one does not simply combine boromir and tank cat

i'm a bit of an internet meme aficionado. the whole theory behind memes and related parts of speech/culture are tangentially related to my research regarding my (someday) future dissertation, plus it's just inherently interesting and also convenient since i'm on the internet all the damn time. i like watching these things grow, spread, become more intricate (eventually certain variations on a meme will become the 'in' thing, while others, when repeated, are taken to show the 'n00bness' of the meme variation's user), and eventually fall out of favor.

anyway, i'm not going to attempt to explain what memes are, because the wiki article, though a bit byzantine, does a good job of explaining that already. a visit to I Can Has Cheezburger? or Fark can also clear up any lingering confusion you might have.

so. awhile back, a meme developed around boromir's "one does not simply walk into mordor" line from fellowship of the ring (show below in a wonky aspect ratio, at around the clip's 4:20 mark):


in this meme, at least as i understand it (sometimes individual histories of memes are difficult to trace for obvious internet-y reasons), boromir does all sort of things to get to mordor, with this photoshop being one of the earliest (and most hilarious) i could find:


eventually, this meme (as internet memes often do) encountered other memes. one of my favorites was the meme that plays on the russian version of "engrish" (playing on native slavic speakers' apparently tendency to confuse words when speaking english and also the general low quality of life in cold-war era russia as portrayed in american films), which in itself results in such sayings as "in soviet russia, english learns you", or "in soviet russia, shirt wears you". and of course there's "in soviet korea, cat eats you" (based on the assumption that in normal korea, you eat cats). anyway, here's boromir:


the seeming pinnacle of this meme-mashing was revealed to me today when i discovered this picture on I Can Has Cheezburger?, combining boromir with the ubiquitous Tank Cat:


i realize that, by the very nature of memes, i'm probably uncovering my uncoolery-ness to everyone by showing that i just discovered this today. but such is the nature of the internet. and i almost wet myself laughing, so in the long run, yay me.