WASHINGTON, April 11 — On the heels of news of a ceasefire between the United States and Iran, an Iranian group has released a new Lego-style video mocking President Donald Trump and declaring that “Iran has won.” This is the latest in a wave of war-themed AI-generated propaganda flooding the internet.
Explosive Media, a pro-Iranian creative group that claims to be independent but is widely suspected of having ties to the government, produced a series of these videos during the conflict that racked up millions of views.
“The world has been shown how to crush imperialism. Trump has surrendered. Iran has won,” the caption on X’s video read after the two-week cease-fire agreement was announced on Tuesday.
“TACO will always be TACO,” he added, referring to the acronym for “Trump Always Chickens Out.”
The ceasefire, which is already showing signs of tension, follows a series of apocalyptic threats by President Trump, including his warning that he would push Iran back into the “Stone Age.”
With dramatic background music, the video shows Trump-like toy figures swarming Arab leaders, hurling chairs at U.S. military personnel, and Iranian generals pressing a red button that says “Back to the Stone Age”, unleashing a torrent of destruction across the Middle East.
Another clip from X showed a caricatured Trump with an oversized yellow head and fiery back holding a placard that read, “Victory! I’m a Loser.”
“The era of AI slop”
Explosive media, which often incorporates American popular culture into its videos, portrays President Trump as elderly, isolated, and prone to childish tantrums, seemingly disconnected from reality.
Iranian state media and diplomatic accounts are committed to that strategy, regularly posting similar so-called AI slop, or mass-produced content created by cheap artificial intelligence tools.
“Iran has developed a wartime propaganda strategy tailored to the era of AI slop and algorithmic amplification,” Joseph Bodnar, senior research manager at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, told AFP.
“They are capitalizing on AI aesthetics and bombastic anti-imperialist narratives that garner attention, stir controversy, and get paid by the platform.”
In recent weeks, viral meme videos have depicted a hypothetical Iranian military victory, world leaders falling into a subservient scenario dependent on Iranian leaders for oil, and even the strategic Strait of Hormuz reimagined as a cartoonish tollbooth.
“It’s clear that Iran is putting out content that resonates,” Bodnar said.
Explosive Media’s English content, which calls itself “Iran’s Lego-style animation team,” appears to be aimed at an audience outside Iran, where platforms like X have been blocked for years and can only be accessed via VPN.
Explosive Media’s ability to produce and upload sophisticated content has heightened suspicions about its ties to the government as Iranians face what monitor Netblox calls an “internet blackout.”
The group rejected the allegations against X as “media distortion.”
meme battlefield
Meanwhile, the White House’s X account posted its own war-themed content that combined battlefield footage with movie and other clips. iron man, gladiator and top gun.
This content highlights the battlefield of internet memes, where the lines between propaganda and entertainment are blurring.
And while the Trump administration has been using AI-generated content in its social media strategy since before the war, the virality of Explosive Media’s clips suggests it may be competing digitally, experts say.
Nina Jankowitz, chief executive of the American Sunlight Project, said the group is “beating the Trump administration at its own game.”
“The immature humor, polarizing rhetoric, mentality of ‘owning’ opponents, and the click-anything strategy that Trump and his allies have employed are now being mobilized against it.” — AFP
