Update 10:31am CT, Oct. 16: A representative for Chuck E. Cheese told the Daily Dot in a statement that “the subject video is simply an attempt by the user to garner attention online.”
“We are all about having fun and our guests playing with our food but stating that this is how we intentionally serve our pizza is absolutely false,” the spokesperson continued.
Original story: A Chuck E. Cheese customer who took a chance on what was billed as a “pumpkin pepperoni pizza” was disappointed in the finished product.
The video documenting the interest came from TikToker Brittany Farfan (@bheeeutiful), getting more than 275,000 views in just a single day on the platform since going up Sunday.
Farfan says in the video, “So I went to Chuck E. Cheese and they’re promoting this new pizza, so I’m like, you know, I’m gonna get it.”
The video shows a sign advertising Chuck E. Cheese fare above the register. That includes a pizza with pepperoni arranged in a jack o’ lantern-styled smile. The text on the sign reads: “Turn your large 1-topping pizza into a pumpkin pepperoni pizza.”
She then says, “This is what they’re advertising, right?” The video focuses in on the pizza, which has a specifically aligned smile.
Then, showing the pizza she actually received, she grouses, “This is what I got,” followed by a gruff, “Count your motherf*ckin’ days.”
The pizza does not have a neat smile arranged out of pepperoni; in fact, it looks like it’s Franken-steined together from parts of other pizzas.
@bheeeutiful Is the pumpkin in the room with us?
♬ original sound – Brittany Farfan
That was not lost on commenters, one of whom observed, “You can not convince me that’s a bunch of leftover pizzas put into 1 pizza for you!”
Someone else, noticing black olives scattered sparsely on three slices, added, “Why are there olives tho.”
That led someone else to remark, “Omg the theory.”
The conspiracy theory that Chuck E. Cheese recycles pizza has long existed; the Daily Dot covered the theory back in 2019. YouTuber Shane Dawson popularized the theory in one of his conspiracy series YouTube videos at the time, and it prompted Chuck E. Cheese to respond in a blanket statement.
“The claims made in this video about Chuck E. Cheese’s and our pizza are unequivocally false. No conspiracies here—our pizzas are made to order and we prepare our dough fresh in restaurant, which means that they’re not always perfectly uniform in shape, but always delicious,” a representative said at the time, according to our previous reporting.
Another commenter pointed to a different YouTube video from The Food Theorists that was posted in 2020 and has since been viewed 13 million times. “Anyone talking about the leftover slices needs to watch food theory on YouTube about it,” the commenter wrote.
Employees have also aimed to debunk the theory, however. They claimed the irregular shapes of the pizza slices are due to how they are cut and then cooked in the oven.
The Daily Dot has reached out to Farfan via TikTok comment and to Chuck E. Cheese via email.
