World War III

What is in the picture

The picture shows four characters crowded shoulder to shoulder against a peach-beige background, grinning from ear to ear. On the left is an elderly gray character; next to him is a villain in a blue suit with a white fur collar; then a yellow character with sharp lightning bolts around his head; and on the right a green character with a black mask around the eyes. Each of them wears an army helmet with a net pattern.

These are not realistic fighters or soldiers, as one might think, but characters from a classic cartoon: according to descriptions of the meme, the original frame from the 1967 Spider-Man series featured the Vulture, Electro, and the Green Goblin, and the Rhino was added to the picture by Reddit user cobe1712 from another scene.

Where the “Me and the Boys” base comes from

The phrase “me and the boys” was used on social media long before the picture appeared. The format took shape in the r/okbuddyretard community at the end of 2018, and it reached mass popularity on May 25, 2019, when user cobe1712 posted the image with the villains from the cartoon series. The post gathered more than 52 thousand upvotes in seven days.

The meaning of the format is simple: a person captions the frame with a phrase like “me and the boys, when we're searching for something at two in the morning,” and the gang of grinning characters looks like a company about to do something reckless or absurd. The smiles and the united front work as a sign of “we're all in this together, and we're having fun.”

Helmets and talk of war

The helmet version is linked to January 2020. On January 3, 2020, an American drone strike near Baghdad airport killed the Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, and on social media people began joking about a possible World War III. It was in this wave that the helmeted characters began to be captioned “me and the boys, when World War III starts.” The exact date when the helmet variant appeared is not established.

Jokes of this kind use black humor: an alarming subject is turned into a caricature. The cheerful faces of the villains and the perky helmets sharply contrast with the seriousness of the event, and this releases the tension. It is important to remember that the meme mocks panic, not the events or the people who suffered in real conflicts.

Examples of captions

“Me and the boys, when the group chat announces a test tomorrow.” Here a school catastrophe stands in for war, and the gang is ready for it.

“Me and my buckwheat stockpile at the start of any news.” A joke about everyday panic.

“Me and my coworkers when accounting announces a rush report.” The helmets emphasize that the workday is turning into a combat operation.

“My friends and I when the game releases at midnight.” The characters are ready for a long night of gaming.

How to use the template

The picture works best with a first-person plural caption in which a group is ready for something that only seems terrible. Try not to put real tragic events into the caption or mock those who suffered: it is funnier when the scale of the catastrophe is mundane. The picture can be used with or without the helmet, and the peach background pairs well with bright captions at the top.