What is Moon Man?

McDonald's Corp. enjoyed a golden decade in the 1980s, reporting record earnings of $727 million for the year 1989.

One thing that made McDonald’s so successful was its nostalgic and catchy commercials, which are still in circulation amongst netizens today. Here we present you the history of “moon man”, the McDonald’s character that rose from TV idol to immortalized Internet fame.

What is Moon Man?

Moon Man today is a meme, but it was formerly known as “Mac Tonight”, the charismatic, piano-playing mascot that starred McDonald's commercials in the late 1980s. Originally created to boost dinnertime sales, Mac Tonight was a retro-inspired marketing marvel that brought lots of money to the Golden Arches. Its accompanying rendition of Mack the Knife tuned the publicity stunt into a complete success, capturing Americans’ hearts—and appetites.

With his iconic crescent moon head, shades, and sleek charm, Mac Tonight helped McDonald's boost evening sales, particularly in California. It was so successful that Mac Tonight jumped oversees and appeared across Southeast Asian TV, including Singapore, Malaysia, and the Philippines.

Nostalgia, it turns out, sells burgers.

How did Moon Man Start?

Mac Tonight’s metamorphosis into Moon Man started in 2007 when users of the “You’re the Man Now Dog” forum made a parody of it. Using computer-generated voices, internet users created parody rap songs, repurposing the Mc Donald’s character into something darker. Unfortunately, many of these songs featured offensive, racist, and violent lyrics and connotations—turning “Moon Man” into Mac Tonight’s Mr. Hyde.

In the 2010s, the meme spread to platforms like 4chan, which prompted some voices to affirm that the Moon Man character was now associated with alt-right symbolism and white supremacist content. The discourse was that these internet communities had chosen the once-nostalgic mascot to be the next hate symbol. By 2016, YouTube began removing Moon Man videos from the platform, and text-to-speech software companies altered their product to restrict the use of the character’s name. In 2019, the Anti-Defamation League officially recognized Moon Man as a hate symbol.

Both Moon Man and Pepe the Frog are apparently harmless memes which have evolved to become symbols of the alt-right. It's up to you to call this reasonable or ridiculous, but it's better to know what you're getting involved with when you post these memes.

What Does Moon Man Mean? Is Moon Man Controversial?

Moon Man can have either offensive or harmless meanings, depending on the context. It’s important to note that not all Moon Man memes have hateful intent. Some users continue to use the character in non-racist, ironic, or simply nostalgic ways—a throwback to the beloved McDonald’s mascot. Ultimately, context is everything to figuring out whether which of Moon Man’s alter egos is on your phone’s screen. Here is an example of each:

Unfortunately, because of the character's contrasting (or conflicting) legacy, Mac Tonight’s reputation has been tarnished forever. Peter Cotroulis, one of the original creators of Mac Tonight, expressed regret over the character’s transformation, saying in 2022 that while he would love to see Mac Tonight return, but “with how he’s been twisted in recent years, I don’t think that will ever happen now”.

Moon Man has come a long way from his days as a jazzy entertainer at a fast food restaurant to becoming a polarizing figure on the internet. It’s up to us to seek the best or worst in him. If you want to play if safe and avoid the hate mob, well, you can avoid Moon Man. If you're tired of being cancelled for anything and everything, you can still cast Moon Man and defend it for what it originally was.