Hawaiian Punch Drinkers Make Depressing Realization After 63 Years

gamerant.com:

A Hawaiian Punch drinker pointed out a noteworthy detail regarding the popular brand's mascot that led to many depressed reactions among longtime fans of the beverage. This marks yet another instance of a shocking realization shared on the internet about a childhood icon that, upon second glance, was painfully obvious all along.

The Hawaiian Punch beverage has been a big part of the childhoods of many people that grew up in the US for several decades at this point. Though the brand itself actually had its start in 1934, it wasn't until 1961 that Hawaiian Punch first brandished the famous surfboarding mascot, Punchy, that many have associated with it over the years. Despite the fact that the character managed to etch itself into the memories of many fruit punch-loving children throughout the mid-to-late 1900s and early 2000s, there's one aspect of Punchy's design that has left drinkers of the beverage a bit baffled. It's no wonder, then, that a recent discovery made by one fan regarding this particular facet of the mascot was met with shocked reactions online.

A TikTok user by the name of pandzeditz posted a meme regarding the iconic design of the Hawaiian Punch mascot on the social media platform. In the post, pandzeditz made a joke about how depressed they were when they realized as an eight-year-old kid that Punchy «was wearing a hat» all along instead of having, presumably, stylish red dreadlocks. Sharing the same sentiment, many fans of the beverage took to the comment section of the post to express the «shock» and «depression» they also felt when they came upon this realization.

One user on TikTok named medA, for instance, called the discovery in question «a Hawaiian Punch in the gut,» while David Olvera claimed that this must be some kind of Mandela effect. Others, like cristano_ronaldo43, also noted that they thought Punchy's hat was red dreads, with TikTok user Ranger corrobating this, claiming that they believed «it was locks from surfing too.» Some