Gotta Go Fast
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About
"Gotta Go Fast" is a catchphrase commonly associated with a poorly drawn fan art illustration of Sonic the Hedgehog, the title character of the eponymous video game franchise developed by Sega. Originally submitted to the now-defunct Sonic Central fan site, this image and derivatives of it are sometimes known as Sanic. Since 2008, parodies of the original image have appeared on fan artist communities such as deviantART and Tumblr.
Origin
"Gotta Go Fast" is the title of the theme song from the English version of the Sonic the Hedgehog anime series, Sonic X[10], which aired from 2003 – 2006.
While the phrase had been used in more serious fan art since as early as 2004[11], became associated with a piece of poorly drawn fan art as early as 2008, when it was posted to the YouChew forums[1] in a thread discussing the art available in the gallery on the now-defunct official fan site Sonic Central.[12] It is unknown who originally drew it. On January 26th, a poster named Cortes shared the image in the thread, noting it was a repost. Other posters began quoting the image, commenting on the poor quality of the art.
Spread
One month later, on February 19th, 2008, Fanboys Forum user Inferno shared the image in the thread "Hilariously bad fanart" (shown below).
![Inferno Re: Hilariously bad fanart « Reply #337 on: February 19, 2008, 08:29:17 PM * M Quote A Modify Remove A Split Topic Preposterous Hero Member Karma: +110/-17 [Daps] [Bat] O Offline Gotta g0 fast Posts: 3041 If I wasn't laughing, I'd weep Thread Report to moderator 205.188.117.143 (?) My color is Red I value freedom, impulse, emotion and fire. I love instant gratification and acting on my gut feeling. At my best, I am passionate and decisive. At my worst, I am shortsighted and destructive. My symbol is a fireball. My enemies are white and blue. Quote from: Cyy on March 09, 2008, 08:24:45 PM Sage, pretty people aren't allowed to like ZADR. You should be hideous and smell like mold. Quote from: Cheri on March 13, 2008, 09:06:53 PM Tell them that a robed penguin with a giant mallet will be stopping by to..negotiate. Rock Lobster? Freshly Picked - New Haruhi Ohressor Re: Hilariously bad fanart « Reply #338 on: February 19, 2008, 08:30:04 PM » A Quote AModify Remove a Split Topic](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/newsfeed/001/882/492/d48.png "gotta go fast inferno post")
On April 22nd, 2008, deviantArt member ingridarcher[2] submitted the earliest parody image (shown below), rendering the character Scout from the first-person shooter game Team Fortress 2 in a similar manner to the original Sonic drawing.
On April 11th, 2009, the original image was used on the Fanboys forums[3] as the first post in a thread titled "The Hilariously Bad Art Thread," generating more than 4,500 replies as of May 2013. Though the phrase had been used on 4chan since as early as May 2008[13], the earliest archived use of the image on the site was posted to /r9k/[4] (ROBOT 9000) board on August 4th, 2010. Also throughout 2010, fan art of the first image continued to appear on deviantART.[14][14]
In October 2010, the drawing was posted to Tumblr for the first time after being submitted to the now-defunct Tumblr blog Fuck Yeah Terrible Art.[5] Nearly a month later, on November 27th, a Facebook[6] fanpage for the phrase was created, gaining more than 500 likes as of May 2013. On July 8th, 2011, the single topic blog Gotta Go Fanart[7] was launched on Tumblr, featuring fan creations and drawings of characters parodying the original image. A second single topic blog, sanic-hedgehog[16] was launched in July 2012.
Steven Universe reference
In the show Steven Universe, shown on Cartoon Network, "Lil' Sanic" was featured in one of the episodes as shown below (Right) along with Pikachu from the Pokemon series (Left), and Gitaroo Man (Middle).
Notable Examples
Fan creations based on this Sonic art have been shared on Tumblr with the tag "#gotta go fast."[8] As of May 2013, there are more than 4,800 search results on deviantART[9] for the phrase "Gotta Go Fast." The phrase has also been used more than 1,400 times on Reddit[17], where it is used both in relation to Sonic content as well as other speedy objects, animals or people.
Search Interest
External References
[1] Youchew – LETS FLOOD SONIC CENTRAL'S FANART GALLERY
[2] deviantArt – Gotta Go Fast
[3] Fanboys – The Hilariously Bad Art Thread
[4] Chanarchive – Strange/Scary Experiences
[5] Tumblr – Fuck Yeah Terrible Art – gotta go fast (reblog from Fuck Yea Sonic)
[6] Facebook – Gotta Go Fast
[7] Tumblr – Gotta go fanart
[8] Tumblr – Search results for #gotta go fast
[9] deviantArt – Search results for "gotta go fast"
[11] deviantART – Sonic X – Gotta go fast
[12] Sonic Central – Fan Art (archive, no working images)
[13] Foolz Archive – /jp/ GOTTA GO FAST
[14] deviantART – GOTTA GO FAST
[15] deviantART – Gotta Go Fast
[16] Tumblr – sanic-hedgehog
[17] Reddit – Search results for "gotta go fast"
![Inferno Re: Hilariously bad fanart « Reply #337 on: February 19, 2008, 08:29:17 PM * M Quote A Modify Remove A Split Topic Preposterous Hero Member Karma: +110/-17 [Daps] [Bat] O Offline Gotta g0 fast Posts: 3041 If I wasn't laughing, I'd weep Thread Report to moderator 205.188.117.143 (?) My color is Red I value freedom, impulse, emotion and fire. I love instant gratification and acting on my gut feeling. At my best, I am passionate and decisive. At my worst, I am shortsighted and destructive. My symbol is a fireball. My enemies are white and blue. Quote from: Cyy on March 09, 2008, 08:24:45 PM Sage, pretty people aren't allowed to like ZADR. You should be hideous and smell like mold. Quote from: Cheri on March 13, 2008, 09:06:53 PM Tell them that a robed penguin with a giant mallet will be stopping by to..negotiate. Rock Lobster? Freshly Picked - New Haruhi Ohressor Re: Hilariously bad fanart « Reply #338 on: February 19, 2008, 08:30:04 PM » A Quote AModify Remove a Split Topic](https://i.kym-cdn.com/photos/images/list/001/882/492/d48.png "gotta go fast inferno post")
