Meaning
What does Edgy Skeleton mean?
Edgy Skeleton refers to a popular image macro meme format, depicting artworks of skeletons, paired with edgy captions, parodying hyper-masculinity and the attempt at looking cool.
“Edgy Skeleton” memes resemble the Coldsteel The Hedgehog memes, as they make fun of the edgy aestethic, embraced by children online. In 2023, the meme also spread to TikTok, with some users pairing the memes with funny songs, while others were throwing schoolyard insults as captions on the skeleton image macros.
An “Edgy Skeleton” meme may include hardcore disses, like I Know You Are, But What Am I? or No U.
Origin
What's the origin of Edgy Skeleton?
Although the exact origin of “Edgy Skeleton” memes can not be found, the format resembles the Gamers Rise Up meme series in its irony, mocking posing masculinty.
One of the main contributors to the trend is da share z0ne, a user active on Twitter and Facebook, posting ironic image macros of skeletons. Their activity began in September 2015, and they have been consistently posting memes on their social media pages ever since.
Their memes, based on poorly done graphic design and edgy quotes, paired with image macros of skeletons have slowly spread across the web in the 2010s, starting to cater to a wider audience in 2018.
Spread & Usage
How did Edgy Skeleton spread?
By January, da share z0ne already had 88,000 followers on Twitter, as reported by Vice Media. Various other journals also began writing about the meme creator, who began making a major impact on popular culture with their ironic content.
In July 25th, 2018, a subreddit was also launched, titled r/EdgySkeletonMemes, with a limited following of 1000. Despite this, more and more “Edgy Skeleton” memes began circulating online in 2018.
However, the trend reached a new peak in 2022, when TikTok videos also began compiling these image macros. By early 2023, the TikTok trend took a new turn, pairing the “Edgy Skeleton” image macros with not-so-edgy songs and lyrics.
