The Brief: "Tonight on Bottom Gear" memes propose absurd subjects for episodes of Top Gear with a collage of text and goofy images of the show's hosts.
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“Tonight on Bottom Gear” memes provide ridiculous premises for episodes of Top Gear: a British show about cars that includes comedy, stunts, and high speeds. These image macro memes, which are particularly popular on Reddit, consist of busy text collages and warped photos of the Top Gear hosts Jeremy Clarkson, Jason Dawe, and Richard Hammond.
According to Know Your Meme, this meme started as a YouTube video on the channel Jixaw which featured user-submitted Top Gear episode parody ideas. The meme spread to Reddit in early September 2020. The subreddit r/BottomGear is dedicated to these memes and has over 4,000 members. These memes also spread to the Dank Memes subreddit where several iterations received thousands of upvotes.
Bottom Gear memes parody Top Gear‘s signature intros which tease highlights, lowlights, and random moments from each episode. In these memes, the proposed episode plots are often vulgar, violent, potentially offensive, and outlandish. The combination of unflattering photos of the hosts and ransom-letter-style text collages add to the chaos of these memes, which already riff on the chaos of the actual show. These memes follow in the footsteps of another Top Gear format where Jeremy Clarkson is seen saying “oh no!” before quickly switching to “anyway…”
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