Spirit Pokémon

About

Spirit Pokémon is a series of multi-pane comics featuring a Pokémon trainer who finds him / herself in some sort of predicament and conjures up the “spirit Pokémon” for help. Oftentimes, the summoned Pokémon brings comical relief rather than resolutions to the problem in hand.

Origin

This meme began in November 2010 with Tumblr user secretcat posting a comic featuring a nerdy person calling upon the power of their “spirit pokemon,” in this case the pokemon Porygon, to help them facilitate an awkward social situation:

That same day, fellow Tumblr user catsnrats posted a comic with a similar concept, except this time Porygon was replaced with a Drifloon. This created a style for the comics: an awkward human being calls upon their spirit pokemon to give them real-life guidance, and usually are led more off track by the Pokemon, or not helped at all.

Spread

These comics were reblogged by two tumblelogs well known for their internet Pokemon prowess, Mare Odomo and the FYP blog. The trend really started to pick up in early December, and the spirit pokemon comics have been growing ever since.
The meme is still primarily based in Tumblelogs.

On December 23, Kotaku made a post about spirit pokemon, encouraging others to determine their own spirit pokemon using a quiz on Quizfarm.