Year 2023: Memes that became mementos

With the year 2023, with all of its highs and lows, coming to an end as the country battles severe political polarisation, one thing remained constant and that is Pakistanis’ love for memes as the phenomenon stayed true to its modern-day conception — driving inspiration from Richard Dawkins’ definition — of acting as a self-replicating piece of information ensuring cultural exchanges that we call can more or less relate to in some way.

From “moye moye” to the all-time relatable “Sher” to someone looking “like a wow”, let’s recap the memes that continued to crack us up throughout the year acting as a humour bridge connecting us all regardless of the idiosyncratic similarities and differences, we all share.

Life goes ‘Moye Moye’

It won’t be wrong to label 2023 as the “moye moye year” as netizens just couldn’t get enough of the seemingly “infectious” phrase that has been doing rounds on social media platforms.

Originating from the chorus of a Serbian song “DŽANUM” by Teya Dora, the phrase actually is spelt “moje more” (meaning “my nightmares”), however, courtesy of its eccentric pronunciation social media users interpreted it as “moye moye” — and apparently there’s no going back!

Here’s the original song which has garnered more than 63 million views on YouTube.

With around 1.4 million reels on Instagram alone, netizens are apparently having a blast utilising the phrase to depict dark humour and a rather comical take on embarrassing, or even dire situations.

Bollywood actor and Indian singer Ayushmann Khurrana also couldn’t resist to the viral trend and gave in to the trend during a recent music gig.

However, there are also those who seemed to be irked by this trend, who, you guessed it right, resorted to none other than memes to express their dislike of the viral phrase.

Are you ‘looking like a wow’?

So, are you “so beautiful, so elegant, just looking like a wow”? That either made you giggle or annoyed you, either way, you’re not alone as the phrase has taken social media by storm leading to a seemingly never-ending memes frenzy on various platforms.

The meme originates from Jasmeen Kaur’s — owner of a clothing store in India’s capital New Delhi — video of simply marketing her outfits describing the look as “so beautiful, so elegant” which caught netizens’ eyes and soon everyone jumped aboard the meme-bandwagon.

The clip also caught the attention of none other than Yashraj Mukhate — the guy behind “Rasode me kaun tha” stint — who as expected, made a song out of it.

Bollywood stars also couldn’t resist the iconic phrase with Deepika Padukone and others parodying it on their Instagram accounts.

‘Jamal Kudu’ takes over the internet

Although the Bollywood movie “Animal” has received mixed reactions, Bobby Deol who plays the character “Abrar ul Haque” is seen grooving idiosyncratically over the “Jamal Kudu” song — which marks the entry of his character into the movie — all while balancing a glass on his head, and apparently, the internet loves it!

The groovy music beat coupled with not-so-orthodox choreography by Deol himself, has resulted in a flood of memes and reels with netizens using it for all kinds of context. Here’s a look at some of them.

Some social media users compared Pakistan's wicketkeeper batter Mohammad Rizwan's recent image from the Australia Test series to that of Deol's character's moves, whereas others used the song on an old dance video of Indian cricketer Virat Kohli.

As per several Indian news outlets, the song drives its inspiration from a Persian song “Jamal Jamaloo” based on the works of Iranian poet Bijan Smandar.

Barbenheimer frenzy

The year 2023 was also the year of “Barbenheimer” — the term coined by cinema fans to mark the same-day release of highly anticipated Hollywood blockbusters “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer”

Owing to the movies being poles apart with regard to their plot and context, social media users resorted to creating rib-tickling memes.

Fans just couldn't decide which movie to watch on their visit to the cinema.

Spidey going strong

Despite first surfacing more than a decade back in 2011 — with origins from the 1967 Spider-Man carton series’ episode "Double Identity" — it seems that the Spider-Man pointing meme still is quite relatable and relevant to netizens who just can’t get enough of it.

It seems that even Taylor Swift can't resist Spidey's charm.

Some even claimed that the meme is actually inspired by the popular sitcom F.R.I.E.N.D.S — although we know that's not true.

The meme remained a fan favourite throughout 2023 with even Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg sharing the meme on X, formerly Twitter, after a gap of over a decade, to mark the launch of Instagram’s “Threads” — a competitor to the Elon Musk-owned platform.

Furthermore, the meme was also featured in the “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse” movie released this year.

The all-time relatable ‘Sher’

Whether it be student life or professional, we all have received that “pep talk” at some point from someone asking us to gather ourselves and be strong and brave like a “Sher” (lion).

However, apparently, netizens have adopted a rather sarcastic approach to this flooding the social media platforms with relatable memes attributing human-like traits to the king of the jungle suggesting that even “Sher” has feelings and needs a break sometimes.

For those of us who wait for the weekend to relax and have fun, but simply find ourselves too exhausted to do much.

Musk-Zuckerberg MMA fight

Social media users also couldn’t stay away from the online banter between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg who at one point agreed to a mixed martial arts (MMA) fight.