The Phenomenon of SpongeBob SquarePants Being Turned Into Memes
Today we’re going to be talking about memes, more specifically SpongeBob memes for my EID 100 course.
I love memes, don’t we all? Anything can be memed and popular memes come from all kinds of sources but what really intrigues me is the amount of trending memes that came from SpongeBob SquarePants. One SpongeBob meme even made it onto New York Magazine’s Top Memes of 2017.
Before we dive into the world of SpongeBob memes, let’s get some context on what SpongeBob SquarePants is for those that do not know (although I’m betting most people already know what it is). SpongeBob SquarePants is an American animated TV series that has been running since 1999. What’s great about the show is its appeal to all age groups. Now that we have some context, let’s dive into some of my favourite SpongeBob memes.
First up is Mocking SpongeBob. This was the one that made it into the Top Memes of 2017 I was talking about earlier. The meme dominated May 2017 and a quick look at Google Trends will show you that searches for Mocking SpongeBob spiked during that month.
The origin of the meme was from the episode Little Yellow Book which showed SpongeBob acting like a chicken whenever he sees plaid. The meme was first used by Twitter user @OGBEARD on May 4th, 2017. The tweet proved to be very popular and the next day on May 5th, 2017, Twitter user @lexysaeyang posted her own remix of the meme, using it in a mockery context. After that the meme spread like wildfire catching the eyes of Crave, Teen Vogue, Mashable, and many other outlets.
Next up is *breath in* Boi, which is used as a reaction to unwise situations. The number of times this meme has made me laugh is too much to count. The origin of this meme came from an online game circa 2003. The game is a karate match and before the game begins, SpongeBob bows giving us this image:
To be fair, animation wasn’t at its peak in 2003, but how did people not think this looked off? Years later on December 22, 2015, a user uploaded a modified image of this on 4Chan with the caption “WHO DIS NIKKA.” From there it spread to numerous other sites such as Tumblr, YouTube, Reddit, and so forth. As the meme grew in popularity, various spinoffs were made using characters from other mediums such as Star Wars and Mario.
Although the inception of this meme happened at the end of 2015, it reached peak popularity on January 2017 according to Google Trends. Since then searches for this meme as declined a bit but it still remains quite popular.
Now this next meme became super wide spread in 2016. I remember seeing it everywhere! The meme that I’m talking about is Confused Mr. Krabs, you know the one where everything around Mr. Krabs is spinning.
The meme is a manipulated version of a scene where Mr. Krabs was surrounded by angry individuals. The first use of the meme was on January 31, 2016 on Twitter. In the following days it spread like crazy over numerous different websites. According to Google Trends, the meme reached peaked popularity in April 2016.
There are so many SpongeBob memes that covering them all would turn this article into a novel. The examples above are just some of my favourites. There are lots more interesting ones such as:
It’s interesting that there are so many SpongeBob memes. It’s probably due to the fact that many of animation of the show seem super funny when taken out of context. Also, the majority of memes are made by millennials and we grew up with SpongeBob. Perhaps we like a bit of nostalgia in our fun. Whatever the reason may be, one thing for certain is that new SpongeBob memes are created everyday. I hereby declare SpongeBob SquarePants as one of the most memeable TV series of all time!
