If you had the self-restraint over the summer to refrain from entering the enticing place that is YouTube, you may have missed out on three months’ worth of the truly cinematic and completely mind-boggling masterpieces that are “Back to School” videos. These videos, filmed and edited by girls who act young enough to still be in school but simultaneously look old enough to be contestants on The Bachelor, tend to paint a portrait of a “typical school student” that is anything but typical.
Not sure what I’m referring to? No worries, because all of these videos end up looking something like this:
The video begins with a montage of color-corrected shots of a girl with 10 layers of makeup and perfectly straightened, blonde-dyed hair dancing on a sidewalk, a street, and an abandoned school parking lot. She does various actions, including holding a pencil, trying to stack three notebooks on her head, and throwing crayons in the grass around her like a crazy person.
Montage ends.
GENERIC FEMALE YOUTUBER: Hey guys! It’s ****!!!
Cannons burst, $100 bills fly out.
GFY: Whoops! That wasn’t supposed to happen! OMG, I’m such a klutz! Anyways, today, I’m doing my first BACK TO SCHOOL video!
Children cheer; at first, the viewer thinks it’s a sound effect, but unbeknownst to them, it’s actually tiny child robots who have been paid to sit and watch GFY’s videos to make her seem more popular.
GFY: I know it’s only, like June 1st , and you regular viewers only got out of school yesterday, but I don’t go to school, so I have no f*cking idea what happens in the real world!
GFY laughs, or is it a sound effect?
GFY: So today, I am doing a HUUUUUUUUUUGE BACK TO SCHOOL video. I’m gonna do my School Supplies Haul to show you guys what I bought for the first day of school!
Child Robot Viewer: But, aren’t you, like, 25 and didn’t even go to college because YouTube became your full time occupation?
GFY: (to child robot viewer) Shut the f*ck up and watch my videos! *smiles* Okay! Moving on to the haul…
GFY pulls up a huge, diamond-encrusted backpack with straps made of velvet.
GFY: So here’s my backpack, that I, like, you know, got at Target or something… Isn’t it cute? It’s so cute, right?
GFY reaches into backpack, and starts pulling out various school supplies.
GFY: First, we have ten different notebooks that I only have here because some company gave them to me along with a check for $10,000…here we have a 50-pack of crayons because I want you to think I’m super quirky even though crayons haven’t been on my school supplies list since kindergarten…also did I mention that I make more money than you and I didn’t even finish school?
GFY continues pulling various “school supplies” out of her backpack; at one point, she pulls out a protractor and refers to it as “this half-circle thing.” After about fifteen minutes of her talking about school supplies she’ll never use, her haul is over.
GFY: So, looks like I’m done with my school supplies haul! Yay! Hope you guys liked some of the stuff I got. If you want to buy these items too, check out the description box below where I linked all the products – except all of them are probably WAY too expensive for you plebeians! Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe! Because even though I already have over one million people watching my videos, that’s still not enough for me and I want more! Yay! Love you!
GFY blows kisses to the camera for about five seconds before she makes a “cut” motion with her hands to an off-camera person. Video screen quickly transitions to a simple screen that says “SUBSCRIBE OR ELSE!” in cheery font.
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