The no-context snippets have become so popular that Kathryn VanArendonk, a Vulture critic who mainly covers TV and comedy, tried to get to the bottom of it.
"Images taken from a TV show or movie and combined with a quote are an internet staple from way down deep in the Tumblr-verse, where GIFs and screenshots of beloved pop-culture objects have long been collected into easily shareable digital scrapbooks," she wrote.
However, VanArendonk pointed out that lately, it feels like they busted out of that particular niche and spread across the broader social-media landscape, where they've developed a distinct flavor and found a bigger audience.
"The no-context screenshot is no longer just intended for fans of a show who will love an image precisely for its context. Now, the no-context screenshot has become a deliberate act of yanking a particular moment out from its original framework," she said.
Part of why social media pages like 'Unusual And Funny Photos' are so have such big followings could be simply utility.
"An image is smaller and less finicky than a GIF, [and] it's easy to share across multiple platforms," VanArendonk said.
"It's easy to lift a single image from, say, Neo Yokio and set it off onto the internet, freed from its original framework."
The incongruity theory can also help us in understanding the phenomenon. It suggests that no-context images disrupt our normal thinking patterns, sparking surprise and amusement.
Such feeds not only capture our attention but also provide a break from all the mundane posts we're used to seeing day in and day out. 'Unusual And Funny Photos' align with our psychological inclination to seek novelty, and capitalizes on it pretty well, if you ask me!
