Journalism is a tireless line of work. At all times, you’ve got to be vigilant for where news might break next. I’ve got my nose to the ground, foraging for what might be buried in a corporate press release, uttered in an interview, or bubbling up on social media, knowing that sometimes—sometimes—I’ll find the next big scoop in time to claim first dibs.
Other times, times like today, what I find is all the world’s biggest game companies tweeting the same dumbass horse.
At first, I’d been scrolling past this awful horse’s awful face without taking much notice. Eventually, with dawning horror, I realized I’d spent the last hour beneath that wretched steed’s inscrutable gaze as it gawped out at me from countless image edits and crude photoshops.
I’ll say it: It’s a singularly terrible horse. I can’t tell whether its lidless eye is widened in terror or delight; whether its rictus grin is bared in pure, equine glee, or as an image of boundless pain. It’s an emotional space I find myself in a lot, lately. And dammit, I love looking at him.
The horse, I’ve since learned, comes from a promotional still released for the upcoming film We Live in Time, starring Florence Pugh and Andrew Garfield in what is, ostensibly, a romance. However, the fun, flirty carnival moment captured in the image pales in comparison to the empty-brained, bucktoothed carousel horse emerging from the lower left frame:
I’m sure Pugh and Garfield will offer excellent performances when We Live in Time releases in October, but the horse is the star now. As tradition demands when presented with a silly horse, people quickly started transplanting it into whatever images they had at hand. Game publishers and developers soon took notice, with the official PlayStation UK account eventually declaring a “petition to add the horse to every video game ever.”
I’ve seen him stapled onto Halo moas, flanked by those horny mannequin robots from Atomic Heart, and leading a charge in Mount & Blade. He’s been turned into a Balatro joker. He’s ruined Octodad’s family. He is everywhere: golden, terrible, resplendent. And chances are, he’ll be intolerable by the weekend.
Fans, of course, have been offering their own contributions. I’m particularly fond of Alan Wake’s latest nightmare:
Me, I’m content to savor the moment while I can. Memes move so fast now that I’ll have either forgotten or learned to hate the horse by this time next week. For now, at least, I choose to look upon this god-awful horse and see something like a friend.
