This week on TikTok: A CapCut meme of Pedro Pascal and Nicolas Cage is everywhere
Just last week, YPulse told you how CapCut template memes have dominated viral content on TikTok this year. This week, a new one has surfaced and is practically all anyone is posting. The cropped-out video of Nicolas Cage looking skeptically at a purely joyful Pedro Pascal while driving comes from the movie The Unbearable Weight Of Massive Talent, and is most often being set to the song “Make Your Own Kind of Music” by Mama Cass. In the repurposed clips of the scene, TikTok users caption Cage’s look with someone being confused or concerned for the caption that is then shown along with Pascal’s crazed joy.
For example, one TikTok says “telling my husband we should go get iced coffee even though we just spent all our money on bills,” with Cage representing the disbelieved husband and Pascal the carefree wife. Another shows Cage with the caption “Me coming home from a long day of work” and Pascal, blissfully happy, with the caption “My dog who ate the entire couch.”
Brands have been able to tap into this template, too; the TikTok experts at Scrub Daddy posted a video with the caption “The Srcub Daddy that’s currently in my sink” as Cage looking over to Pascal captioned “The 20 more Scrub Daddies I just ordered online lol.” To get in on it themselves, brands should use this template to show an idea that just slightly unhinged with Pascal’s wide-eyed smile, met with speculation from someone else posed as Cage—like buying tons of their product even when they don’t need more, or letting their social media manager post whatever they want even if it looks crazy.
Blockbuster’s viral video proves maybe the store will survive after all
The days of video rental stores are long gone, and we know young consumers have ditched cable in favor of the (too) many services available to stream (YPulse’s Media Consumption Monitor shows more than half of young consumers are currently paying for streaming services)—but Blockbuster wants to let everyone know they’re still kicking. Specifically, their last physical location in Bend, Oregon. In a video posted online around the time of the Super Bowl last month, the camera follows a cockroach perusing through a desolate town with abandoned buildings and dusty, empty streets, with a voiceover saying: “When the world ends, and the Internet streams no more, we’ll still be here.” The brand is poking fun at the fact that they’ve ultimately survived this long, thus they’d survive an apocalypse situation, too.
The video went viral quickly, proving to be more successful than any official ad during the big game. Sandi Harding, the last Blockbuster’s store manager, told NewsNation Prime that sales “are up 200% at the store.” It could help that post-apocalyptic content is trending at the moment with the success of HBO’s The Last of Us and The Hunger Games movies being in Netflix’s top 10 this week. The Oregon location previously operated as a tourist attraction, eliciting an extreme sense of Friday night nostalgia for Millennials, but thanks to the video, it’s as if it was the store’s grand opening back in 1985.
TikTok’s Bold Glamour filter is almost too realistic
YPulse data shows young women are accustomed to using filters on social media to alter their appearance: 50% of young women agree they always use filters on photos of themselves—but this time the Bold Glamour filter on TikTok is taking things to a whole new level. The new filter, which applies makeup, clears blemishes, and sharpens bone structure, was crafted using machine learning, which means the filter doesn’t simply lay over a user’s face, it adapts wholly to their specific features—making the result eerily realistic. One user, @zhangsta, explained that unlike traditional filters, which use an augmented 3D face mesh, the Bold Glamour filter uses GAN (generative adversarial networks) “meaning every pixel on your face is regenerated and then outputted after referencing a dataset of images, which is why the filter looks so realistic.”
#BoldGlamourFilter currently has 149.5M views on the app, yet, while some users are loving it, others are having the complete opposite reaction. For those with more angular facial features, the Bold Glamour filter can appear dramatic, giving a harsher edge than what they’re used to. Some TikTokers who are seeing other creators use the filter are complaining that when they try the filter on themselves, it looks “too masculine” or that it’s reminiscent of “costume or drag makeup.” TikTok user @liv_inla explains how some users may not like the filter because in “Western beauty standards, it would seem that increased angularity lends itself to increased beauty until we hit the threshold that is masculinity” and goes on to say that because of her square jawline and high forehead, she looks like none other than Lord Farquad from Shrek. Other influencers are arguing that they can do their makeup IRL and look better than the filter; beauty guru Mikayla Nogueira even uploaded a makeup tutorial showing viewers how to recreate the same makeup as the Bold Glamour filter.
Links we’re passing:
Celebs & Influencers: TikTok is taking sides on the Selena vs. Hailey drama
Jake Paul’s latest boxing match is also dominating FYPs
Award shows: James Hong called out Hollywood’s past lack of Asian representation in a SAG award acceptance speech
Music: BTS’s J-Hope released a new song collab with J. Cole
Beauty: A Reddit post about finding mold in a concealer sparked a conversation on “clean” beauty labels
