About

Nier is an action RPG developed by Cavia and produced by Square Enix. ^[1] It is a spinoff of the Drakengard series and was intended by Square Enix to be an RPG for an older audience. Though it received mixed-poor reviews upon its release in 2010, the game developed a cult following in the following years, leading Square Enix to produce a sequel, Nier: Automata, developed by Platinum Games and set for release in 2017.

Premise

The story takes place in the distant future. The middle-aged titular character Nier (whose name can be changed in game) embarks on a quest to save his daughter Yonah from an illness known as “the black scrawl.” Along the way, he meets a snarky book named Grimoire Weiss and social outcasts Kainé and Emil (cast shown below). The game’s main enemies are creatures known as Shades and the villain is a shadow version of the title character who wants to kidnap Yonah.

History

Nier was released in 2010 by Square Enix. It was initially planned as an entry into the Drakengard series, but was released as its own spinoff. Director Tako Yoko had high creative control over his game, and as a result, the game blends multiple styles and genres. Yoko stated the game was inspired by the events of September 11th, 2001 and that he wanted to show how in conflict, both sides believe they are doing the right thing. Thus, Nier features multiple perspectives on the events of its plot, revealed through multiple playthroughs. In Japan, the game was released as Nier: Gestalt and an alternate version, Nier: Replicant was released and featured a younger main character.

Reception

Nier received mixed reviews from critics, earning a score of 68 on Metacritic.^[2] Reviewers were critical of its graphics, but praised the voice acting and soundtrack. They were more divided on the the effectiveness of the game’s mix of styles and the sidequests were almost universally derided. In his review, Yahtzee of Zero Punctuation gave tepid praise to the story but criticized the game’s sidequests and repetitive structure (shown below).

In the years following the commercial and critically tepid response to Nier, it developed a cult following. In 2015, Eurogamer^[3] called it “the rare game that gets better with age,” with critic Jeffrey Matulef attributing its cult following to the “sense of wonder” produced by the game’s cryptic storytelling, downbeat atmosphere and mashup of genres. In 2016, Pat and Liam of Super Best Friends Play played the game on their channel. They received it very positively, and noted that flaws in the 2010 title would likely be addressed by Platinum Games in the the upcoming sequel, Nier: Automata.

Nier: Automata

In 2014, production began on Nier: Automata, a sequel to Nier, with Yoko returning as director. The team’s intent was to stay true to the spirit of the original while creating better action gameplay. Nier: Automata takes place after the events of Nier and features androids fighting a proxy war on Earth for humans who have fled to the Moon to escape Earth invaders. The main protagonist is YoRHa No. 2 Model B, or “2B” for short. She is a female-model android whose main traits are being calm and composed. On December 22nd, 2016, Playstation released the Nier: Automata demo to the Playstation store.^[4] Critics were impressed by the gameplay mechanics and the emotional heft of the 30 minute demo’s story.^[5]

Butthole Controversy

Following the release of the demo, members of Twitter began talking about a screenshot^[6] of the character 2B’s butt in which it is possible to see her anus beneath her underwear. The image generated interest in the game, as fans praised the “lovingly rendered butthole” and created fan art of the character. However, some people insist the screenshot is fake. While it is possible to see an upskirt image of 2B, it appears as though the popular “butthole” photo was photoshopped.^[7][8]

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About

Three Drinks Later is an image macro series in which photographs of well-known extremists and radicals are juxtaposed beneath the caption “me: i promise i won’t get all political / 3 drinks later” as a way to poke fun at one’s tendency to engage in emotionally charged political debate when inebriated.

Origin

The first known variation of the post appeared on September 11th, 2016, featuring an image of well-known communist Vladimir Lenin as the punchline. It appeared on the Facebook page of @SarcasticDragonite^[2] that day. A screenshot of a Facebook post using the image and its ensuing thread was posted to /r/iamverysmart^[1] by Cerberus73 the same day. The post gained 69 points.

Spread

In the following days, the image inspired variations depicting artistic renderings of different political scenes with the caption, before evolving to include humorous pop culture references, other memes, and snowclone variations. On October 6th, Stackward^[3] posted a compilation of some of the best “3 Drinks Later” jokes.

Various Examples

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About

Autistic Screeching is an exploitable comic series featuring an illustration of two people shaking hands next to a person crouched in anger with the caption “autistic screeching” above their head, often associated with the onomatopoeic expression REEEEE. The series if often used to mock angry reactions to various political alliances.

Origin

On July 30th, 2016, the Anarchyball Facebook^[2] page posted a comic in which two anarcho-capitalist balls agree on exchanging money for services, causing a person wearing a Che Guevara shirt to yell “Oppreshun!” (shown below).

Spread

On November 22nd, FunnyJunk user drkinferno uploaded a comic in which United States and Russian flag balls are shown shaking hands with a depiction of the EU “autistic screeching” (shown below).

On December 13th, 2016, FunnyJunk^[3] user nuxtheunkrakible submitted several photographs of 3D printed firearms followed by an “autistic screeching” illustration of an ATF agent (shown below).

On December 26th, Redditor nickmariostories submitted a post titled “Autistic Screeching Memes are on the rise” to /r/MemeEconomy.

Various Examples

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About

Jersey Shore as Movies refers to a series of jokes made on Twitter in which screenshots from the television show Jersey Shore are paired with movie titles, making it appear as thought he Jersey Shore screenshot is from the film it’s paired with.

Origin

On December 31st, 2016, Twitter user @sinamonnroll^[1] posted a tweet that read “Jersey shore as movies (a thread).” He then followed it with dozens of posts of screenshots of Jersey Shore paired with movie titles (ex: shown below). His original tweet gained over 5,000 retweets and 6,500 likes as of January 3rd, 2017.

Spread

@sinamonnroll’s tweets were very popular, with many gaining thousands of retweets and likes. spizalert^[3] of /r/memeeconomy suggested investing in the memes that day. @sinamonnroll’s tweets also inspired several other posters to make their own variations with popular films. One of the most popular shows the men of Jersey Shore walking in black tank tops, captioned “Reservoir Dogs (1992)” (shown below).

New York Magazine’s SelectAll^[4] covered the spread of the jokes on January 3rd. @sinnamonroll’s tweets were also compiled by Twitter Moments^[2] on January 3rd.

Various Examples

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Unavailable

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About

Kono Subarashii Sekai ni Shukufuku o! (この素晴らしい世界に祝福を!, literally “Give Blessings on This Wonderful World!), more commonly known by its abbreviated title of KonoSuba, is a web novel by Natsume Akatsuki, later released in print form and adapted into both manga and an anime series produced by Studio DEEN.^[1]

Premise

KonoSuba is in the “Isekai” or “Other World” genre of light novels similar to popular series like Sword Art Online or Re:Zero. However, KonoSuba’s popularity stems from its distinctively comedic approach and the subject matter borders on parody of this genre.

The plot begins as follows: cynical shut-in Satou Kazuma is killed and finds himself brought to a goddess named Aqua. She presents him with the opportunity to begin life anew in a fantasy world, and grants him the choice of one item he may take with him on his journey. Kazuma promptly chooses to bend the rules and chooses Aqua herself as his “item of choice”. Thus, the two are transported to another world and commence their quest to defeat the Demon King.

History

KonoSuba began life as a web novel published online from December 2012. It was reworked into a light novel from October 2013.

The series’ popularity saw large escalation with the airing of the animated adaptation in January 2016, with western fandom viewing the series on streaming websites such as Crunchyroll.^[2]

Reception

The series has a light-hearted nature and as such was well-received by anime fans tired of the traditionally more grim or “edgy” entries in the Other World genre. Anime review and news website Anime News Network found the series’ second episode (which features Megumin’s introduction) to be “the funniest episode of anime seen since ”http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/subcultures/gekkan-shoujo-nozaki-kun-monthly-girls-nozaki-kun">_Monthly Girls’ Nozaki-kun_"^[3]

However, as a Studio DEEN show, the animation style is occasionally mocked by viewers for its quality.^[4]

Online Relevance

The series has fandom entries on sites such as reddit. Megumin has her own subreddit at r/Megumin, in accordance with her memetic popularity (discussed below), with over 4,000 subscribers.^[5] Bizarrely, this dwarfs the size of r/Konosuba at around 2,000 subs.^[6] Tumblr also sees some fandom presence.^[7]

Fan art is prominent on sites such as Pixiv, where “この素晴らしい世界に祝福を!” (full Japanese title) has over 3,000 results.^[8] Megumin alone (めぐみん) returns around 2,800 results.^[9] On DeviantArt, searches for “konosuba” return over 1,000 results.^[10]

Related Memes

Megumin

One of the regular cast, Megumin is a rookie mage who is a mockery of the “chuunibyou” or “edgy middle schooler” character archetype. She is popular among series viewers for her bizarre and over-the-top behaviour.

Megumin is so memetastic that she is often referred to by fans as “Megumeme”.

“Megumin Monday” is a series of Megumin-themed threads posted on 4chan’s /a/ (anime & manga) board, particularly popular during the series’ air years of 2016/17.^[11]

EXPLOSION

The sole spell in Megumeme’s arsenal, which she can only cast once a day. Cast with an overly-long incantation punctuated by an Engrish pronunciation of the word “explosion”, the spell is a common “mark-out” moment for many fans. “EXPLOSION” is commonly spammed in the comments sections for KonoSuba-related material online.

WAGA NA WA MEGUMIN

Megumin’s haughty way of introducing herself when she first appears. Although the line simply translates to “my name is Megumin”, it is an old-fashioned way of saying so in Japanese, with connotations of arrogance, and as such reflects Megumin’s hammy and chuuni-like demeanour. Like “EXPLOSION”, it is often seen as a kind of roleplay-shitposting in online comments.

A button for “Waga na wa Megumin” has been added to MyInstants.com.^[12]

Search Interest

References

After “Pokemon Sun and Pokemon Moon’s ^[1]” demo was datamined and the game itself was released, players took notice of one particular Pokemon who seemed significantly angrier than the rest. Jokes about this Pokemon began to spread throughout the Pokemon community, with many fans beginning to adore the menacing look this Pokemon constantly had.

[WARNING: This article may be incomplete and/or inaccurate, you can help by expanding it]

The iFunny server war started on early 2017.
iFunny users are raiding eachothers tags.

The origin of the intra-war on iFunny’s servers started begin 2017, when an iFunny user uploaded a photo of a burning Brazilian flag. A moderator banned that post and thus starting the war between the American and the Brazilian servers.

Popular iFunny users “Ark” and “Sandpapercondoms” contributed to the raiding and got banned by the moderaters moderating the Brazil servers. This sparked anger by the users of the American servers and thus many users (especially those from the “Offensives” tags) agreed to raid the Brazilian servers. Even popular moderator “Weest” contributed to the raidings. Only to take back what he said after.

The raiders would preferably make posts, spam the tags full of invasion related propaganda and fill the comments calling names and make hygiene related jokes such as “laughs in clean water”, “Zika n*gger” and more.

The “Shucc” Meme originated on the Subreddit known as /r/DankMemes and quickly gained traction with the user base with many spin off varieties being made.

The meme involves a face of a African American man and often the text “Shucc” writen over it. This is commonly used to express distain for something or a particularly strong emotion regarding a specific topic.

About

Increasingly Verbose Memes, also known as Deconstruction Comics, are a series of multi-pane images featuring a preexisting meme poorly redrawn in MS Paint several times – or, alternatively, successively degraded using JPEG compression – accompanied by a caption rewritten to become increasingly verbose with each successive illustration. The reciprocal relationship between the increasing verbosity and the decreasing graphic fidelity is a characteristic of some ironic memes.

Origin

On May 8th, 2016, Imgur^[2] user AFuckingWhiteMale posted a gallery of Breath-in, Boi examples, featuring several redrawn illustrations of the original image with verbose variations of the caption “breath in / boi” (shown below).

Naming

This type of meme has a number of names attached to it due, in part, to a lack of comprehensive structure when creating these types of memes. Some early, alternate names to ‘increasingly verbose’ include meme corruption, deconstructed memes, verbose memes, and meme decay .

In November 2016, YouTuber The Kase Reibe called the meme style a “progressively verbose” meme^[6], giving rise to the now common name “increasingly verbose” as it picked up in /r/coaxedintoasnafu in December 2016.

Precursors

The series Coaxed Into a Snafu features poorly redrawn variations of internet meme characters, along with reworded versions of their associated catchphrases (shown below, left). Additionally, the series bears many similarities to Verbose Memes, an image macro series featuring lengthy reworded variations of internet meme references (shown below, right). Similarly, the meme may be derived from Archaic Rap.

Spread

One of the earliest spin-offs dates back to October 7th, whenYouTube user ‘The Kase Reibe’ uploaded Press X to Doubt (below), a video spin-off of an L.A.Noire Increasingly Verbose Meme of the same name. Kase Reibe (presumably) narrates the increasingly verbose meme with their own voice, with their audio quality degrading over time in tandem with the video resolution.

On December 11th, Redditor Stop_Drop_And_Roll submitted an increasingly verbose image based on a picture of the Heavy Weapons Guy from Team Fortress 2 with the caption “put a dispenser here” (shown below, left). Within three weeks, the post garnered upwards of 3,700 votes (89% upvoted) and 70 comments on /r/tf2.^[5] On December 20th, Redditor ChronicVenom submitted a post asking about the series to /r/OutOfTheLoop,^[4] including an increasingly verbose version of Big Smoke’s Order (shown below, right).

On December 25th, Redditor Thomasvdw14 submitted a Bee Movie-themed increasingly verbose image to the /r/dankmemes^[3] subreddit, where it accumulated more than 1,200 votes (96% upvoted) and 30 comments (shown below, left). On December 27th, 2016, an increasingly verbose meme posted on /r/MemeEconomy^[1] reached the front page of Reddit, amassing over 17,000 votes (84% upvoted) in 24 hours (shown below, right).

Various Examples

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Rain Drop Drop Top is a lyric from the song “Bad and Boujee” by hip hop group Migos that became a phrasal template for jokes primarily on Twitter, especially Black Twitter in late December 2016. The song’s first lyric is “Rain drop, drop top, smokin’ on cookie in the hotbox.” In the snowclone, “smokin’ on cookie in the hotbox” is replaced.

Origin

On August 27th, 2016, Migos uploaded “Bad and Boujee” to their Soundcloud page.^[1] As of December 27th, the track has been played over 49.4 million times. On October 31st, the group posted their video for the track to YouTube, where it has been viewed over 60.7 million times (shown below).

Spread

Initially, “Rain Drop Drop Top” spread in mid-December 2016 as a game among friends to jokingly prove their credibility/loyalty in which one person would text another “Rain Drop” and the other would have to reply “Drop Top.”

A week after the initial spread, “Rain Drop Drop Top” began appearing in more snowclones. One of the most popular was posted by @niicksx in a tweet that gained over 63,000 retweets and 107,000 likes in a week (shown below).

On December 25th, CavsFan2014 posted a thread to /r/OutOfTheLoop^[2] asking about the origins of the meme in a thread that gained 83 points.

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Overview

Wendy’s Twitter Own refers to an interaction the Twitter account of the fast food chain restaurant Wendy’s had with a disgruntled customer who took issue with their slogan “fresh, never frozen,” which refers to the beef they use in their hamburgers. Wendy’s twitter responded in a way that made the customer look foolish, leading to media coverage and praise from other Twitter users.

Background

On December 30th, 2016, Wendy’s tweeted “Our beef is way too cool to ever be frozen.”^[1] On January 2nd, 2017, Twitter user @NHride, account now deleted, replied and accused Wendy’s of lying, saying that they do in fact freeze their beef. In the ensuing exchange, Wendy’s denied the accusation, eventually quipping to @NHRide “You forgot refrigerators existed for a second there” (exchange shown below).

Developments

On January 2nd, Twitter user @parkermolloy^[2] tweeted screenshots of the exchange. Their tweet gained nearly 62,000 retweets and 153,000 likes. Daily Dot,^[3] AV Club^[4] and other media outlets covered the exchange as well as the positive reaction it had received on Twitter. They also noted that @NHride had deleted their account, presumably out of humiliation. The success of the tweet led others to ask the Wendy’s Twitter to roast them, which it did. The Wendy’s roasts were compiled in a Twitter Moment^[5] on January 4th. That day, Wendy’s responded to a user who asked “Got any memes?” with a picture of Pepe the Frog drawn in the likeness of the Wendy’s mascot. The tweet, shown below, drew criticism and was deleted, causing the account to tweet, “Our community manager was unaware of the recent evolution of the Pepe meme’s meaning and this tweet was promptly deleted.”^[6]

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External References

dog muffin at frappe

About

Gordon Ramsay’s Lamb Sauce refers to a series of shitpost style images referencing a 2006 episode of Hell’s Kitchen in which Chef Gordon Ramsay berates a kitchen full of chefs, demanding to know where the lamb sauce is for a dish.

Origin

In a clip from a 2006 episode of his show Hell’s Kitchen, Ramsay profanely berates a kitchen of chefs, eventually demanding to know where the lamb sauce is for a dish (shown below).

Spread

The clip inspired several YouTube Poop and remix videos in the coming years, becoming one of the more widely referenced clips of the show.

Editor’s Note: This entry is a WIP. Please request editorship if you think you can help!

About

Lamb Sauce, also known as Gordon Ramsey Cannot Locate the Lamb Sauce, refers to a scene from an episode of Hell’s Kitchen where Gordon Ramsey yells “Where’s the lamb sauce” at the cooks. It has been referenced and edited online.

Origin

{WIP}

Spread

{WIP}

Various Examples

{WIP}

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Bart’s Butterfingers Commercial is a popular candy bar produced by Nestlé that has ben on The Simpsons. There have been many commercials for Butterfinger that have featured The Simpsons since 1988 up through today.

Origin

The vary first commercial was in 1988 called “No Teasing” it became vary popular.

Spread

W.I.P.

Various Examples

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About

Anti-Memes are image macros which are typically captioned with anti-jokes and meta humor mocking a variety of internet memes, bearing many similarities to Wholesome Memes and Reverse Memes.

Origin

In January 2009, the web comic Big Fat Whale^[1] published a comic titled “Internet Anti-Memes & Non-Sensations,” featuring illustrations of various absurd and unlikely internet phenomena (shown below).

Spread

On February 8th, 2012, the /r/antimeme^[5] subreddit was launched. On September 25th, 2016, the @memearchive Twitter feed posted an image macro combining the memes Bae Come Over, The Barber, Nut Button and Doggo (shown below).

On November 6th, 2016, Imgur^[2] user TheRealOle uploaded a gallery image macros titled “A little bit of anti-memes.” On November 21st, Redditor JarJarsMyHero submitted a post titled “Anti Memes are Skyrocketing! Buy Now!” to /r/memeeconomy,^[6] where it received upwards of 4,600 points (92% upvoted) in one month. The following day, Redditor jayjenks submitted an MS Paint-style Evil Kermit comic, captioned with a meta joke about the image macro series (shown below). Within two months, the image gained over 3,200 points (87% upvoted) on /r/me_irl.^[8]

On November 30th, Redditor Dr-Dangerous posted an edited This Is Fine comic in which the dog says “This is a cup of coffee” to /r/me_irl^[9] (shown below).

On December 2nd, Imgur^[4] user DanWest124 posted a similar gallery of anti-memes. On January 3rd, 2017, BuzzFeed published a listicle of “19 Anti-Memes For People Who Have Evolved Past Memes.” The following day, Redditor mfkdso submitted a post titled “BuzzFeed has picked up Anti-Memes. Sell!” to /r/MemeEconomy,^[7] gathering more than 3,500 points (95% upvoted) and 100 comments within 24 hours.

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About

“This Bird Keeps Itself In The Air By Sheer Force Of Anger Alone” is a phrase frequently used in association with a picture of a Loggerhead Shrike.

Origin

The original photograph of the Loggerhead Shrike caught in midair was taken by Flickr user Steve Leach on January 19th 2010 ^[10]. On Flicker it preceded to gain over 2,700 views.

Spread

On March 16th 2012, Tumblr user Fairy-Wren posted the image on their blog^[2]. In within 6 years the post gained over 179,000 notes. The image was also frequently reposted on other sites, without proper attribution, often used as an example of “Angry Birds in Real Life” referring to the popular mobile game Angry Birds^[3][4][5]

On March 25th 2015, the phrase “This bird keeps itself in the air by sheer force of anger alone.” became associated with the photograph when Twitter user @Paul2eD posted said image with the caption.In two years it gained over 22,000 likes and 16,000 retweets.

External References

About

Don’t let your kids watch it is an meme explosion of the character Robbie Rotten in the Icelandic children’s television show LazyTown, which was broadcast on Nickelodeon.

Origin

W.I.P.

Spread

On Sep 25, 2016 a video was uploaded called “Don’t let your kids watch this.mp4” the video has over 2,890 views.

Various Examples

Search Interest

Sushu is a meme that originated of the [s4s] board of 4chan on 10/15/16. It was originally posted with the comment being the exact same as the filename, excluding the .jpg and adding a question mark at the end, and the subject “what in the food”. It has since been adapted to many post formats with many different comments and subject lines.

About

Princess Leia is a fictional character prominently featured in the Star Wars saga as the princess of the planet Alderaan, who has been portrayed by Carrie Fisher up to the upcoming title Star Wars: Episode VIII slated for release in December 2017. Widely regarded as one of the most iconic characters from the saga, the fictional character has been a long-running subject of fan art and fanfiction on the web.

Origin

Princess Leia was introduced in the original Star Wars film (Star Wars: Episode IV – A New Hope) in 1977 and portrayed by American actress Carrie Fisher.

Character History

In the film, Leia plays an important role in foiling the evil plan of main antagonist Sith Lord Darth Vader and bringing about the destruction of his cataclysmic weapon, the Death Star. In the sequel The Empire Strikes Back (1980), she commands a Rebel base and falls in love with Han Solo. In Return of the Jedi (1983), Leia leads the operation to rescue Han from the crime lord Jabba the Hutt, and is revealed to be Vader’s daughter and the twin sister of Luke Skywalker.

The prequel film Revenge of the Sith (2005) establishes that the twins’ mother is Senator (and former queen) Padmé Amidala of Naboo, who dies after childbirth. Leia is adopted by Senator Bail and Queen Breha Organa of Alderaan. In The Force Awakens (2015), Leia is the founder and General of the Resistance against the First Order and has a son with Han named Ben, who now goes by the name Kylo Ren.

Spread

Based on Google Ngram analysis and news articles, Princess Leia has been a subject of interest in American pop culture for almost as long as since the franchise has existed, particularly her character traits marked by heroism, which has been praised by many film critics, feminist scholars and columnists as “an exemplary personification of female empowerment.”

Fandom

The character has been widely featured in fan-made artworks, ranging from fanfiction and parodies to illustrations and cosplay. In addition to tributes, Princess Leia has been referenced or parodied in both pop and internet cultures for several decades, including Fisher’s appearance in the Leia metal bikini on the cover of Rolling Stone’s summer 1983 issue and a painting of Leia featured on the cover of May 1983 issue of TIME magazine announcing Return of the Jedi. In 2008, Leia was selected by Empire magazine as the 89th greatest film character of all time and IGN listed her as their 8th top Star Wars hero. In 2010, UGO Networks listed Leia as one of their best heroes of all time in 2010.

Carrie Fisher’s Death

On December 27th, 2016, Carrie Fisher died at the age of 60 after suffering a massive heart attack on an airplane on the 23rd. Her passing led to an outpouring of support in memoriam, as people celebrated her life as an actress and advocate for mental health awareness as well as her unique Twitter presence.^[12][13]

Some reactions to Fisher’s death drew criticism. Notably, Cinnabon drew backlash when it tweeted an image of Fisher drawn in cinnamon with a cinnamon roll in place of her iconic Princess Leia “earmuff” hair style (below, left). Smash Mouth also drew backlash when it tweeted an image of Fisher with their logo photoshopped onto it (below, right).^[14] Both tweets have since been deleted.

Quartz^[15] and Daily Dot^[16] also wrote articles about a tweet by Katherine Nesbitt,^[17] shown below, which contained a story Fisher told in her autobiography in which George Lucas told her there were no bras in space because they would strangle those wearing them. This lead Fisher to muse “no matter how I go, I want it reported that I drowned in moonlight, strangled by my own bra.”

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