The 2010s was the first decade in which social media and entertainment came together. YouTube birthed some of the decade’s biggest artists, such as Justin Bieber, Carly Rae Jepsen and Alessia Cara. Movie trailers could be shared on various social media platforms. The 2010s had a large influence on music and movies, with this decade changing the music and movie entertainment industry in big ways.
Some of film’s most well-known franchises began, and ended, in the 2010s. “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2,” the eighth and final film in the Harry Potter movie series, premiered July 15, 2011. The Hunger Games film adaptations began when the first movie came out on March 23, 2012. This year, “Avengers: Endgame” marked the end of the first phase of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) and became the highest-grossing film of all time, drawing in $2.79 billion at the box office, dethroning 2009’s “Avatar.”
The first Avengers movie, “The Avengers” was released in 2012, with other installments such as “Avengers: Age of Ultron” released in 2015, “Avengers: Infinity War” in 2018 and “Avengers: End Game” in 2019.
Sophomore Samuel Guajardo is a self-proclaimed Marvel enthusiast. He said he remembers watching each Avengers film in theaters and is thankful for the impact the films had on him.
“I feel like the Avengers movies provided a reality in which we could use our imagination,” Guajardo said. “As a kid, I know I wouldn’t think of myself as a superhero … when those movies came out, it was a sudden shift and I felt like I wanted to be a superhero, and that I could be something else.”
The 2010s also hearlded a return of boy bands to popularity. 5 Seconds of Summer and Big Time Rush were just some of many boy groups that were popular in the decade. Most notably, One Direction was formed and went on hiatus during this time period. Millions of fans across the world claimed themselves to be “Directioners,” avid fans of One Direction.
Sophomore Sierra Endsley was, and is, a big fan of One Direction. She said the era of boy bands accurately reflected the music style of the 2010s.
“That’s what we listened to in high school, just like other generations had their own music they listened to growing up that defined their era,” Endsley said.
K-pop, Korean pop music, broke into the American music scene in 2012 with Psy’s “Gangnam Style.” The video has garnered close to 3.5 billion views on YouTube. Psy essentially introduced K-pop to America, with names such as BTS, Blackpink and NCT 127 later becoming household names in this country.
As a K-pop fan, junior Ocean Reckell drove 18 hours last summer to see BTS in concert. She believes the 2010s were a large decade in the growth of K-pop in America.
“I hope to see the American culture respect theirs, and not try to mold it to our [culture] and respect the differences because that’s what makes it what it is,” Reckell said. “Music is universal, and we all understand and feel the same emotions.”