KYM Review: Fandoms of 2018

Editor’s Note: This article is part of Know Your Meme’s annual review series looking back at some of the most memorable and popular memes, events and people that defined internet culture in 2018 as we know it.

ith few exceptions, blockbusters dominated fandoms this year. Huge video games, multi-billion dollar franchises, and Shrek (again) proved to have the most influential fanbases of 2018, dominating the meme landscape. Those who regularly check Know Your Meme’s top image galleries won’t be surprised by this list. Smash, Spider-man, and Avengers all have rightful spots in our top ten. But some smaller indie delights found their way to our top ten as well. Toby Fox’s Deltarune followed up his wildly popular Undertale admirably, while ultra-violent anime Goblin Slayer proved to be the top source of animemes of the year. And naturally, it wouldn’t be a year in fandom without a little bit of horny sprinkled in, as 2018 was the year Gijinka went mainstream. Here’s our look at the top fanbases of the year.

Super Smash Brothers Ultimate

The coming of Super Smash Brothers Ultimate was in many ways the gamer equivalent of the second coming of Christ. Most of 2018 was spent in an unbearable wait for the game’s 2018 release, and every scrap of news to come out about it was instantly the most popular thing going on in video games. Every Nintendo Direct about Smash spawned memes. Every new character announced was cause for simultaneous praise to the heavens and curses to Satan.

The Smash fanbase is nothing if not dedicated, and in 2018, it scoured every corner of the internet for news about the game, at one point swearing to the legitimacy of a (false) leak that somehow included The Grinch. The fans are also incredibly creative, making seven wildly entertaining memes in 2018, including Everyone is Dead Except Kirby, Galeem’s Laser Parodies, Inkling Girl’s Eye, and Everyone is Here. All the work and waiting has seemed to pay off, however. Upon release, the game scored an astounding 93 on Metacritic. As for me, I’m writing this on December 7th, and all I want is to go home and rip the game open.

Moe Anthropomorphism

Moe anthropomorphism seemed to take over literally everything in 2018. The year began with a stream of gijinka characters rising alongside planets and the inexplicably popular Tide Pod craze, and thus was born Tide Pod-chan, Clorox-chan, and Shaving Cream-chan. The whole thing was like that ProZD skit about ‘Chairem’ anime.

Of course, when it seemed like chan-mania (mania-chan?) had finally died down, Nintendo put a Super Crown on Toadette and we had to do the whole thing again, this time with every Nintendo character in the Mario universe. It seemed as though every meme this year came with at least one cute anime girl interpretation. If everyone knows what Rule 34 is, 2018 made the case for the creation of a Rule 34b: If it exists, there’s anime girl art of it.

Deltarune

After dominating the meme scene for several years, Undertale finally saw its follow-up in late October of 2018 with Deltarune. Toby Fox, game developer and fandom sparker, launched another rabid fandom with the second game in the series.

Reviews for the game have been almost uniformly positive, as Deltarune currently sits with an impressive 9.1 user score on Metacritic. As with Undertale, Deltarune features a massive fandom based around its cast. This time, adorable characters like Ralsei, Lancer, Jevil, and Susie received tons of fan art, and a full-blown ship, Krusle, graced Tumblr and Archive of Our Own. Deltarune also isn’t yet fully released, which means that with each new installment will come a new wave of memes, fan art, and parodies. Get ready to see Deltarune for a long time.

A Star Is Born

A Star Is Born looks headed for Oscar glory, but I’m sure that means dick to Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga in comparison to the slot they secured in our Top Fandoms of 2018 list. While critics loved their performances in the film, everyone else cared about this two-second exchange in the trailer in which Cooper tells Lady Gaga “I just want to take another look at ya.” Here it is for ten minutes:

The cheesy exchange, complete with Lady Gaga’s sheepish smile, reverberated as an exploitable on Twitter for months. Cooper’s dialogue got replaced with all the good news the internet had to offer, including how one time the guy who Mr. Belvedere sat on his balls and they had to stop filming for a couple days. To date though, the best parody is this stellar recreation by comedian Ayo Edebiri:

Goblin Slayer

When a Goblin Slayer anime was announced, fans were worried that the show wouldn’t live up to the gut-busting, soul-draining gore of the manga. Boy, how they were wrong! While true, episode one of the anime doesn’t include visuals of the notoriously brutal rape scene from the manga’s first chapter, Goblin Slayer, fans were nonetheless adequately traumatized, leading to one of the quickest growing anime fandoms of 2018.

The anime was wildly popular on /r/animemes throughout the year, overtaking other hits like Miss Komi and My Hero Academia. Goblin Slayer’s stoic demeanor and the Game of Thrones-esque vibe to the show made it an addictive watch, and helped spawn the You Get Used to It template. In a year dominated by anime waifus, that the top anime fandom of the year was devoted to brutal gore, dismemberment, and blood is something of a miracle.

Fortnite

Fortnite is a dumb game for babies and I will die on this hill. However, there’s no denying that it had an absolutely massive impact in 2018. The free-to-play smash hit was everywhere this year, consuming and integrating pop culture like a gelatinous blob. Thanos entered the game around the time of Infinity War. John Wick featured prominently in one promotion. The game's most famous player, Ninja, became arguably the first mainstream gamer.

As with any game that gets this popular, Fortnite has generated its fair share of controversy and backlash. People balked at the idea of parents hiring Fortnite tutors. Memers have mocked fans of the games as prepubescent virgin idiots. Meme, dance, and PUBG creators all have threatened or gone through with lawsuits against Fortnite, but it doesn’t appear as though the juggernaut game will suffer any adverse effects from that. For the time being, it doesn’t look like Fortnite is going away soon.

Avengers: Infinity War

As 2017 was dominated by the Star Wars prequels, 2018 was all about Avengers: Infinity War. Marvel’s monster movie made memes materialize marvelously through much of the year. Over the course of 2018, we’ve documented twelve memes based on the film.

Thanos dominated much of the meme landscape with several of his iconic lines and, of course, the snap. /r/ThanosDidNothingWrong became one of the most populous subreddits. There was even a car that kind of looked like the character which took off. With Avengers: Endgame coming in 2019, we can anticipate another load of Avengers content, but Endgame has a massive game of catch-up to play if it wants to have the impact of Infinity War.

Spider-Man

It seems fitting that on the year of Stan Lee’s passing, Spider-Man would have its biggest year in pop culture since arguably the first Tobey Maguire film. Thanks to Tom Holland’s memorable turn as Spider-Man in Infinity War and a very good Spider-Man video game, 2018 was very much the year of Peter Parker.

That should continue well into 2019. In addition to DLC for Marvel’s Spider-Man being released in installments and a follow-up Avengers movie, Spidey fans will be treated to Into the Spider-verse, an absolutely delightful-looking adaptation blending multiple interpretations of Spider-Man. Hopefully seeing arguably his greatest creation dominate pop culture helped Stan the Man go out with a smile.

PewDiePie

In 2018, PewDiePie took a break from being a controversy magnet (well, very nearly) and somehow got the entire internet to rally behind him. Felix Kjellberg’s supremacy as the most subscribed-to user on YouTube was threatened this year by T-Series, an account that makes Bollywood music videos, and when it seemed that the account would surpass Pewds, YouTubers united to keep PewDiePie on top.

The whole saga marks an ideological stand for YouTube creators. PewDiePie himself has stated he doesn’t care if he’s no longer number one, and it truly means very little in the grand scheme of things if T-Series gains more subscribers than a Swedish ham who mocks memes and video games. But the principle behind the campaign is that the internet should be the land of creators. Keeping PewDiePie number one is the internet’s rebellion against the increasing corporatization of the internet, which can be seen in fronts like the Net Neutrality battle and Tumblr’s banning of adult content. Even if the PewDiePie campaign is doomed to fail, it marked a solid final stand against the encroachment of boring, monetized internet.

Shrek

Christ it’s 2018 and we’re STILL doing Shrek memes. It’s stunning. Shrek’s big meme of the year was his Cringe Compilation, a bizarrely hilarious reaction of image taking Shrek’s smug mug mocking the truly ridiculous cringe-inducing internet content.

If that weren’t enough, fans banded together to create Shrek Retold, film compiling dozens of creators remaking Shrek scene-for-scene. It’s an impressive ode to this pretty good film, human achievement, and human stupidity. But, we have to ask… is THIS peak Shrek? What else can be done now that fans have literally turned the entire film into a shitpost? Who knows. Shrek is Love, Shrek is Life. And perhaps Shrek is forever.