Egoraptor Arin Hanson meme

7 images

Arin Hanson's infamous scrunched face has become one of the most recognizable Egoraptor reaction images from Game Grumps.
The official Sonic the Hedgehog Twitter account replies to Egoraptor in a 2015 exchange that referenced his critical Sequelitis videos on the Sonic franchise.
Arin Hanson's 2019 Twitter thread taking issue with SrPelo's storytime animation, part of a wider debate about the storytime YouTube genre.
Game Grumps promotional card featuring Arin Hanson alongside the rest of the show's rotating cast of hosts.
Fan art depicting Arin Hanson as "Egoraptor the Hedgehog," playing on his well-known love-hate relationship with the Sonic franchise.
"Team Arin" promotional artwork from a Game Grumps competition, featuring Arin Hanson in a stylized cowboy design.
One of Arin Hanson's early hand-drawn Sonic-inspired sketches from his amateur artist days on Newgrounds and DeviantArt.

History

Egoraptor is the online handle of American animator and Let's Player Arin Hanson, who broke out on Newgrounds in 2006 with the Flash short Metal Gear Awesome. He later co-founded the Let's Play channel Game Grumps and the video game comedy band Starbomb.

Origin

On February 23rd, 2006, Arin Hanson uploaded a short animated film called Metal Gear Awesome to Newgrounds, parodying Konami's Metal Gear Solid[3]. It was the first entry in what turned into the long-running Awesome Series and drew the attention of MTV, which commissioned similar shorts on the condition that the style stay rough[3].

Hanson opened his YouTube channel Egoraptor on March 11th, 2006, and eight months later posted his first video there, a review of the Nintendo DS puzzle game Gunpey[4]. Between 2006 and 2012, he added roughly 69 more animations to his Newgrounds account, later re-uploading many to YouTube with the Newgrounds banner still attached[5].

Platform: Newgrounds (source) / YouTube (viral spread)
Creator: Arin Hanson
Date: 2006

Overview

Egoraptor is the online handle of American animator, voice actor, and Let's Player Arin Hanson. He built his reputation on Newgrounds in the mid-2000s with the Awesome Series, a run of loud, deliberately scrappy Flash parodies of console games[3]. That aesthetic became a signature: MTV reportedly commissioned shorts from him early on with the note that he should keep the animation looking cheap[3].

Beyond animation, Hanson co-created the Let's Play channel Game Grumps in 2012 alongside JonTron and fronts the video game comedy rap band Starbomb with Ninja Sex Party[1]. His main YouTube channel Egoraptor collects most of the Awesome Series alongside Starbomb music videos, giving him a foothold in both older Flash animation fandom and modern YouTube gaming culture[4].

How It Spread

The Awesome Series climbed through the late 2000s and hit its peak on December 8th, 2011 with PokeAwesome, a Pokémon battle parody that reached 27.4 million YouTube views by April 2016[5]. That popularity spilled into a second act in July 2012, when Hanson and Jon Jafari launched Game Grumps, a two-host Let's Play channel that pulled in more than 197 million views and a million subscribers inside its first year[6]. When Jon left in mid-2013, Leigh Daniel Avidan of Ninja Sex Party stepped in as co-host[5].

Starbomb, the video game rap side project Hanson formed with Ninja Sex Party, widened his audience again[1]. The band's first animated music video, Luigi's Ballad, went up December 17th, 2013 and passed 22 million views; the follow-up Zelda rap posted April 8th, 2014 cleared 27 million[5]. Earlier in 2012, Hanson also drew a wave of press when Sony's reality show The Tester voted him off after three days despite a fan campaign that had put him on the show, an outcome writers at VentureBeat used to question the series' judging[2].

How to Use

Egoraptor isn't a template meme so much as a body of work people quote and reference. Common conventions in fan circles include reciting lines from Metal Gear Awesome ("SNAAAKE!"), swapping in clips of Hanson's exaggerated shouting for reaction-image purposes, and citing Game Grumps moments as shorthand in gaming subreddits and Discords[6].

Frequently Asked Questions

What is Egoraptor Arin Hanson?

Egoraptor is the online handle of Arin Hanson, an American animator behind Newgrounds' Awesome Series and co-founder of the Let's Play channel Game Grumps and the band Starbomb[3][1].

Where did Egoraptor Arin Hanson come from?

He first appeared on Newgrounds on February 23rd, 2006 with the Flash short Metal Gear Awesome, then opened his YouTube channel a few weeks later[3][4].

What does Egoraptor Arin Hanson mean?

Egoraptor is just Arin Hanson's chosen internet alias, used across his Newgrounds and YouTube animation work since 2006[3][4].

How do you use Egoraptor Arin Hanson?

Fans quote lines from the Awesome Series (like Metal Gear Awesome's "SNAAAKE!") and share Game Grumps clips as reactions in gaming communities[6].

Is Egoraptor Arin Hanson still popular?

Yes, Game Grumps is a well-established Let's Play brand and his Egoraptor channel had passed 2.4 million subscribers and 364 million views by 2016[5].