Be Kind; Don’t “Rewind” 2020
On November 12, 2020, YouTube announced there would not be a 2020 Rewind. Even with bad receptions of the previous rewinds, YouTube created a Rewind every year since 2010. However, this year, content creator Mr. Beast decided to create his own YouTube Rewind.
The original YouTube Rewind was a top ten list of the most popular videos of the year. However, in 2012 the company began to incorporate creators on YouTube into the Rewinds. Popular channels, like Jenna Marbles and Good Mythical Morning, starred in the video reenacting or showing off popular videos, trends, and music. Past Rewinds included trends like the 100 layer challenge, the ice bucket challenge, pen pineapple apple pen, and many more.
Some agreed with YouTube’s decision to not create a Rewind, while others were disappointed with the decision. The company explained that it didn’t feel right to create one with the chaotic and miserable year 2020 was. Although, others were looking forward to seeing something lighthearted in a dark year. Even if the Rewind was bad, they would have fun making fun of and making memes of it.
Many of the recent Rewinds faced many criticisms and dislikes. This is even present with some of the YouTuber created rewinds. 2018’s rewind stands as the most disliked video on the entire site with 18 million dislikes. The next year’s rewind, 2019, has 9.3 million dislikes,ranking as the 5th most disliked video.
“Before 2016, they were OK. After that, they became pretty bad,” one commentator said about the videos. “Honestly, the YouTube rewinds sucked,” said another. Some agree that the earlier rewinds carried a charm with them and aren’t all that bad compared to the recent ones.
People held up high expectations of Mr. Beast’s rewind. For the most part it was received with praise, standing with 4 million likes vs 60k dislikes. The video even made it to #1 on the trending page.
It wasn’t necessarily a bad rewind, but it may not be easily understood by the average person. Previous rewinds showcase trends and music that most people could recognize. Many of the things showcased in Mr. Beast’s rewind were YouTuber centric. They focused on content creators and didn’t include popular songs, although this may be from a fear of copyright strikes. The average viewer might not be familiar with these specific details.
There was another creator made Rewind, but it did not live long. The video was deleted, but many other channels have reuploaded it for viewing. This Rewind was a musical to recap 2020. Posted on Michelle Khare’s channel, this was not a new subject. There was also a 2019 Rewind the Musical.
The video recapped popular subjects and creators, such as Among Us, Unus Annus, the Jeffree Star and Shane Dawson drama, and other small appearances of viral topics. The musical also had a small section about Jenna Marble’s departure from YouTube. Many found the section distasteful and disrespectful. They took a serious situation and shoved it in with lighthearted and playful trends.
Whether it’s worse than YouTube’s rewind is up to the viewer. Many felt 2018’s rewind was cringe worthy and had many jokes that fell flat. Although, others would take the opportunity to instead laugh and create memes out of it. It was bad, but people were still able to get something out of it.
2018’s was a compilation of top ten lists. Commenters called it a glorified WatchMojo video, a channel that purely uploads various top 10 lists. It showed the most like videos, most viewed video games, the most liked beauty videos, new creators, and the most viewed creators, and other smaller topics. It was extremely lacking and felt like there was no effort put into it.
2021 already looks like another notable year. With the pandemic still going on and political turmoil, it’s gonna be hard for this year to be good. No one knows when the next official Rewind is ever gonna happen or if there’s ever gonna be a good one again. Maybe it’s time to take a lesson from 2018 and try to make the most of what we’ve got.