Irene, the most popular Nichijou character you've never heard of

If you don’t remember her, she’s the waitress who appeared in episode 9. No, it’s okay if you forgot her, she doesn’t even have a name. It’s a classic case of a fandom so starved for content that they memed a character into existance.

“H-hey Irene existed!” I’m sorry, Irene is a fan character created by us collectively, extrapolated from the crumbs we were fed about the waitress. She was barely a character but we ship-of-theseus’ed made her into a complete one. She’s the fandom’s own babygirl. She’s probably more popular than your fav - she’s more popular than most favs.

While I don’t know the exact origin of the name, I do have this tweet from Mewochy (known as Snowiicat at the time). I’m willing to bet Irene’s popularity is single handedly caused by Meowchy.