2022 is drawing to a close, which means it’s time to look back and reminisce on the year. What better way to do so than through the hilarious and sarcastic lens of memes? Most of the major pop culture events of the year can be tracked wholly through memes. From popular app releases to cheating scandals and Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter, we can always count on the internet to capture every major happening with an appealing dash of dark humor.
While most of the memes are reactions to releases, scandals, major events, and shake-ups, some of them are solely just for fun. In some cases, the internet just saw something that was a bit odd and humorous and decided to capitalize on it. In an increasingly chaotic world, it’s becoming all the more important to continue holding onto the things that make us laugh, even if we don’t always know quite why they do. Here are the 10 best meme trends of 2022, ranked to the funniest.
10. Pokémon Scarlet & Violet
Pokémon Scarlet & Violet is a Nintendo game that was released in November for the Switch. The highly anticipated game marks the latest installment in the hugely popular Pokémon franchise and video game series. Unfortunately, it had a less-than-ideal launch when players began to complain about the game being riddled with glitches and performance issues (which Nintendo has vowed to fix with updates). While the 10 million players who bought copies waited for the issues to be resolved, they took to social media to make funny memes about the glitches, and just about Scarlet & Violet in general.
9. Wordle
Initially released to the public on October 21, 2021, Wordle truly exploded in popularity in 2022. Users became obsessed with the word streaks, sharing their Wordle results with others and desperately trying to guess the word of the day. Wordle gained further prominence when the New York Times bought the game for an undisclosed seven-figure amount and vowed to keep it free for users. Of course, with the intense popularity came a wave of Wordle memes with internet users capturing how surprisingly difficult and addicting the game is.
8. Euphoria High School
Euphoria season 2 premiered in 2022 and brought the show to the forefront of the internet’s mind again after a nearly two-and-a-half-year break between seasons. While achieving critical acclaim, Euphoria has also received some criticism for portraying high school students alongside explicit content, including drug use and sexuality. However, others found humor in the outlandishly dark nature of Euphoria‘s high school and turned those takes into memes. The hilarious memes give suggestions for what kind of teachers should teach at the high school, interrogate what kind of budget the school has, and question how those students are passing high school when they’re never seen studying or doing homework.
7. Elon Musk Twitter
After years of expressing an interest in purchasing Twitter, billionaire business magnate Elon Musk officially wrapped up his acquisition of the social media platform on October 27. He expressed interest in lifting “censorship” on Twitter and using the platform to encourage free speech—of course, the site has been a mess since his acquisition, as he laid off a significant portion of the company and instilled an $8 monthly subscription for a blue check mark. Since then, he has verified several accounts belonging to extremists and fostered an environment of hate speech on the platform. Naturally, the internet’s response was to tackle the acquisition with some dark humor and roast Musk with several hilarious memes.
6. Girl Explaining
The Girl Explaining meme broke out in the summer of 2022, though the initial picture was snapped in 2018. A woman at a party was taking photos to capture the event and realized that, in one photo, two kids in the background had photobombed her. In the background, a girl appears to be insistently explaining something in her unamused boyfriend’s ear. It turns out that she was actually singing along to a song while her tired then-boyfriend listened. However, the photo exploded and went viral in 2022 as internet users began to create memes guessing what deep philosophical insights the girl in the photo was explaining to her boyfriend.
5. Liz Truss
Liz Truss is a British politician who became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom … for a month. She officially took on the position on September 6, when the UK was already edging towards crisis due to the escalating cost of living. On September 23, she proposed a controversial budget that abolished the 45% tax rate on top of income and introduced other drastic taxation-cutting measures. The Economist predicted that she wouldn’t last long and that she had “the shelf-life of lettuce.” This resulted in the Daily Star holding a live stream to see if Truss could outlive lettuce. Turns out, she couldn’t, as she resigned on October 20, sparking numerous memes roasting her for being unable to outlive lettuce.
4. Elmo vs. Rocco
Early in 2022, the internet was absolutely tickled by a clip of Elmo losing it over Zoe’s pet rock, Rocco. Elmo has always been exasperated by Rocco and the fact that he is 1) an imaginary friend, and 2) a rock. When Zoe tries to give Rocco a cookie that Elmo wants, Elmo goes off on Rocco, and the internet was surprised with just how much shade he throws at the rock. The clip was shared on Twitter on January 3, where it racked up 9.1 million views and soon sparked several hilarious memes capturing Elmo’s abhorrence of poor Rocco.
3. Negroni Sbagliato with Prosecco
Toward the end of September, House of the Dragon stars Emma D’Arcy and Olivia Cooke sat down to ask each other some fun “get to know me” type questions for HBO Max. During the interview, D’Arcy is asked what their go-to order at the bar is, to which they respond, “A Negroni Sbagliato, with Prosecco in it.” Cooke responds, “Oh, stunning!” Unexpectedly, the entire internet, especially the LGBTQ+ community, fell in love with the way that D’Arcy says the name of the drink, sparking a torrent of memes.
2. Adam Levine’s DMs
If there was anyone more in need of a meme-roasting than Liz Truss this year, it was Adam Levine. The Maroon 5 singer came under scrutiny after Instagram model Sumner Stroh revealed that she had an affair with him. Not only that, but he texted her asking her for permission to name his pregnant wife’s unborn child “Sumner.” Stroh also shared the other cringey DMs Levine sent her, which were akin to something a teenage boy might write instead of a married 43-year-old singer/songwriter. The internet had a blast making countless memes out of his DMs.
1. It’s Morbin’ Time
The internet works in funny ways and one of the funniest was turning Morbius from the most unremarkable movie of the year into one that people couldn’t stop talking about. Shortly after Morbius bombed at the box office and received scathing reviews, the internet created a fictional catchphrase for the character: “It’s Morbin’ time.”—a spin on the Power Rangers’ phrase, “It’s morphin’ time.” It’s Morbin’ Time became a viral meme as viewers imagined Morbius showing up all over the world and saying, “It’s Morbin’ Time.” Users even began to demand a Morbius 2 just for the sake of hearing him say the catchphrase.
(featured image: iStock)
