It’s a good time to be a nostalgic millennial
The Backstreet Boys are playing to sold-out crowds.
Lindsay Lohan is starring in a new “Freaky Friday” movie.
And former “Dawson’s Creek” co-stars and exes Katie Holmes and Joshua Jackson were recently spotted filming a new project in New York City.
No, it’s not the early 2000s — but millennials feel like they’re so back.
As the saying goes, what’s old often becomes new again. And millennials, typically defined as individuals born between the early 1980s and the mid-1990s, are now at a point in their lives where their generational nostalgia is front and center.
This recent surge in millennial-focused pop culture serves as “the next level of escapism” for the generation, said Kate Kennedy, author of “One in a Millennial: On Friendship, Feelings, Fangirls, and Fitting In.”
“It returns us to a time when our biggest worry was getting in line for a CD, not whether we would be able to afford a house,” Kennedy said.
At the Sphere in Las Vegas, that sentiment was echoed by thousands of Backstreet Boys concertgoers, many wearing all-white attire in homage to the band’s “Millennium” album, singing along to hits like “Drowning.” Those who couldn’t attend watched the concerts unfold on TikTok — where some videos have amassed millions of views.
“This healed more of my childhood in 1.5 hours than any therapist has,” one TikTok user wrote in the caption of their video from the show.
“I feel like I just time traveled,” another creator wrote in the text of their video from the concert. “At the Sphere, listening to Backstreet Boys, wearing an all white 90s outfit, taking Jell-O shots.”
Kennedy, who went to the Backstreet Boys concert last weekend, described nostalgia as a “connective tissue that makes people feel less alone and less judgmental toward themselves, because other people like what they like, too.”
“I think we’re a more lonely and isolated generation as adults than we ever anticipated that we would be in our youth,” she said, adding that millennials “straddle two very different eras in terms of technology and information.”
Generations “can be hard on each other online,” Kennedy noted. But now, “after several years of being called cringe, or ‘cheugy,’ we millennials are leaning in.”
The longing for the millennial era has even crossed generational lines. Gen Zers, who once mocked millennial culture, are now romanticizing it. On TikTok, hundreds of users have recently posted tributes to all things millennial — from Tumblr and skinny jeans to upbeat music, Barack Obama and, perhaps most notably, HBO’s TV series “Girls.”
Perhaps sensing that enthusiasm, a string of early 2000s artists have stepped back into the spotlight. Nelly, Creed and The All-American Rejects — all staples of the late ‘90s and early aughts — have launched tours.
Beyoncé brought her Destiny’s Child bandmates Michelle Williams and Kelly Rowland on stage for her final “Cowboy Carter” show in Las Vegas last weekend, marking the group’s first reunion in seven years.
Hollywood is also jumping on the trend. Studios continue to green-light sequels, prequels and spinoffs based on beloved titles from the ‘90s and 2000s.
Shots of Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci and Emily Blunt filming the sequel to the 2006 hit “The Devil Wears Prada” in New York City have caused a frenzy. Fans online are analyzing the actors’ high-fashion looks and others are reportedly lining up to catch glimpses of the stars in person as they shoot, according to Variety.
Adam Sandler’s “Happy Gilmore 2,” which came out almost 30 years after the 1996 film, debuted to 46.7 million views on Netflix, making it the streamer’s largest U.S. film opening ever.
