YMMV / asdfmovie

• Angst? What Angst?:
  • A talking hamburger is pretty calm about the fact that it used to be a cow.
  • And Mr. Muffin is so cheerful about dying.
  • The girl at the beginning of asdfmovie11 is pretty chill about turning her dad into ice cream and eating him.
  • In asdfmovie14, even though a guy has potentially apocalyptic powers of turning people into eggs, he doesn't sound too off-put by it, and the one guy who tries to stop him sounds more irritated than he is fearful.
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Did the student who flunked out of Standing Up School really fail at standing up? Or was he simply trying to do the Flop?
    • The "Do the Flop" music video has a freeze-frame bonus of a newspaper saying that people are flunking out of the school, providing evidence for the latter, but it's ultimately unclear.
    • Maybe the student who flunked out of the school took advantage of his inability to stand up to create a new music craze. Maybe that flunked student is Dougal Flopguy.
    • Again, the music video provides evidence for that. Dougal is stated to have done just that, he took advantage of his inability to dance in order to create a music craze.
  • Is Larry unaware that he is breaking people's necks, or is he pretending to be to mock his victims?
  • The "Beep Beep I'm a Sheep" skit seems to be a metaphor for memes; the sheep does something funny for no reason, it quickly catches on with everyone, and later, when the cow tries to do it again, everyone gets mad at him and nobody wants anything to do with it. Or it might not be about memes specifically, but rather fads in general.
  • Does Dougal Flopguy actually care about the safety of the world at the mercy of the Flop, or is he just pretending to care just to salvage his reputation, since he was still willing to do the Flop in the vicinity of a poor soul about to commit suicide (not to mention he brought back the Flop craze despite its risks to the world just so that he'd be popular again)?
  • That guy seemed a bit too happy to admit he parked his car on that other guy's sandwich. Did he do it to be an asshole and was smiling because he wanted to rub it in his face, or did he think parking on the sandwich would be helpful in some way?
  • Is the "I Like Trains" Kid insane? Is he an Enfant Terrible who's Obfuscating Insanity and is perfectly capable of saying things that aren't "I like trains" (even without the Ritalin) but deliberately says it so that the train will come and kill whoever stands in his way? (Note that he says it as a response to bad grades and an awkward date). Or is he cursed (which the singer wonders at the beginning) and the curse requires focus to resist, yet he has ADHD (hence the Ritalin) and usually can't focus well enough to resist the curse?
  • When Saturn called the Sun fat, it simply smiles instead of being offended, considering it a compliment. Was this an Insult Backfire, or was Saturn trying to compliment the Sun in the first place? Consider how the Sun was frowning before this point...
• Awesome Art:
  • asdfmovie12 has an animesque opening. Not only does it look fantastic, it also humanizes the cast.
  • There seems to be a big boost in animation quality found in asdfmovie13, with character movement coming across as a lot more dynamic, edged, and far less stilted.
• Cargo Ship: Invoked in The Muffin Song, with the Book Guy from asdfmovie4 caressing his book with a Luminescent Blush on his face, putting into perspective the phrase, "Well, I'm gonna do a book".
• Contested Sequel: asdfmovie14's reception was decidingly mixed. Some people found it just as hilarious as those preceding it thanks to its multitudes of creative double subversions, whereas others found it mediocre due to the sponsor plug, inconsistent animation, and being the first asdfmovie since 5 not to have Todd Bryanton doing the music.
• Crosses the Line Twice: Has its own page.
• Diagnosed by the Audience: "I Like Trains" kid seems to be only capable of saying "I like trains!" (when he's not being medicated) and has an obsession with trains. His dedicated song states he never spoke a word until he went to school, and had to take a ritalin treatment.
• First Installment Wins: Not so much the first installment itself, but there's a Vocal Minority of fans who believe that asdfmovie1-5 are the only funny installments, with 6 onward (though, some come to the defense of 6) being hollow recreations.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • Not surprisingly, there's a lot of crossover with fans of this series with other beloved web-based animation, like The Lazer Collection, Suction Cup Man, and FilmCow's various properties. Many of the creators of these animations have also guest starred in asdf skits.
  • There's also fan crossover with, of all things, VeggieTales, thanks to a series of well-made animations by YouTube animator Cmanflip recreating ASDF skits with VeggieTales characters.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: The videos are enormously popular in the United States, thanks to the Rapid-Fire Comedy and Black Comedy being liked by both countries.
• Growing the Beard:
  • The first video is essentially just randomness for the sake of randomness. By the second video, Tom begins to figure out what works and what doesn't, the series begins to develop its pechant for the Running Gag, and in general everything starts to click.
  • The first five episodes experimented with who animated the episodes and who composed the music, with 1 being animated by PivotRJ and composed by Binärpilot, 2 animated by Edd Gould and composed by Stephen Grant, 3 and 5 animated by RageNineteen, and 5 composed by The Living Tombstone. However, between 3 and 5 was asdfmovie4, which was the first episode to feature Wonchop as animator and LilDeuceDeuce as composer. The two would be promoted to lead animator and composer starting with 6, with the two staying all the way up until asdfmovie13, and the animation and music style staying consistent with what was presented in 4. At least, up until 14, when Wonchop was fitted into a collective team of animators, and the music was co-composed by Elliot Gough and Dan Pugsley.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • In THE TWENTY MINUTE ASDFMOVIE, an angry potato tells a look-alike of the "I Like Trains" kid, "I am an angry potato and I hope you get cancer!" Edd Gould, who voiced the trains kid, died of cancer a year later. Particularly Tempting Fate, considering he had recovered from it a year earlier.
  • asdfmovie7 has a lot more jokes about death and suicide than previous episodes. A month after it was released, the creator admitted he had been suffering from depression and that it may have been subconsciously influencing those jokes, though luckily he emphatically denied wanting to commit suicide.
  • Tom has admitted that the many jokes about messed-up parental relationships in the ninth episode were a result of his parents' marriage falling apart.
  • The beginning of 10 can be downright uncomfortable to watch after Logan Paul came under fire for filming and uploading a video of a man who ended his life in Japan's Suicide Forest on the first day of 2018. For bonus points, Jacksepticeye voices the sketch, and would later admit to having suicidal thoughts himself back in 2017.
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • 4 had a clip where a guy sarcastically says he likes someone else's hat. The other guy steals his face. Guess what's the main plot in Miitopia?
  • An especially gruesome example is 5's opening clip, which features a guy falling down the stairs and landing on a piano... eight years before a certain video game featured something similar to that as part of The Reveal.
• LGBT Fanbase: If the comments are to be believed, the Skateboard Cow-centric music video Real Man is very popular with transgender viewers.
• Memetic Mutation: Considering the videos consist of multiple seconds-long gags, it's easier to list the lines that haven't become memes.
  • "Well, I stole your face!" ^ExplanationA section of asdfmovie4, where a guy proceeds to steal the face of another guy who said his compliment towards him was sarcastic. It's been re-enacted with other characters, sometimes involving characters that actually lost their face.
  • "Everybody do the flop!" ^ExplanationThe main Running Gag of asdfmovie6 are the appearances of Dougal Flopguy, who appears out of nowhere while saying this, causing him and everyone around him to Face Plant. Many re-enactments have been made with other characters and real people, some of which are compiled here.
  • "There's something on your face!" *punch* "It was pain!" ^ExplanationIn asdfmovie3, a man says this as he punches another person on the face.
  • "I baked you a pie!" "Oh boy, what flavor?" "[insert random object here] FLAVOR." ^ExplanationOriginates from the very first exchange of asdfmovie2, where someone is baked a "pie-flavored" pie (represented by a small pie bursting out of the bigger one). It grew into a snowclone where the original "pie" flavor is replaced with just about any other word. The exchange would experience another surge in popularity thanks to its usage in The Muffin Song below.
  • "Suddenly, pineapples." ^ExplanationA Running Gag in the deleted scenes is to have pineapples appear everywhere, with this line preceding it. The line has been used in other videos outside of asdfmovie, where pineapples will appear upon it being said.
  • "Die, potato!" ^ExplanationA classic scene from the first asdfmovie, which was later played with in asdfmovie2. It caught on for its blunt and silly nature, and it's frequently used when potatoes or the squashing of foods are involved.
  • It is now literally impossible to say that you have an affinity for locomotives in any way, shape or form without someone responding with "I LIKE TRAINS."
    • Now in song form!
  • "Beep beep, I'm a sheep." ^ExplanationA line from asdfmovie10 said by a sheep, which was later turned into a song. It spawned many variations in the form "[x] [x], I'm a [y]", with [x] being a random word that rhymes with [y], which is an object, but usually an animal. It also spawned various remixes, which got enough attention that a (somewhat) official remix was made.
    • "Meow meow, I'm a cow/I said meow meow, I'm a-" "NO!"
  • It's Muffin Time/The Muffin Song ^ExplanationA set of memes involving 2 remixes of the Muffin's lines starting from asdfmovie7. The first remix from 2014 was mainly used in fan animations. The second remix from 2018 gained more exposure when it became a popular audio on TikTok, where it was used for lip-dubs and duets. The "I baked you a pie" section became especially popular for duets due to a lip-dub video which gained notoriety for how janky the peoples' movements were.
• Misaimed Fandom: The Muffin Song has become a meme, especially on TikTok. However, many people who sing and dance to it completely missed that it isn't just about a muffin wanting to die. The song is actually about Tom's depression and desire to quit the series, put in song form. The bridge (sung by The Gregory Brothers) really drives it home, and is mostly cut out in performances for this reason.
  • Strangely enough, this trope gets zigzagged by the fact that, as explained by this video, not only did its surge on TikTok lead to the song going gold, but it also inspired Tom to change the name of Random! into Muffin Time, both of which helped to further his career he had long since been debating on whether or not to quit.
  • This trope also gets downplayed by Tom giving an Approval of God when he reacted to asdfmovie on TikTok, finding most of the clips he viewed as incredibly creative with how they reshape the original sketches. In particular, so long as it doesn't play the song completely straight or involve puppets, Tom finds a lot of the TikToks of The Muffin Song to be really funny.
• Misblamed: With asdfmovie11 being his first as co-writer, some fans blamed Eddie Bowley for the infamous butt joke. TomSka later admitted the joke was actually his idea, and Eddie fought against its inclusion.
• Moe: Thanks to the chibi-esque art (yes, even for a show like this), expect a few of the characters to come off as such.
  • The "I Like Trains" kid, since he's modeled after and voiced by Edd Gould.
  • Mine Turtle, thanks to the way it squeaks out "Hello!" JUST before it explodes.
  • And then there's Mr. Muffin, a sentient muffin with the voice of a Cheerful Child. Awww!
  • The Animesque opening to asdfmovie12 has both Mr. Muffin and the "I Like Trains" Kid drawn as cute anime boys, and also the human versions of Beep Beep Sheep and Skateboard Cow.
• Most Wonderful Sound:
  • The intro skit of asdfmovie2 ends with an awesome-sounding guitar riff.
  • The train. Whenever you hear it approaching, you know a funny moment will occur, usually involving someone getting hit.
  • Any time Mr. Muffin speaks, with his high-pitched, childlike voice being a delight to hear thanks to contrasting with the nature of what he says. Even when not being suicidal, he still sounds adorable, especially his happy giggle at the end of the Muffin Song.
• Replacement Scrappy: While the Waffle in asdfmovie12 isn't necessarily hated, per se, him serving almost the exact same role as one of the series' most popular characters, Mr. Muffin, only replacing suicidal tendencies with brain damage, left many fans disappointed, to say the least. He was quickly retired after only two scenes.
• Retroactive Recognition: Some of the characters TomSka voices have him use the voice he uses for Tom from Eddsworld.
• Seasonal Rot: asdfmovie11 is widely considered to be the least popular episode to date, mainly because of the fart jokes (which the series has gone out of its way to avoid up until this point). The butt jokes even composed the entirety of the lowest-rated asdf sketches in a polling website Tom set up. Even TomSka himself feels this one shouldn't have been made.
• Special Effect Failure:
  • The animation of the boy putting on his sunglasses in the beginning of asdfmovie9 consists of only two frames.
  • asdfmovie14 is rather inconsistent in its animation.^note According to Word of God, this is because it was completed on short notice and had three animators. The earliest example being that the chef's mouth from the first sketch is backwards, with his tongue being on the wrong side of his mouth. From thereon, it then flip-flops between the asdfmovie4-12 style and the asdfmovie13 style, with three sketches being of noticeably lesser animation quality than the rest. ("Taco Tuesday", "Guess Whose Arms I Stole", and "The Baby Is Taking His First Life")
• Suspiciously Similar Song: The hook for "Beep Beep, I'm A Sheep" is clearly a riff on the "uptown funk you up" refrain from "Uptown Funk" by Mark Ronson and Bruno Mars (which itself was borrowed from "Funk You Right On Up" by The Sequence). This can't be a coincidence, as "Uptown Funk" was one of the biggest hits in the world at the time of the video's release.
• Tear Jerker: Much of "The Muffin Song", due to being an analogy about how burned out Tom is, but wanting to continue the series, but a particular scene, involving the Train Kid, shows Tom giving his voice actor, Edd Gould, a T-Shirt, and afterward showing him and Tom at a stand. The next time the stand is seen, it fades out, and Edd Gould is gone.
• This Is Your Premise on Drugs: The Ritalin'd movie is basically asdfmovie but on Ritalin.
• Tough Act to Follow: asdfmovie10 is considered by many as the best asdfmovie episode to date, but the episodes that followed didn't receive as much praise by some viewers, especially 11 because of the butt jokes. However, asdfmovie10 is one of Tom's least favorites as he found a majority of the jokes to be on-the-nose.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: The series is popular among older children, thanks to its simple format, Surreal Humor, and unforgettable jokes. However, there are lots of Black Comedy sketches with red animated blood and some Suicide as Comedy. There is also a sexual (and adultery-related) reference^note In asdfmovie12, an anthropomorphic car punches a guy for "sleeping with his wife", and, in earlier sketches, mild profanity. Even its Board Game, Muffin Time, is rated 12+!
• Win Back the Crowd: The 11th episode was panned by some viewers, mostly because of the fart jokes, and even TomSka recognized this episode wasn't that great. The following episode, asdfmovie12, received a better reception.

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