TIME's Top 10 Everything of 2013: Top 10 Miley moments and more
Top 10 Miley Moments:
10. October 2: Miley is the subject of a documentary
Proving that the network had been hip to the Miley narrative all along, MTV spent months documenting the making of Bangerz. The finished product, Miley: The Movement, aired a week before the album was released. Though the film didn’t really reveal much that fans didn’t already know, its very existence was proof that first-name-only Miley was enough of a star to merit such treatment. (The documentary was also the week’s second most tweeted-about show, according to Nielsen’s Twitter tracking.)
9. April 4: Miley appears on a Snoop song
Even before any of the songs from her own album were released, Cyrus made it clear that her new style would be far from what it had been in the past. Case in point: the star was featured on a track with Snoop Lion (Snoop Dogg’s reggae incarnation) - “Ashtrays and Heartbreaks” - perhaps foreshadowing her decision to smoke a joint onstage at MTV’s European Music Awards in November.
8. March: Miley hires Larry Rudolph as her manager
Following her January 2013 decision to leave Hollywood Records and sign with RCA, Cyrus also picked up a new manager - someone whose name might be familiar to pop fans. Before Miley, Larry Rudolph was probably best known as Britney Spears’ manager. Though Rudolph doesn’t take personal credit for Cyrus’ creative decisions, her career after signing on with him has drawn parallels to that of boa-constrictor-era Spears.
7. Sept. 16, 2013: Miley’s engagement ends
Miley Cyrus met her erstwhile fiancé Liam Hemsworth when they starred together in 2010’s The Last Song and they were engaged in mid-2012. In April, they announced that they’d decided to put a hold on wedding planning - months after her father told Us that they were planning three separate ceremonies to celebrate their love - but she went back to wearing an engagement ring over the summer. In September, they announced that they were officially calling it quits.
6. October 5: Miley hosts Saturday Night Live
The third most tweeted-about show this week - the week of Miley: The Movement - was Cyrus’ turn hosting SNL. From topical sketches (like one mocking the government shutdown), to her two musical performances, Cyrus drew generally positive reviews. Viewers curious to see how she would top a month of crazy buzz also drove the episode to a ratings high, the most viewers since a Justin Timberlake episode in March.
5. October 26: Paris Hilton dresses as Miley for Halloween
What’s the ultimate proof of pop-culture permeation? The instantly recognizable Halloween costume, of course. Just a year ago, a Cyrus costume might have drawn a “who are you?” this year’s holiday came with multiple options, from teddy-bear teddy to white leggings and sports bra to, for the truly adventurous, underwear/boots/sledgehammer. Paris Hilton opted for the first, complete with foam finger.
4. October 9: Miley Walt Disney Records removes her name from songs by Hannah Montana
Though it’s not clear exactly when the change happened, the celebrity blog “Oh No They Didn’t!” noticed in October that Cyrus’ name was no longer attached to any of the Hannah Montana material available on iTunes. A few months earlier, in a Billboard cover story, the singer had admitted that she was unhappy that a search for her music turned up both incarnations of her career - but by the fall her evolution was complete, taking her from squeaky-clean Disney girl to, well, pretty much the polar opposite of that.
3. June 3: “We Can’t Stop” is a hit
The first single from Cyrus’ 2013 album debuted in June and put the pop world on look-out. Though Robin Thicke’s “Blurred Lines” eventually emerged as the consensus winner for the song-of-summer=2013 title, “We Can’t Stop” was an early contender and its “la da di da di” hook was inescapable. Though the song only made it to No. 2 on the Billboard Hot 100 (it debuted at 11), it was a No. 1 hit in the U.K. Later in the month, the song’s video would set a new VEVO record for the most views in 24 hours.
2. September 9: The “Wrecking Ball” video goes boom
Proving that her album Bangerz, which would debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200 in early October, was not just about not stopping, Cyrus made another splash - or, rather, a crash - with the clip for “Wrecking Ball.” The scantily-clad singer rode the titular piece of construction equipment all the way to the bank, as the clip quickly became the most-viewed video on VEVO. (Bonus for Cyrus: she bet producer Dr. Luke that the song would go to the top of the Billboard Hot 100 and she won; the wager was a $10,000 toilet.)
1. August 25: Miley stuns at the VMAs
Few six-minute periods in the year generated as much buzz as Cyrus’ appearance with Robin Thicke at MTV’s Video Music Awards. The tongue! The teddy bears! The twerking! Whether the performance was great, tasteless, racist, inappropriate or awesome - or all of the above - it was the top culture story for days and is still being talked about. Without this appearance, this list probably wouldn’t even exist.
Miley Cyrus is #1 on Top 10 comebacks:
It began with May’s surprisingly catchy “We Can’t Stop.” Then came the VMA awards. Then that video where she straddled a wrecking ball…totally nude. Then the #1 single and album. Like it or not, Miley has twerked her way back into relevance, morphing from has-been Disney star to pop-cultural lightning rod. And at just 21, she’s got a long career to go.
We Can't Stop is #7 on Top 10 songs:
If you didn’t listen to the words of Miley’s surprisingly downbeat party-whipper-upper, you’d assume that it was a heartsick Rihanna-style lament. What she’s actually singing about is an exhausted, tooth-grinding, 3 AM kind of not stopping (hence the plausible-deniability drug references), anchored in hip-hop tropes from eight years before she was born: “can’t stop/won’t stop,” hands in the air, the hook from “La-Di-Da-Di.” Maybe the slyest detail in a song full of ‘em: the totally country inflection Cyrus adopts for “can I get a ‘hell no’?”
Wrecking Ball is #2 on Top 10 music videos:
Cyrus, who already released a swell clip for “We Can’t Stop” (featured on our mid-year listing of best videos), would later team up with fashion photographer Terry Richardson to create one of the most controversial videos of 2013, which featured Miley nude and nearly nude swinging on the titular metal sphere. While some of her fans were cool on the video, it did get people talking about the heartbreak anthem - and isn’t that really the point of music videos? The clip has also spawned many, many parodies including a Chatroulette version and the Carrie Underwood cover for Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.
Miley Cyrus vs. Sinead #3 on Top 10 feuds:
After Miley Cyrus’ infamous twerking exhibition at the VMA’s, Sinead O’Connor wiggled her way back into the cultural spotlight by writing the younger singer a series of accusatory open letters proclaiming that unless she stop allowing the music business to “make a prostitute of you, ” disaster would follow. This led to a social media battle in which Cyrus tweeted out O’Connor’s past Twitter breakdown that led to psychiatric help. “Before Amanda Bynes … there was …” Cyrus wrote.
O’Connor then threatened Cyrus online with a lawsuit for trying to damage her reputation.
Miley Cyrus in nude latex bikini is #1 on Top 10 worst dressed:
Miley’s schizophrenic fashion this year has landed her on both our best and worst dressed lists. For the VMAs performance heard round the globe, Cyrus initially wore a furry gray leotard with a teddy bear graphic before stripping down to reveal a nude-colored latex bikini. Leaving aside her suggestive dancing, this two-piece serves no other stylistic purpose apart from showing a lot of skin.
Miley Cyrus in Marc Jacobs is #6 in Top 10 best dressed:
After a summer spent shocking America with increasingly provocative getups-she told MTV that her ultimate look was a mix of “white trash and Chanel”-the former Hannah Montana did an about-face with this Marc Jacobs gown for Fashion Group International’s Night of Stars. The glittery green dress with a daringly low back is just the right mix of youthfulness and sparkle for the pop star. No furry animals, no crazy hemlines, no tongue wagging; here, Miley is dazzling and, dare we say, elegant.
Selena Gomez in Atelier Versace is #8 in Top 10 best dressed:
Though she was ultimately overshadowed by another former Disney star’s antics at this year’s VMAs, Selena Gomez pulled off a more elusive feat: she looked sexy and decidedly grown-up without seeming sleazy. This Versace gown was provocative in all the right ways-with a peel-away design that exposed a corset top-and landed Gomez on the sartorial map. She expertly navigated the fine line between revealing and showing too much. Along with her sleek hair and dark makeup, Gomez isn’t hanging out on Waverly Place any longer.
Frozen is #7 on Top 10 best movies:
Princess Elsa has powers of sorcery beyond her control: she can and does cast a nuclear winter on her northern kingdom. Her sister Anna is the normal one, falling in love at the first sight of any eligible male, yet bound to confront her sister and save their realm. The first animated feature in the Walt Disney studio’s glorious history to offer two princess heroines, Frozen transforms Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Snow Queen” into a fable of modern, timeless sisterhood. For this full-musical enchantment, Writer Jennifer Lee and co-director Chris Buck tapped some of the Broadway musical’s brightest lights - composers Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez and actor-singers Idina Menzel (Elsa), Kristen Bell (Anna) and Jonathan Groff (as the gruff mountain man Kristoff) - and poured all comic inspiration into the snowman character Olaf (voiced with irrepressible enthusi-woozy-asm by The Book of Mormon’s Josh Gad). His show-stopping set piece “In Summer” provides the finest two minutes of cinema you’ll seer this year.