The reign of the Kardashian-Jenner women over culture has been long, very long indeed. Sometimes it feels like the KarJenners even take turns breaking the internet: as of mid-January 2024, Kylie is up to bat.
On January 16, the 26-year-old model, entrepreneur, and reborn cool girl posted a carousel of selfies with a new head of light pink hair with a matching matte lip. Rejoice, loyal subjects, for King Kylie has returned.
Kylie captioned the picture, “hiiiii remember me," presumably an invitation for fans to let loose in the comments section. Mission accomplished.
“OMG KING KYLIE IS IT YOU?” and “THE RETURN OF KING KYLIE??????” represent the sentiments of the over-20,000 comments left an hour after Kylie uploaded the three photos.
She also uploaded a video of herself driving with her new pink look to her Instagram Stories to the tune of Lana del Rey’s “Let The Light In.” What does all this mean? And why do people still look at their phone while driving?!?
Now, Kylie herself has not gone anywhere.
She was just at the Golden Globes with her new beau and Hollywood darling Timothee Chalamet, remember. Her businesses are making millions and she's still posting on Instagram almost every day.
No one will ever forget Kylie Jenner so who is King Kylie and why do people care that she's back?
Someone could likely teach a semester-long seminar at NYU on the meaning and implications of the era of King Kylie but it’s truly not all that complicated.
But we must return to a simpler time, back when Kylie was just the queen of then-emerging social platforms Vine and Snapchat, to understand its true meaning. Cue the flashback music.
The King Kylie era broadly refers to a period around 2015 and 2016, when Kylie's very-online fans were transfixed by her every post. Trust me, it was different then.
In a clear break from the rest of her family’s otherwise very curated public postings at the time, Kylie was doing makeup tutorials and dancing with her friends, giving people unvarnished insight to her actual teenaged life.
Then came her rather messy though equally transfixing and public relationship with Tyga (they split in 2017) who, to this day, has “King Gold Chain” in his IG Bio.
Further, Tyga's child is named King Cairo and he often uses “king” as a qualifier for himself.
At the height of Kylie’s social media reign, amidst the daily back and forth about her relationship with Tyga, she changed her Insta handle to King Kylie, partially as a joke and partially in ode to her paramour. Presumably.
The nickname never left — to this day, even without pink hair, fans will sometimes call her King Kylie.
Alliteration! Making things catchy since, well, forever.
This was the era of Kylie’s ever-changing hair colors, from blonde to blue to pink to red and back again. It was the closest thing that perpetual millionaire Kylie would ever come to a punk rock phase.
Hence her asking fans in 2024 if they remembered this pink-haired version of herself. It’s the return of King Kylie, get it?
Kylie is a mom of two kids now and worth hundreds of millions of dollars as opposed to mere tens of millions, far away from the young woman she was a decade ago.
But she doesn’t do social media lightly. Is this King Kylie revival tied to some drop? Is she making hair dye along with lip kits now? Was she just a little bored over the weekend?
Safe bet, as with all things Kardashian, is that there's always an angle.
