme fed into and merged with the broader "2020 Disaster Bingo" format that was already circulating during early pandemic lockdowns[4].

Frequently Asked Questions