{"id":664967,"date":"2026-03-18T17:59:12","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T17:59:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/664967\/"},"modified":"2026-03-18T17:59:12","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T17:59:12","slug":"ai-ruined-the-fun-of-mega-viral-moments-from-the-oscars","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/664967\/","title":{"rendered":"AI Ruined The Fun Of Mega Viral Moments From The Oscars"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tWelcome to\u00a0Rendering<\/a>, a Deadline column reporting at the intersection of\u00a0AI<\/a>\u00a0and showbiz. Rendering examines how\u00a0artificial intelligence<\/a>\u00a0is disrupting the entertainment industry, taking you inside key battlegrounds and spotlighting change makers wielding the technology for good and ill.\u00a0Got a story about AI? Rendering wants to hear from you: jkanter@deadline.com.<\/p>\n

\n\tConfession: I didn\u2019t watch the Oscars<\/a> on Sunday night. You may say this is an act of professional negligence for a Deadline journalist, but the reality is, my LA colleagues don\u2019t need a sleepy Brit on hand when they are already dominating at The Dolby Theater.<\/p>\n

\n\tSlumbering through a global spectacle like the Oscars inevitably means waking to a deluge of news reports, videos, and pictures from the ceremony and its fringes. You can turn to the trusted pixels of Deadline, or any number of our rivals, to digest what went down, but social media usually provides the ultimate dopamine hit.<\/p>\n

\n\tSo when I logged in on Monday morning, I was hungry for viral treats. Conan O\u2019Brien\u2019s gag about the absence of British acting nominees<\/a> \u2014 fun. Leonardo DiCaprio<\/a> cementing his status as the \u201cKing of Memes<\/a>\u201d \u2014 delightful. Kieran Culkin going off script<\/a> to call out Sean Penn\u2019s no-show \u2014 great gear. I\u2019m here for it all.<\/p>\n

\n\tBut when I was inspecting the array of off-stage clips, I found something catching in my brain. A seed of doubt. A sniff of skepticism. A question: Is this real? It\u2019s a question that I need not have asked maybe even as recently as a year ago. But such is the startling sophistication of artificial intelligence, and the reckless abandon with which it is deployed to deceive online, cynicism seems a healthy side-dish to many viral moments.<\/p>\n

\n\tWe\u2019re at the point where a Spanish Instagram user can deepfake photos of Zendaya and Tom Holland\u2019s wedding that are so convincing, they dupe personal associates of the Spider-Man stars<\/a>. So what chance do we have when grifters turn their attention to the Oscars and get prompting for engagement?<\/p>\n

\n\tYou need not look far for fakery. Let\u2019s start with the Instagram user who fooled Zendaya and Holland stans. He pumped out at least two plausible images from the Academy Awards, including Robert Downey Jr. and Chris Evans huddling up<\/a> with a proud Michael B. Jordan, and a group photo of Marvel universe actors<\/a>. Wholesome content, but entirely concocted. The images do not exist on Getty, and contain tell-tale details that reveal their AI origins, not least Pedro Pascal sporting a moustache, which he famously shaved for the 2026 Oscars. The photos\u2019 dubious provenance did not stop them amassing more than 200,000 likes.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\n\tOver on the wild west of X\/Twitter, a picture of Nicki Minaj walking the red carpet in a MAGA hat<\/a> went semi-viral (because of course it did!), while others riffed on Timoth\u00e9e Chalamet<\/a>\u2019s ballet comments by dressing the Marty Supreme actor in a tutu. Both certifiably fake. Others were more imperceptible, like Rihanna<\/a> on the red carpet with a baby bump. This alone got 7M views, and why? It\u2019s just so basic.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe majority of these examples are harmless, and probably frivolous in a world in which deepfakery is now a war strategy, but they all contribute to a degrading of our collective experience. <\/p>\n

\n\tThe AI dross made me question the authenticity of joyous moments, like Michael B. Jordan celebrating his Best Actor triumph by hugging it out with DiCaprio<\/a> and then inhaling an In-N-Out Burger<\/a>. It also casts doubt over genuinely questionable incidents, like Teyana Taylor\u2019s altercation with an Academy security guard<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n\tFor me, it\u2019s hard to escape the feeling that AI has ruined the innocent internet fun around events like the Oscars. And it\u2019s depressing to realize that the technology is only getting better, making the fakes harder to fish out. No one wants to delight in these deeply human celebrations, only to be told, in the immortal words of Zendaya, \u201cBabe, they\u2019re AI.\u201d<\/p>\n