What is Is This a JoJo Reference??

It's a sarcastic catchphrase used by anime fans to jokingly claim that almost anything, no matter how unrelated, is secretly a nod to the manga series JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.

Where did Is This a JoJo Reference? come from?

The wording first appeared on 4chan's /a/ board on September 13th, 2009, in a thread reacting to "FUCK YEAH NAGARSUMI!", with a sarcastic version turning up in another /a/ thread on December 9th of the same year.

What does Is This a JoJo Reference? mean?

It mocks fans who see JoJo homages in every piece of anime, gaming, or pop culture media, so posters use it under images with only the flimsiest connection to the series.

How do you use Is This a JoJo Reference??

Post an image with the barest hint of a dramatic pose, purple outfit, or bold pointing gesture and drop the caption underneath, ideally where the alleged link is obviously a stretch.

Is Is This a JoJo Reference? still popular?

It hit its viral peak across 4chan, Reddit, Facebook, and DeviantArt between late 2016 and early 2017 and stuck around as a classic anime catchphrase within JoJo fandom.

Is This a JoJo Reference?

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Published September 1, 2026

"Is This a JoJo Reference?" is a sarcastic question anime fans deploy whenever they spot a visual, pose, or line that even faintly resembles something from Hirohiko Araki's manga series JoJo's Bizarre Adventure. What started as a genuine 4chan question in 2009 flipped into pure irony by late 2016, becoming the go-to caption for any image tenuously linked to the franchise.

jojos bizarre adventure memes catchphrase memes anime manga fandom discourse memes ironic memes

Overview

The joke works because JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is one of the longest-running Weekly Shonen Jump titles, so its dramatic poses, sound effects, and character designs show up as shoutouts across other manga, anime, and video games1. Fans point out that Street Fighter's Guile, Rose, and Juri, along with Benimaru from The King of Fighters, borrow heavily from JoJo characters like Rudol von Stroheim, Lisa Lisa, Jolyne Cujoh, and Jean Pierre Polnareff1. Any similar overlap, real or completely made up, is fair game for the caption.

By 2016 the phrase was almost never asked in earnest. Posters slap it under images that share only the vaguest visual cue with JoJo, such as a purple hat, a diagonal camera angle, or a character pointing2. The humor comes from the willful stretch, treating trivial coincidences as if they were obvious homages.

Gallery

Origin & Background

Platform

4chan (origin) / Facebook and Reddit (viral spread)

Creator

Unknown 4chan /a/ poster

Date

2009

The earliest documented use of "Is this a JoJo reference?" appeared on September 13th, 2009, in a 4chan /a/ (anime and manga) thread replying to the line "FUCK YEAH NAGARSUMI!"3. At that point the question was still sincere, part of the board's habit of flagging genuine homages to Hirohiko Araki's work.

The ironic reading followed quickly. A separate /a/ thread on December 9th, 2009 is cited by Know Your Meme as one of the first sarcastic uses of the same wording1, setting the template that later boards, subreddits, and Facebook pages would copy.

How It Spread

The catchphrase drifted through anime circles for years before breaking out. On April 22nd, 2015, Redditor SamuraiDDD posted "Name an anime that has a good JoJo reference" to r/StardustCrusaders, and the replies leaned hard into the joke, listing shows with only glancing similarities to the series2.

The format hit critical mass in late 2016 around Pokemon fandom. On September 22nd, 2016, YouTuber Mundano XXXIII uploaded "How JoJo's fans see Eevee Z-Move," a Pokemon Sun and Moon clip dubbed over with JoJo music4. On November 3rd, a thread on 4chan's /vp/ board asked "Is this a Jojo reference?" about the board's own Pokemon header image, and on November 17th a follow-up /vp/ post shot back with "not everything is a Jojo's Bizzare Adventure reference you fucking weeaboo" written in Expand Dong lettering1.

Facebook picked it up next. On November 24th, 2016, the Jojo's Meme Adventure page posted the phrase itself, and on November 30th a dedicated "Is This a Jojo Reference?" page went live and passed 10,000 likes within two months1. On January 15th, 2017, DeviantArt user TheSteveYurko uploaded a JoJo and Pokemon crossover titled "Is this a JoJo reference?!", cementing the meme's grip on anime-adjacent fandoms1.

How to Use This Meme

The typical setup pairs any image with the caption "Is this a JoJo reference?", where the image contains only a token similarity to the series, such as a dramatic pose, a colorful outfit, a sudden zoom, or a character shouting. The comedic weight sits on how thin the connection is. Common conventions include using it in the comments of anime edits, video game screenshots, or unrelated real-world photos where any minor detail can be twisted into a fake homage2.