The best social media memes of 2021

He was sitting socially-distanced on a folding chair with crossed arms and legs, wearing a practical brown winter coat instead of a suit, as well as his now famous oversized woolen mittens: This photo of Bernie Sanders stole the viral show at President Joe Biden's inauguration.

The internet quickly picked up on the senator's bored vibe.

Twitter user Ashley K. combined a popular meme — "This meeting could have been an email" — with the photo; her tweet obtained over a million likes.

   

Then Inauguration Bernie was photoshopped into every possible situation.

Following reporting on the origins of Bernie's mittens, their creator, Jen Ellis, a teacher in Vermont, entered into a business partnership soon after the ceremony to cope with increasing demand for the product. "I can't be more thrilled because I personally can't make 18,000 pairs of mittens," said Ellis of the deal, announcing in the media, "Everybody will get their mittens — everybody."

Singing with the Wellerman

It's not every day that a man gets to leave his day job to become a sea shanty singer, but Nathan Evans is living the dream.

The former postal worker's TikTok version of "Wellerman"— with its lyrics echoing the stoic attitude needed to make it through these pandemic times — became extremely popular in early 2021. It became a viral hit when other musicians added their own contribution to the original clip.

Even Kermit the frog joined the fun:

There once was a ship in the Suez Canal

Talking of seas and voyages, another source of memes was the Ever Given, a massive container ship run by Taiwanese company Evergreen, which blocked the Suez Canal in March this year, causing massive disruptions in logistics worldwide.

A scene from the film "Austin Powers" offered a powerful demonstration of the phenomenon:

And the tiny bulldozer trying to free the massive ship also became a symbol of our powerlessness amid the current situation:

Shocked Oprah vs. interested Oprah

Who can forget the tell-all interview that Prince Harry and his wife Meghan had with Oprah Winfrey, which unveiled the royals' ugly side?

Among the revelations Meghan made, the one surrounding the royal family's concerns "about how dark" her and Harry's baby would be led Oprah to throw up her hands in shock. 

That image, combined with another shot of Oprah attentively listening during the interview, provided the visuals for a meme commenting on our human contradictions. 

Kim Kardashian breaks the internet, again

Any list of memes is incomplete without headline-grabbing Kim Kardashian.

The celebrity, who also owns a fashion label called Skims, showed up at this year's MET Gala wearing black from head to toe. And a black mask that covered her face.

The look led social media observers to compare her to all kinds of dark figures, including Darth Vader, the soulless Dementors in "Harry Potter," an alien from Ridley Scott's cult film of the same title, or even a women's bathroom sign.

A photo of Kim next to Kendall Jenner at the same event made her appear like the shadow of her glamorously dressed sister, leading the internet to caption them as two parts of a same person.

'For the better, right?'

First posted in April 2021 on the Twitter account @starwarsposting, which is dedicated to incorrect quotes from the film franchise, a combination of screenshots of Anakin and Padme from the 2002 film "Star Wars: Episode II – Attack of the Clones" went viral.

The initial dialogue refers to the fact that Anakin will later become the evil Darth Vader:

Anakin: "I'm going to change the world."
Padme: "For the better, right?"
Anakin: (gazes in silence)
Padme: "For the better, right?"

The template inspired countless memes, including this one commenting on health insurance in the US:

This other one, on how a simple task in a Word document can easily ruin the entire formatting, obtained more than 230,000 likes.

How it started vs. How it's going

Social media users first adopted the "How it started vs. How it's going" format last year, often using it to post a positive development about their relationships or their personal journey. 

But quickly enough, others used the meme ironically to express the exhaustion caused by the pandemic.

Through two different film stills, one from the 2004 film "The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou" and the other from "The Lighthouse" (2019), iconic actor Willem Dafoe expresses perfectly how much we've aged within a year of the pandemic:

Here's a more recent variation, featuring actor Rosamund Pike in the new series "Wheel of Time".

The world is still dealing with frustrating restrictions due to the omicron variant, which inspired this take on the meme, drawn from the mega-successful Netflix series from South Korea, "Squid Game."

Angela Merkel visits a bird park

But despite COVID, we can still try to end the year — and this list — on a more colorful note, following the example of former Chancellor Angela Merkel.

One of her last public outings, at a bird park, led to some of the most iconic photos of her chancellorship.

For one Twitter user, the shots of her covered with parrots embodied the contrast between Instagram and Twitter: 

 

Edited by: Elizabeth Grenier