Slang dictionary
shit just got real
[ shit jusht got reel ]
What does shit just got real mean?
The phrase shit just got real is used when a situation has escalated. It can be used dramatically in serious scenarios—when someone responds aggressively or when the reality of some matter is fully felt or underway—or in a more humorous one, as ironic commentary on a minor annoyance.
First day on the job that you spent the last 12 years of your life studying and working for? Shit just got real. Your partner says he wasn’t hungry but drank your last soda and ate the last slice of pizza? Oh, shit just got real.
Where does shit just got real come from?
While it almost certainly predates the film, the phrase shit just got real was popularized by the 2003 Michael Bay-directed action-thriller Bad Boys II.
The film features two cops, Detective Marcus Burnett (Martin Lawrence) and Detective Mike Lowrey (Will Smith), as they investigate the dealings of a Cuban drug cartel. In one melodramatic scene, Burnett receives some disturbing news over the phone and tells Lowrey that shit just got real, as if to say that the investigation (shit) had become much more serious—that the stakes had risen (got real).
Shit, here, means any “thing” or “stuff,” (which is what it has meant since the 1930s). Getting real, or “serious,” draws on long-running slang senses of real for “authentic” (e.g., Get real!, real deal, or the real thing).
The Bad Boys scene was apparently so over-the-top that the phrase was then used in Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright’s 2007 Hot Fuzz, a parody of the buddy-cop film genre.
The phrase went viral in a 2012 meme featuring the usually agreeable Sesame Street characters holding knives and machine guns. This was in response to Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney declaring in a debate that if elected, he would get rid of subsidies for PBS, which produces Sesame Street. The presidential hopeful did mention that he loves Big Bird, but apparently that didn’t cut it for Elmo and the gang—threatening their existence made them ready to fight back, because shit just got real.
WeKnowMemes
And, then there was this trend …. this graduate’s shit just got real.
Examples of shit just got real
Who uses shit just got real?
Shit just got real is said when “things are going down.” For example, after witnessing a fight between Rick Ross and Young Jeezy that temporarily suspended the 2012 BET Music Awards, Cleveland rapper Machine Gun Kelly sent out the following tweet regarding the brawl.
Got mase in my eyes. That beef shit just got real outside.
— colson (@machinegunkelly) September 29, 2012
But as with much slang, shit just got real is also hyperbolic and tongue-in-cheek, used of annoyances or setbacks that are trivial in the grand scheme of things.
i just rolled up my sleeve so i could reach my hand to the bottom of the cheeto bag. shit just got real. #5AM
— lauren s. carter ☀️ (@lauren_stays) August 5, 2018
Note
This is not meant to be a formal definition of shit just got real like most terms we define on Dictionary.com, but is rather an informal word summary that hopefully touches upon the key aspects of the meaning and usage of shit just got real that will help our users expand their word mastery.