“In The Way Guy’s” Unlikely Rise to Internet Fame

Mike Crisolago | July 24th, 2013

They call him “In the Way Guy,” and he’s big on the Internet. He wears a white polo shirt, grey shorts, and a single-strap backpack. Eugene Levy would probably play him in a movie.

“In the Way Guy” likely has a real name, a family, a job, a life. His friends would probably tell you that he loves sci-fi movies, or is great at Sudoku. But in the fraction of a second it takes for a camera shutter to snap down and back, this poor guy became an online sensation.

It started with Nick Landis and his girlfriend Erika Boone, both in their early 20s, taking a Disney World vacation. During a stroll through the Magic Kingdom, Landis dropped to one knee and prepared to pop the question to Boone as a park staffer stood in the wings, camera at the ready to capture the big moment.

The proposal was probably a beautiful sight – “probably,” because at that exact moment an unidentified man stepped between the couple and the photographer, then recognized he was in the way and awkwardly tried to move out of the shot. The result is the image above. Nick proposed. Erika accepted. And during it all “In the Way Guy” stepped into the annals of Internet meme history.

According to an interview with Today.com, Boone posted the pic on the website Reddit.com and the site’s users photoshopped the photobomber into various iconic images from history, including blocking the view of everything from the assassination of Lee Harvey Oswald to the moon landing to the first images of Prince George Alexander Louis of Cambridge.

No word on “In the Way Guy’s” actual identity, but we imagine, with his gaffe making the Internet rounds, he’s most likely adopting a new moniker: “Hiding Out Until This Blows Over Guy.”

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