TikTok is where the modern day sitcom unfolds

Main character Veronika is a Canadian girl in the big city with big dreams. She is spunky, spontaneous and head over heels infatuated with her roommate Kyle. Kyle is more reserved, chill and does not share the same feelings for Veronika. The two get up to wacky hijinks while accompanied by their sidekick other friend Michael. A knockoff version of New Girl? Netflix original sitcom? No, TikTok.

TikTok and Instagram account @veronika_iscool is my friend Sam and I’s favorite tv show. Just like how I used to discuss "Succession" with my friend Valentina while it was airing, Sam and I laugh and joke about characters Veronika and Kyle.

Veronika is off putting, offbeat and has the humor of a car wreck you can’t look away from. Someone in her comments described her as “the Instagram Michael Scott,” as Veronika shares the same lack of social awareness and unwavering optimism.

It is difficult to explain and even more difficult to understand in pieces. A video on its own would just be a weird and uncomfortable 90 seconds. Veronika is just a girl on TikTok, but she is playing a character that somehow satirizes social media while also creating a captivating story arc centered around her and her roommates. Veronika, who is supposed to be in real life but being filmed by her friend Michael behind the camera is always saying things like #kylesface or “comment down below” in a self-aware, social-media-is-cringe type way. It is, at times, very meta. Especially when Veronika is showing Kyle the warehouse she got to sell t-shirts to the fans. They are in character, yet they are real people who are selling the merch. It would be like if characters Will and Grace were selling “Will and Grace” t-shirts in an episode.

Kyle first began appearing in videos in September and yet there has been almost a three season sitcom arc around them. In the past week, Veronika has broken into Kyle’s girlfriend's apartment, Kyle decided to move to LA, Veronika follows him, the third character MIchael shows feelings for Veronika, and Kyle decides to move back. It has been a whirlwind of emotion for Veronika fans and I am seated with my popcorn. These TikToks were actually filmed on a plane. Did they take a trip just for that reason? Was it a happy coincidence? How much planning goes into this?

It is strange, it is funny, and it is not the only account like it. While social media was originally intended to show the “real” life of “real people” it has become a comedic playground for creators. Accounts like @almostfriday.tv have become a sketch show in themselves. Amidst the writers and actors strike, the lack of long seasons and lovable sitcoms, the next generation has turned to social media to create narrative entertainment.

Advertisements are woven seamlessly into the plot. An ad for beatbox alcohol is also a video where Veronika hosts a party and no one shows up so Kyle supports her in his own funny way. It has almost become a product placement in a tv show. A strange ad for Guinness is followed by a video where Veronika is wearing the Guinness hat in a heartfelt conversation with Kyle.

I don’t know what will happen next. Will Kyle’s jaded and cool guy exterior fall and accept the happy-go-lucky strange Veronika as his one true love? Is this a weird short lived thing and the actual people end up getting other real jobs and move on? Is anyone else even watching? I don’t know the answers, but I will be tuned in.