About

In the Aeroplane Over the Sea Cover Parodies is a meme based on Neutral Milk Hotel’s second studio album, In The Aeroplane Over the Sea, as well as it’s cover. The cover is parodied, often alluding to other parts of the album, along with references to other albums and memes favored by /mu/, such as Death Grips, and Dubs Guy among others.

Background

In the Aeroplane Over the Sea is the second studio album by indie band Neutral Milk Hotel, released in 1998. It was one of the most critically acclaimed and influential albums of the late 90s. The album received high praise from many critics, and in 2008 the album was reissued for its tenth anniversary and received a perfect 10/10 score by music review website Pitchfork Media, an achievement that has only been reached 13 times.

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

This Is Snek refers to a phrase used as a caption of a photo of a Indian woman holding a giant snake. The phrase is used as a hashtag or to caption other humorous photos of snakes.

Origin

The exact origin of the photo is unknown, although it began to pop up online on various photo blogs during the winter of 2013-2014.^[1] The caption, an unrelated quote by Indian singer Dharmendra Rada, appeared on the photo during this time as well, and it’s likely that the combination was first created on 4chan, although it hasn’t been archived. The first instance of the photo posted online was on FunnyJunk on January 24th, 2014.^[2]

Precursor

The word “snek” in reference to snake predates the “This Is Snek” image by several years. The word snek has been archived on 4chan almost 10,000 times, and the first instances of the word snek being used to reference a snake date back to at least 2012.^[3] According to Urban Dictionary, snek is often paired with the word “stahp,” as in “Snek Stahp!” in the image below.^[4] In addition, snek is often used as a hashtag on Tumblr, where many use it to tag photos of their own snakes, and Instagram, where there are more than 12,000 posts doing the same.^[5][6]

Spread

The first known reddit post of This is Snek, to the subreddit /r/nottimanderic, was February 10th, 2015 and received 1691 upvotes as of September 2015.^[7] This post, in turn, inspired the subreddit /r/sneks, which has gained over 11,000 readers in the same time span.^[8] The image phrase has been used over 750 times on 4chan, the first of which was May 19th, 2014 on the /s4s/ board.^[9] On November 26th, 2014, the image was posted to reddit again, this time in the /r/indianpeoplefacebook subreddit, where it received 2,888 points (100% upvoted).^[10]

There are thousands of snake-related results at any given time for “This Is Snek” on Tumblr,^[11] and the hashtag #thisissnek produces a variety of results on Instagram and Twitter.^[12][13] There are 24 deviations on DeviantArt.^[14]

Notable Examples

Search Interest

External References

Editor’s note: For more information, visit KYM Forum Thread – Office of Cease & Desist Records.

About

Scumbag Girl, also referred to as “Scumbag Stacy” and “Scumbag Girlfriend”, is an Advice Animal style image macro series featuring a photo of a scantily clad young woman posing in a bedroom. The overlaid text typically consists of unethical, selfish and sadistic behaviors that are meant to represent the female counterpart toScumbag Steve.

Origin

The origin of the photo of the girl comes from a post on the single topic blog HottestGirlsOnCampus, entitled “North Carolina Hat Girl”^[1], posted on the 26th of January 2011. Soon afterwards, the subject of the photograph was identified as a winner of CollegeHumor’s “Hottest College Girl” contest in 2007.^[9]

Spread

Following the post on the HottestGirlsOnCampus, the photo of the hat girl has been used as an avatar in adult dating sites and was posted in various forums. The photo has also being used as an advertisement for the adult dating site Fling^[2].

A Scumbag Girl Quickmeme page was created on April 2011^[3]. The first thread on the r/adviceanimals^[4] subreddit was posted on the 14th of April 2011 titled “Introducing:Scumbag Girlfriend”.

Meme generators for Scumbag Girl can be found on QuickMeme^[5] and DIYLOL^[6].

Derivative: Cool Chick Carol

Similar to the Good Guy Greg series that was created as the polar opposite of Scumbag Steve, Cool Chick Carol is the polar opposite of Scumbag Girl. The photo originates from a post titled “Destination Playstation 2009” on February 26th, 2009 from the Spanish videogaming blog Bitgame^[7]. Derivatives can be found on Quickmeme.^[8]

Search Interest

Search queries for “Scumbag Girl” peaked in April-May 2011, corresponding with the creation of the Quickmeme page.

External References

^[1]HottestGirlsOnCampus – North Carolina Hat Girl

^[2]TinEye – Search results using a Scumbag Girl derivative

^[3]QuickMeme – i hate how men treat women golddigger

^[4]AdviceAnimals Subreddit – Introducing: Scumbag Girlfriend

^[5]Quickmeme – Scumbag Girl

^[6]DIYLOL– Scumbag Girl

^[7]Bitgame – Destination Playstation 2009

^[8]Quickmeme – Cool Chick Carol

^[9]UDReview – Del Student Named America’s Hottest College Girl

About

Tampon Girl is the nickname given to Giovanna Plowman, a teenager who uploaded a video of herself sucking on what appears to be a used feminine hygiene product. Since its upload onto Facebook and YouTube in January 2013, the video has sparked several reaction videos as well as an online debate regarding its authenticity.

Origin

Giovanna Plowman uploaded the original video to her Facebook^[9] page on January 19th, 2013, in which she removes a tampon off camera and proceeds to put it in her mouth while listening to the song “212” by Azealia Banks. The video was re-uploaded to YouTube later that same day by YouTuber FizzyShizzles, but both copies were subsequently removed for violating the sites’ terms of services. Eventually, a mirrored copy was re-uploaded to LiveLeak (shown below).

Spread

On January 20th, 2013, Yahoo Answers^[3] member Chantelle B. submitted a question asking if other members thought the video was faked, which sparked a debate about the video’s authenticity in the comments. The same day, the Examiner^[6] published an article about the Internet’s reaction to the video, reporting that Plowman was being bullied and people were spreading rumors that she had committed suicide. Meanwhile on YouTube, several viewers posted their reactions to Plowman’s video, in similar vein to the response videos associated with Two Girls One Cup and Interior Semiotics.

Also on January 20th, Redditor Madclown55 submitted the LiveLeak video to the /r/cringe^[10] subreddit, where it received over 160 up votes and 160 comments within 24 hours. On January 21st, YouTuber DailyGrace uploaded a fake reaction to the video, in which she acts disgusted while watching a tampon commercial (shown below).

As of January 21st, 2013, the “Giovanna Plowman” Facebook^[7] page has received over 161,000 subscribers and the @ItsGiovannaP Twitter^[8] account has received over 8,100 followers. Posts about the video can be found on the microblogging site Tumblr under the tag “#giovanna plowman.”^[1]. Giovanna appears to show rather no regret for her infamy and actions in her scandalous video, stating “im kinda famous guys”

Notable Examples

Image Macros

Search Interest

External References

About

“What Year Is It” is the caption of an image macro featuring a photo of Robin Williams’ disheveled-looking character from the 1995 film Jumanji. In rage comics, it is often used in similar fashion to the my face when reaction faces to convey the disoriented sense of time experienced when waking up.

Origin

Jumanji is a fantasy-comedy film released on December 15th, 1995, starring Robin Williams playing the role of Alan: a boy who is sucked into a board game only to emerge 26 years later. After being freed from the game, he asks the two children that have freed him “what year is it?”^[1] and is shocked to discover how much time has past. The image used for the caption “What year is it?” was taken from the official Jumanji movie trailer and can be seen at 1:09 in the following video:

The earliest known reaction image macro instance was posted to the r/pics subreddit in a thread titled “How I feel after an afternoon nap”^[2] on September 7th, 2011 by Redditor topshelf89. The thread managed to reach the front page and has accumulated 16,886 up votes as of November 30th, 2011.

Spread

The same reaction image reached the front page of the marijuana enthusiast r/trees subreddit in a thread titled “First words out of my mouth after waking up still a solid 6”^[7] on October 13th, 2011. The first known rage comic using the captioned image titled “Every damn night”^[5] was created by Redditor Arbypwnyou and reached the front page of the f7u12 rage comic subreddit on October 16th, 2011.

On November 11th, 2011, a Skyrim rage comic by Redditor JoshuaTheWarrior reached the front page of the r/gaming subreddit. Rage comics using the reaction image have since spread to FunnyJunk^[4] and Tumblr.^[3] Two Quickmeme^[6][7] pages have been created featuring the image with a total of 32 submissions as of November 30th, 2011.

Notable Examples

External References

About

“REEEEEEE” is an onomatopoeic expression of intense rage or frustration typically associated with the Angry Pepe character and used by those who frequent the /r9k/ board on 4chan. It is meant to represent the unique croak produced by several species of frogs when agitated.

Origin

Certain frog species are known to produce a shrill scream noise to ward of predators when threatened.^[12][13] On October 25th, 2009, the earliest known video of this behavior was uploaded by YouTuber ppparaone, which gained over 2.5 million views and 4,600 comments in the next six years (shown below). This video would later one become even more popular with a screenshot of a comment, and spread to humor content aggregator clickbait websites such as Buzzfeed^[14] or Smosh^[15].

The earliest known archived use of the onomatopoeic version of the scream was submitted to 4chan’s /r9k/^[7] board on December 27th, 2014, featuring an image of Pepe the Frog accompanied by the message “REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE” (shown below).

Spread

On January 23rd, 2015, a series of posts with Angry Pepe images featuring the cries of frustration appeared on /r9k/.^[6] On January 31st, a thread was submitted containing a picture of Pepe vomiting along with the expression, to which other users replied with audio clips of themselves making the screaming noise. Over the following weeks, additional posts were submitted featuring the onomatopoeic expression.^[9]

On February 21st, a Redditor submitted the question “Why do people on 4chan’s r9k say ‘REEEEEE’ all of a sudden?” to the /r/OutOfTheLoop^[16] subreddit, to which Redditor Dragon___ replied that the sound was similar to shrieks made by autistic people (shown below). On March 19th, Redditor Taaqif submitted another question about “Reeeeeee” comments to /r/OutOfTheLoop.^[17]

Various Examples

“Fucking Normies! REEEEEEE!”

“Fucking Normies! REEEEEEE!” is an expression indicating rage against ‘normies’,, which is associated with the catchphrase “Fucking normies! Get out of my board!” used in audio recordings submitted to /r9k/.^{[2][3][4][5][10]} On February 1st, 2015, YouTuber GoldenSodaXbox uploaded one of the recordings (shown below, left). On February 24th, YouTuber The Dank Memester uploaded a video titled “NORMIESGETOUT,” featuring several of the audio clips (shown below, right).

The audio clip inspired other parodies with various /r9k/ audio clips (shown below).

Search Interest

External References

About

Don’t Look at Them Ricky! is a webcomic featuring a son who undergoes a transformation after witnessing two men kissing while walking with his mother. The comic is often used as an exploitable template to depict other transformations in a similar vein to the “Sweet Jesus, Pooh!” comic series.

Origin

In April 2014, the webcomic Extra Fabulous Comics^[1] posted a comic titled “Probably Not How it Works,” in which a mother warns her son to look away from two men kissing before he is magically transformed into a sweater vest, tie and pair of heart-shaped sunglasses (shown below).

Spread

On April 28th, 2014, Redditor FunkSiren submitted the comic to the /r/Unexpected^[3] subreddit, where it garnered more than 3,500 votes (90% upvoted) and 90 comments prior to being archived. On June 27th, NeoGAF member Peff submitted a Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure-themed version of the comic (shown below, left). On May 3rd, 2015, the original comic was submitted to the /r/ireland^[2] subreddit, where it gathered upwards of 2,600 votes (91% upvoted) and 140 comments. On June 29th, Redditor friendzoned_niceguy submitted a version of the comic titled “The birth of a furry” to the /r/CringeAnarchy^[5] subreddit (shown below, right).

On November 4th, Twitter user @studiopixelbeam^[6] tweeted a version of the comic featuring the PC gaming masterrace character (shown below, left). On November 14th, Redditor demonboi uploaded an edited version of the comic mocking DJs who play trap music to /r/trap^[4] (shown below, right).

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

Ed Balls is a British politician who rose to internet fame after accidentally tweeting his own name in April 2011, leading many users on Twitter to mockingly retweet the message thousands of times. Since then, many British Internet users have been annually celebrating “Ed Balls Day” by spamming his name on Twitter on the anniversary of the original tweet.

Origin

On April 28th, 2011, British Labour Party and Co-operative Party politician Edward Michael Balls accidentally tweeted his own name while trying to search for an article about him on Twitter (shown below). Within two years, the tweet received over 10,800 retweets and 4,300 favorites.

Spread

For the remainder of 2011 and 2012, the tweet remained intact on Balls’ Twitter profile and became mocked by many British users on the site. On February 5th, 2013, Storify^[6] user Moose Allain uploaded a compilation of tweets describing how to pronounce “Ed Balls.” On April 8th, a Facebook^[3] event page was created for the second anniversary of Ed Balls’ tweet, which received over 900 RSVPs in the following week. On April 10th, journalist Andy Kelly tweeted a joke about Ed Balls punning his own name at the funeral for former British prime minister Margaret Thatcher. Within five days, the tweet gained more than 55 retweets and 40 favorites.

On April 11th, blogger Rebecca Baker published an article about the upcoming two-year anniversary for the tweet.^[8] The following day, Balls retweeted a photograph of a train sign with his name written on it. Also on April 12th, the tech news blog Digital Spy^[2] published a post about Balls’ recognition of the meme.

On April 13th, Urban Dictionary^[4] user mosmi submitted an entry for “Ed Balls,” defining it as a meme inspired by the tweet from April 2011. On April 15th, the viral content site BuzzFeed^[1] featured a compilation of notable examples of the meme and The Mirror^[5] published an article about the upcoming anniversary of the tweet, reporting that many Twitter users planned to retweet Ed Balls’ name on April 28th.

Notable Examples

Leading up to the tweet’s two-year anniversary, many Twitter users posted edited photos and image macros referencing the meme.

Bookmarklet

An Ed Balls bookmarklet^[7] tool allows users to change the text on an entire webpage to the name “Ed Balls” (shown below).

Ed Balls Day

Since the original tweet went viral in April 2011, the incident has been annually celebrated by British Internet users on the day of its anniversary, with many retweeting his original message and others commemorating the occasion through various works of homage on April 28th. In 2015, Balls submitted a framed and signed printout of the infamous tweet to be auctioned off at a fundraising event for the Labour party.

Search Interest

External References

About

Towel is the pseudonym used by an anonymous hacker who gained minor notoriety for hacking and vandalizing the YouTube and Twitter accounts of several notable video bloggers in late October 2015.

History

Little biographical information is available about the anonymous hacker. The name “Towel” remained rather obscure until early November 2015, when several YouTube channels and Twitter accounts of popular video bloggers, including YourMovieSucks, Exinthevatican (Joel Johansson of Vinesauce) and Lyle McDouchebag, as well as the Tumblr account of Markiplier, were breached and vandalized with the pseudonymous signature.

Exinthevatican Channel Hijack

On November 4th, the hacker claimed responsibility for breaching and hijacking the YouTube and Twitch channels of Joel Johansson, a well-known member of the popular video game streaming channel Vinesauce, replacing his YouTube avatar and channel name with images bearing the signature “Towel.” In addition to vandalizing Johansson’s social media channels, Towel also uploaded three videos in which he taunts the subscribers by stating that he now owns the channel, while banning nearly everyone who commented on the Vinesauce streamer’s Twitch channel.

Shortly after the hack, Johansson’s subscribers began discussing the events on Vinesauce’s official forum, the /r/vinesauce subreddit and 4chan’s /v/ board, with some reportedly attempting to identify and mobilize a raid against the hacker. On the following day, a brief article about the anonymous hacker “Towel” was created on Vinesauce’s Wikia site. On November 8th, Towel uploaded a video titled “Goodbye” to Johansson’s YouTube channel, seemingly suggesting that he would release his control over the channel. However, by the next day, all of Johansson’s videos had been deleted from the channel. As of November 10th, all of the videos that had been removed were restored and a short video of Johansson announcing the recovery of his channel was uploaded.

Lyle McDouchebag’s Twitter Account

On November 7th, Towel claimed responsibility for taking control of popular Machinima filmmaker Lyle McDouchebag’s Twitter account and renaming it to “Towel McDouchebag.” By November 10th, Lyle McDouchebag’s Twitter feed had been restored.

YourMovieSucks’ Twitter Account

On November 7th, Towel took control of YouTube film critic YourMovieSucks’ Twitter account. As of November 10th, the account appears to be restored.

Search Interest

External References

About

Rikka’s Finger Spin refers to a series of hand-drawn animated GIFs/videos which are tributes to an adorable finger spin by Rikka Takanashi, a main character in a Japanese light novel/anime Love, Chunibyo & Other Delusions. It was a poular subject for fan creations on the Japanese video sharing service Nico Nico Douga (NND) and illustrators community pixiv in 2012-2013.

Origin

Rikka’s finger Spin appears on the opening movie of the 1st season for the TV anime series aired in October to December 2012. This opneing movie itself also became to a popular subject for the op parodies on NND. The finger spin is inserted in the beginning of the climax part of the song. However, its length is just 2 seconds.

Spread

Despite a quite short footage, her adorable finger spin caught a much attention among viewers. On YouTube, this part was used in a video titled “WOOP WOOP”, made and uploaded on October 4th, 2012 by user jgsfgs (shown below, left) and it was the first fandom. It has been watched over 200,000 times during 3 months of the anime’s airing period. And the finger spin reached more recognition, when a NND user 01 made a Fukkireta fad response and uploaded it on October 12th, 2012 (shown below, right). The video was also the trigger for Fukkireta videos featuring this dance and character were also re-drawed. As seen on Opening Parodies, the finger spin is also re-drawed in these.

More than 100 of parody/tribute videos for Rikka’s Finger Spin had been posted to NND during the airing period.^[1] Additionally, dozens of the finger spin illustrations/animated-GIFs are also found on Nico Nico Seiga^[2] and pixiv^[3] as well as deviantART.^[4] On these Japanese online communities, Rikka’s finger Spin fan creations are usually tagged by a Shift-JIS art “（σ回ω・）σ←↖↑↗→↘↓↙←↖↑↗”.

Notable Examples

Illustrations

Search Interest

[Not Available]

External References

Editor’s Note: Registration is needed to browse the original videos listed in this section.

About

“Jeff The Killer” is a popular creepypasta character depicted as a nose-less, grinning, white skinned man with no eyelids and a black ring around his eyes. The character is frequently used as a popular Internet Screamer along with becoming a largely popular creepypasta story. The character is also frequently associated with the phrase “go to sleep”.

Origin

The first known use of the image originates from a post on the Newgrounds forums by the user killerjeff on August 14th, 2008.^[1] In the post, killerjeff claimed that the image was in fact, a picture of himself. The image is commonly believed to be a photoshopped image of Katy Robinson, a girl who was bullied to suicide by 4chan users for her weight in Fall of 2008.^[5]

Spread

Later, on October 3rd, 2008, YouTube user Sesseur uploaded a video presentation of a creepypasta based around the character. The video has since gained over 700,000 views in under 8 years and is the first known use of the creepypasta based on the character.

The creepypasta later spawned a number of derivatives, with over 200 results on Creepypasta Wiki^[7] and over 3,700 on Creepypasta.com.^[8] YouTube user MrCreepyPasta later uploaded a video in which he read the creepypasta (shown below, left). The video has since gained over 4 million views in 4 years. A video of a rap battle between Jeff The Killer and Slender Man was uploaded by YouTube user Keyblade on November 1st, 2014 (shown below, right). The video has since gained over 50 million views.

A popular screamer site known as “anne.jpg” featuring Jeff The Killer accompanied by a gunshot sound was created on September 9th, 2008.^[9] Over the next 8 years, the site was visited over 23 million times. An Urban Dictionary definition for the screamer was later created on July 30th, 2013.^[10]

Various Examples

Search Interest

External References

About

“Dawn of the Final Day” is an expression that is commonly used in anticipation of a near future event, in a similar vein to the Imminent Ned advice animal series or its snowclone form “Brace yourselves, (X) is coming.” Stemming from an in-game notification that appears throughout the 2000 Nintendo 64 video game The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, the phrase has been also paired with various imagery of Moon from the same game.

Origin

The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask was released in Japan for the Nintendo 64 video game console on April 27th, 2000. In the game,^[1] the player has three days before the Moon crashes into the land of Termina, which the player can avoid by resetting time. Every 24 hours, the player receives an in-game notification regarding how much time is left (shown below).

In early 2010, the slide images and the phrase “dawn of the final day” were used to express anticipation for a coming event. On October 8th, 2010, YouTuber McCrackerTheCracker uploaded a video featuring a slide from Majora’s Mask reading “Dawn of / The Final Day / 24 Hours Remain” (shown below).

Spread

On May 18th, 2011, a Yahoo Answers^[6] user submitted the question “Dawn of the First Day 72 hours remain. May 21, 2011, are you ready?”, referencing Harold Camping’s 2011 rapture prediction.

On September 22nd, 2012, Redditor Rowona submitted a post titled “Dawn of the Final Day” to the /r/zelda^[5] subreddit, featuring a painting of the Moon from Majora’s Mask. Prior to being archived, the post received over 1,000 up votes and 25 comments.

On December 18th, 2012, three days prior to the predicted doomsday of December 21st, the single serving site Terrible Fate^[2] was launched with a large image of Majora’s Mask hanging over a countdown timer (shown below). Created by the video game music remixer Theophany, a Bandcamp playlist of a Majora’s Mask tribute album was unveiled on the site after the countdown reached zero.

Notable Examples

Image macros captioned with “dawn of the final day” are often used in anticipation of an imminent event or as a reference to the game Majora’s Mask. Additional examples can be found on the microblogging site Tumblr^[7] under the tag “#dawn of the final day.”

Search Interest

External References

About

Egoraptor is the online alias of American animator, song artist, and let’s player Arin Hanson,^[1] known for creating the Awesome Series and his co-production of Game Grumps and Starbomb.^[2] His animations, music, and let’s play videos all focus on video games.

Online History

Newgrounds

On February 23rd, 2006, Hanson uploaded a short animated film titled Metal Gear Awesome to Newgrounds,^[3] featuring a parody of the game Metal Gear Solid (shown below). This was the first in what went on to be a famous staple series on Egoraptor’s YouTube channel titled The Awesome Series. Almost directly after having uploaded the Metal Gear Awesome animation, Hanson was approached by MTV to make animated shorts in the same style for them, specifically requesting he not improve the style and keep it shitty.^[20] Other notable series uploaded on his Newgrounds channel include Lemon n’ Bill, Girlchan in Paradise, and Press Start.^[19] Egoraptor has the most fans on Newgrounds at 43k total, and is the 13th highest rated creator on there with an average rating of 4.43/5.^[21] From 2006 to 2012, Hanson uploaded an additional 69 animations to the site.

Youtube

Arin Hanson created his YouTube account Egoraptor on March 11th, 2006.^[4] Eight months later, he uploaded his first video to the channel titled Gunpey Review., featuring Arin Hanson reviewing the video game Gunpey (shown below).^[5] Egoraptor’s popularity on YouTube steadily climbed as he released more episodes in the Awesome Series, the series reaching its peak of popularity on December 8th, 2011 with his most viewed video Awesome Series – PokeAwesome – Just a Pokemon Battle which has 27.4 million views as of April 19th, 2016.^[27] Starbomb also heavily increased Egoraptor’s notoriety since its first music video’s release on December 17th, 2013 titled Luigi’s Ballad ANIMATEDMUSICVIDEO– Starbomb which received 22.7 million views.^[28] The most popular Starbomb video was released on April 8th, 2014 titled BEST Zelda Rap EVER!! ANIMATEDMUSICVIDEO by Joel C – Starbomb and received 27.2 million views.^[29] Many of the videos on his YouTube channel are re-uploads of animations from his Newgrounds account (mainly ones from the Awesome Series) and as a result often feature the Newgrounds banner at the beginning or end of them. As of April 18th, 2016 he has the 617th most subscribed-to channel on Youtube and the 1575th most viewed with 92 uploads to the channel total.^[22] Over the course of ten years, the channel garnered upwards of 364 million views and 2.4 million subscribers.

Social Media Presence

Arin Hanson’s Egoraptor Facebook page has 258k likes^[34] and his Twitter page has 456k followers and has made over 10k tweets as of April 19th, 2016.^[35] His Instagram @egofaptor has 196k followers as of April 19th, 2016.^[36] On January 29th, 2014, Egoraptor did an AMA which received 2400 comments.^[37] His Reddit account has 3k link karma and 79k comment karma.^[38] On July 9th, 2015, the official Sonic the Hedgehog twitter tweeted to @egoraptor a question (shown below).^[39]

Game Grumps

Arin Hanson and Jon Jafari/JonTron co-created the Let’s Play channel Game Grumps.^[9] In its launch in July 2012, the channel quickly developed a fanbase consisting of video game enthusiasts and subscribers to the two hosts’ personal YouTube channels. Between July 2012 and June 2013, Game Grumps released more than 600 videos, accruing more than 197 million views and a million subscribers in less than a year. Egoraptor and JonTron had a good run together, but after about a year Jon left to focus on his own channel and was replaced by the current co-host Leigh Daniel Avidan/Danny Sexbang.^[8]

Starbomb

Arin Hanson collaborated with Ninja Sex Party to create the band Starbomb which produces comedy rock, synthpop and rap music.^[10] Their first and second albums focus exclusively on video games and every song has been fully animated and uploaded to Egoraptor’s channel.^[11] A video of the first album’s songs without the animations was released December 13th, 2014 (shown below, left).^[12] On March 25th, 2014, a rap-along version of the Starbomb song I Choose You To Die was released including the voices of famous youtubers Rocco Botte, Ashly Burch, Keith Apicary, The Angry Video Game Nerd, Markiplier, Dude Huge, The Completionist, ProJared, Steve Kardynal, Chloe Dykstra, and Smooth McGroove (shown below, right).^[23]

Fandom

Arin Hanson has undoubtedly acquired a large fandom given his strong ties to video game fandoms and the 369.4 million total views on his main animation channel Egoraptor; in addition to the views on his co-hosted let’s play channel Game Grumps currently at 2.1 billion total views.^[4][30] He has acquired his own Wikipedia page^[31] as well as several wiki pages about him found on The YouTube Wiki,^[32] Game Grumps Wiki,^[6] and Wikigrounds.^[33]

Fan Art

Fan Remixes

Notable Videos

Notable Series

Awesome Series

The Awesome Series is a comedy series featuring animated parodies of video games. The first episode in this series was also Arin Hanson’s first ever publicly available animation titled Metal Gear Awesome which was first uploaded to Newgrounds.^[3] Uploaded on February 23rd, 2016, the animation was met with strongly positive reception by the Newgrounds community for its hilarity and ridiculous style, causing MTV to take notice and offer Arin Hanson the job of animating shorts of the same quality for their television channel which he accepted.^[20] The series was originally uploaded on Newgrounds and then re-uploaded to YouTube, but now episodes are exclusively uploaded to YouTube.^[19][4]

Sequelitis

Sequelitis is a review series featuring comedic animated critiques of video game sequels. The first episode in this series was titled Sequelitis – Castlevania 1 vs. Castlevania 2 and it along with all episodes of the series was uploaded exclusively on YouTube (shown below, left). Uploaded on March 11th, 2011, the episode was met with strongly positive reception for its intelligent blend of game design analysis and humor. Notably episodes in this series are much longer than typical videos on Egoraptor’s channel, the longest episode being Sequelitis – ZELDA: A Link to the Past vs. Ocarina of Time which was 31m 29s long (shown below, right).

The Tester

Arin Hanson submitted a video (shown below, left) to a contest to become a contestant in Sony’s show The Tester and fans voted him to victory. However, on the first day in the show the judges gave him a tough time, saying they’d leave a spot open on the couch for him to sleep unlike the other contestants whom had beds.^[14] He tried his best but was ultimately voted off by the judges on the third day for questionable reason after having been beneficial to his team (shown below, right).

Fan Outrage

Egoraptor’s fans unanimously agreed the show’s judges voted him off the show for no good reason other than wanting him gone. This outrage led to fans uploading numerous videos to YouTube mocking and criticizing the show’s judgement as well as other online gaming sites conveying similar feelings.^[13][15][17] He was later quoted saying “The Tester can lick my nuts” in an interview on Destructoid.^[16]

Related Memes

Arin Hanson’s Chin

Arin Hanson’s Chin is a meme about Hanson’s chin that grew popular after the release of a video on his channel titled Lightsaber Fightsaber – Episode IV on May 19th, 2012.^[18] His chin has been referenced in a number of image macros.

Personal Life

Arin Hanson was born on January 6th, 1987^[6] and married his wife Suzy Berhow/Mortem3r on October 25th, 2013.^[7] His father is a musician named Lloyd “Pararaptor” Hanson, his mother is Maurette Hanson, and his brother is an aviator named Nate Hanson.^[6] Jon Jafari is a close friend of Arin’s who co-hosted Game Grumps with him during its first year in which they shared many close humorous moments. Leigh Daniel Avidan took over after Jon left and became similarly close friends with Arin as a co-host of Game Grumps.^[26] Arin Hanson is a friend/friendly enemy of Ross Kenry O’ Donovan and regularly conveys as much on the show Game Grumps, most notably while playing levels Ross created in Super Mario Maker and during the five-episode Guild Grumps series.^[24][25]

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About

This Is Fine. refers to a panel from the web comic Gunshow where a dog is slowly engulfed in flames while proclaiming that everything is fine. It is used as a reaction image used by forum posters trying to say calm in stressful situations.

Origin

The comic originally comes from K.C. Green’s Gunshow comic #648, actually titled “The Pills Are Working” or “On Fire”, originally posted January 9th, 2013. ^[1] Green’s drawings have been the basis of several other memes including Staredad, Dickbutt, Mother of God and I’m Okay With This. The comic, depicts a dog in a room that is burning to the ground. The dog reacts calmly, even as he slowly melts from the heat.

Spread

The comic’s first two panels have become popular on sites such as Imgur and Tumblr for being an accurate and useful description of stressful situations.

On September 21st, 2014, user SPIDER_MAN posted these two panels onto /r/Funny^[2]. The post received over 1,400 upvotes and 40 comments. The same post also received 4,300 upvotes and 106 comments on imgur.^[3]

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External References

About

Mic Drop and Drop the Mic are expressions referring to the practice of intentionally letting a microphone fall to the ground as a display of bold confidence following a successful performance. Colloquially, the expressions have also been used to celebrate the delivery of an impressive argument or insult.

Origin

According to an article on Slate^[2] titled “The History of the Mic Drop,” the practice of letting a microphone drop on stage was popularized by rappers and comedians in the 1980s. The earliest known example occurred during comedian Eddie Murphy’s 1983 stand-up special Delirious, in which he drops the microphone on stage after a fan yells “Shut up bitch!” at a heckler (shown below, left). The earliest known reference to the practice in hip hop is contained within the 1987 track “I Ain’t No Joke” by Eric B. & Rakim, in which Rakim raps “I used to let the mic smoke, now I slam it when I;m done and make sure it’s broke” (shown below, right).

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During a scene in the 1988 comedy film Comedy to America, the lead singer of the fictional R&B band Sexual Chocolate finishes a song and yells “Sexual Chocolate!” while dropping the microphone (shown below, left). In the 2000s, comedian Chris Rock employed the mic drop at the end of his stand-up sets (shown below, right). On September 5th, 2006, a theater house manager published a post on his personal blog,^[3] which urged performers to stop damaging microphones by dropping them on stage.

On March 19th, 2007, the channelzerotv YouTube channel uploaded footage of rapper Big Daddy Kane dropping the mic on stage at a concert in Chicago, Illinois (shown below, left). In 2008, Saturday Night Live introduced the character Obnoxious Microphone Guy (played by Bobby Moynihan), who would steal microphones from public speakers, yell “what” and then drop it to the ground (shown below, right).

On October 4th, 2011, Urban Dictionary^[1] user Nicki Menagerie submitted an entry for “mic drop,” defining it as “when a performer or speaker intentionally drops/throws the microphone to the floor after an awesome performance.” On February 7th, 2012, the Comedy Central YouTube channel uploaded a skit from the show Key & Peele, in which United States President Barack Obama approaches a street rapper, takes his microphone and says “I’m the leader of the free world” before letting the mic fall to the ground (shown below, left). Within three years, the clip gained over 4.5 million views and 1,800 comments. On April 24th, Obama appeared on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, where he sings a “slow jam” with the show’s host before dropping the microphone on stage (shown below, right).

On July 4th, 2013, a page for “Mic Drop” was created on TV Tropes.^[4] On July 11th, 2015, actor Bryan Cranston dropped the microphone after delivering a “your mother” joke to an audience member during a panel Q&A session at the Nerd HQ convention (shown below, left). On July 27th, the JackInTheBox YouTube channel released a commercial in which the fast food company’s mascot drops a microphone after introducing a new sandwich (shown below, right). On August 27th, the OxfordDictionaries.com^[5] added “mic drop” to its online dictionary.

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About

“Objection!” is a image macro series where the subject is often pointing an index finger next to the iconic speech bubble from the game Phoenix Wright, which exclaims “Objection!” These images can then be used as reaction images by those who wish to bring up contradicting facts to a claim previously posted. (See also Phoenix Wrong)

Origin

Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney is a video game first released by Capcom in October 11th, 2001 where you play the role of the prominent lawyer, Phoenix Wright. This was the first installment to the Phoenix Wright Series and later went on to build upon it with game after game including installments such as Phoenix Wright: Justice for all, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney: Trials and Tribulations, and even games starring a different lead role such as Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney. (Along with the spin-off, Ace Attorney Investigations: Miles Edgeworth.) The gameplay for the most part features text based adventure surrounding the lives of the previously mentioned Phoenix Wright, Apollo Justice as they battle other attorneys in court, scourge crime scenes, and ultimately reach the ultimate goal of a “Not Guilty” verdict. The phrase “Objection!” is notable for its prevalence in the series, its over-the-top bombastic nature, the iconic finger-pointing gesture that goes with it, and comedic liberal usage throughout gameplay, as opposed to it, in reality, being far more orderly notion in real life, used to point out things that go against proper court proceedings.

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Mrdictionary.net

Launched sometime around the seventh of July in 2006, a website under the title of “Objection!” was launched, which was described as allowing users to “put words in the mouths of various characters from the series: Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney”. With more than 7,000,000 objections saved to date, it has exploded in renowned popularity in a manner which can only be described by its creators as “stupidly popular”. Users can input up to around 790 characters, and have their objections accompanied by various themes throughout the series if (tunes) is typed just before their message. Though Objections created cannot be edited, saved or transferred upon completion, permanent links will still trace back to the final product which is saved to the server.

Various Examples

Search Interest

Template

External References

About

Furry Scale, also known as the Anthro Scale, refers to a series of charts and discussions regarding the artistic continuum between human furries and animals.

Origin

On February 7th, 1996, the earliest known example of a furry scale was posted in a document titled “The Code of the Furries”,^[1] which contained a rating system for where people “fall on the human-to-animal scale”:

1 : Basically human, with minor furry features (perhaps eyes, nose, ears, claws, some fur, etc)
2 : Humanoid, with significant furry features (muzzle, tail, etc); this includes centaurs and mer-people
3 : Anthropomorphic animal (or taur)
4 : Equally comfortable on two or four legs (or, if you’re a taur, on four or six)
5 : Animal shape, with some unusual features (perhaps hands, speech, etc); this includes most dragons, gryphons, etc
6 : Normal animal shape

Spread

On June 16th 2010, pixiv user かｂ uploaded a chart which depicts a girl transforming into a fox up a set of stairs (shown below, left).^[2] An English variation features the slogan “Knowing is half the battle” from the cartoon G.I. Joe along with the phrase “Oh shit nigga what are you doing” (shown below, right). This scale subsequently inspired an infrequently used tag on Pixiv^[3] containing similar images.

On December 4th, 2012, DeviantArtist^[5] Timscorpion uploaded an illustration titled “Sliding Scale of Anthropomorphism,” depicting a human-moth hybrid transforming into a moth (shown below).

On March 3rd, 2014, Redditor Psykun submitted a furry scale image featuring the character Bastet from the third person action multiplayer online battle arena (MOBA) game Smite to the /r/Smite^[4] subreddit (shown below).

Various Examples

Po-ju Furry Scale

One of the most frequently used images of furry scale originates from Hentai artist known as Po-ju, showing 5 different levels of furry, ranging from fully human to fully cat. Various parodies of this translated version circulate on the web, including those that only use English captions and do not use Po-Ju’s art.

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About

Can’t Argue With That is an exploitable three-pane cartoon series featuring a stick figure character with the look of disapproval who reluctantly refrains from raising an objection. The image of the character is typically used as a reaction image to highlight the utter lack of logic behind an absurd statement.

Origin

It is unclear exactly when or where the cartoon was first uploaded, but the earliest known instance that is accessible online was uploaded by Flickr user Joe Loong on January 12th, 2009, tagged #walk and #away.^[1]

Spread

On June 9th, 2009, the image was featured in a post titled Silverton Mountain- Don’t Believe the Hype on 14erskiers^[2], a skiing activities blog created by Brittany and Frank Konsella. On July 31st, 2009, the cartoon character appeared on Kotaku and Stompfest.^[3][4] On June 24th, 2012, FunnyJunk^[5] user Hydromatic used the last two panels of the cartoon in response to a comment posted under a Sudden Clarity Clarence image macro. The comment received 113 upvotes.

On October 21st, 2012, the image was used again in a FunnyJunk post titled He has got a point picture.^[6] In November 2012, the image also appeared in a “You laugh, you lose” thread on Vandriven^[7] and a “funny pictures” thread on Neoseeker Forum.^[8]

Notable Examples

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About

No1Curr is an abbreviation of the phrase “no one cares” typically used in online discussions to dismiss someone else’s post or remark as insignificant, similar to other snide reaction memes like “Didn’t Read, LOL” and Look at All The Fucks I Give.

Origin

The term is said to have been coined by KatieKylie, a LiveJournal member and diehard fan of Christina Aguilera, on a spin-off site of the celebrity gossip community Oh No They Didn’t, where it became used to heckle articles about individuals widely regarded as unworthy of discussion.^[12] The earliest known mention of “No1Curr” can be found in a comment posted by LiveJournal member Hay_Bitch in an article^[13] about the details of Resident Evil 5 Collector’s Edition published on January 17th, 2009.

Spread

The earliest UrbanDictionary^[2] entry for “No1Curr” was submitted on June 11th, 2009, by user no1currz, which reads:

“Something you say when someone says something stupid, irrelevant or just ridiculously weird.

The hashtag instance of #no1curr on Twitter was tweeted by Cliffysworld^[3] on October 9th, 2009.^[4] On June 18th, 2010, a post about the boy band The Jonas Brothers titled “NO1CURR About The Jonas Brothers” was published on Ohnotheydidn’t,^[9] which sparked the first wave of search interest.^[10]On May 30th, 2011, DeviantArt artist saladsalty^[8] uploaded a GIF of a dancing pineapple which says “no1curr.”

On June 7th, the Tumbr blog no1curr-opinions^[5], which features images with sexist, homophobic, or overly privileged messages edited so they no longer falls in those categories, was created.On June 13th, YouTuber lolavermillion^[1] uploaded a video of the ’90s Disney castle with “no1curr” appearing at the base instead of Disney. As of March 2014, the video has more than 23,000 views.

On October 15th, Tumblr blog sayitwithgifs^[7] posted a GIF of the “no1curr” Disney castle. As of March 2014, the post has over 80 notes. On March 3rd, 2012, YouTuber DannyNoriega^[6] uploaded a video titled “no1curr” that explains no one cares if you delete them from your Facebook friends. As of March 2014, the video has over 36,000 views.

Notable Examples

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About

“Hack 127.0.0.1” is an online expression used to taunt a self-proclaimed hacker in a mocking manner. The phrase originates from an IRC chat log in which a user named “bitchchecker” is tricked into attacking 127.0.0.1, an IP address that is typically designated for accessing the computer’s own network services, otherwise known as the localhost.

Origin

On April 6th, 2005, the German hip hop music site StopHipHop^[12] posted a chat log from the #stophiphop IRC channel in which a user named “bitchchecker” enters the channel and threatens to hack another user named “Elch” for booting him, to which the latter responds by inviting him to attack the localhost^[2] loopback IP address 127.0.0.1. Unaware of its consequences, Bitchchecker then ends up repeatedly crashing his own computer.

Transcript

On April 9th, Total Illusions Forums^[1] member Cochrane posted an English translation of the German chat transcript:

<bitchchecker> tell me your network number man then you’re dead
<Elch> Eh, it’s 129.0.0.1
<Elch> or maybe 127.0.0.1
<Elch> yes exactly that’s it: 127.0.0.1 I’m waiting for you great attack
<bitchchecker> in five minutes your hard drive is deleted
<Elch> Now I’m frightened
<bitchchecker> shut up you’ll be gone
<bitchchecker> i have a program where i enter your ip and you’re dead
<bitchchecker> say goodbye
<Elch> to whom?
<bitchchecker> to you man
<bitchchecker> buy buy
<Elch> I’m shivering thinking about such great Hack0rs like you

• bitchchecker (~java@euirc-61a2169c.dip.t-dialin.net) Quit (Ping timeout#)
  

Precursor

On May 23rd, 2001, a comic was published on the webcomic archive User Friendly,^[6] featuring a woman sitting at a computer who tricks a hacker into attacking his own IP address (shown below).

Spread

On April 27th, 2005, Slashdot^[4] user RawGutts submitted a link to the original forum thread in a post titled “The Planet’s Most Moronic Hacker.”^[4] On the following day, Museum of Hoaxes^[5] user Alex created a page titled “Tale of a Clueless Hacker," in which the author questioned the authenticity of the chat log. On June 10th, Urban Dictionary^[7] user thetron defined “127.0.0.1” as a practical joke that can be played on networking n00bs. On January 23rd, 2009, the tech news blog Slopjong^[8] posted an article about the bitchchecker chat log. On June 11th, 2008, Ubuntu Forums^[10] member Vivaldi Gloria posted the bitchchecker log. On July 28th, a profile article for bitchchecker was created on the Italian Language version of the wiki Uncyclopedia.^[9] On November 14th, 2009, Toribash Forums^[11] member hAsbroken posted a thread about the IRC chat log. On May 27th, 2011, the computer networking blog Network World^[3] published an article titled “Worst Hackers Ever?”, which included the IRC log among several other hacking FAIL stories.

Search Interest

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