2012 Internet Meme Costume Ideas (for the lulz)

As a huge fan of internet memes, I would like nothing more than to dress like one for Halloween. When a couple friends mentioned the idea of hosting a meme-themed Halloween party, my head started spinning. There are so many hilarious options! From bronies to rage faces, memes offer some of the cheapest, but most trendy (and humorous) costume opportunities.

Let's have a look at the best ones (starting with the trendiest for 2012). Some require little more than a printer, a piece of paper, some string, and scissors. Others are all about one or two small accessories. And a few incorporate more artistry and advanced planning. All, however, are fantastic. Enjoy.

One of the easiest meme-related costumes (and one which can quite effectively be matched with another costume) is one related to the "Don't Worry, We're From the Internet" meme. This catchphrase-based meme mostly involves creating image macros using photos of nerdy cosplayers with the phrase, "Don't Worry, I'm from the Internet." or "Don't worry, m'aam, we're from the Internet."

To replicate the meme in costume form, just create a sign that says something to the effect of "Don't worry ______, ___ from the Internet."

To be really true to the meme, it would be best to pair this sign with an outlandish costume. Dressing up as a character from a video game, anime series, Star Trek, or Star Wars is ideal. You might also just dress like a hopeless nerd or horrifying freak.

The perk of this costume is that it enables you to wear potentially-embarrassing costumes ironically!

On March 14th of 2012, a girl of a photo grasping Goosebumps books (with pigtails, a retainer, and an expression of great excitement) was posted online, which was quickly re-posted with the caption "GERSBERMS - MAH FAVRIT BERKS!"

Thus the Ermahgerd meme was born. While much of the meme revolves around the original image, a big portion of the meme revolves around retainer lisps. Both key elements are easy to incorporate into a simple costume. All you might need is:

• Pigtails
• A retainer, if you have one
• Goosebumps books
• A willingness to speak with a retainer lisp all night
• A willingness to start all exclamations with "ERMAGHERD!" or to hold up your books and yell "BERKS!!"

Memes like Hipster Jesus and Guido Jesus translate very well to costume parties because Jesus costumes are so easy to buy, make, or wear, and making them particularly meme-friendly only requires the addition of a couple of accessories.

Should you like to put together a Guido Jesus costume, all you would need is:

• A fake tan
• Flowing black hair (grab a wig!)
• Chin-strap facial hair (may be drawn on with a marker, mind you)
• A tight white shirt
• Muscles

Hipster Jesus costumes are even easier. All you really need is one or more of the following:

• Hipster glasses
• Tight pants
• A flannel shirt worn over a white sheet robe

Throughout 2011 and into 2012, the mysterious, controversial (and politically active) hackers behinf the group Anonymous have been making headlines, so the ultimate internet meme costume involves dressing up as these world famous heroes/antiheroes.

Dressing up as a member of Anonymous is ridiculously easy. All you need is a Guy Fawkes mask, which is not only inexpensive but versatile (e.g. good on Halloween, good on the 5th of November, good for V for Vendetta cosplaying parties, and good for joining Anonymous-inspired or associated protests).

If I were to don the most relevant meme-related costume, this would be it. Hands down.

An immensely popular meme costume in 2012, Rage Faces (including, obviously, the most beloved ones, such as Y U NO guy, Forever Alone, Me Gusta, and, my personal favorite, Trollface) make up the most simple internet meme costume one could imagine.

The incredibly lazy (or rushed, or nonchalant) need do no more than print out a rage face on paper, stab two eye holes with a pencil, tie some string around the sides, and voila! A perfect, easy rage face mask results.

I've even done most of the legwork for you by providing an image from the left. See what I do for you??? Y U NO PRINT THIS???

Rage face masks can be far more elaborate, of course. Pictured to the left is a pair of more advanced masks I ran across at a comic convention in San Francisco. These creative meme cosplayers utilized thicker boards and drew the faces themselves. Well done, dudes!

In addition to donning rage faces, you might also use Awesome Face (sometimes known as Epic Smiley). Just a thought!

If you exist in America and are not a total hermit, you must be aware of Pepper Spray Cop, otherwise known as Lieutenant John Pike, a police officer at UC Davis who pepper sprayed a bunch of young Occupy protesters (in an exceedingly casual manner) on November 18th, 2011.

This incident took place in front of a very large group of people, many of them intent on photographing and filming every moment of the debacle, so after the pepper spraying took place, the internet was soon littered with images of this man spraying orange mist onto the huddled masses.

Such politically charged and visually dramatic imagery is just too perfect to not be picked up- hence the Casually Spray Everything Cop meme was born. People started photoshopping Pepper Spray Cop into all sorts of historically significant paintings and photos, creating both hilarious and poignant images!

Why not create some Casually Spray Everything moments of your own by getting a cheap cop costume, a bottle of hair spray, and a riot helmet? The lulz will abound.

One of the most popular internet memes that first emerged in 2011 involves bronies. If you're not familiar with this trendy group of people, here's the gist: they're male fans of the cartoon television series "My Little Ponies: Friendship is Magic". Chances are you know about them already. They have, after all, made their way into the mainstream media, even getting mentioned on CNN and NPR.

A brony costume can be incredibly simple. All you would need is: (1) to be male, and (2) to be wearing a My Little Ponies t-shirt, or to be toting around a My Little Pony doll. The total cost of this costume should be no more than $20 (plus some of your dignity, but if you're dressing up as anything, lost dignity is a given).

Some cursory knowledge of the television series is desirable, as it would always help to be in character as you impress your buddies with your knowledge of Tlight Sparkle and the fun misadventures that take place in the quaint town of Ponyville.

If you would like to build a fancy costume this year, and also want to be somewhat trendy, a great option is Nyan Cat. This strange animated gif cat first blessed this fine planet in April 2011, and has been lulling audiences into a trancelike state ever since.

To create a Nyan Cat costume, you'll need to combine a gray cat costume with a large, torso (at least)-sized pink poptart, and a rainbow. Combining these elements in an artful manner is where the skill and creativity factor in. The ultimate costume would, of course, also incorporate the song "Nyanyanyanyanyanyanya!" Duh.

One could knit the Pop Tart Cat costume, as pictured to the right. But one could also...

1. paint one's face gray,
2. add two rosy pink circles on one's cheeks
3. don dray socks and gloves, a gray tale, and gray ears
4. paint two large slabs of cardboard pink with red sprinkles and wear them, sandwich board style
5. purchase a gay pride flag and let it trail from the back slab of cardboard

To make life easy for you, I've conveniently linked to the cat products and flag below. You're on your own for the cardboard.

Of course, if this costume is too much for you, you could always create an awesome lawn decoration like the one pictured to the right. I want to find the people who made this. I want to find them and kiss their feet.

Are you looking for a cheap, quick, and hilarious meme costume? It doesn't get much better than Steve Buscemeyes.

This meme, which involves pasting Steve Buscemi's eyes onto various people (mostly celebrities). Since Mr. Buscemi has, er, exceedingly unique eyes, this simple cut-and-paste action produces some truly remarkable results.

To make a Steve Buscemeyes costume, all you need to do is find a sizable image of Steve Buscemi, print it out, cut out the eyes (with wee holes so you can see through) and either tape them to a pair of glasses or turn them into a tie-on mask. For added creepiness, you may want to photoshop the image before printing to get the skin tones to match your own.

A collection of meme costumes would not be complete without a shout out for dear ol' Rebecca Black. Honestly, walking around with some portable speakers blasting her (ever so fabulous) hit "Friday" is almost an internet meme costume in and of itself (though I suppose it should be more technically classified as performance art... or political satire?).

One could, however, dress as Miss Black herself. If you do take this route, I recommend dressing (and styling your hair) as she does at the very beginning of the video. All you'll need is a turquoise shirt, some pajama bottoms, and some craaaaazy hair. Knowing the lyrics to her song (as shameful as that is) will help to make the costume more effective, I think. But then again... that would require listening to the song...

Image macros are one of the most popular means of delivering internet memes, so turning yourself into an image macro, meme-related or not, is an excellent option, and offers the added utility of timelessness (which is great, because you can re-use whatever you create year after year).

Creating an image macro doesn't have to be too difficult. With two strips of thick poster board and two wooden dowels, plus some cut-out letters, one can create a very convincing image macro frame for one's own face. A good example can be seen to the right.

One could also purchase a larger poster board and simply cut out a round space for one's face, or a larger square for one's head and shoulders.

In internet meme world, lolcats never really go out of style. If you don't believe me, run a Google image search for "vintage lolcat" and you'll discover that humans have been photographing and captioning humorous images of felines for decades and decades.

Dressing as a lolcat is not incredibly hard. One simple option involves donning a traditional cat costume, but walking everywhere with a cheeseburger (in homage to the first major lolcat website, ICanHazCheezburger, which has since gone on to become the Cheezburger Network).

Another option is to dress as a particular lolcat, such as monorail cat, serious cat, or invisible bike cat. A third scenario involves dressing as a cat but applying words from an image macro to one's person, as pictured in the photo to the right.

For the more cerebral of meme fans, the philosoraptor is an excellent choice. There are two general approaches one might take to this costume:

• Dress as a famous philosopher (perhaps a fun French philosopher with a beret) with a velociraptor hand puppet
• Don a velociraptor mask and reptile-like gloves and assume the classic philosoraptor pose upon being questioned about one's costume (for creative flourish, one might dress as a philosopher to lend more credence to the costume

If you have a legitimate velociraptor costume, all the better! Just wear the whole thing, assume the pose as you please, and let the meme illiterate just assume you're dressing as a dino.

If you want to go slightly retro with your internet meme costume, you might as well dress as Antoine Dodson, the Internet Meme Darling of 2010.

Dressing up as the inspiration for the Bed Intruder Song is not difficult. All you'll need is:

• A red bandana around your head
• A black tank top
• Jeans

And of course, you'll need to have memorized his famous words. Or at least the ones that make up the refrain of the hit Autotune song Autotune the News made of his media interview:

He’s climbing in your windows. He’s snatchin your people up.Tryna rape em so y’all need to. Hide your kids, hide your wife. Hide your kids, hide your wife. Hide your kids, hide your wife. And hide your husband. Cuz they’re rapin errbody out there.

If you want to go vintage 2009, go for a Three Wolf Moon shirt.

The Three Wolf Moon shirt the only way to physically wear a meme, since the shirt itself was the source of all the unexpected hilarity. If you're not familiar with this meme, you need to little more than view the Amazon.com comments on the original shirt.

Basically, they started and didn't stop. And they became, of course, increasingly hilarious and absurd.

Another exceedingly simple internet meme costume, this shirt is readily available, as it always has been, on Amazon.com. All you have to do is put it on. And let the lulz begin.

One of my favorite memes is an old one- back from 2007! Are you, like myself, incredibly fond of Zombie Kid of the I Like Turtles meme?

If you don't know what I'm talking about, watch the video. See? Wasn't that GREAT?

Zombie Kid is incredibly easy to dress as. All you need is some cheap face paint, a shirt, and the brilliant catchphrase. The meme reference might be a bit outmoded or obscure, but after all this time, it is more likely to be regarded as classic than passe.

Did I miss your favorite meme? Oh noes!!

To be honest, there are so many amazing memes out there... it would be difficult to cover all of their potential costumes in one guide. But if there is one that you think would produce a great costume, leave a comment about it! If it's a really really good one, I'll add it to the article!

Also, be sure to weigh in to the right and vote for your favorite costume idea. I'm curious to see which you think is the best! Also, if you happen to dress up as any of these things, you had better let us know how it goes by coming back and leaving a comment!

Finally, if you would like to learn more about the various internet memes out there, I heartily recommend visiting the folks over at Know Your Meme. Their fantastic video explanations, plus their crowdsourced pages explaining even the more obscure memes floating on the internetz, are fantastic. So far as I'm concerned, they're the ultimate internet meme authority, and I adore them with all my technology-addled heart.

Happy meming!