main character

The phrase main character is a reference to the idea of a main (primary) character in a work of fiction that the story centers around. The main character, also referred to as the hero or protagonist, is usually the most important character in the story. 

The emergence of the main character trend on TikTok is attributed to two users. In May 2020, user @lexapro_lesbian posted a video where they jokingly sing and dance about being the “main character” of their neighborhood.

Later in the summer, user @ashlaward posted a video in which they melodramatically encourage people to view themselves as the “main character” in life. This video received over 519,000 likes. 

Following these videos, other TikTok users began posting videos portraying themselves as the main character. These videos often showed a person engaged in a montage of interesting things or dramatically performing a mundane activity accompanied by indie music from coming-of-age movies. 

The #maincharacter hashtag is also used in another TikTok meme. In June, TikTok user @samvicchiollo filmed a video of themself acting as every main character in the scenario of robbing a bank. This video had over 3.4 million likes and motivated many other users to make similar videos portraying themselves or their friends acting out popular movie tropes.