Like it or not, celebrities hold extreme importance in our society. They influence everything from the clothes we wear, the things we buy, even the way we think about things (in some cases). Sometimes, the scope of a celebrity’s importance to and impact on popular culture isn’t apparent until after their death. Here is a look at eight celebrity deaths that totally changed the pop cultural landscape.
September 13 marked the 14 year anniversary of Pac’s death. To say that he had a profound impact on our culture, both in life and in death, would be an understatement. For an entire generation of hip-hop fans Pac was a revoluionary. Not was he a great rapper, but his reach went beyond rap into political clout. His passion and intellect had the potential to get people mobilized in a way that few could ever do. There’s no telling what he would’ve went on to do had he not been gunned down that fatal night in Las Vegas, but he continues to live on through his music (he has released more albums posthumously than he did when he was alive).
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The most tragic thing about Heath Ledger’s death in 2008 of an accidental overdose was that the Austalian actor’s career was just taking off. After an Oscar-nominated turn in Brokeback Mountain, Ledger was hailed as one of the big acting talents of his generation and was working towards proving that. His take on The Joker in The Dark Knight was incredible, and unfortunately we’ll never get to see what else he can do.
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Kurt Cobain was undoubtedly the voice of ‘Generation X.’ His music and persona perfectly captured the essence of the early-mid 90s – cynical, anti-corporate, etc. One can only wonder the direction he would’ve went in musically had he not taken his own life,
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Christopher Wallace a.k.a. the Notorious B.I.G. is arguably the greatest rapper to ever do it. He may have only put out two albums in his short lifetime, but with those albums he managed to set the template that every rapper follows to this day. He was a jack of all trades, and hip-hop hasn’t been the same s
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It’s often said that you have to know the horrors of the human experience in order to be an effe
