The Best (and Most Unforgettable) Pop Culture Moments of 2025

Pop culture in 2025 moved at internet speed, and no one was spared. This was the year when nothing stayed serious for longer than six or seven minutes, everyone had an opinion, and the internet proved—once again—that it runs the world now.

From almost losing TikTok to watching a billionaire museum heist unfold in real time, here are some of the best, funniest, most “how is this real?” moments of pop culture in 2025, in chronological order.

January: The TikTok Ban That Never Actually Happened

For months, Americans emotionally prepared for the death of TikTok. Influencers posted teary-eyed “just in case” videos, exposing their secrets and embarrassing moments. People rage-downloaded rival apps. Some even fled to RedNote out of pure spite.

Then January arrived… and nothing happened. 

Despite legislation theoretically banning TikTok, neither President Joe Biden nor President Donald Trump showed much interest in enforcing it. Trump repeatedly delayed the ban until September, when he struck a deal to transfer majority ownership to Americans. The result? Mass panic, zero consequences, and the clearest example yet of government policy being absolutely no match for thirst traps and recipe videos.

TikTok survived. The memes were eternal.

January–All Year: Blake Lively vs. Justin Baldoni

What began as vague whispers about tension on the It Ends With Us set turned into one of Hollywood’s messiest legal sagas.

Blake Lively accused co-star and director Justin Baldoni of sexual harassment in a complaint filed in December 2024. Baldoni responded with a $400 million defamation lawsuit against Lively, Ryan Reynolds, and The New York Times. A judge later dismissed the suit, ruling that Lively’s accusations were legally protected.

But the real drama lived online. Lively’s team alleged Baldoni’s PR operation orchestrated a social media smear campaign portraying her as a “bully” and “mean girl.” TikTok detectives dragged everyone from Taylor Swift to random PR firms into the discourse.

The trial date is now set for May 2026, and as of now, no one has backed down. Hollywood loves a comeback story—but it loves a feud more.

February: Bianca Censori, Kanye West, and the Grammys Outfit Heard ’Round the World

At the 2025 Grammy Awards on February 2, Bianca Censori stepped onto the red carpet wearing a sheer bodysuit beneath a fur coat that revealed… almost everything. Cameras flashed. Twitter/X combusted. Fashion accounts posted freeze-frames within minutes. Think pieces practically wrote themselves in real time.

As the coat slipped away, reactions split instantly. Some hailed the look as high-fashion provocation. Others questioned whether it crossed a line into public indecency. Still others debated whether the moment was empowering, exploitative, or something more complicated entirely. The discourse spiraled into familiar but freshly heated territory: fashion versus shock value, autonomy versus spectacle, and who actually gets to decide where the line is.

Kanye West stood beside her throughout the moment, expression unreadable, which only intensified speculation. Commentators dissected body language. Social media parsed intent. Critics and defenders alike argued over whether Censori was subverting expectations or being used as an extension of West’s long-standing obsession with provocation and control.

Within hours, the look had eclipsed the awards themselves. It dominated headlines, cable news segments, TikTok explainers, and dinner-table conversations. By the next morning, the Grammys felt almost secondary to the question everyone was asking: had fashion finally gone too far — or was the outrage the point?

Kendrick Lamar vs. Drake—Super Bowl Edition

When Kendrick Lamar headlined the Super Bowl LIX halftime show on February 9, everyone expected spectacle. No one expected a direct stare into the camera and a perfectly timed “Say, Drake…” during “Not Like Us.”

The moment detonated online. His grin. The pause. The bootcut jeans. It instantly became pop culture canon.

Weeks later, Drake’s lawyers actually cited the Super Bowl performance in his defamation lawsuit against Universal Music Group. Kendrick, meanwhile, went on to win Song and Record of the Year at the Grammys. Scoreboard.

March: Morgan Wallen Says “Get Me to God’s Country”

After performing on Saturday Night Live, Morgan Wallen walked off camera before the episode even ended. Moments later, he posted a photo of his private jet with the caption: “Get me to God’s country.”

The internet did not let it go.

The phrase became a meme, a personality trait, and eventually a merch line—because of course it did.

April: Katy Perry Goes to Space

On April 14, Katy Perry joined Blue Origin’s first-ever all-women flight crew, launching into space for approximately 11 minutes alongside Gayle King, Lauren Sánchez, former NASA astronaut Aisha Bowe, civil rights activist Amanda Nguyen, and film producer Kerianne Flynn.

That alone would’ve been enough to dominate the news cycle. But Perry, fully committing to the bit, revealed her Lifetimes Tour setlist while floating in zero gravity, then went fully viral again by dramatically kissing the ground the moment she stepped back onto Earth — a clip that immediately became reaction-meme gold.

The internet spent weeks arguing over the moment. Was it camp? Was it dystopian? Was it peak celebrity excess? Was it performance art? Yes.

And just when the discourse finally started to cool, Perry reignited pop-culture chaos by announcing her split from Orlando Bloom — a breakup that blindsided fans who had long considered them one of Hollywood’s steadiest couples. Almost immediately, rumors (and then sightings) linked her to Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, sending timelines into full disbelief mode.

In less than six months, Katy Perry went to space, kissed the ground, launched a tour, ended a marriage, and soft-launched a geopolitical romance — a level of main-character energy few could compete with in 2025.

Spring–Summer: Labubu Takes Over the Internet (Against Everyone’s Will)

What started as a niche collectible spiraled into the biggest, strangest consumer craze of 2025. Labubu — a wide-eyed, toothy plush doll sold in blind boxes by Pop Mart — became impossible to escape. Described lovingly (and sometimes cruelly) as “creepy,” “ugly-cute,” and “deeply unsettling,” Labubu nonetheless became the year’s must-have object.

Drops sold out instantly. Resale markets exploded. Knockoffs — dubbed “Lafufus” — flooded online marketplaces. A life-size Labubu sold for more than $170,000 in China, and by summer, Labubu thefts were being investigated by local police departments in California. Yes, really.

TikTok turned the plush into a status symbol, irony accessory, and personality trait all at once. People carried them like designer bags. Influencers staged photoshoots. Comment sections argued over which version was the rarest. No one could fully explain why Labubu mattered — which, of course, only made it matter more.

In 2025, Labubu proved one thing definitively: the internet will crown anything, and it does not need your approval.

May: “Chicago Pope”

History was made on May 8 when Cardinal Robert Prevost was elected Pope Leo XIV, becoming the first American pope — and, crucially, a Chicago native. Almost immediately, the gravity of the moment was matched only by the internet’s enthusiasm for turning it into content.

The memes were instant and relentless. “Da Pope.” “Chicago Pope.” “Midwest Vatican.” Photoshop edits placed the Vatican flag over Lake Michigan. Jokes flew about whether he was a Cubs or White Sox fan, if communion wine would be replaced with Malört, and whether papal blessings would now come with a side of Italian beef, dipped.

Catholics celebrated the historic milestone. Non-Catholics celebrated the memes. Chicagoans celebrated everything. Social media filled with mock headlines like “Pope Leo XIV Seen Blessing CTA Delays” and “Confession Now Includes Complaining About Parking.” Even people who hadn’t thought about the Vatican in years suddenly had strong opinions about papal robes and Midwestern representation.

For a brief, glorious moment, the internet agreed on something rare and pure: this was Chicago’s biggest flex since deep-dish pizza, and possibly the only time the papacy and the Midwest felt culturally aligned.

In 2025, even the Vatican couldn’t escape regional branding — and honestly? It worked.

June: Justin Bieber “Stands on Business”

When paparazzi caught Justin Bieber in June, they expected the usual silent walk-by or a polite no-comment. Instead, they got the quote of the year:

“It’s not clocking to you that I’m standing on business, is it?”

Delivered with an aggressive temple tap and the energy of someone who had absolutely reached his limit, the clip exploded instantly. Within hours, TikTok was flooded with parody reenactments, lip-syncs, and “POV: you’re standing on business” captions. By the end of the week, “standing on business” had fully entered the 2025 lexicon, joining the elite ranks of phrases that no longer meant anything — and therefore meant everything.

The moment also marked a shift in Bieber’s public persona: less apologetic pop star, more visibly fed-up adult asserting boundaries in real time. Fans called it growth. Haters called it unhinged. The internet called it content.

And, naturally, the Bieber brand wasted zero time. Hailey Bieber leaned into the meme on Instagram Stories shortly after the release of Justin’s Daisies album, writing: “Is it finally clocking to you f–king losers?” — a caption that sent the discourse spiraling all over again.

July: Coldplay’s Kiss Cam Scandal

At a Coldplay concert in Boston, two concertgoers briefly appeared on the kiss cam — then immediately ducked out of view, a move so suspicious it might as well have come with dramatic music. Frontman Chris Martin clocked it instantly, joking to the crowd, “Either they’re having an affair or they’re just very shy.”

Unfortunately for everyone involved, it was affair-adjacent.

Internet sleuths quickly identified the pair as Astronomer CEO Andy Byron and the company’s HR executive Kristin Cabot — both married at the time. What started as a blink-and-you-miss-it concert moment spiraled into a full corporate scandal, complete with LinkedIn screenshots, organizational charts, and long threads explaining why HR should, in fact, not be doing this.

The fallout was swift. Byron resigned from his position as CEO. Cabot exited the company soon after. For weeks, the clip lived everywhere: TikTok reenactments, parody “caught on the kiss cam” skits, and jokes about workplace boundaries set to Coldplay songs. The phrase “Chris Martin called it” became shorthand for accidentally predicting disaster.

Months later, Cabot addressed the moment in an interview with The New York Times, acknowledging that she had already been separated from her husband and admitting, “I made a bad decision… and I took accountability and gave up my career for that.” The quote added nuance — but the internet, predictably, had already made up its mind.

In true 2025 fashion, what should’ve been a harmless concert clip became a case study in modern surveillance, workplace ethics, and the terrifying power of a stadium camera. The kiss cam moved on. The internet never did.

Sydney Sweeney’s Jeans Break the Internet

A denim campaign featuring Sydney Sweeney praising her “great jeans” somehow detonated one of the most chaotic pop-culture debates of 2025. What was meant to be a straightforward American Eagle ad quickly morphed into a full-blown culture-war.

Critics argued the messaging carried racial and eugenics-adjacent undertones, accusing the campaign of centering a narrow beauty ideal. Others, particularly on the right, celebrated it as a defiant rejection of “wokeness,” framing it as a return to “classic American advertising.” The discourse spread far beyond fashion Twitter, pulling in cable news panels, TikTok explainers, and endless think-piece threads dissecting denim like it was constitutional law.

Then, because 2025 refuses to be subtle, Donald Trump weighed in, declaring it “the HOTTEST ad out there” — a sentence no one asked for but everyone immediately screenshotted. At that point, the jeans were no longer just jeans; they were a political statement whether anyone wanted them to be or not.

Sweeney eventually addressed the uproar in an interview, acknowledging that her long-standing strategy of staying silent had backfired. “I’m against hate and divisiveness,” she said, explaining that not responding had only widened the divide rather than closed it.

By the time the discourse finally cooled, one thing was clear: in 2025, even a pair of jeans could trigger a national identity crisis, and Sydney Sweeney had become an accidental lightning rod for everything from beauty standards to free speech — all over denim.

Summer–Fall: “67” Enters the Chat

Just when millennials thought they’d finally caught up with Gen Z slang, Gen Alpha pulled the rug out from under everyone — with two numbers.

“67” (or “six-seven”) became one of the most confusing and inescapable pieces of internet lingo of the year. Often accompanied by a double hand gesture mimicking a scale weighing two options, the phrase didn’t actually mean anything — which meant it could mean everything. Reaction? Mood? Insult? Affirmation? Yes.

Teachers began banning it in classrooms. Parents asked what it meant and were told, unhelpfully, that it didn’t. According to explainers, the phrase originated online and spread through short-form video platforms before jumping fully into real life.

At the peak of the trend, In-N-Out Burger reportedly removed the number “67” from its order ticket system to avoid confusion and disruption — a moment that cemented the phrase’s total cultural takeover.

Like all Gen Alpha slang, “67” thrived on chaos, ambiguity, and the pure joy of watching adults struggle. It didn’t need to make sense. It just needed to spread.

And spread it did.

August: Taylor Swift Gets Engaged 

Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce announced their engagement on August 26 with the caption: “Your English teacher and gym teacher are getting married.”

Later revelations? Kelce proposed while Swift unknowingly recorded a podcast episode—while a rose garden proposal setup was happening outside.

She would go on to release The Life of a Showgirl in October, an album that immediately sent Swifties into full investigative mode. Fans dissected lyrics, timestamps, and liner notes like sacred texts, convinced every metaphor doubled as either a love letter to Travis Kelce or a wink to her newly engaged era.

The project marked a sonic return to glossy, Max Martin–era pop, complete with theatrical hooks, glittering synths, and just enough self-awareness to remind listeners that Taylor Swift knows exactly how her mythology works — and how eagerly her audience will decode it.

Naturally, this included the now-infamous “wood” song lyrics, which launched a thousand think pieces, TikTok breakdowns, and extremely unserious jokes. Was it symbolic? Literal? A callback? An inside joke? Swifties debated it with the intensity of a Supreme Court confirmation hearing, proving once again that no noun is ever just a noun in a Taylor Swift song.

TikTok filled with “which track is about Travis?” breakdowns, timeline theories, and dramatic reenactments of alleged real-life references. Even casual listeners found themselves dragged into discourse about diamond imagery, garden metaphors, and whether certain bridges were too specific to be fictional.

Swifties, naturally, lost their minds. Again.

September: Jimmy Kimmel Gets Suspended

When Jimmy Kimmel was abruptly taken off the air after making jokes following the death of right-wing media personality Charlie Kirk, the backlash was immediate and explosive. Conservative outrage collided with concerns from free-speech advocates, and suddenly late-night comedy was once again at the center of a national culture war.

ABC’s decision to suspend Jimmy Kimmel Live! sent shockwaves through the entertainment world. Protesters gathered outside Disney’s studios. Fellow comedians and celebrities weighed in, warning about chilling effects on satire and political humor. Media watchdogs debated whether the move was about standards—or corporate panic in an election-year climate.

For a week, Kimmel’s empty time slot became its own statement.

Then, just as suddenly, he returned.

Kimmel was greeted with thunderous applause, opening his first episode back by addressing the controversy head-on: criticizing Trump, acknowledging the backlash, and attempting—somewhat awkwardly—to smooth tensions while refusing to fully walk back his remarks. Ratings spiked. Clips went viral. The discourse reignited.

The takeaway was unmistakable and deeply 2025: outrage cycles fast, suspensions are temporary, and nothing fuels late-night relevance quite like controversy. In the end, Kimmel didn’t just survive the moment — he turned it into must-watch TV.

Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban Split

Hollywood’s most famously unproblematic couple stunned fans when Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban announced their divorce on September 29. After nearly two decades together, the news landed less like gossip and more like a collective gut punch.

Unlike most celebrity breakups, there were no messy subtweets, no leaked blind items, no competing narratives. Instead, fans were left scrolling through old red-carpet photos, award-show kisses, and interviews where the two had spoken openly about sobriety, partnership, and surviving fame together. For many, they represented the rare Hollywood love story that actually worked.

The internet’s reaction was unusually restrained. No pile-ons. No memes. Just quiet disbelief, soft “this makes me sad” posts, and timelines briefly filled with people reassessing their belief in long-term celebrity relationships. If pop culture thrives on chaos, this moment stood out precisely because it wasn’t chaotic at all.

For once, the internet mourned quietly — scrolling, sighing, and realizing that if Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban couldn’t make it, no couple was truly safe in 2025.

October: "Diddy" Trial Ends

Sean Combs was sentenced to more than four years in prison after a seven-week trial that dominated headlines and sparked uncomfortable conversations across the entertainment industry. He was convicted on two counts of transportation to engage in prostitution and acquitted on the more serious charges of racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking. While Combs pleaded not guilty and denied wrongdoing, the verdict still marked a stunning fall for one of hip-hop’s most powerful figures.

The trial’s daily revelations — testimony, surveillance evidence, and accounts of abuse of power — forced a public reckoning with how long wealth, influence, and fear can shield misconduct. Brands quietly distanced themselves. Former collaborators scrubbed mentions. Fans debated whether separating art from artist was still possible. By the time the sentence was handed down, the consensus wasn’t relief — it was exhaustion.

And then there was 50 Cent.

Throughout the year, 50 Cent emerged as the undisputed petty king of 2025, posting reaction memes, cryptic captions, and barely veiled victory laps that made it clear he felt vindicated. Each update in the case seemed to arrive with a matching Instagram post, often accompanied by emojis, sarcasm, or a single line that said more than a press release ever could.

The saga reached its most on-the-nose conclusion in December, when 50 Cent released a Netflix documentary examining Combs’ rise and collapse, reframing the story through years of industry rumors, power dynamics, and warnings people claimed were ignored. The timing was ruthless. The tone was unapologetic. And the message was unmistakable: he wasn’t done talking about it.

In true 2025 fashion, the case didn’t end with a verdict — it ended with content, cementing the Combs trial as not just a legal reckoning, but a pop-culture moment that continued to echo long after the courtroom went quiet.

The Louvre Heist

On October 19, thieves pulled off one of the most audacious crimes of the decade, stealing $102 million worth of historical jewels from the Louvre — in broad daylight. Using a furniture elevator truck to gain access, the group drilled directly into display cases, calmly collected jewels tied to French emperors and 19th-century queens, and escaped the scene on scooters like they were late for brunch.

But the crime’s true pop-culture legacy wasn’t just the haul — it was the aesthetic.

Surveillance footage captured one impeccably dressed suspect in a tailored coat and gloves, instantly dubbed “the dapper man.” Within hours, the internet had turned him into a folk hero: fancams, outfit breakdowns, Ocean’s Eleven fancasting, and jokes about him “respecting the art” while stealing it flooded timelines.

Then came the detail that pushed the story from cinematic to downright absurd.

In later reporting, investigators revealed that part of the security system was protected by an embarrassingly simple passcode — reportedly something as basic as “1234.” Yes. That level of guessable. The kind of code you use for a gym locker, not one of the most famous museums on Earth.

Suddenly, the discourse shifted from “how did they pull this off?” to “why was this even possible?” Was it criminal genius — or institutional complacency? Either way, the internet agreed on one thing: the thieves didn’t just steal jewels, they stole everyone’s confidence in museum security.

The jewels still haven’t been recovered. No arrests have closed the case. And the Louvre was left with a PR nightmare that somehow doubled as a fashion moment.

A real-life heist movie, impeccably styled, fueled by vibes, scooters, and a passcode that should’ve never existed.

No sequel yet — but 2025 is always watching.

November: Wicked Press Tour Weirdness

By November, the Wicked: For Good press tour had fully and unmistakably gone off the rails. What began as standard promotional interviews slowly transformed into something far more intense: emotional confessions, prolonged hand-holding, unwavering eye contact, and moments of vulnerability so raw they felt like they belonged in a therapy session rather than a junket.

Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo spoke about their bond with the gravity of people who had survived something together, prompting viewers to wonder whether they had filmed a musical or completed a spiritual quest. Clips of them tearing up over friendship, destiny, and the power of sisterhood flooded TikTok, often slowed down, zoomed in, and set to dramatic soundtracks.

The internet, predictably, lost its mind. Some found the sincerity refreshing. Others found it deeply uncomfortable. Many found it endlessly memeable. TikTok filled with parody reenactments of intense eye contact, whispered affirmations, and exaggerated emotional pauses. “POV: you’re on the Wicked press tour” became its own genre.

By the time the tour wrapped, it was clear the promotion had eclipsed the movie itself. The press run became a cultural artifact — a reminder that in 2025, the rollout is the spectacle, and sometimes the vibes alone are enough to sustain the discourse for months.

The internet ate it up. And then asked for seconds.

Final Thoughts

2025 proved that pop culture no longer waits for permission. It moves fast, argues louder, and memes everything—whether it deserves it or not.

And somehow, we loved every second.