McKayla Is Not Impressed

On August 5, 2012, McKayla Maroney fell during her vault routine at the London Olympics. She didn't just lose the gold—she gave birth to the Games' first viral meme. As she stood on the medal podium accepting silver, photographer Bryan Snyder captured the scowl that launched a thousand Photoshops: lips pursed, eyes narrow, radiating pure athletic disappointment.

Within hours, McKayla was not impressed by everything. The Mona Lisa. The moon landing. The Grand Canyon. Your life choices. The format was elegantly simple: take the face, paste it anywhere, watch it judge. The Wall Street Journal declared it the Olympics' defining meme. McKayla herself embraced it, recreating the pose with President Obama in the White House.

The meme peaked in that golden August, when the whole world was watching the Olympics and desperately needed something to Photoshop. For two glorious weeks, we were united in making a teenager's disappointment into a universal symbol of disdain.

But Olympic flames don't burn forever. When the closing ceremonies ended, so did the meme's cultural oxygen. By September, posting McKayla marked you as someone still living in August. The format didn't die dramatically—it simply became irrelevant as the news cycle moved on to things that weren't the Olympics.

McKayla returned to gymnastics, then retired, then grew up. The internet returned to cats. But for one perfect summer, we all knew exactly what it looked like to be deeply, profoundly unimpressed.