The Hottest Memes of Summer 2018

Kyle Krajewski
August 3, 2018
Categories

Ahh, summertime. Beautiful weather. Beach trips. Late nights. Barbecues. What’s not to love?!

It’s that time of year that we all enjoy putting down our devices, spending some time outdoors soaking up the sun, and engaging in some real-life face-to-face interactions. Right? Right?!

Not quite.

In fact, I’ve found that the summer is just as busy a time for the internet as any other time of year – if not busier. Deal with it Boomers and Gen-Xers. It’s just the way the world is now. We live online!

If anything, this fact has been evidenced by the strong crop of hot memes we’ve seen come through this season. In my opinion, it has been the dankest season we’ve seen so far in 2018. Allow me to elaborate:

Is this a pigeon?

Easily the summer’s hottest meme, so we’ll begin here. Our source material here derives from a Japanese anime series The Brave Fighter of Sun Fighbird and features a character gesturing towards a butterfly while asking the question, “Is this a butterfly?” This scene is altered to express one’s complete and utter confusion.

Flustered LeBron

This instant classic takes us back to the NBA Finals in June. Long story short, Lebron James (left) became extremely frustrated with teammate JR Smith (right) after neglecting to shoot the basketball when their team needed to score to win the game. The still of this moment was pulled from the broadcast and used to express similar frustrations, disappointments, and obvious mistakes.

https://twitter.com/hmfaigen/status/1002394124681601024

Miss Vanjie

“Miss Vanjie” was a catchphrase that drag performer Vanessa Vanjie Mateo was known to use on RuPaul’s Drag Race. Upon being eliminated from the show, Mateo repeated the catchphrase three times as you’ll see below.

Once the internet caught wind of this awkwardly hilarious scene, a meme was born.

Fake Elon Musks

A couple of weeks ago, Twitter implemented a strangely specific new rule: that users who are not Elon Musk are not allowed to change their display name to “Elon Musk.” Go ahead and tell the internet they’re not allowed to do something. What’s going to happen? You can probably guess.

https://twitter.com/LaterCapitalism/status/1023129746287276032

“How old is…”

As someone who personally loves dumb and meaningless humor, this one is a personal favorite. This meme features an emotional man Google searching the age of a specific person (this person typically has a name that’s a pun). He then searches the life expectancy of the object relating to that pun. Upon realizing that this person is nearing the end of their life expectancy, the man breaks down into a full sob.

What am I gonna do? Say no?

In 2012, popular recording artist Drake tweeted the words, “What am I gonna do? Say no?” For some reason, some internet weirdo dug up this six-year old tweet. A meme was born in which this tweet would serve as the punchline to a quote tweet.

Slaps roof of car

Another meme that is extremely pointless. This template follows the conversations of a car salesman speaking with a potential buyer and saying “This bad boy can fit so much ____ in it,” then slapping the roof of the car. Fill in the blank with whatever. It’s extremely stupid.

Despacito 2

Inspired by the 2017 pop hit Despacito, this meme imagines and parodies the potential cultural significance of a sequel.

My Momma Said

Using a hilariously sassy photo of a young Cardi B, this meme hinges on the phrasal template of “My momma said ________” to caption it, using the lens of a confident child with an attitude to speak to a specific subject.

https://twitter.com/childofhub/status/1017234583467773952

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlTaxpVBUjZ/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=embed_loading_state_control

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlTeyYdHah0/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=embed_loading_state_control

Jay-Z on a jet ski

We all remember Jay-Z diving. And how could we forget Jay-Z on a bicycle? Well this summer, the internet was blessed with Jay-Z looking silly as hell on a jet ski.

Tell me something I don’t know

This meme refers to a Paris Hilton selfie tweeted with the caption “Tell me something I don’t know.” This tweets was quoted with completely obscure facts.

BBQ Becky, Permit Patty

Who could forget these nutjobs? We’ve been unfortunate enough to see the faces of a number of folks plastered across the internet for calling the police on groups of african americans for doing seemingly normal, everyday stuff. We’ve been fortunate enough to see their likenesses turned into the following:

https://twitter.com/piccharesq/status/996186196480012288

Did I miss your favorite summer meme? If so, I’d love to update this rundown with some of your favorites. Drop ‘em in the Facebook comments or tweet ‘em to me at @kylekraj!

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