Charlie Garner

Opinion Editor 

avg6206@psu.edu

If you have been a viewer of the YouTube space for a long time, like I have, you have probably seen or heard of YouTube Rewind. YouTube Rewind was an annual video special that was produced by YouTube to highlight popular videos, celebrities, content creators, trends, music, memes, and moments of each year. Each one was met with mixed reception, with the satisfaction declining every year. YouTube Rewind was a popular sensation from 2010 until they stopped doing them all together in 2019. 

YouTube Rewind 2018 became extremely popular and was the topic of many memes when it was released… and it was not for good reasons. It received over 10 million dislikes in its first two weeks and it quickly became the most disliked video on the platform. It had the theme of “Everyone Controls Rewind” and it was just very awkward and cringy to watch to millions of viewers. They drastically changed the style of YouTube Rewind the following year, but it also received poor reception. It was then discontinued in the year 2020 and there has not been another installment. 

In December of 2010, the first Rewind was uploaded to YouTube and it was just a simple “Year in Review” that featured a top 10 list of the most popular YouTube videos of that year. It followed a similar format with a top 10 list the following year, but it was hosted by Rebecca Black, who’s song, “Friday,” was super popular at that time. 2012 was the first year they went away from the top 10 and they were beginning to get more creative with the videos. It was titled “Rewind YouTube Style” as a spin off of PSY’s “Gangnam Style” and it referenced many pop culture moments from that year. This started the trend of YouTube Rewind’s being named after popular songs, with the ones following 2012 being: “What Does 2013 Say?,” “Turn Down For 2014,” “Now Watch Me 2015,” and “The Shape of 2017.” I am pretty sure you can guess what songs these titles are named after. In terms of style, the 2013 video was similar to the 2012 video, however this was the first year that the YouTube Rewind Button was featured and it marked the first appearance of popular YouTuber, PewDiePie. YouTube Rewind 2014 was not structured around the songs, but they were mainly played in the background with popular references being shown. 

My personal favorite is YouTube Rewind 2015, but this is when people began to notice the dip in quality. This video came out during the year of YouTube’s 10 year anniversary, so it was pretty special. A part of the video was built up to imitate Five Nights at Freddy’s, and it featured more gaming celebrities than in past years, including Markiplier, CaptainSparklez, MatPat, and Smosh Games. Halfway through the video, PewDiePie and Zoella appear at a scoreboard with two dates, December 9, 2015—a reference to the 2015 setting of Back to the Future Part II. One scoreboard’s date was changed by Zoella to February 14, 2005, while the other remains at December 9, 2015. PewDiePie then “brofists” the Rewind button, causing the video to play backwards and display earlier viral videos and memes from 2005 to 2015. In 2016, they referenced many Internet challenges that went viral in that year and 2017 was kind of the same thing. 

Even though most of the YouTube Rewind installments are widely disliked and criticized, I honestly miss them. It was like a yearly tradition to watch these videos as soon as they would come out and it would give me something to talk about with my friends for a few days. I loved seeing all of my favorite creators be put in these videos all together while a random pop song from the year plays. I loved seeing the memes that I liked get referenced, even when they seemed very out of touch with what was being shown. The mashups of popular songs, although cliche, were very catchy and enjoyable. YouTube Rewind was sometimes pretty cringe, but they were also just a fun watch each year.