Terry Gilliam Claiming Responsibility For QAnon Isn’t as Bizarre as it Sounds

Terry Gilliam is responsible for the iconic animated sequences in Monty Python’s Flying Circus, classic films like Brazil and a one-sided feud with late talk show host Jerry Springer. But is he also behind the most unhinged modern conspiracy theory that doesn’t involve a time-traveling Simpsons producer?

Speaking with Variety at at the Torino Film Festival, Gilliam flat-out stated, “I’m responsible for QAnon,” in reference to the far-right conspiracy theory group which claims that “President Trump is waging a secret war against elite Satan-worshipping paedophiles in government, business and the media,” based on information provided by an anonymous government source named “Q” (not to be confused with James Bond’s tech guy or the Star Trek villain). Also JFK Jr. is secretly alive for some reason.

Gilliam’s statement met skepticism online, which is understandable since Gilliam has made a number of baffling comments to the media in recent years, including his complaint that Trump “fucked up” the anti-woke comedy film he wanted to direct.  

However, Gilliam’s QAnon connection isn’t actually as tenuous as it might initially seem. In the interview, Gilliam pointed to the group's conspiracy theory about “adrenochrome.” According to the QAnon crowd, the world’s shadowy elites “torture children to harvest the chemical adrenochrome from their blood, which they then inject in order to stay healthy and young.”

As Will Sommer, the author of Trust the Plan: The Rise of QAnon and the Conspiracy That Unhinged America, once told Terry Gross on an episode of NPR’s Fresh Air, this element of the conspiracy theory originated in Hunter S. Thompson’s seminal gonzo journalist fable Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, which Gilliam adapted into a feature film in 1998.

“In his book, the Hunter S. Thompson character receives a drug called adrenochrome from another character, and that guy says, you know, you can only get this from a pedophile,” Sommer explained. “Now, adrenochrome as a concept was kind of knocking around the counterculture. Various writers had used it as sort of a stand-in for a very powerful drug, I think, because it just sounds cool.”

“Both the book and then the movie starring Johnny Depp really popularized this idea of adrenochrome and this link with pedophiles,” Sommer continued. “And so that's really where QAnon people get it…  And so when you look at, you know, Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas YouTube clips about adrenochrome, all up and down in the comments, it's QAnon people saying, you know, Q sent me here and things like that.”

As The New York Times pointed out, adrenochrome is real, but it’s a “byproduct of adrenaline… not a recreational drug,” and “its effects are said to be negligible.” But Thompson’s book related that adrenochrome makes you feel like you’re “wired into a 220-volt socket.”

“That’s how fucking stupid they are,” Gilliam said of QAnon followers. “There’s madness afoot. Adrenochrome is a complete invention – Hunter started that and we just carried it on. But what’s interesting about QAnon is this belief in secret cabals and hidden control. It’s not like that at all. It’s far more chaotic than they imagine. Really, it’s a desire to believe in structure – a displaced faith in God, except God was more open-minded than the world they’re talking about.”

So while Gilliam may not be responsible for QAnon, as he said, he did seemingly play a hand in bringing the source text that inspired elements of it to a wider audience. As far as we know, no part of QAnon takes their inspiration from Time Bandits or The Adventures of Baron Munchausen.