In late February 2024, TikTok user @reesamteesa posted a 50-part series spanning over six hours about her experience meeting, dating, marrying and divorcing a pathological liar. The massive playlist called “Who TF Did I Marry?!?” has gained over hundreds of millions of views and Tareasa Johnson, known as Reesa Teesa, has gained national attention for her story.
“Who TF Did I Marry?!?” had users riveted, abandoning their For You feed to scroll through the hours of content Reesa created. The simple video format of the storytime mirrored the experience of a FaceTime call, giving the entire playlist a far more intimate and real feeling. Recaps, livestreams and stitches made by other platform users only helped to boost the story and get more watchers invested. Earlier this month, Reesa even made an appearance on Good Morning America talking about her experience in the spotlight.
The 50-part series is told by Reesa, in chronological order starting in early 2020 when she first met “Legion,” a nickname she gave the “pathological liar.” Shortly after the two met on an online dating site, they moved in together for the start of quarantine in Reesa’s Clayton County home. One year later, Legion and Reesa were wed before filing for divorce in 2021 after Reesa started to uncover the many lies Legion had been feeding her. From his big-time ‘job’ to his Social Security number to even his family members and previous marriages, Reesa unveils all of Legion’s known lies in great detail that had watchers at the edge of their seats.
TikTok, like many social media apps, is an addictive form of entertainment. Its short-form video format allows users and creators to capture, comment and repost memorable and funny moments. However, the TikTok algorithm is far more advanced than competing social media sites, tailored for the user experience and allowing even the smallest of stories to go viral.
The TikTok set-up allows for more than just the simple short video experience associated with Musical.ly and Vine. By expanding the video time limit to 10 minutes, TikTok allows users such as Reesa to tell more long-form stories. The ability to create playlists for your published videos gives users easy access to the entire narrative instead of just one chapter, allowing them to keep scrolling and enjoying many videos on the same topic. Users can experience everything from old Vine revivals to entire scenes from popular movies to even whole episodes of their favorite childhood cartoons. Why spend time searching for a show on Prime Video, Netflix or Hulu when you can scroll through the entire world’s catalog on one free app? When they get sick of scrolling, users can even hop onto a creator’s live stream instead!
According to a research article published in Frontiers in Psychology, TikTok users “seem to be caught in an entertainment spiral.” With every scroll, users experience the dopamine effect, almost like a shot of happiness. This prompts users to continue using the app, creating that “entertainment spiral” that is biologically extremely difficult to escape from.
Not only does TikTok provide a space for dance challenges, movies broken into 179 parts and story times, it also provides spaces for fandoms to explore new theories, for scientists to break down cool and exciting facts and for readers to give their honest book reviews. The app holds a wealth of knowledge and entertainment each user barely scratches the surface of, and the idea that the next video down may have just what a user is craving only fuels the cycle. But is the app itself bad?
TikTok, like many other social media apps, is a hub of creativity and innovation. As trends take off and creators add their own spin on old ideas, the app becomes more and more captivating. Just think of the revival of the adult swim trend. The community aspect of TikTok, encouraged through comments, duets and stitches is also valuable, as the world loses more and more places for people to connect with each other.
As the user and creator bases on TikTok grow, so will the types of content and production value seen on the social media app. Everything from short films to brownie recipes to political campaign videos can be found on this app — there’s something for everyone. And as TikTok continues to perfect its system and algorithm, we can be sure to see and enjoy more moments such as Reesa’s viral story — for better or for worse.
