The Time Of The Orc Has Come
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About
The Time Of The Orc Has Come is a quote from The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, spoken by the orc Gothmog after their successful siege of Osgiliath. The line proved memorable for Lord of the Rings fans, and went on to appear in numerous memes, often as a snowclone with the template, "The X is over. The time of the orc has come."
Origin
In Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, released in 2003, Mordor's forces successfully capture the garrison at Osgiliath.[1] Upon their victory, the orc Gothmog says, "The age of Men is over. The time of the Orc has come" (shown below).
The phrase appeared occasionally in online jokes in the years following the film's release, usually as a snowclone with the template "The age of X is over. The time of the orc has come," though these rarely spread widely on social media. For example, on January 17th, 2016, Twitter user @androidlust[2] tweeted, "The age of idols is over. The time of the Orc has come," gaining only five retweets and seven likes (shown below).
One of the first memes using the line to see success was posted on April 16th, 2018 by Redditor mixaxbb in /r/lotrmemes,[3] crossing the line with the I Killed Them All meme from Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones. The post gained over 450 points in four years (shown below).
Spread
The phrase began appearing more regularly in memes in the early 2020s. On July 1st, 2021, Redditor Belkan-Federation[4] posted a meme about the end of Pride Month with the quote, gaining over 1,900 points (shown below, left). On May 29th, 2022, Redditor Crazy-Ad-420[5] posted a Star Wars crossover with the meme, gaining over 1,400 points (shown below, right).
As the meme grew popular on Reddit, tweets referencing the quote began gaining more spread. For example, on August 30th, 2021, Twitter user @joshcarlosjosh[6] posted a meme using the quote with the Hot Girl Summer meme, gaining over 30,000 retweets and 176,000 likes (shown below, left). On August 11th, 2022, user @rob_pearson86[7] posted it in reference to Ryanair saying "The era of cheap flights is over," gaining over 360 likes (shown below, right).
On December 30th, 2020, YouTuber BurtBot posted a parody video of the scene giving the orcs regular human voices, gaining over 2.3 million views (shown below).
Various Examples
Search Interest
External References
[1] Lord of the Rings Wiki – Siege of Gondor
[2] Twitter – @androidlust
[3] Reddit – /r/lotrmemes
[4] Reddit – /r/lotrmemes
[5] Reddit – /rlordoftherings
[6] Twitter – joshcarlosjosh
[7] Twitter – rob_pearson86
