The Brief: These memes fabricate hypothetical situations in which a time-traveler informs someone about future events.
DEEP DIVE
Time traveler memes are particularly popular on Reddit and TikTok. In many of these memes, a time traveler comes from the future to the year 2019 and gives a clue about shocking events that will occur in the future: for better or for worse. Others of these memes take place in the past and depict someone being informed of a historical event that has yet to happen.
Reddit Time Traveler Memes
These memes take shape through a number of image macro formats.
Surprised Andy Dwyer
An image of Chris Pratt’s character looking surprised is used in these memes to show someone’s astonishment after learning what the future will hold.
For those who don’t like Fortnite:
One possible outcome of the Area 51 raid:
*Happiness Noises* from memes
Avengers Endgame Spoiler: We Won, Mr. Stark
This reaction image is for positive news that time travelers may bring.
An anti-Nestlè meme:
Nestlé bad from memes
Misc Reddit Time Travel Memes
On future president Belle Delphine:
Just making some dark-mode friendly memes for you guys. from dankmemes
#TimeTravel TikTok Memes
TikTok time travel memes follow a similar template as Reddit ones, except in video form. The soundtrack to these videos is a remix to “I Wanna Be Like You” by Rain. Sometimes the “time travelers” wear clout goggles. The utter surprise of people from the present or past learning about the future is demonstrated through a filter which makes their eyes look bigger and their faces appear blue and purple. On TikTok, the hashtag #TimeTravel has been viewed over 100 million times.