Year in Review: The 15 Biggest Moments in Hollywood of 2015
2015 was a pretty big year for Hollywood. Between movies breaking all sorts of records and new TV shows setting new standards for records, we’d say 2015 was one for the books. If you’re interested in seeing what happened outside of pop culture, Google has a great video on the “Year in Search” as well as their list of top searches. You can check out the top 10 RT’d tweets of 2015 here and the most viewed videos on YouTube here. For all the juicy stuff, we’ve got a break down of the 15 biggest moments in Hollywood!
Empire kicked off new TV in 2015 with a real bang, having the highest-rated debut on FOX in three years. It continued it’s amazing success by being the first prime time broadcasted series in at least 23 years to have its viewership increase week to week during its first five episodes. By the first season's finale in March, it had 17.62 million in viewers. Empire also had the highest rated debut season finale since May 2005, when Grey's Anatomy ended its first season. Critics and fans alike credit the show’s success to two of it’s main stars, Taraji P. Henson and Terrence Howard. Even people who don’t watch Empire can quote the show, “no nookie from Cookie!”
Katy Perry’s performance at the Super Bowl back in February was pretty damn epic, but we all know the true star of that night. Left Shark. The memes that took over the internet were never ending. You can buy Left Shark costumes, blankets, trinkets, and more. That surprise appearance by Missy Elliot kicked Katy's already epic performance up to another level, making it one of the best Super Bowl Half Time shows in years.
Fifty Shades of Grey dominated (wink wink) the box office in February, ending up with a worldwide lifetime gross of $570, 489,358. It became Universal Pictures biggest rated-R film of all time. It is currently the #1 opening weekend for the month of February and the #2 biggest opening weekend for Winter (although Star Wars: The Force Awakens will knock it the #3 shortly).
To promote their film Zoolander 2, the highly anticipated sequel to 2001’s Zoolander, Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson walked the runway at Paris Fashion Week. Very obviously, these two stole the show and we can look forward to Zoolander 2 in 2016!
March 25th, 2015 is a dark day in the One Direction fandom. After five years with the band, Zayn Malik (the one who hit all the high notes) left the band and the band issued a statement that made all of our hearts break. Since his departure, he’s turned on his word of “wanting a normal life” for a 22-year-old and signed with a new record company and is working on new music. But that’s okay, 1D stuck together and put out their fifth album, Made in the A.M., which is arguably their best one ever. They are set for an 18-month hiatus now, but who knows, maybe in 2017 the band will be a fivesome again.
Usually, the 7th movie in a film franchise doesn’t break records. But after the untimely death of star Paul Walker, Furious 7 broke a lot of records and hearts around the world. The film’s current gross is $1,515,047,671. It came in at #5 All Time Worldwide and #3 Worldwide Openings in the charts (though that's sure to change after Star Wars). The song’s theme tune “See You Again” by Wiz Khalifa ft. Charlie Puth hit #1 on many charts, staying there consistently for weeks and weeks. The song was nominated for 3 Grammys and 1 Golden Globe award.
Everyone knew that Jurassic World was going to be a big summer blockbuster film, but no one anticipated the success it would generate in one weekend. For six months, it held the recording for highest grossing opening weekend with $208, 806, 270 (the Star Wars: The Force Awakens changed that). That mega success in it’s opening weekend led to continued growth, making it the 3rd highest grossing film of all time (domestically). As of December 21st, Star Wars did beat Jurassic World, but the whole Jurassic Park family was classy as hell about that.
In June, Netflix released it’s 3rd season of Orange Is the New Black and when Ruby Rose popped up, people lost their damn minds. People took to social media to express their love (*cough* obsession *cough*) with Ruby Rose. Everyone needed to know who the hell she was and they needed to explain that they had a serious crush on her.
With less than 2 months left of 2015, Adele swept in to break all the damn records. Her newest album, 25, is the first ever to sell more than 3 million (3.38 million to be exact) copies in one week. The previous record holder was *NSYNC, with No Strings Attached in 2000. This feat is incredible in 2015 with all the various streaming services and abilities to illegally download music that were not as available 15 years ago. 25 quickly became the best-selling album of 2015. People are so obsessed with this album, 10 million people logged onto Ticketmaster on December 17th to buy tickets to her 2016 North American tour (which only had roughly 750,000 tickets available).
Star Wars: The Force Awakens nabbed $238 million during its opening weekend, which included $100 million from Friday alone (the largest single day gross ever) and is the biggest midnight release of all-time. As of right now, The Force Awakens is well on its way to becoming the highest grossing Disney film of all-time (let that sink in for a minute). With no big blockbusters planned for Janury 2016, Star Wars will continue to make waves at the box office and break more records previously held by Disney and other franchises.
