YouTube “react videos” went full-ouroboros awhile ago. First, kids were recorded reacting to everything from Windows 95 to Sonic the Hedgehog; then parents reacted to their kids reacting to stuff; and eventually react videos reacted to react videos reacting to react videos. It’s the sort of increasingly self-aware entertainment that grows stale as it becomes less authentic
Watching college students react to their teen ‘react videos’ is a nice reminder that time waits for nobody
Fine Brothers Entertainment has a new take on the react genre, one that manages to be even more meta than usual. They’ve gathered three college kids and asked them to react to themselves, as recorded five years ago. Is there anything more cringeworthy than having to watch your youthful self gush about Twilight or dance to “Gangnam Style”? Maybe, if you take the time to dissect your teen fashion.
It sounds pretty mortifying, having a video time capsule of your dorkiest years, but each kid handles it with charming touch of existential embarrassment. It’s a good example for the rest of us, who just have to live with Facebook regularly bombarding us with our old photos.
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