If you’re familiar with the world of nonsense memes—think John Pork and Tim Cheese, Skibidi Toilet, and Gnomes vs Knights—you’ve probably come across what’s now being celebrated as ‘Italian brainrot’, and has taken over the internet in recent weeks. On the surface, this form of content might feel entirely harmless, but some netizens have pointed out certain problematic layers that need to be addressed.

It all began with a few viral TikTok videos that quickly snowballed into a full-blown trend. Originally born in the niche internet corners of Italian TikTok, ‘Italian brainrot’ rapidly broke out of its bubble and spread worldwide. Explaining the logic behind viral memes or trying to dissect why certain trends blow up is never easy—it’s a phenomenon we might never truly understand. They grab our attention, spread like wildfire, and suddenly, everyone is in on the joke. Often, there’s no clear reason for their virality. Sometimes, they just hit the right nerve.

@italian_brainrot_animal

Ballerina Cappuccina | Italian Brainrot Animal | #funny #Animal #aibrainrotmeme #italianbrainrot #ai #Italian #cappuccinoassassino #ballerinacappuccina

♬ original sound - ItalianBrainrotAI

The Italian brainrot wave started with a video posted by an Italian user on TikTok. It featured a blue shark wearing Nike shoes, called Trallalerò trallala. The video, which was generated with AI, paired the shark with a nonsensical and borderline offensive rhyme, complete with blasphemy against both God and Allah, and bizarre character names like “Merdardo” and “Ornella Leccacappella.”

@meme.hub734

#tralalelotralalatralalaotrarala #fyp #memehub #follow #like #meme

♬ Originalton - ່່່່່່່່່່່່

Brain rot is the kind of content that melts your mind—loud, absurd, chaotic, and often completely meaningless. It’s the digital junk food you can’t stop consuming, even though you know it’s frying your neurons one scroll at a time.

World leaders, but in the Italian brainrot universe

pic.twitter.com/Dcvh9QFeEu

— JB (@Jeetburner) April 17, 2025

By the end of 2024, the Oxford English Dictionary named ‘brain rot’ the word of the year. According to Oxford University Press, brainrot is defined as “the supposed deterioration of a person’s mental or intellectual state, especially viewed as the result of overconsumption of material (now particularly online content) considered to be trivial or unchallenging.” Use of the term, despite being over a century old, has skyrocketed by 230 per cent in the past year alone. This spike is largely attributed to the overwhelming presence of absurd, low-effort content flooding TikTok and Instagram, especially among Gen Z and Gen Alpha.

Alongside Trallalero Trallalà, other major characters are Trippi Troppi Troppa Trippa, a sort of trout with hairy arms and the overweight body of a man. He’s considered the undisputed king of the sea. Then there’s Brr Brr Patapim, who has human feet, the face of a monkey (more precisely, a proboscis monkey), and legs made of roots, which give him a kind of wise, ancient aura. Or Ballerina Cappuccina, which is one of the AI-generated Brainrot characters that gained popularity on TikTok. Staying true to her name, this character is shown as a young woman with a cup of coffee for a head, specialising in ballet. Totally rational.

@cloudlando

Balerinnaaaa Cappucinna 🙄 #CappuccinoHead #BalletArt #SurrealCharacter #FantasyFigure #LatteArtLover #CoffeeBallerina #AIArtworks #RealisticFantasy #WhimsicalDesign #CreativeFusion #TänzerinMitKaffeekopf #MagicalVibes #TikTokArt #SurrealAesthetic #DreamyScene #CappuccinoLove #AIgenerated #KunstInspiration #BallettLiebe #Kaffeekunst

♬ Balerinna Cappucinna - AIronic Fun

@alapenguin

Little tung tung sahur #ballerinacappuccina #fyp #memer #viral #viral_videos #ai #tungtungtungsahur #capuccina #italianbrainrot #brainrot

♬ original sound - Follow me or you’re gay - Follow me or you’re gay

Most of these characters were originally invented within Italian TikTok, but as the trend started spreading and gaining traction globally, other countries began creating their own brainrot figures. One standout is Tung Tung Tung Sahur: an anthropomorphic wooden figure wielding a bat. The onomatopoeic phrase “tung tung tung” mimics the sound of the bedug, a traditional wooden drum used in Indonesia and Malaysia to signal sahur—the pre-dawn meal before fasting during Ramadan. According to meme “lore,” if you ignore the call to sahur three times, this creepy figure comes looking for you.

@noxaasht

hati hati #tungtungtung #sahurr #brainrot #bismillahfyp

♬ original sound - 7AJ🎧 - 7AJ🎧

Since the first videos appeared, countless characters have been created within the brainrot universe—each one becoming a kind of protagonist in a massive, chaotic, user-generated movie playing out across the platform.

Every character has its own storyline, often tangled up with others, forming a bizarre but strangely coherent mythology. Take Ballerina Cappuccina, for example—the sister of Espressona Signora. She’s a graceful dancer, hopelessly in love with Lololo, a fellow performer who only has eyes for ballet, not for her.

Things take a turn when Ninja Cappuccino Assassino falls for her and kidnaps her. Surprisingly, she starts to fall for him too, and the two end up engaged. But the drama doesn’t stop there: in one version of the storyline, Ballerina Cappuccina cheats on him, with Trallallero Trallalà.

But beneath the seemingly “nonsense” and ridiculous surface of brainrot, there’s also a political layer that has sparked outrage among many.

As we’ve seen, the original rhyme, the one with Trallalero Trallallà, includes two blasphemies—one directed at God, the other at Allah. At first, people reshared the videos, sung in Italian, without fully understanding what the lyrics were actually saying. The absurd visuals and catchy rhythm distracted from the meaning of the words, which were often taken at face value as just another silly internet thing.

But eventually, some Muslim individuals began to speak out against the brainrot trend, highlighting its problematic content. For example, Akhi Altamash posted a video on TikTok warning fellow Muslims about the dangers of sharing brainrot content, calling it clearly haram—forbidden in Islam. In Islamic, the term haram refers to anything that is religiously prohibited, the opposite of halal, which refers to what is allowed.

The video, which initially spread on TikTok, soon became a topic of heated discussion on the platform and subsequently on the muslim corner of Reddit, where users debated the problematic nature of its content.

Some users pointed out that in Italy, blasphemy is often used casually as a filler word in everyday speech, and that the original intent wasn’t meant to be Islamophobic or anti-religious.

However, the controversy escalated with the introduction of one of the storyline’s darker characters—Bombardiro Crocodilo: a fine flying alligator that bombs children in Gaza, Palestine. It doesn’t believe in God and loves to bomb.

Criticism also came from the Christian community. Pastor Simon Tallur argued in a sermon that the issue with Crocodilo and Tung Tung Sahur was the same as that faced by the ancient heretics, the Monophysites—those who believed in the union of two natures into one mixed nature. In contrast, he emphasised that in Jesus Christ, the two natures are perfectly united. While these criticisms from both religious groups have continued to stir debate, the trend has now evolved beyond a niche internet oddity.

As Italian brainrot content has gained mainstream attention, it has attracted the interest of major brands like Ryanair, Loewe, and A.C. Milan, who have incorporated these characters into their advertising.

For instance, Ryanair chose to feature Tung Tung Sahur, Trallalero Trallalà, and Ballerina Cappuccina in their content. However, instead of creating a storyline, they simply showcased these characters on their aeroplanes, which sparked a reaction from their community. Some users, in fact, voiced their concerns, explaining that the content was offensive and urging the airline to stop.

Brainrot content can act as a powerful tool for escapism, allowing creators to be expressive and creative in new and unique ways. That being said, the nature of this kind of content can also give way to offensive and hateful messages, ones that ostracise certain groups of people and perpetuate harmful stereotypes. Brainrot videos first gained popularity for their absurdities and emphasis on silliness let’s keep it that way.