Top TV Memes: The Best Formats From 'Arthur'

Arthur has finally come to an end. For over two decades, the world has been watching the titular anthropomorphic aardvark and his friends suffer through childhood, and while we were supposed to learn something from it, instead we came up with memes like That sign can’t stop me because I can’t read and D.W. being threatened by a kneecapping.

There’s no way to get our childhoods back, but we can mourn the loss of Arthur through memes before we inevitably forget about it by next week and go back to memeing that same episode of SpongeBob we’ve been pulling content from for the past decade.

But even if we’re too old to really care that Arthur is no longer around, we still have a reason to be sad. It’s been 25 years since the kids’ show first aired, and for many of its now grown-up viewers, the show is older than us. Millennial and Gen-Z meme fans can’t imagine a world without it, especially after it gave us so many popular formats. Here are the best episodes that have led to the creation of memes throughout the series’ time on air.

Most Popular Memes: Season 4, Episode 1B: "Arthur’s Big Hit"

In this episode, D.W. (voiced in this episode by Oliver Grainger) is kind of the worst, and the internet is still undecided on whether or not she deserved what she got. Here, Arthur (Michael Yarmush) had just spent weeks building a model plane that she accidentally destroys, despite being told not to touch it. This leads to Arthur punching her in the arm in one of the most overdramatic scenes on children's television. Storm clouds hover above Arthur as he clenches his fist, then punches his sister, knocking her to the ground, where she screams in agony. The close-up on Arthur's hand just moments before disaster has led to what has undeniably become the most popular Arthur meme out there.

Arthur’s fist is now the first thing people think of when this show is mentioned, and while the creators probably don't appreciate that at all, the rest of us can. A show that we've outgrown suddenly has a whole new meaning, and we all kind of feel for Arthur’s repressed rage toward his horrible little sister. We all relate so easily to the Arthur's fist meme simply because we can project our own suffering onto the two-dimensional animal person (who still has a dog — is that ethical?) we've all come to know and love. Or maybe we just still believe D.W. deserved it, and we’re bitter about her parents setting her free to destroy the other toys and dreams of the neighborhood children.

Most Meme Potential: Season 9, Episode 6A: "Arthur Makes Waves"

"Arthur Makes Waves" isn't as well known compared to the episode where D.W. gets punched. In this one, Arthur and D.W (voiced by Cameron Ansell and Jason Szwimmer respectively, because, on this show, the voice actors dropped like flies) are trying not to die of heatstroke while the neighborhood looks on. Eventually, they find a new pool to go to, but before that, the two of them try to visit the public pool, which is closed. As they arrive, D.W. places one hand on the fence and looks in forlornly through her sunglasses. This meme became very popular in its later days of use and is still a widely used template now.

D.W. clinging desperately to the fence spoke to many of us, but another point in the episode only a minute before did as well. There’s a flashback-style moment when Arthur and his friends are recreated as cowboys, arguing with the Old Western version of their school bullies. One of them says, "Your crops are where our cows graze," to which Arthur replies, "Your cows are where our crops grow." If you've ever visited any of the states between West Virginia and Florida, you'll know that this gem is perhaps the best description of the American South that you will ever find, anywhere. Perhaps this scene was the inspiration for that time in 2014 when a rancher named "Cliven" tried to overthrow the federal government because his cattle wanted to graze on public lands for free. Either way, the show was ahead of its time, and it’ll be tragic to watch it fade into a distant memory now that it’s no longer in production. At least we’ll have memes to remember it by.

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