Joshua Graham

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About

Joshua Graham is a major plot character in the Fallout: New Vegas DLC Honest Hearts. A missionary of the Mormon faith and revered and feared figure, the character has been one of the best-known Fallout characters who gained wider recognition thanks to memes and his quotes "I survived because the fire inside me burned brighter than the fire around me" and "We can't expect God to do all the work".

Origin

On May 17th, 2011, the second Fallout: New Vegas DLC Honest Hearts was made available for download on Xbox Live and Steam.^[1] In the DLC, the main protagonist The Courier encountered a major plot character Joshua Graham, also known as "The Burned Man." The character is also mentioned multiple times in the base game.

Joshua Graham is a missionary of the Mormon faith (who usually referred to as New Canaanites), co-founder of Caesar's Legion, and its first Legate. Graham led Ceasar's troops to a defeat in the First Battle of Hoover Dam, for which he sentenced to execution by Caesar. Graham was coated in pitch, set on fire and tossed into the Grand Canyon.^[2]

Despite grievous burns, Graham survived. In 2281, the year the events of the game take place, Graham is the acting leader of the Dead Horses, a tribe living in Zion Canyon. After his burning, Graham became a subject of folk legends, referred to as the Burned Man.

Joshua Graham is a man of faith, and recites and references Bible in his dialogue.

Spread

It was Joshua Graham's line, "I survived because the fire inside me burned brighter than the fire around me." which first gained viral recognition online, becoming a subject of inspirational image macros. On November 9th, 2014, Tumblr^[3] account wordsthat-speak posted the quote, with the post gaining over 19,700 likes and reblogs in nine years. On July 30th, 2015, Tumblr^[4] user the-pietriarchy posted a screenshot of wordsthat-speak's post along with multiple inspirational macros based on the quote, with the post gaining over 4,700 likes and reblogs prior to being deleted (shown below).

Joshua Graham achieved initial popularity on Tumblr as memes featuring the character were posted on the website as early as in 2014. For example, on November 12th, 2014, Tumblr^[5] user brofligate posted a meme that gained over 5,400 likes and reblogs in nine years (shown below, left). On June 10th, 2015, Tumblr^[6] user Deathpaint posted a Rikka's Finger Spin animation of the character that garnered over 200 likes and reblogs in eight years (shown below, right).

In November 2017, Facebook user Jack Crimson posted We Can't Expect God to Do All the Work reaction image, based on another popular line said by the character, to now-defunct Fallout Radposting Facebook group (original post no longer available; image shown below). The image used a Glowing Eyes edit of an image of the character and followed the Tony Kornheiser's 'Why' format. On January 30th, 2018, an anonymous /pol/ board user reposted the image to 4chan,^[7] which is the earliest publicly available repost of the reaction image.

The image and the phrase achieved viral popularity as reactions in the following years.

The character gained more online recognition in late 2010s and early 2020s as he appeared in various memes shared in Fallout communities and beyond. For example, in June 2020, an Understandable, Have a Nice Day reaction image featuring the character was posted (author unknown),^[8] widely used on Twitter in the following years. On October 23rd that year, an unknown Redditor posted a Moe Tossing Barney Out meme that gained over 7,900 upvotes in the /r/NewVegasMemes^[9] subreddit in three years (shown below, right).

The character achieved virality in early 2023 as AI Voice videos became popular online. For example, on February 1st, 2023, YouTube^[10] user C.O.'s Archive posted an AI-generated narration of Genesis by Joshua Graham. The video (shown below, left) gained over 541,000 views in two months. On March 6th, 2023, YouTuber^[11] Leon Talks a Lot posted a video essay about Graham titled, "This Character Has Made People Religious." The video (shown below, right) accumulated over 2.1 million views in one month.