These People Defined the Year. So We Gave Them Superlatives.
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Once again, it’s time to look back on the year that was. Behold: Slate’s unofficial guide to 2023’s biggest winners and losers, debased jokers, and most valuable players. They defined the year—and not always for the better! Who (or what) did we miss? Let us know in the comments.
Best Celebrity Pregnancy Announcement: Rihanna at the Super Bowl
Most Indicted: Donald Trump
Biggest Winner: E. Jean Carroll
Longest Goodbye: Henry Kissinger
Fastest-Talking: Vivek Ramaswamy
Most Likely to Delete Your Movie and Use It as a Tax Write-Off: David Zaslav
Least Valuable Social Media Platform: X, formerly Twitter
Most Promising Replacement for X, Formerly Twitter: N/A
Worst Reputation: Panera’s Charged Lemonade
Best Reputation: McDonald’s Grimace shake
Most Chaotic Rise to Power: Speaker of the House Mike Johnson
Best Revenge Against an Ex-Boyfriend: Caroline Ellison’s testimony against Sam Bankman-Fried
Most in Need of Real (Not Fake) Ethics Reform: The Supreme Court
Most Bitey: Commander Biden
Most Likely to Get Pro-Slavery Talking Points Into a Schoolroom: PragerU
Best Source of Dating-Life Intrigue: Tim Scott
Most Unlikely Political Protagonist: Disney
Cutest Animal We All Collectively Learned Exists Because of the Possibility It Could Have Helped Spread Horrendous Disease: Raccoon Dog
Best Drip: The A.I. Pope Coat
Most Glaring Sign We’re Living in a Regressive Era: The dismantling of child labor laws
Right-Winger Most Justified in Yelling About Being Canceled: Tucker Carlson
Most Esteemed Walmart Parking Lot Enthusiast: Clarence Thomas
Strangest Celebrity Food Promo: The Ice Spice Munchkins drink with blended doughnut holes in it
Best Odd Couple: Barbenheimer
Best Couple Everyone Claims Is an Odd Couple but Actually They Are Very Similar, When You Think About It: Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce
Best Kelce: Jason Kelce
Most Ridiculous Theory About a Trump Indictment: CNN reporting that Jack Smith going to Subway during lunchtime sent “a message to Donald Trump”
Least Likely to Have Actually Watched Blade Runner: Elon Musk
Most Surprising Cause of Geopolitical Tensions: The Chinese balloon
Biggest, Strongest Balloon-Shootin’ Man: J.D. Vance
Best Rendition of the Words “Fo’ Shiz, Fo’ Shiz”: Michelle Williams reading the audiobook version of Britney Spears’ memoir, imitating Justin Timberlake running into Ginuwine in the early 2000s
Biggest Airport Whiskey: David Brooks
Most Rebooted Campaign: Ron DeSantis’ presidential primary run
Worst Online Discourse: Everything Israel-Gaza related
Least Likely to Wriggle His Way Out of This Jam: Rudy Giuliani
Biggest Utilizer of the Color Pink: Barbie
Best Movie for a Girls’ Night Out: Oppenheimer
Most Likely to Host the Hunger Games: The Sphere
Biggest “You Ruined a Good Thing” Moment: World Cup Kiss
Best Comeback: Simone Biles
Biggest Comeback: Labor strikes
Worst Comeback: The specter of A.I. taking all of our jobs
Most Un-coup-able CEO: Sam Altman
Most *Zealous* Patron of the Arts: Lauren Boebert at Beetlejuice
Saddest Sack: Kevin McCarthy
Hottest Working-Class Cosplay From an Actor During the SAG-AFTRA Strike: Colin Farrell
Best Concert Venue: AMC Theatres, according to Beyoncé and Taylor Swift
Best Trumpworld Mug Shot: Sidney Powell
Most Overexamined Shoe: Ron DeSantis’ high heel
Worst Judge: Matthew J. Kacsmaryk
Longest Nonapology Apology Video: Hasan Minhaj
Biggest Threat to Restaurants in Atlanta: Keith Lee
Best Volleyball Player: George Santos
Most Likely to Have Seen a Ghost: Mitch McConnell
Most Questionable Breakup-Announcement Method: The no-holds-barred New York Times story about Bill de Blasio and Chirlane McCray, which also revealed that de Blasio is now dyeing his hair black
Most Unexpected Glow-Up: Toilet Paper
Most Enjoyable Legal Trial: Gwyneth Paltrow’s ski trial
Worst Rendition of an Already-Not-Great Song: Fall Out Boy’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire”
Most Debated Television Ending: The Succession finale
Best Takedown of Ticketmaster: Swifties
Most Horrifying Hypocrite: The Moms for Liberty co-founder whose sexual assault scandal is tearing her chapter apart
Most Deranged New “Movement Leaders”: The “effective accelerationists”
Best Example of Coming to the Aid of Your Work Colleagues: The Alabama riverboat brawl
Most Annoying Brawl That Never Happened: Zuck vs. Musk
Most Unforced Error: The Paraguayan government staffer who resigned after signing an official deal with a fake country
Most Pressing Global Emergency That’s Been Placed on the Back Burner: Climate change, who else?
Most Successful Riverdale Alumnus: Charles Melton
Joe Biden–Fantasy–Replacement Bait of the Year: Andy Beshear
Most Shortsighted Use of a Bargaining Chip: Republicans using Ukraine to push a hard-line vision of border security
Best Diplomatic Farewell: The pandas leaving the National Zoo to board a flight to China
Most Thought-About Empire (men): Roman
Most Thought-About Empire (women): “Does the Pioneer Woman’s Family Own All the Land Killers of the Flower Moon Is About?”
Least Popular Kennedy (Within His Own Family): Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Most Unnecessarily Flammable Discourse: Gas stove–gate
Most Apex Predator of the Rich: The Titanic
Second-Most Apex Predator of the Rich: The orcas
Most Ominous-Sounding Nuptials: Speaker Mike Johnson’s covenant marriage
Most On-Brand Screw-Up: Classified documents being discovered near Joe Biden’s Corvette
Most Publicly Troublesome Adult Son: Hunter Biden
The Worst “Full of Passionate Intensity”: The handful of people who were behind the thousands and thousands of book ban challenges that were brought nationwide during the 2021–22 school year
Ultimate Loser Who Was Actually a Winner: Golden Bachelor runner-up Leslie Fhima
Most Well-Lit Darkness Retreat: The one Aaron Rodgers did
Biggest Kris Jenner Coup: Kylie dating Timothée Chalamet
Most Delicious Nickname: Meatball Ron
Most Iconic Animal Escapee: Flaco the owl
Second-Most-Iconic Animal Escapee: The Newark bull
Most in Need of a Turkey Pardon: Eric Adams
Most Likely to Have Written This List: ChatGPT
Simply the Best: Tina Turner
