Psycho Wojak / Le Scary Face

About

The Psycho Wojak or Demonic Grin Wojak, also known as "Le Scary Face", is a Wojak variant of Feels Guy with an unnaturally large grin and black, beady eyes. Its first known posting was on 4chan in 2018, and going into the 2020s, the character became closely associated with the NATO Article 5 Memes and others made about the 2022 Russian Invasion of Ukraine posted to subreddits like /r/PoliticalCompassMemes.

Origin

Currently, the Psycho Wojak's first known upload was made to 4chan's^[1][2] /v/ board on September 14th, 2018, by an anonymous user who wrote "Have you ever been scared by a game? i havent" (shown below). The post received numerous replies including one that said, "good 'jak, what is it called?"

Spread

On the next day, September 15th, 2018, the Psycho Wojak was posted to 4chan's^[3] /tv/ in which the anon wrote ">yeah man, spooky movies dont really spook me at all / be honest, which flick really SPOOKED you?" The post received numerous replies (shown below). The Wojak then spread to multiple 4chan image boards in late 2018 and 2019.^[4]

On January 23rd, 2021, /u/Haver_Of_The_Sex posted an image of the Wojak to /r/PoliticalCompassMeme on Reddit^[5][6] with the title "Who is this guy and why is everything he says super fucking based," earning roughly 1,100 upvotes in two years (shown below, left). The post inspired mass usage of the Psycho Wojak in the subreddit going into 2021. For instance, on March 21st, 2021, Redditor /u/posted a meme to /r/PoliticalCompassMemes that used the Wojak, gaining roughly 12,700 upvotes in two years (shown below, right).

Poland Wojak Pushing NATO Article 5 Button

The trend of using the Psycho Wojak in political memes eventually led to its usage in the Poland Wojak Pushing NATO Article 5 Button meme amid the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. The first known appearance of the video meme was on March 4th, 2022, when it was posted to Reddit's ^[7] /r/NonCredibleDefense by Redditor JacketsTapeRecorder, where it gained roughly 6,900 upvotes in one year (shown below).

Various Examples

Template

External References