Comedian 'Megan Bitchell' Explains The 'Cowboy, Samurai, Pirate' Trend And Her Impact On Meme Culture

Megan Bitchell is a comedian, actress and content creator who has had a significant impact on meme culture over the past few years. She has a storied history of viral posts and has inspired numerous memes, including the recent Pirate, Samurai or Cowboy trend and the If It Was Written by Joss Whedon meme, not to mention writing several viral LetterBoxd reviews. This year, she's set to appear in the movie Rent Free.

We recently spoke with Megan to learn more about her online history and how she became a leftist comedy legend on Twitter.

Q: It's good to talk with you, Megan. When did you first start posting online?

A: I think I've always been online. I'm unfortunately one of the first generations of kids that grew up with [accessible] internet. I was on Club Penguin and stuff like that, I was getting groomed on Tumblr when I was like 12. That's satire, parody, kind of.

I had a SuperWhoLock blog back in 2012, which is for Supernatural, Doctor Who and Sherlock. I started posting there, I did not have that many followers on there, but I learned the ropes of the internet on Tumblr. Then around 2015 in high school, I was like, "Time to get on Twitter." I got the bug for Twitter in like 2015 because I had a viral tweet about the SAT. It was a starter pack meme about the questions on the SAT and that went viral, then I was like, "I gotta keep doing this. I gotta get these numbers up."

Q: Where does your love of comedy come from?

A: I've always liked writing. I get more entertainment out of making people laugh than feeling anything else. I could write serious stuff, but that doesn't interest me. So I've been a writer since I was a little kid. I got in trouble in the first grade for writing a story where there was a ghost who was threatening me with a gun, so I took the ghost's gun and shot myself in the head. I had to go talk to the guidance counselor.

So I've always been interested in causing problems by writing and that was kind of the start of that. I hadn't done standup until around January 2020 and then guess what happened in March of 2020? Everything shut down. So I kind of got more popular online during COVID, which is when I really started doing comedy, 'cause I started Twitch streaming. I was just locked in my apartment all day long during COVID. So I would just talk to the camera for five hours straight.

Q: What was your thing on Twitch?

A: My favorite thing that I did on Twitch was I would build 3D puzzles, 'cause I love building puzzles. So I had a thing that if enough people subscribed or donated, I would smash the 3D puzzle no matter how far I was into it.

I had a lot of fun just being crazy on Twitch. Then I started doing standup around January 2022. My boyfriend and I broke up around 2022 then I was like, "Oh, I should start doing something with my life now that I don't have a boyfriend." Then I started doing standup and sketches and stuff. It wasn't his fault that I wasn't doing anything, I was just in wife mode and not creating things.

Q: What's your earliest viral moment?

A: Okay, the first one that can be traced back to me, 'cause the other account with the PSAT or the SAT tweet is gone, was when Jeffrey Epstein had died. I was at work and I was working in Denton and I was living in Arlington, which is like, an hour away from each other 'cause it was over the summer, so I couldn't live on campus. I had an on-campus job and my shift ended at midnight and then my next shift started at 7:00 AM. So I was like, "I don't wanna drive an hour home, go to bed, and then drive an hour back to work, I'll just stay awake all night in my office."

So I did that and then as soon as other people started coming into work at 7:00 AM, it was announced that Jeffrey Epstein had died. None of my co-workers knew who that was. I was like, "Why are you guys not freaking out right now? There's a man who's dead who could've gotten the whole world in trouble." They were like, "What are you talking about?" So then I get up and there's a whiteboard in the office and I draw a diagram explaining all of QAnon all of Jeffrey Epstein and Hillary Clinton stuff. The top of the board says, "Trump is God and is gonna save everyone, plus Hillary Clinton eats baby brains," or something like that.

So I explained that to my coworkers and I took a picture of myself in front of the whiteboard 'cause I was very proud of it. I posted it, then my friends over at the Cum Town subreddit posted it on the Cum Town subreddit and they said, "Boys, I think we found our wife." Because I guess my boobs looked really good in the picture where I'm also standing next to the most schizophrenic-looking whiteboard in the world.

I gained 10,000 followers just from that, which made sense 'cause it was political and it was my boobs. That's kind of where I got the ball rolling and I loved the podcast Cum Town, too. I made friends with an edgier part of the internet. I'm not even that edgy. I just find the same things funny that they find funny. That was the first big thing that happened.

Q: What was your next big viral moment?

A:I hated Elizabeth Warren so much. Elizabeth Warren supporters had made this really embarrassing "12 Days of Christmas" parody, in support of Elizabeth Warren. I was like, "Oh, I know what I'm gonna do. I don't even have to make a joke 'cause this is already so embarrassing. I'm just gonna do the song that they wrote." To be even more politically confusing, I put on a "Hamilton, the Musical" t-shirt. Then I put a communist flag up in the background.

I sang the pro-Elizabeth Warren "12 Days of Christmas" song and people flipped out. Barstool Sports was like, "What is this?" Everybody just lost their mind. The people that understood it was a joke loved it. The people that didn't get it, they were like, "This ugly idiot should die." I think I was up to about 20,000 followers then I think COVID happened. The ball just kept rolling from there. It was a snowball going downhill.

Q: Where does your interest in leftist politics come from?

A: I grew up poor and by poor, I mean, our house got foreclosed on in 2008. It was hard to find a place to live after that. My parents got divorced and the car got repossessed. So I think I've always been very class-conscious. As a woman, I love women's issues.

I think I just grew up always being very aware of the world. I'd watch the news every night as a kid 'cause I thought it was so important to watch the news and stuff. So I think I had an inclination towards being political. Then 2016 happened [and Trump was elected], I was 16 years old and that was the biggest deal in the world to me. My family was very Republican.

I decided I had to be the opposite of what they are I was just like, "Why don't we all just kill everybody that's rich?" Now I'm here. I was very Taylor Swift feminist in 2015. Then when Trump won, I remember, 'cause I'm from Texas, when Trump won, I was the most outspoken.

Q: In 2021 you inspired the viral If It Was Written By Joss Whedon meme. What's the story behind that?

A: I was watching the Snyder Cut of Justice League. I thought, let's go watch the original Justice League to see why it was necessary to release a better version of it. It was the worst thing I've ever seen in my life. The part that bothered me so much is whenever the Flash falls on Wonder Woman's boobies. I don't even remember what he says, but they go, "Hmm, that was freaking weird." That irritated me so much, just from a "good movie" standpoint, not even from a feminist standpoint, I was just like, "Why?"

It was also really frustrating 'cause I loved the first Avengers movie as a kid. I was like, "This is such a good movie." It was probably my favorite superhero movie. Upon reflection, that movie is why all media sucks now. Everybody's quip, everybody sucks. So I did the Silence of the Lambs if it was written by Joss Whedon. She goes, "Hannibal Lecter. Isn't that a little Andrew… " No, "Your name's Hannibal and you're a Cannibal, it's a little on the nose, don't you think?"

Then other people started making similar memes. That was a lot of fun. It's such an obnoxious, lowest-hanging fruit, joke writing style. It's so fun to emulate that. It's so fun to write the worst thing possible on purpose. It's so entertaining.

Q: What is it about Joss Whedon's quippy style of writing that you hate so much?

A: I love physical comedy. I love I love Lucy. I love Carol Burnett. You're in a superhero setting and comic books are already goofy enough. Why not just do insane, hilarious physical comedy? You don't have to try to be intelligent. It ends up not being intelligent at all. It's just wordplay, which I hate. Wordplay is funny, but I hate it. I love doing it, I hate when I hear it. They think [physical comedy] is below them, but it's not. I would write a better superhero movie than Joss Whedon, I think.

Q: You're very active on LetterBoxd and have had several reviews go viral. What's your LetterBoxd strategy?

A: I think you have to do a balance of sincere reviews and joke reviews. When it's an awful movie where nothing I can say will persuade you to see the movie or dissuade you from seeing the movie, I'm just going to say something stupid. I do the same thing when it's a really good movie that you already know how good it's going to be. It's five stars and a heart, like Avatar. I love Avatar so much but there's nothing I could say to you that's going to convince you to see Avatar if you weren't already going to go see Avatar.

So either I'm going to write a funny line for a really good movie, I'm going to write something funny for a really bad movie, or if it's a middle-of-the-road movie I'm going to pour my heart and soul into the review because some movies just frustrate me so much. I have the top negative review for Everything, Everywhere All at Once. It has probably 800 comments in the thread which is insane for Letterboxd and it was just me fighting for my life constantly. But that was a review that I was sincere on because my best friend loved the movie and then she yelled at me 'cause I didn't like the movie.

I have a review for Smile. During the movie, I was just zoned out. It was so stupid. I had just watched Austin Powers for the first time so I was really in an_ Austin Powers_ mood and I turned to my friend and I whispered, "Hey do you want to hear my Austin Powers impression right now?" They were like, "Yeah, okay," and I kept trying to whisper, "Do I make you horny baby?" in the British accent. I realized I couldn't whisper and do the accent. So I just kept laughing. There were tears running down my face. I just leaned in and I whispered "Do I make you horny baby?" We just lost it because it wasn't an impression at all. I think I have one of the top reviews for Smile because my review was just me telling that story. I love LetterBoxd, it's a lot of fun.

Q: Your next big viral hit was "Small Penis Fall." What's the story behind that meme?

A: So do you remember Hot Girl Summer? That was the precursor to Small Penis Fall and I had just broken up with my boyfriend of two years around that time and so I decided it was just time to date random men. Not a good phase for Megan. But I was having a very Sex in the City style conversation with my best friend and I was just like, "Small penises are actually low-key underrated. They're better than big penises." Which is just so stupid.

I was like, "The opposite of Hot Girl Summer is Small Penis Fall," which is not even true. The opposite would be "Ugly Boy Winter," but I was all for Small Penis Fall. That's the natural progression of Hot Girl Summer. So I think I literally just tweeted, "It's Small Penis Fall." That did pretty good and then I kept adding to it. I did the ice bucket challenge for Small Penis Fall. I just kept adding onto that. Then my one friend who now works for Cosmo, well I wasn't friends with her then because of journalistic integrity, but she wrote an article about me for Inside Hook or something and then Men's Health Magazine picked it up and then some gay magazine picked it up last fall. So it's the gift that keeps on giving because every fall can be Small Penis Fall.

Unfortunately, a lot of men sent me their penis because of that meme but that comes with the territory. People are going to send me their penis anyways but I was like, thanks guys. You don't have to show me support, I support you without seeing your small penis. Some weren't even small, they were normal-sized. Some were big. They just wanted an excuse to send someone their penis.

People will send you a disgusting nude with the goal that you will tweet it and then they will get humiliated publicly 'cause they have a humiliation fetish. So anytime you see a girl post like, "Look at this insane DM I just got" and it's the nastiest penis you've ever seen, it's because that guy wants you to make fun of him. That's the only reason he's doing that. A lot of girls don't realize that and I wish I could spread the gospel of humiliation fetishes. So a lot of it was men sending me a big penis and me being like, "That's not small."

Q: What's your opinion on the rise of AI?

A:I think AI would be cool if people weren't evil. It would be cool if people already made enough money to make art for a living but since that's never happened in history it's just going to ruin everything even more. I think my hot take that you asked for about AI is that I think that AI is going to replace art, AI is going to replace programmers. I think AI is going to replace nurses first as the first in-person job that's going to go away. 'Cause what does a nurse do? They ask you what's wrong and then they tell the doctor what you said and then the doctor asks you what's wrong again.

I think you're just going to fill that out on an iPad, then the doctor's going to still do the same thing that you did on the iPad. Not trauma nurses, by the way. I respect trauma nurses and hospital nurses and real nurses. I'm talking about nurses at your doctor's office. I respect nurses, but I think that's the first job that's going to go away. I could get replaced by AI any day now but AI doesn't have huge boobs and a sense of humor so we'll see what happens.

Q: I mean, the AI chatbots are getting pretty sophisticated.

A: Oh my God, those are awesome. Here's the thing, I didn't even mention this in my internet history, but I used to role-play on Omegle, the chat website. I never did the video 'cause I was 10. I got an iPad when I was 10, I saved up all of my chore money and I bought an iPad and so I just had unrestricted internet access even more than just the family computer. So I would do chat roleplay on Omegle with strange men and I would lie. I'd say I'm 18 and all of the roleplay scenarios I had were like, "I'm a princess and you kidnap me because you got sent to prison and I'm ransom."

It was just very sweet roleplay stuff but it was really psychotic that a 10-year-old was doing it, then it would also get sexual. So 10-year-old me, having no idea what anything was, I was like, "I think I roll back your foreskin and suck your penis," 'cause I had no idea what foreskin was. I just knew that worked.

They would disconnect at a certain point after that. So I could be a chatbot. They're not replacing me anytime soon. I was never into the roleplay community when I had a SuperWhoLock account but there were always people that were like, "You're the doctor and I'm your companion, what would you do if we were stuck in space together?" To each their own but I was much more original with it. I was creating geopolitical problems for a reason why a pirate would have to kidnap a princess.

Q: There used to be a subreddit dedicated to you where men basically just shared your lewd photos. What did you think of that before it was banned?

A: I was fine with my subreddit existing as long as I could be the main moderator. Then I just got sick of it or I got sick of it being a thing that would show up when you'd search for me. So I locked it down because I got a little bit more serious about comedy and acting recently. So over the summer I locked it down, so they were nicer on there than on any other subreddit that posted me on Reddit. It was kind of the Megan fan club. I'd post a sketch that I did and they would all go like it so I appreciated it.

They were nicer to me than other subreddits. So I was okay with them existing. I'd delete mean comments. I'd be like, "You think my nose is messed up? You're blocked forever, buddy."

Q: You recently went viral for finding a sad, dead dog's portrait at an estate sale. What's the story behind that?

A: I was driving home [from work] and I saw an estate sale in this really nice part of town. I was like, I'm going to the estate sale in the fancy house that I've never been able to see the inside of before. So I get in the house and there's all of these paintings of this dog everywhere and it's just somebody's beloved dog.

I was thinking, "Oh, the owners died so the dog is somewhere else." There are dog paintings on the wall. There's fine China with the dog painted on it. This dog is everywhere. Then I go out into the garage and I'm looking through picture frames because maybe there's a nice picture frame. There's a picture of the dog and it says, "Thank you so much for everything. I had a wonderful time," I think is what it said. I just started sobbing. I was tired. I just lost it.

The lady at the house, she said, "It's sad isn't it?" I was like, "Yes, it is." I'm literally tearing up right now thinking about how sad this dog is. I put the picture frame back. I took a picture of it and I posted it.

People wondered why I didn't buy it. If I bought that, I would be haunted by it. Every time I saw it, I would start sobbing. If my dog dies, I cannot get a picture frame that says that, 'cause I'll start crying every time I see that, 'cause it's the sweetest thing in the world.

Q: Your most recent viral hit was the Cowboy, Samurai or Pirate question. What's the story behind that?

A: So I was dating a guy over the summer and I asked him this question a month before I posted the TikTok. When you're getting to know someone and you want to talk to them, but you don't actually have a good question to ask or anything important to say. So it's like, let me just start a conversation.

So I texted him, I wrote, "Would you rather be a pirate cowboy or a samurai?" He said, "That is the most amazing question anybody's ever asked me." Then we went back and forth for probably 40 minutes about the pros and cons of each one. For me, the answer is cowboy, because Samurai is too high honor and there's too much responsibility with samurai.

@megitchell Boys, sound off in the comments about which one you would rather be!!! #datingadvice #satire #comedy ♬ original sound – meg bitchell

Pirate is just nasty. A pirate is doing the most crimes and probably being the grossest. Cowboy, you can be a good guy. You can have a ranch and be a cowboy, or you could be a cool outlaw, but you still get to live in a house and you don't have to kill yourself if you fail your mission. So a pirate or a cowboy is the right answer.

Then I finally met the guy that I was talking to long distance and we rehashed the pirate, cowboy, samurai question. I was like, "Oh, I should just make a TikTok of that." That went insanely viral which I did not expect at all, 'cause that's normally not the stuff I make.

@freshout_the_oven #stitch with @meg bitchell Thank you for coming to my Ted Talk #samurai #pirate #cowboy #history #choose #warrior #theboys #boys ♬ original sound – Jordon B

@meg.stanley

What goes through this man’s brain?

♬ original sound – Megan Stanley

I went to go to my friend's birthday party. I get back home and it literally has a million views immediately. It's because it's a question that people in the comments could argue about. If you want a million views is just to let people argue in your comments.

People wanted to know why knight is not an option. If you want to be a knight over those three options, just join the United States military. Why would you want to be a knight? That's the lamest, you're going to die for the King? That's that kind of gay, don't you think? Why would you want to be a knight? They were also like, "You forgot ninja." That's a stupid option. Could you tell me what a ninja does during the day? No, you can't.

Q: What does each option represent in your opinion?

A: Samurai is solitude to me. Samurai is the most sigma grindset answer. It's like, "I want to have honor and my personality is my job." That might be a racial stereotype that I'm saying right now, but stick with me.

Pirate is a tough one because that could either be, "I wanna chill with the boys" or "I want to commit crimes." That's the way that pirate goes. Cowboy is also kind of sigma, but you don't have as much responsibility. You're a cowboy because you want to be a cowboy. Not because there's a title that comes with it. You're just a cool guy. I also love West World. I love cowboys.

Q: So what's next for you? What are you planning to do content or career-wise in 2024?

A: I'm doing more improv. I'm doing more sketches. I never planned on what I'm gonna post. My dream would be to write for a TV show or something like that. I'm writing my pilot right now. I'm trying to put together a film crew to film some of my sketches that I have written. I'm trying to get better at standup and I'm acting more.

There was a movie I was just in recently too, Rent Free, that's gonna be at a festival this year. I'm just gonna keep doing the same thing I've been doing and hope I get somewhere with it. It's been going okay so far.

You can follow Megan on Instagram @megan.bitchell, X @meganbitchell, TikTok @megitchell and LetterBoxd @megbitchell.