This Is Big Brain Time

The phrase from the Baldi's Basics video

On April 20, 2019 the YouTube channel Markiplier published the video “Baldi's Basics 1 Year Birthday Bash,” a playthrough of the indie horror game Baldi's Basics. At one point the blogger hides from the main character and proudly explains his decision. That is where the phrase “Yeah, this is big brain time” is spoken.

In the video itself, for comic effect, the hero's head is visually enlarged, as if a huge brain had appeared inside it. This effect gave the basis for the joke, but the image entered the template without it: viewers remembered the intonation and the image.

The frame and its mood

The picture shows a close-up of a man in large headphones and glasses with thin frames. He looks sideways, presses his lips together, and squints slightly. The background is dark and blurred. There is no enlarged head, as in the video, in the frame, so the whole meaning rests on the caption.

The link between the face and the blogger Markiplier relies on the meme's name and the origin of the phrase, but not on the snapshot itself. The expression can be read in two ways: as self-satisfaction or as skepticism. This double meaning makes the frame flexible enough for different captions.

Early memes

According to a summary of the origin, the earliest known meme based on the phrase is a post by the Reddit user Z_2000 from April 27, 2019, in r/memes, titled “1000 iq”: in it a person correctly spells a long word without looking in a dictionary. This example is named as the first known one, but earlier posts may have gone unnoticed.

On May 31, 2019 a post titled “too early” appeared in r/dankmemes, and it was from there that the format began to spread noticeably wider. From then on the phrase began to live separately from the video and turned into a label for jokes about overly clever or, on the contrary, absurd decisions.

Four captions and their mechanics

Example 1: “Turned off the alarm to get some sleep, and was three hours late.” The caption states a claim about one's own cleverness, and the outcome destroys it. What is funny is that the logic looks flawless right up to the end.

Example 2: “Decided not to read the instructions, because I'll definitely figure it out.” The expectation of reasonableness collides with overconfidence, and the sideways glance looks like pride in a bold decision.

Example 3: “Moved all my tasks to tomorrow, but today I reached a very important conclusion.” The caption uses a substitution: the conclusion is presented as an achievement, although the actual matter is simple procrastination.

Example 4: “Told friends I would save money by buying three identical mugs.” The decision sounds rational, but the absurdity is obvious; the contrast between the wording and the act creates the effect.

When the template is appropriate

The format is best suited to self-irony: when the author of the caption admits that his own decision was funny. If the joke is aimed at another person, it quickly turns into mockery of their intelligence or abilities, and that is no longer about the phrase from the video.

The caption describes the decision of the hero in the picture, not his biography. There is no need to attribute to the blogger views, statements, or actions that did not appear in the video.