Since becoming the social media equivalent of crack, TikTok has birthed previously unfathomable things into our world.
Due to the extremely personalised nature of its algorithm, there are vast e-environments of content that you’ve never even come close to traversing. In these wacky corners of the TikTok-verse, you'll find trends and famous characters so absurd it'll make you question humanity. Or tbf, I'll find them FOR you and tell you about them here because somehow that's my JOB.
The Public Is The Punchline
You may be familiar with JONBOVI or Pearl Cooley, who have gone insanely viral by asking strangers to film them in public places and then immediately elevating the situation by imitating wild animals or screaming at the top of their lungs - basically just acting like a menace.
That can be great content, but as soon as the beast is unleashed, the member of the public unlucky enough to be tied up in the debacle knows there is some larger joke at play here - it’s like when Ashton Kutcher would run out during MTV Punked.
Infrabren’s slow and awkward torture of the public is a far-weirder trend that deserves a spotlight.
Usually in a Walmart, he pretends to know an innocent stranger by communicating what sounds like an inside joke or a childhood memory.
“You were such a nefarious little critter - ‘NLC’ as Kenneth would say, remember that?” he asked one poor soul.
As the interaction goes on, documented through a hidden camera, Bren dominates the conversation with insane comments, endless laughter, and offering a drink of “pickled sphincter”. All we see during this is his victim's face attempting to process what must be the weirdest social interaction they’ve ever had.
After Bren blew up (as I was writing this he got banned from TikTok for reasons currently unknown), clones of him spawned in shopping malls and supermarkets around TikTok. People are calling fellow supermarket-goers ‘pipsqueaks’, announcing weird things in an elevator packed with strangers, and even screaming “HELP!” in parking lots at night... just to post to TikTok.
All are shining examples that we’re in the golden age of intentionally cringe content, where we don’t know who in the video we’re laughing at, but we just know we're glad we're not involved.
Thirst-trap Cooking
Slick-haired men are performing foreplay on pastry and we can do nothing but scroll on and ask ‘why?’.
Manny HP is the unashamed veiny-armed cook leading this trend. Some of his videos are less sexually intense than others, but in all of them the cooking is simply a front to show off his arms, chest and unfortunately his fingers too.
As YouTuber Cody Ko pointed out when he covered this new devilish form of creator, the worst part about these videos is the food looks genuinely delectable and it’s ruined by the guy doing something like making the sponge squirt as he washes the rim of a pan.
Now, I'm aware I'm not exactly the target audience for this guy, who has gotten even more popular lately as people have pointed out the absurdity of the content. But he and other horny chefs like him blew up because there was an audience genuinely enjoying his content.
In the comments, there is a clear split between some people asking "where his shame is" and others - most likely someone in your mum’s book club - asking what else his hands can do other than making gnocchi.
When you think about how much of the internet loves cooking and attractive people, it's genuinely a surprise that it took until 2023 for this monstrosity to become a trend.
The Pig Everyone Ignored
John Pork was/is a half-man half-pig influencer. Someone created him as a bit of a laugh, posting realistic photos alongside captions that are perfectly normal for social media.
Eventually, a filter was made of him that circulated TikTok and really turned him into something bigger. The filter was simply an incoming call from John Pork. His handsome pigface smiling on your screen as you let the call ring out.
Soon after the virality of his incoming call filter, people made ‘Breaking News’ videos that John Pork has suddenly passed because “no one would pick up his calls”.
John Pork - whose creator is still unknown - refuted his death claims on his own social media accounts but this didn’t stop loads of TikToks being made about his saga.
To this day, the John Pork Instagram account is still posting to a devoted fan base. But at one time, all I saw on TikTok was videos about him passing away.
John Pork's saga is a tale of fan culture, the internet being in its prime silly-goofy era, and TikTok's ability to quite literally run a meme to death
If there is a lesson to take away from this, it's that there is no point in guessing what trend will dominate 'For You' pages in the near future, just sit back and ride the wave of weirdness, baby.
