The Untold Story of What Happened Afterward 'Back at It Again at Krispy Kreme,' the Best Vine of All Time

There are many good Vines, but few perfect ones. Cats, dogs, pranks, visual trickery, half dozen-2nd operas — at that place'due south no shortage of great piece of work on the video platform that created the Loop, a new type of video format. Vine was founded in January 2013, and its first year, like whatever growing platform, came in fits and starts. But I never really understood the mesmerizing nature of the loop until I saw "Dorsum at It Over again at Krispy Kreme," the best Vine of allfourth dimension.

Two years ago, on Jan xiii, 2014, the Vine account Fab Cheerleader posted a video captioned "He hit the sign😂," and it is incredible. In the first shot, a homo holds a Krispy Kreme lid up to the camera and says that famous line, "Back at it once again at Krispy Kreme." In the 2nd shot, he does a back handspring into a neon Krispy Kreme sign, knocking it from its housing. Roughly a quarter-2nd later — before the audio of the sign being wrenched from the wall has even finished — the video begins once more. It is amasterpiece.

I honey many things well-nigh this Vine. First of all, the dial line is insane. "Back at it again at Krispy Kreme," we hear. What does it mean? I tin can all but guarantee that nobody assumed the phrase meant "dorsum handspring into a neon sign." I love how it ends before the sign hits the flooring. We get only enough to know that the handspring — impressive in and of itself — has caused some damage. Just nosotros don't know the extent of the damage, nor how our stuntman reacted, or how the employees of Krispy Kreme reacted. It's a bare space that our imagination fills — made all the more dramatic by the eternal, endless loop ofVine.

So much of what made Dorsum at It Again at Krispy Kreme fantastic — besides the guy crashing into the sign — tin can be attributed to the odd formal characteristics of Vine, chief amid them the lack of context. Vines create an odd tension in the viewer: Each video is a mere vi seconds, merely it loops on endlessly. You develop an intimate knowledge of the six seconds yous're given through the peephole of the Vine — but are left totally in the night about the context and resolution. Theories and speculation abound. The viral Vine economic system, where Vines are copied and reuploaded with no credit or explantion, only heightens the mystery. Vine purists, if such a thing exists, might insist that such mystique is essential to a Vine. But as much as I could admire the fragile artistry of the unresolved disaster in "Back at Information technology Again at Krispy Kreme," I still needed to know: What the hell happened later he kicked the sign downwards? And then, on its ii-year anniversary, I prepare out to find the origins of this incredible Vine — as well as learn itsaftermath.

Of course, as is oftentimes the example with Vines, it wasn't going to be like shooting fish in a barrel. While "Fab Cheerleader" was the account on which the Vine went viral, information technology didn't create this video — information technology'south but a page filled with freebooted (that is, ripped and reuploaded without credit) clips of cheerleading and tumbling. On a site called FunnyVineVideos.com, I was able to find a better-quality version of the original Vine — ane that had been posted a week before Fab Cheerleader's. But, like Fab Cheerleader, FunnyVineVideos didn't credit the original writer of the video.

I decided to take a different tactic. I called up the scene of the crime: Krispy Kreme. In the first shot, 1 tin can conspicuously make out a edifice number for the Krispy Kreme location: 9301. A quick Google query volition direct you to a Krispy Kreme location in Matthews, North Carolina. (Credit where credit is due: This deduction is non my own. I vaguely recall seeing someone having done this on Tumblr months ago.)

I spoke on the phone with Heath, a managing director at the Krispy Kreme location who about knew the incident I was describing. He was, however, slightly surprised that I knew of the video. "Really, that video was supposed to have been removed from the spider web," he told me, "so I'm surprised information technology's still out therecirculating."

I told him that the video had millions of loops, and that I wanted to follow up on information technology, see what the backwash was. At this point, Heath said that he could non tell me anything, and said he would have to direct me to Krispy Kreme's corporate part. I called the phone number, which presented me with a list of options that did not include "viral video response." I had no luck. I followed upward with an email to Krispy Kreme's media contacts, but have not heardback.

I couldn't cease thinking about that video, though — the best Vine of all fourth dimension. So I turned to Twitter,searching for posts that contained the words kicked and sign, as well equally the URL string "vine.co" and restricted results to earlier the date of Fab Cheerleader'svine.

What I found were a number of tweets, all of which reference the aforementioned now-removed Vine. Many included the hashtag #tumblingislife, and a few referenced the user @TumblingIsLife1. The man who runs that business relationship, Aaron, is the hero of our story — the man who kicked the sign off the wall at Krispy Kreme. Aaron, who originally hails from the Bronx and now lives in Atlanta, told me that he took upward tumbling at an early age. He was inspired past watching his cousin tumble, and also by Mighty Morphin Ability Rangers. He now teaches tumbling toothers.

I can try to tell the story of that infamous nighttime any number of ways, only none of them tin can compare to how Aaron described the incident to me immediate. It is an amazing story. In his own words:

Oh my God, let me tell you lot about that nighttime. And so I have a free coupon to go similar a dozen doughnuts, so I go, "All correct, say no more." I go make moves — we're all in line, we're only talking. I was like, "Yo, I'm about to make a video, I'm well-nigh to do a flip." So I give them my coupon, I'1000 like, "Stand up in line, become the dozen doughnuts, I'thou gonna go over here and make this video," and all that.

So it was me and my ii friends. I tell them to prepare at the table. I was like, "Oh, I gotta get my intro real quick." I did my piffling intro — "Dorsum at it over again at Krispy Kreme" — and I was like, "Y'all ready?" Then we flipped the photographic camera effectually.

I support. I told myself, I'1000 non gonna hit annihilation. And then I do my flip, simply the second flip that I did — the back handspring, the back one with hands going into the spin — I stretched it out likewise long. So when I went into the air and started spinning, my left leg hit the sign off the wall make clean, and it dropped behind the counter. And it was similar [glass shattering sound effect].

Information technology was packed. There was a practiced hundred, a hundred and some change, people inside. Everybody was talking. As soon every bit that thing dropped, everybody didn't talk for a practiced thirty seconds. Information technology was nothing only silence. Equally soon as I landed — I didn't fall after that, you saw me, I landed on my anxiety. I looked up and I saw that it vicious, I didn't look at nobody, I merely kept walking, and I walked out the door. Everybody was like, "What the heck? Oh shoot, he merely kicked down the sign!" Everybody started going crazy.

And so I was simply outside chilling. Three people from behind the desk that were making doughnuts or whatever ran outside and it was like, "Yo, that shit crazy, bro!" And he was like, "Bro, I think somebody in there's calling the cops," or whatever. So they called the cops on me, and I had to do a little whipping and running. They didn't find me, and and so that was it for the night.

In the aftermath, Aaron said that he did get a visit from police force enforcement. " The sheriff came to my firm, and we talked about it, but he was like, 'Y'all don't accept to pay for annihilation like that, merely don't do anything like that again.'"

And that was it. Afterwards, Aaron deleted the video from his account in society to avert attention from police enforcement, but information technology nevertheless lives online. And thank God information technology does, considering it is the best Vine of all time. The phrase "Back at it once again at Krispy Kreme" is still referenced on a daily basis. That famous sentence is now a mantra — every time yous inject a little bit of extraordinary flair into the mundane, yous, too, are back at it again … at Krispy Kreme.

Asked if he had whatever other thoughts to add, Aaron stated, as a matter of fact, "Tumbling islife."

The Story of 'Back at It Again at Krispy Kreme'