13 of the best and funniest 'Gossip Girl' memes that are taking over the internet

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  • A new "Gossip Girl" meme format that imagines dialogue between the show's most iconic characters, Serena van der Woodsen and Blair Waldorf, is circulating online. 
  • The meme's humor is simple and absurd, but it cleverly plays into collective nostalgia for the popular teen drama, which aired on The CW from 2007 to 2012. 
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Good news, wannabe Upper East Siders: "Gossip Girl" nostalgia is alive and well on Twitter, where the show has inspired a new meme format.

Here's how it works. The format is a split screen dialogue between fictional frenemies Serena van der Woodsen (Blake Lively) and Blair Waldorf (Leighton Meester). Serena asks her best friend a question in confidence, and then, by rearranging the letters of the show's title, Blair is supposed to give a pithy response in the form of an anagram. 

The joke that started it all was posted on April 11.

—hey BESTie.. (@baro_tokiyo) April 11, 2020

According to StayHipp and KnowYourMeme, the first "Gossip Girl" meme was posted on April 11 by @baro_tokiyo. Days later, the meme quickly picked up in popularity.

The meme's humor is derived partly from the worldplay, and partly from the dynamic between the two characters. Kind, though somewhat empty-headed, Serena is a flaxen-haired, bohemian It Girl for whom everything seems to come easily. Blair, on the other hand, is a firebrand with a tendency to be a bit rigid and blunt, who never leaves the house without a headband and some kind of scheme or feud in the works. 

—Lili-Rose (@fillesdouces) April 14, 2020

The exchanges below, for example, are exactly the kind of tête-à-tête Serena and Blair would have about their romantic and sexual escapades on "Gossip Girl." 

—toni🍋 (@banditkabai) April 12, 2020—aya (@blxckswns) April 13, 2020—drue (@drumicarter) April 13, 2020

But as the meme gained momentum online, users put increasingly absurd spins on this imagined moment of "girl talk." 

—rosh thee archivist (@eiIhart) April 13, 2020—V (@digbickvibes) April 12, 2020—daniel (@dbs_tweets) April 13, 2020—elliot green (@heyelliotgreen) April 13, 2020

Then, a deluge of memes that put a distinctly political bent on Serena and Blair's chat came into play.

—ryan streit (@ryanstreit) April 13, 2020—elizabeth (@peeanofreek) April 13, 2020—dirt prince (@pant_leg) April 14, 2020

Soon, people were forgoing the terms of the original format entirely and adding new letters to create even more idiosyncratic iterations of the meme. 

—nicky b (@nickybrownson) April 13, 2020—Dan ❀ (@Dan_theHoe) April 13, 2020

Obviously, this isn't the first "Gossip Girl" meme format to make the rounds online. Remember "Three Words, Eight Letters," the meme that parodied that corny line Blair said to her on-again, off-again boyfriend Chuck Bass in Season 2? 

But the trend does feel especially timely right now, as we approach the premiere of the social media savvy "Gossip Girl" reboot coming to HBO Max later this year, in which early fashion blogosphere prodigy Tavi Gevinson is set to star. 

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