The 9 Worst Times Internet Memes Jumped the Shark

Look, it gives me no pleasure to verbally attack a young child. OK, it only gives me some pleasure to verbally attack a child. But in this case, it's not my fault... Blame the parents!

OK, the backstory, for anyone who has just gotten hooked up to the Internet for the first time. (Welcome! Trust me and avoid searching for Goatse no matter what people tell you!) Charming scamp David went to the dentist and got some laughing gas during his procedure, causing him to get a little loopy on the ride home. Obviously, his father thought to film the incident, so that his son's intoxication could be shared with the entire world.



Let this be a lesson to you kids. Get f**ked up as often as you can. It makes you HILARIOUS.

Unfortunately, just becoming a viral web sensation based on being high and saying things like "Is this real life?" wasn't enough fame for David and his parents. So they continued filming the kid, telling jokes and stories and otherwise trying his 7-9-year-old best to entertain you, the Internet community. And as anyone who has seen Robin Williams do stand-up recently will tell you... sometimes it's just not funny without the drugs.

This Smartwater ad starring former "Friends" actress and current star of 1/3rd of all unwatchable Hollywood romantic comedies, is like the Day the Music Died for Internet memes. As part of a "clever" "viral" online campaign for Smartwater ("The Cynically Self-Aware Water"), Aniston attempts to recreate elements of other successful YouTube videos. This includes checking in on pint-sized lip syncher Keenan Cahill, hanging out with adorable puppies, dancing with some babies and, yes, checking in AGAIN! on the Double Rainbow guy!

(And no, you can't jump the shark twice. That's just ridiculous. Bear had already shark-jumped at this point.)



The whole thing is just irritating, not to mention pointless. Kind of like paying high-end prices for a bottle of water just because the lady from "The Bounty Hunter" told you to while simultaneously ridiculing everything you've found funny over the past year.

On Valentine's Day, 2007, Samwell released a video for his single "What What (in the Butt)" to YouTube. The surreal ode to homosexuality and anal sex was directed by Andrew Swant and Bobby Ciraldo (collectively known as Brownmark Films), and went on to receive over 40 million YouTube views.



In the South Park Season 12 episode "Canada on Strike," the character Butters performs his own version of "What What (in the Butt)" as part of a bid to become an online celebrity. The episode includes parody appearances from a variety of other YouTube celebrities, including the "Numa Numa Guy," Tay Zonday and, of course, the Afro Ninja.


Suing people for animating and re-purposing your funny YouTube video and then putting it on television defeats the whole point of making a funny YouTube video. It sort of defeats the whole point of the Internet. Declaring Samwell's sexually suggestive nonsense too sacred to parody not only makes zero sense, but renders the original video a lot less entertaining in its own right.

And finally, we come to the Meme Graveyard that is "The Chronicles of Rick Roll," a feature film project bringing together dozens of YouTube personalities to essentially guarantee you will never want to hear the words "Internet" or "Video" ever, ever again.

Yes, all your favorite driven-into-the-ground catchphrases are here, from Leeeeeeeeeeroy Jenkins to Boom Goes the Dynamite to, YES, ONCE AGAIN, DOUBLE RAINBOW GUY. And they're all awkwardly shoehorned into a parody of Alice in Wonderland less advisable than chasing a rabbit down a dirt hole in a local park before eating whatever mushrooms you happen to find strewn about.



What makes the trailer for "The Chronicles of Rick Roll" so brutally painful is the total lack of actual jokes. In their place are references, reminding you of these personalities original claim to fame. I mean, why give Antoine Dodson something amusing to say when you can just have him restate his "hide yo _____, hide yo ______" for the five hundred billionth time this year?

The "Boom Goes the Dynamite" guy gets even less impressive treatment, literally turning to the camera and dramatically re-reading his catchphrase with a sincerity you'd normally expert from Walter Cronkite announcing the death of a sitting president. I'd rather get Rick Roll'd about 100 times in a row than have to sit through this trailer once more. It doesn't just jump the shark. It launches into orbit miles above the shark, never again to return to land.