Unsettled Tom

Unsettled Tom is not a frame from the Tom and Jerry cartoon. It is a Paint-style drawing by DeviantArt artist lazerbot from “Fuds Choice 8,” a page of the fan webcomic Tails Gets Trolled published on May 10, 2012.

The panel originally shows Tom waking with a stressed expression. A text-free crop began circulating as a reaction image on 4chan's /co/ board in January 2013; the earliest post preserved in this source set is dated January 9, making that the responsible first-seen date for the meme.

The image remained a niche reaction until March 3, 2019, when Redditor inactive_meme posted two captioned versions to r/dankmemes. One drew only 70 votes in nine days; the other passed 20,300, demonstrating how quickly the right disturbing punchline could activate the format.

A larger wave followed on March 7. Posts by staticdanger and whaman273 reached roughly 16,100 and 24,500 votes within five days, and the cropped face became a standard second panel for jokes that begin normally and suddenly reveal something alarming, taboo or grotesque.

The crude drawing looks almost serious beside Tom's usual elastic cartoon expressions. Placed after an innocent setup, its silent dread tells the reader exactly when the joke has gone too far.

Use it as the reaction to an uncomfortable confession, a dark implication or a sentence whose second half changes everything.