A mysterious cartoon lizard has turn into TikTok’s newest rising star.
The inexperienced reptile, standing in a pitch-black room with a considerably dazed smile, is repeatedly smacking a small lizard icon on a glowing display — every time triggering an automatic voice saying “lizard.”
It comes from a post-credits scene in Disney’s newest Pixar movie “Elio” which was launched in June. The scene was a promotion for Pixar’s upcoming launch “Hoppers,” which arrives in theaters subsequent spring.
However in latest weeks, the clip has became a viral meme, with the soundbite making its approach into quite a few musical remixes on-line.
In accordance to the meme database Know Your Meme, the teaser picked up traction after YouTuber The Pixar Nerd posted a video of it on June 20. One month later, on July 27, the TikTok account igreenscreenthings posted a user-made green-screen template that includes the lizard.
The template has impressed greater than 78,000 movies on TikTok, the place folks use it to symbolize spamming actions like skipping songs, annoying their associates or fast-forwarding by way of office compliance trainings.
“My final mind cell making an attempt to make it by way of the workday,” wrote one TikToker within the textual content of their video utilizing the meme.
The lizard has additionally impressed an array of fan creations. One person made a T-shirt commemorating the meme, and one other baked a lizard-inspired cake with a movable smacking arm.
One TikTok creator has been gaining large traction by making mashups of the lizard soundbite with varied well-liked songs. A lizard mashup with the 2010 basic “Like A G6” accrued greater than 12 million views, and others set to hits like Eminem’s “Rap God,” Cardi B’s “WAP” and AC/DC’s “Thunderstruck” additionally received tens of millions of views every.
A performer at an EDM music pageant in Denver final weekend even featured the lizard of their set onstage.
Pixar’s official social media accounts acknowledged the hype across the meme final week. Posting the clip to its platforms, the animation studio wrote: “his title is Tom.”
“See Tom in Disney & Pixar’s #Hoppers, arriving in theaters March 6, 2026. 🦎” Pixar wrote within the caption.
Tom is not featured within the teaser trailer for the brand new film, which follows a lady named Mabel as her consciousness is transferred into the physique of a robotic beaver, which in some way allows her to speak with different animals.
NBC Information has reached out to Pixar for remark.
Although not a lot is thought about Tom the lizard, many on-line nonetheless can not seem to get sufficient of him.
Or, on the very least, cannot get him out of their heads.
