Hornet first appeared as a recurring boss and ally in Team Cherry's Hollow Knight, released in 2017, where her fast needle and thread attacks made her fights memorable. Her short vocal shouts became easy to isolate from gameplay recordings and were shared on soundboards as standalone clips. As anticipation for Hollow Knight: Silksong kept the character in gaming discussion for years, the HAAAA cry stayed in circulation in edits, streams and meme videos, valued because it is instantly tied to Hornet without needing a full scene.