A never ending stream of fresh trends cycle through TikTok on a near-daily basis, overloading users with too much content to reasonably sift through.
There are new makeup trends, dating trends, fashion trends, comedy trends, child-rearing trends, dance trends, and even video editing trends — it’s exhausting. Its almost impossible to keep track of which trend started where, and specific chords of dozens of songs now instantly remind frequent TikTokers of any number of brief, but booming, former crazes.
Most of these get old eventually. You can only watch so many makeup transformations or Halloween reveals before you feel like you’ve seen them all, but I can essentially guarantee you won’t feel the same about the “subtle foreshadowing” trend. Its among the best trends I’ve seen hit the app so far — and I’ve been covering TikTok since 2018. Ceaselessly hilarious, often painful by proxy, but perpetually watchable, once you dive into TikTok’s latest craze you may never find your way out.
TikTok’s subtle foreshadowing trend
Its not hard to pick out a video participating in the subtle foreshadowing trend. For one thing, many participating videos add captions noting the subtle foreshadowing to come, and thus far almost all share the same audio — a somewhat surreal track from Aphex Twin. The track, “QKThr,” released in 2001, but its finding a horde of fresh fans via its new TikTok usage. Flipping over to the audio’s page yields an almost exclusive array of subtle foreshadowing videos, and every. Single. One is pure, Tiffany-grade gold.
I mean look at this queen, this absolute diva, as she makes falling down a set of stairs look elegant. How does she do it? We’ll never know, but we will watch this video on repeat for the next three months, minimum.
A big part of the comedy in the subtle foreshadowing trend is the complete lack of subtlety. The so-called “foreshadowing” is just clips from further into the video, played early on, hinting toward some impending disaster. Its hilarious, occasionally painful, and oh-so very humbling.
None are quite so humbling, perhaps, as my favorite video of the trend so far. The utter lack of grace, the gorgeously serenity of the setting, and the unfathomable distance this woman tumbles makes it a true work of internet art.
Videos participating in the trend span topics, genres, and even countries, but they almost always involve some kind of unexpected mishap. A fall, an unexpected breakage, any sort of startling mistake is perfect fodder for the genre, and TikTokers are taking full advantage of its versatile nature.
The result is a truly glorious trend. Perpetually funny and never problematic, and open to literally anyone, anywhere. Perhaps the best part is you don’t need to record fresh content to participate. Those old home videos of you or a loved one tumbling into the pool, sending the grill sprawling, or getting chased by hornets are all tailor-made for the trend, they just require a few edits. Pop in there, add in some of that impeccably low-key foreshadowing, and you’ve got a viral powerhouse on your hands.
