Katt Williams, crypto and cat ladies: 2024 was the year of unexpected second chances
If 2024 was defined by anything, it was a distinct feeling of deja vu. Donald Trump ran and won, Death Cab and Janet Jackson headlined music festivals, and aesthetes on social media lusted after Windows Vista design language circa 2007. Same old, same old – almost. Because 2024 was also the year of unexpected second chances: in some very special cases, those who suffered a fall from grace or otherwise unfortunate first run in the spotlight got another shot at glory. Call it a comeback, a redemption, or deja vu all over again … for better or worse, it was their year once more. .
The Menendez brothers
Before OJ Simpson, the Menendez brothers were America’s most ridiculed defendants – the guys who killed their rich parents, seemingly for the money. By the time both were convicted of murder and sentenced to life in prison in the mid-90s, the country had already moved on to gawking at the trial of the century. It’s only since the brothers’ case was revisited in a Netflix docuseries, a Ryan Murphy soap opera and a raft of other deep-dive efforts this year that they have become a justice reform cause for a gen Z crowd that has much broader bandwidth for the nuances of the case than their forebears. Thanks to these efforts, a Los Angeles county superior judge could decide to free the brothers in January. It’s an ending no one would have seen coming when Erik and Lyle were put on trial more than 30 years ago. AL
Sex and the City
When Sex and the City hit Netflix this spring, many of us couldn’t help but wonder: would gen Z be able to handle a decidedly unwoke 25-year-old series? Turns out, they could: it feels like every woman under 35 watched or rewatched the show this year, liking it much more than they thought they would. Depressing, maybe, that Carrie’s perennial dating woes still feel relatable in 2024, or that the idea of four friends maintaining a close friendship into adulthood feels aspirational. As young people battle a much-discussed loneliness epidemic, the real fantasy of Sex and the City may not be making it in New York or finding Mr Big, but rather having a tight group of girlfriends to go through it with. AD
Cryptocurrency
Bitcoin was the next big thing – until it crashed. Then it rose again – and slumped again. If you had invested, you were an idiot. No, wait, if you hadn’t invested, you were stuck in the stone age. Actually, ethereum was the better move. Or Solana. Or an NFT of Melania Trump’s eyes.
Through all the volatility, and despite the fact that any mention of it signals the beginning of a miserable conversation, cryptocurrency has refused to go away. Now it’s got a special place in the heart of our next president, who promises to make America “the bitcoin superpower of the world”, and his latest sidekick Elon Musk, who has named an as yet fictional agency, the “department of government efficiency (Doge)”, after his favorite digital currency. When fartcoin exists – let alone reaches a $1bn market capitalization – it’s clear crypto is triumphant. MC
Millennials
They’ve always been the generation that got it from both sides: older generations see them as coddled, entitled brats; gen Z uses them as the definitive measure of uncoolness. They’ve been mocked for their pauses on TikTok, their socks and their side parts. Meanwhile, they reached young adulthood in a recession, had to move back in with their parents, and are often described as the first generation that will earn less than those parents.
But in 2024, a few things finally went their way. Side parts were deemed acceptable again. Their financial prospects started to look a little better. And millennials, for once, weren’t the ones taking heat after an election that saw the majority of gen Z men – and an increasing number of gen Z women – voting for Trump. As for coolness, a millennial named Charli xcx established the year’s most talked about aesthetic. MC
Katt Williams
If you were making a best comedians list in 2023, there’s a good chance that Katt Williams would have been overlooked entirely given how long it had been since he held audiences captive with his Emmy-winning guest appearance in the TV dramedy Atlanta. But then, three days into 2024, he roared back with a vengeance with a nearly three-hour long interview that’s still breaking the internet. Chatting with the former football great Shannon Sharpe, Williams was totally unfiltered, hitting out at rival comics and at Hollywood for disrespecting him. But it was his P Diddy PSA (if he “wants you to party”, Williams sniped, “you got to tell him no!”) that had the internet calling him a prophet once the hip-hop mogul’s empire came crashing down mere months later. The interview, viewed more than 85m times on YouTube alone, paved the way for Williams’s comedy special on Netflix and his acting return in One of Them Days, the Keke Palmer-SZA buddy comedy that hits theaters in January. AL
Cat ladies
When JD Vance described Kamala Harris supporters as “childless cat ladies”, he meant it as a diss. But the line quickly became a rallying cry, a reappropriation in line with 2016’s “nasty woman” in pink pussy hats. Taylor Swift signed her endorsement of Harris as “childless cat lady”, Etsy stores began selling merch and social media feeds flooded with the term. Once associated with batty, single women approaching midlife, being a childless cat lady became a badge of pride. Dog people had their pandemic moment; cat people, it’s your turn now. AD
Roasts
In an age when insult comedy is never more than a scroll away, the idea of a modern roast seemed as antiquated as those old Dean Martin infomercials. But if the past year made anything clear, it’s that the format can keep up with the times – whether it’s Colin Jost emceeing the White House correspondents’ dinner (“We’re all here at nerd prom. Well, Matt Gaetz is at regular prom …”) or Tony Hinchcliffe likening Puerto Rico to a “floating island of garbage” at a Madison Square Garden rally for Trump without the punchline backfiring on him or the now president-elect. But nothing marked the roast’s resurgence quite like the Netflix showcase dedicated to trashing Tom Brady, which was more viewed than standup specials from Dave Chappelle and Katt Williams. So it fits that Netflix would close the year with a roast of 2024, hosted by roastmaster general Jeff Ross. AL
Rats
Two years ago, Jessica Tisch, New York City’s then new sanitation commissioner, uttered a phrase that would go down in TikTok infamy: “The rats don’t run this city, we do.” To which the city’s approximately 3 million rats replied: “Oh, really?” In 2024, rodents had their comeback – if we can use that word to describe a perennial vermin. It came via the hot rodent boyfriend, a meme used to describe men who look like Stuart Little (complimentary), such as Timothée Chalamet, Jeremy Allen White and the Challengers star Josh O’Connor. But also, literally, rats became a main character in NYC, which held its first annual, multi-day National Urban Rat summit dedicated to their removal. A true flex to be hated that much. AD
Los Angeles Dodgers in the World Series
This was the year LA’s deeply beloved baseball team finally, definitively, actually won it all. Perennial contenders, they’d made it to the playoffs every year for more than a decade, and all the way to the World Series in 2017 and 2018 – only to lose it twice in a row. In 2020, they managed to win it all! … after a Covid-shortened season in which their fans were literal cardboard cutouts. There was no parade.
Finally, in 2024, they won the championship again, in the most definitive way possible: beating baseball’s biggest juggernaut, the New York Yankees. This time, the city got its parade, and made it count: more than 200,000 Angelenos showed up to celebrate. MC
Mike Tyson
Iron Mike was in the last throes of his post-fight evolution – podcaster, cannabis purveyor and tech bro thought leader – when Jake Paul, the YouTuber who only picked up his boxing gloves six years ago, started openly fantasizing about taking on a man who won his first 19 professional bouts by knockout. When the 58-year-old took up the challenge, fight fans feared he was in for another ear-biting low. While the actual match proved to be a damp squib – with Paul taking pity on his boxing idol, thank God – Tyson at least proved less glitchy than Netflix; the streamer struggled to host the more than 120 million viewers who logged on to watch the spectacle. Meanwhile, Tyson netted an estimated $20m. Next up: Jake’s brother, Logan. Maybe. AL
Gypsy Rose Blanchard
It feels like we’ve lived multiple lifetimes since Gypsy Rose Blanchard was released from prison at the tail end of 2023, but for a few months, 2024 really was her year. Blanchard, who pleaded guilty to her role in the murder of her mother, Dee Dee, turned into an unexpected It girl upon re-entry, garnering 7 million Instagram followers, jetting to Paris for fashion week, starring in a Lifetime docuseries and posting colorfully about life with her then husband, Ryan Scott Anderson. (One comment she made about her sex life – “the d is fire” – really had us all in a chokehold for a day or two.) Then she shunned the limelight, deleting social media and divorcing Anderson, before rekindling a romance with an old prison pen pal and returning to social media to talk about her new memoir. The couple expects a baby in January – what a year, indeed. AD
