10 pop culture moments that defined 2014

Lupita won an Oscar in her film debut 

Lupita Nyong’o, who played Patsey in 12 years a slave, was awarded the best supporting actress Oscar this year. She became the fifteenth actress to win an Oscar in her debut film – talk about coming out guns blazing.

She has since become the darling of Hollywood and the world, gracing nearly every magazine cover, and many a style page as well. Nyong’o was announced brand ambassador for Lancôme in April this year.

Here’s the moment that started it all – her acceptance speech.

Generations took a 2 month break

South Africa’s oldest running soapie took a rather abrupt six week break. 16 actors from the local TV favourite went on strike, demanding better pay and improved working conditions.

Show creator Mfundi Vundla would not back down and insisted that the Generations 16, as they later become known, would not get what they wanted.

Vundla insisted that if the charade was kept up he would write a new soapie and thus Generations Legacy was born. It was aired on the 1^st of December and was watched by 10 million people it’s first day.

The cast of Generations. Image courtesy of Facebook.com/GenerationsTVShow

Taylor went pop 

T-Swift surprised us all by brewing away from her country roots and releasing a pop album.

Unsurprisingly it did just as well as her country albums.

1989 sold over a million copies in its first week, becoming the biggest selling album in its first week since Eminem’s The Eminem show in 2002.

She is also the only female artist in to have 2 albums consecutively sell over a million copies in their first week.  Let’s pause to ‘Shake it off’

A puppet was sued

Steve Hofmeyer sued puppet Chester Missing. You can read all about the Hofmeyr/Missing saga here.

Puppeteer Conrad Koch and his puppet Chester Missing sit in court, 27 November 2014, at the Randburg Magistrate’s court in Johannesburg. Koch allegedly attacked and defamed Steve Hofmeyr on social media following a tweet that Hofmeyr published that read “Sorry to offend but in my books blacks were the architects of apartheid. Go figure.” Activist Dan Roodt then filed an interim protection order which was hear in court. Picture: Alaister Russell

Kim Kardashian got married, and stayed married

In May this year Kanye West and Kim Kardashian tied the knot. Given the brides marital track record we were relieved to see that they were still married 72 hours later. And that theyre still together 7 months later. Here’s to the next 7 years, KimYe.

That wasn’t the only talked about celebrity wedding this year. Even eternal bachelor George Clooney got married.  As did his pal Brad Pitt, who finally made became Mr Angelina Jolie. Oh, how we loved that veil, Angelina!

Other Hollywood stars who tied the knot this year – Kaley Cuaco and Ryan Sweeting, Solange Knowles and Alan Ferguson and Adam Brody and Gossip Girls’ Leighton Meester.

A picture posted on Instagram by Kim Kardashian of her special day.

Local celebs split up  

While Hollywood was getting married, local celebs were breaking up.

First it was Tamara Dey and Isaac Klawansky and then funky music couple, Chiano Sky and Ross Jack.

And lastly and quite recently Francois Hougaard and his beautiful girlfriend Chelsea le Roux. Who could forget that video of Hougaard saying ‘hallo’ to le Roux?

Pharrell made us all Happy

But his hat was the real star this year. It even has a twitter account.

Pharrel’s hit song Happy had the whole world singing in 2014, and sparked a ripple of Happy videos world wide.

Can we go ahead and name Happy the official feel-good song of 2014?

There was a fight in an elevator

We woke up on May 12th to the internet buzzing with the news that Solange Knowles had attacked her brother in law, rapper Jay Z in an elevator.

Amongst internet memes and swirls of speculation, the Carter Knowles clan kept mum.

Well, until that cryptic line crept into Beyonce’s Flawless remix, that is.

”Of course s**t go down when there’s a billion dollars in an elevator.”

Rihanna went to Instagram jail

There is no doubt that RiRi is one sexy woman, but the good girl went bad when she took things a little too far on Instagram.

She was suspended from the photo sharing site for 6 months after incessantly posting nude photos of herself, but she’s back now, so you can calm down.

Rihanna attends the “Charles James: Beyond Fashion” Costume Institute Gala at the Metropolitan Museum of Art on May 5, 2014 in New York City. Larry Busacca/Getty Images/AFP

Celebrity iCloud accounts were hacked

And a flurry of nude photos flooded the internet. A number of  Hollywood actresses were horrified to find out that their private nudie pics had been leaked online by some hackers who managed to hack into their Apple iPhone iClouds.

The list includes Jennifer Lawrence and Kirstin Dunst.

Getty Images/AFP/File / Isaac Brekken
Nude photos of actress Jennifer Lawrence, seen here on September 19, 2014 in Las Vegas, were posted online by hackers

Here’s to next 365 days of pop.