In the post-ironic reddit chungus irony era, resurgence of vine-ist antique irony (such as king bach or trollface revivals) have shaped the meme culture of the new Instagram reel space. The newest addition to this post-irony line up are contemporary FNAF nostalgia parodies.

Unlike, the mainstream normieness of the new uncanny incredibles meme or the failure of the spiderman voiceover meme to gain much traction, FNAF nostalgia has found a blossoming niche that seems sustainable and could potentially stay ironic for months. FNAF nostalgia won’t be as consistently strong as classics like vine thud or bruh sound effect #2 but could reach the twitter-level peak of clash royal hi-hi-hi-has or deez nuts.

Why has FNAF nostalgia become popular?

Instagram meme commentator @berry_0714mix believes its similar to spongebob memes in its origins:

“The recent noise surrounding the release of FNAF: Security Breach has put FNAF irony back into relevance. Security Breach not being as scary as the original games has prompted many gamers to return to FNAF originals to relive the experience of being scared by Freddy for the first time. And as we know with most game , influx in player base leads to influx in meme traction.”

This is not the only reason. The current meme environment is showing itself to be very receptive to post-irony nostalgia. The cult-like popularity and callbacks of Spiderman: No Way Home has seen many early internet juggernauts like FNAF and Clash Royale become viable relatable-and-therefore-funny memes.

Also contributing to this is the general age arithmetic of current meme-ists: the most active meme-ists started out on the internet with FNAF and its relevance is thus maximized by the current meme cohort.

What impact is FNAF nostalgia having on other memes?

FNAF nostalgia’s popularity is immense and it could displace some big hitters.

It has definitely thrown MnM memes to the curb and has reduced the current wave post-ironic Garfield.

Another memer @monongnft commented: “I see it having a range of impacts. Firstly, it’s rise will bring with it other memes from the franchise such as FNAF beatboxing or FNAF security alert which will see its disruptiveness only increase. Will it displace staples like minecraft and Clash Royale irony? No, I think it will only enhance those and we’ve seen many instances of FNAF being combined with minecraft mods or other memes such as uncanny minions or general current affairs commentary.”

FNAFs impact is limited though, it hasn’t had much traction in the normie space and is strong mainly in certain tiktok FYPs and on individual subreddits.

What does it mean for wider meme culture and the future?

It shows that post-irony nostalgia is here to stay and we won’t see the end of revivals of big chungus or thanos memes. However, FNAF’s reach is limited to who has played the game and its growth might peak relatively soon. It might develop an anime-like subculture of the internet and fall to irrelevancy but currently demand is high and progression is happening.

Pushing P and other memes are on the rise and meme culture is only set to grow in popularity with the trivialization of relevant news such as the Ukraine-Russia conflict.