Huey Crying

Submission 2,754

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About

Huey Crying is a scene from the Adult Swim cartoon The Boondocks in which the character Huey Freeman is crying in a rain storm near a tree while lightning strikes. The scene is originally from the season one finale of the show titled "The Passion of Reverend Ruckus" in which Huey is praying. Huey Crying became a TikTok meme in mid-2023 as meme creators added captions to the scene, often posing unserious predicaments that were contrasted by the dramatic nature of Huey crying in the rain. The trend's TikTok sound was a WHOKILLEDXIX remix of PinkPantheress' song "Break It Off," which led with the lyrics, "No one ever saw me cry until I left the party the other night."

Origin

On March 19th, 2006, season one, episode 15 of The Boondocks titled "The Passion of Reverend Ruckus" aired on Adult Swim.^[1] In one of the episode's last scenes, the character Huey Freeman walks up a hill during a thunderstorm to pray for his friend Shabazz K. Milton Berle who's on death row.^[1] Huey cries on top of the hill while looking at the lightning. On March 9th, 2020, YouTuber^[2] Max X Scum Plug posted a moldy video called "Huey crying to PTSD" where the scene was set to the Juice Wrld song. It is unknown if the YouTuber created the video but it is the first-discovered upload. It received roughly 22,000 views in three years (shown below).

The aforementioned video ultimately inspired the format's later usage on TikTok in 2023, evident in the first TikTok meme made with the scene that seemingly used the moldy YouTube^[2] video without its Juice Wrld audio. The video was posted by TikToker^[3] @dxvilkze on July 18th, 2023, gaining roughly 2.4 million plays and 336,000 likes in 13 days (shown below). The video had text reading "Lets mute our mics and see who has the echo!" and it used the WHOKILLEDXIX remix of PinkPantheress' "Break It Off"^[4] as the TikTok sound.^[5]

@dxvilkze The scariest words. #fyp ♬ break it off – unknown

Spread

Going into July 2023, various TikTokers followed the same template, using higher-quality versions of the scene. For instance, on July 21st, 2023, TikToker^[6] @sxko.cc posted a version with a caption about the Nerd Emoji, gaining roughly 1.9 million plays and 503,800 likes in 10 days (shown below, left). On July 22nd, 2023, TikToker^[7] @melonnzz_ posted a version about someone muting a phone call to pee, gaining roughly 2.4 million plays and 602,800 likes in nine days (shown below, right).