Well, that happened. Unless you were a soulless demagogue, a Canadian musician, or a unicycling frog — 2016 was a pretty awful year. Even social media, that everlasting Gobstopper of cheap serotonin, became a wasteland that at times seemed solely comprised of drunken, racist grandpas. But through it all, there was one thing we could still count on: memes.

As we noted back in June, the first half of the year turned in a stellar roundup of hilarious and nonsensical internet weirdness, and the second half didn’t disappoint. (Except for the death of Vine. #RIPVine, man.) Now it’s time to see which memes held the throne, which got knocked off the CN Tower, and which even taught us a little bit about ourselves.

So grab your water bottles, clench that aardvark fist, and start worrying about that guy she told you not to worry about. Here come the best memes of the worst year of all time!