Trumps Movie Meme Blunders Expose Cultural Gaps
Trump's "Chipocalypse Now" Threatens Chicago
Donald Trump has once again used an AI-generated image in a post that appears to threaten the city of Chicago. This follows the controversial rebranding of the Department of Defense to the "Department of War". The image shows Trump as Lieutenant Colonel William Kilgore, Robert Duvall's character from the 1979 Vietnam War film Apocalypse Now. In the background, Chicago's skyline is engulfed in fire and helicopters, resembling a war zone.
The caption on the image, titled "Chipocalypse Now," twists one of the film's most iconic lines to fit Trump's political agenda: "I love the smell of deportations in the morning…". This is a direct reference to his plan to deploy the National Guard in Chicago, a strategy that mirrors his administration's ongoing militarization of Washington D.C.. The original line from the movie is, "I love the smell of napalm in the morning."
Political Leaders Condemn Threatening Post
The reaction to Trump's post was immediate and critical. Illinois Governor JB Pritzker stated on X, "The President of the United States is threatening to go to war with an American city. This is not a joke. This is not normal." He labeled Trump a "scared man" and a "wannabe dictator," asserting that Illinois would not be intimidated.
Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson echoed these sentiments, calling the president's threats "beneath the honor of our nation." He added, "the reality is that he wants to occupy our city and break our Constitution. We must defend our democracy from this authoritarianism."
California Governor Gavin Newsom, who has previously turned Trump's branding tactics against him, accused Trump of using US troops "like political pawns" and urged the public not to become desensitized to such actions.
The Strategy of Memetic Warfare
Beyond the immediate threats, this post highlights a recurring tactic of the Trump administration: engaging in what researcher Kurt Sengul calls "memetic warfare". In a discussion with Euronews Culture, Sengul explained that the administration's use of memes and generative AI creates an environment where serious issues are cloaked in humor. This strategy allows Trump to dismiss any criticism as a sign of being "humourless and can’t take a joke."
A Pattern of Misunderstood Movie References
However, this latest meme also exposes a significant flaw in this strategy: a striking lack of cultural literacy when it comes to the movie references being used. This isn't a new problem for the administration.
During his campaign, Trump repeatedly referenced Hannibal Lecter from The Silence of the Lambs, calling the cannibalistic serial killer a "wonderful man" and referring to him as "the late, great Hannibal Lecter." This reference failed on multiple levels: Lecter is a fictional villain, far from "wonderful," and survives at the end of the film, meaning he is not "late."
Another instance was a Star Wars Day post in 2025, which depicted an AI-generated, muscular Trump holding a red lightsaber. The caption positioned him against the "Sith Lords," yet as any fan knows, red lightsabers are the weapon of choice for the villainous Sith. This made the image an epic self-own, effectively branding himself as the very evil he claimed to oppose.
Similarly, a White House post portraying Trump as Superman with the caption "THE SYMBOL OF HOPE. TRUTH. JUSTICE. THE AMERICAN WAY" was deeply ironic. Superman is canonically an undocumented immigrant, a fact that clashes jarringly with Trump's harsh anti-immigration policies and the widespread protests against ICE raids.
Why the Apocalypse Now Reference Backfires
This brings us back to "Chipocalypse Now." Francis Ford Coppola's film is a critique of the absurdity and madness of war, based on Joseph Conrad's "Heart of Darkness." The film contains no heroes, only characters descending into moral chaos. While Coppola himself has stated it may not be a straightforward "anti-war" film, it is an undeniable portrait of humanity's capacity for evil.
The character Trump chose to embody, Colonel Kilgore, is a prime example. He orders a helicopter attack on a village of innocent people simply so his men can go surfing. He is an empathy-devoid warmonger, not a hero to be emulated. If Trump's goal was to appear as a strongman, he failed spectacularly. Instead, he aligned himself with a character defined by senseless violence, suggesting that his understanding of the film is limited to the superficial imagery of helicopters and Wagner's 'Ride of the Valkyries.'
The Horror of a Backfiring Meme Strategy
Had the administration understood the film, they might have recalled Colonel Kurtz's observation about the hypocrisy of war: “We train young men to drop fire on people, but their commanders won’t allow them to write ‘fuck’ on their airplanes because it’s obscene.”
Trump's latest AI-generated post is a powerful example of how his memetic warfare strategy is backfiring due to a lack of cultural ammunition. It showcases not strength, but a profound misunderstanding of the very symbols he attempts to wield. In the haunting final words of Colonel Kurtz, it's simply: "The horror... the horror..."
