focuses on death, destruction, apocalypse, survival, and power, and the memes poke fun at all those things. There is no shortage of memes, but only a handful manage to sum up these themes with just a simple image and a few words. The show is, after all, about much more than surviving an apocalyptic event. It's about the characters, the difficult decisions they have to make, and the possibilities of rebuilding a society and humanity in the face of tremendous adversity. Memes are designed to be funny and light-hearted, but some of them truly capture the essence of the show.
When ended its series run in 2022, it left behind 11 seasons of successes, failures, tragedies, and love stories. This gave meme-makers plenty to work with when it came to making parts of the show's journey into shareable social media posts. Some of these take tragic moments and add some humor to them, allowing fans to remember their favorite moments, but with a smile at the joke. Others just like to poke fun at the popular zombie apocalypse show and allow everyone to laugh, from fans to non-fans alike.
One of the most iconic scenes from the show is when Carol made the difficult decision to execute the young Lizzie. These memes take the image of Carol holding the gun, Lizzie’s back to her, and jokingly suggest it’s the feeling fans might get after playing the video game and being in a room with their own sibling. But the moment truly reflects one of the underlying themes of , which is survivors having to make seemingly impossible decisions they would otherwise never have to make, or could even imagine ever having to make.
These memes poke fun at another show, , to prop up . While had a fabulous run, fans were upset by the final season, not believing it did the story justice. By contrast, after a dip in ratings and story in the middle, made, as this meme creator notes, “one hell of a comeback.” Looking at every season of ranked by IMDb average, it's clear that the show rallied after a lull. The show came back to life with a renewed focus, leaving viewers feeling as pleasantly satisfied as Jim from looks in this image.
Rick had one of the most compelling character arcs on the show, and his storylines were front and center. One moment that truly represented a change in him was when he beat Gareth to death, in a church. So these memes, showing Gabriel calling the church “the Lord’s house” and a caption suggesting Glenn and Maggie correct him, implying that it’s Rick’s house now, is perfectly indicative of the kind of person he had become. He was ruthless, had issues trusting others, and took what he needed after having so much taken from him. It was the name of the game for any surviving group on the show.
These memes take a more humorous look at the brutal beheading of fan-favorite character Hershel, , what this meme truly represents is a common theme for Rick: battling head-to-head with a vicious leader of another group. It’s all about bitter rivalries, and before there was Negan, there was the Governor. While Rick’s pleadings did not really involve mentions of Santa, he did, time and time again, have to plead for the lives of his friends and family members, exchanging edge-of-the-seat dialogue that was far more intense than this.
While Rick was in a hospital bed in a coma, presumed dead, his best friend and partner on the police force Shane took up with his wife Lori. When Lori became pregnant shortly after Rick showed up, the timing suggested that the baby’s biological father was Shane. But the trio purposely avoided talking about this obvious reality. It became an important bit of information, as the fact that Rick cared for Judith as his own even after Lori died proved the type of man he was. Meanwhile, Shane, who was as brutal as the other characters became right from the beginning, would be the type to suggest he’d be a better father.
Negan was one of the most ruthless villains on the show, but everything he said, he delivered with an arrogant smile and charming demeanor. The only time fans ever saw Negan vulnerable, prior to his imprisonment by Rick, was when Rick slashed his throat. Instead of leaving him for dead, Rick asked for him to be medically treated to save his life. It was definitely one “hell of a day,” particularly because the moment was one that fans waited a very long time for, with a few seasons that some felt were dragged out far too long. This led to Negan becoming one of the most redeemed characters on the show.
While Negan - one of had his knee bend and body tilt to the side, for Rick, it was all about the head tilt. When he cocked his head to the side, fans knew that he was serious and gearing up to fight. Chances are he would be pulling out a gun or charging with a knife or other weapon within moments of this move. Clearly other characters pull the same move, but only Rick knows how to do it right, and these memes pointed that fact out perfectly.
The Whisperers were one of the scariest enemy groups on the show that the main group encountered. They wore skins of the dead on their faces to protect themselves from walkers while also concealing the fact that they were human, so they could strike against enemies. Doing, and wearing, gross things in , from walker masks to blood and guts, remained par for the course on the show, but understandably this was a bridge too far for a lot of fans. These memes showed what would happen to characters in the show who felt the same way.
Another of the hilarious crossover and memes, this one takes two fan-favorite characters, Jon Snow and Glenn Rhee, smiling widely, asking if they should “tell them” about something or “let them keep guessing.” This references a big plot device used in , which is teasing the death of major characters and leaving fans waiting with cliffhangers. Glenn, one of , was presumed dead, just like Jon Snow, until a new season commenced, and it was revealed that he survived after all, exactly what happened with Snow.
In these memes, a young man tells Carol that she will “go full Shane” if she’s hungry and should eat a Snickers bar to satiate her hunger. It’s a play on the popular candy bar commercials. Going “full Shane” references the fact that, even at the very beginning of the apocalypse, Shane was acting like people eventually did after several years of trying to survive. Some believe he was ahead of the curve and the group should have followed his dog-eat-dog style, while others think Rick’s strategy of still living with a modicum of trust and morality was the better way. Much of focuses on analyzing which viewpoint is correct.
