Like Austin Powers with abs, Mr. Fantasy emerged from the depths of TikTok last summer, all mop-top bob, funky teeth, and unnerving hip swivels. A pop singer with a British accent and an eye toward Hollywood, he romped through our social feeds — often shirtless, always undulating — and hip-thrusted his way into our reluctant hearts.
From day one, though, fans noticed an uncanny resemblance to the star of a similarly campy, horny TV show: New Zealand-born actor KJ Apa, who dutifully, painfully dyed his hair red for seven years to play Archie in Riverdale, a fever dream that made millennials feel funny about the comics they used to read in the grocery-store checkout line as kids.
Now, though, Apa has declared war on the foppish “fraud” at the very moment that Mr. Fantasy’s debut album, Fantasyland, shimmers on the horizon.
From Mr. Fantasy’s fateful TikTok debut to Apa’s fighting words on Instagram, here’s the complete timeline of this social media star.
Summer 2025: A Star Is Born
Mr. Fantasy burst onto the scene via TikTok on Aug. 19, 2025, with a video featuring him bobbing his bobbed head to a 2017 track by the Australian band Parcel. “Hello TikTok. Hello Los Angeles. Hello world,” he wrote by way of intro, but commenters weren’t fooled. The most-liked comment reads, “kj apa? what u doin queen.”
The posts came fast and furious after that, with Fantasy posting videos of the Hollywood Bowl and the famed Hollywood sign, with his manager, known only as “John,” behind the camera. Fans, again, played sleuth, noting that the musician’s tattoos appeared to be an exact match for Apa’s.
In late August, Fantasy released his self-titled debut single, dropping the accompanying video at the top of September. Synth-flecked and funky, neither the song nor the video play coy. “I can be your Mr. Fantasy/I see you looking my way,” he croons, while, in the video, he thrusts and pirouettes in a short bathrobe, tie-dyed Speedos, and a plethora of snazzy suits.
“Oh, did Jughead accidentally reset the universe again?” queried one commenter, referring, once again, to Riverdale and its propensity for mind-bending plot twists.
Whether it was penned by Apa or some Brit with possessed hips, the song soon took off. It has topped the Global Viral 50 Spotify chart and has over 10 million streams.
Fall 2025: Don’t Rain on His Parade
Those Johnny Come Latelies known as the media finally caught Mr. Fantasy fever following several weeks of TikTok fervor, and Mr. Fantasy started doing interviews — all fielded by the mysterious John. Prior to a chat with The Hollywood Reporter, John ominously informed the journalist that “the ‘silly actor boy TJ Apple’ [should] not be brought up” during the interview. So the writer gamely played it straight.
Mr. Fantasy was inspired to seek a career in Hollywood due to his grandmother, he told THR. “That’s where the story begins because she is my reason, and she fostered this gift that I had been given by the gods to create music.”
He decided to cross the pond, he said, “because America is this place, this magical place, where somehow, for some reason, you can be completely who you want to be. Any version of yourself seems to be accepted. … I mean, look at how many stars were made here. James Franco, for example, came to Los Angeles to pursue this dream, and I’m just another artist who’s out here doing his thing.”
He goes on to extoll the talents of Franco myriad times, for some reason.
As for his message? “Love. That’s really the main ingredient, and it’s not a conscious thing that I’m trying to concoct. It just sort of seeps out of me, like some kind of strange liquid. But that’s where the music comes from, it’s very natural.”
In October, he continued to spread that message with “Wayuwanna,” which my ace reading comprehension skills tell me could be about… sex? In the video, he sings about being “hot to trot” in a castle, as one does. Around that time, he joined Tinder, presumably on a quest to find someone to have sex in a castle with.
On Nov. 27, though, Mr. Fantasy was introduced to the world — and my nine-year-old niece — during the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, where he undulated once more to his signature song, this time on a pirate ship populated by children. My niece’s review? “That was weird.”
He followed up that triumph the following day with “Catapult,” in which he shimmied in somehow even shorter shorts — and a sports car that can drive on water, much like Jesus.
This Means War: Spring 2026
Things were looking up for Mr. Fantasy at the top of 2026 — he has a real PR person now (they’ve sent me emails!), and thus announced the premiere of his debut album, Fantasyland, due out on June 26.
Then, on May 1, he premiered his new single and video, “Do Me Right,” with much fanfare — and a truly dizzying array of guest stars, including Alex Warren, Camila Mendes, Cody Simpson, Daniel Seavey, Dave Franco, Derek Hough, Frank Grillo, Isiah Hilt, Jimmy Tatro, Justice Smith, Kiernan Shipka, Lili Reinhart, Madelaine Petsch, Neal McDonough, Nick Jonas, Patrick Schwarzenegger, Pete Berg, Rob Lowe, Rufus Sewell, Sombr, Tyler Posey, and Zoey Deutch.
Eagle-eyed fans noted that the video — which sees Mr. Fantasy cavorting on horses, skates, and the beach — also included appearances from several Riverdale cast members.
Apa, it seems, took note. On May 6, he took to Instagram to address the resemblance between him and Mr. Fantasy for the first time, alleging that the mop-top is “hurting me and my career.”
He continued, “There was recently a music video that was released that included a bunch of people who are really close to me by a guy who’s completely and utterly stolen my image and misappropriated my image and my likeness, and I think we all know who we’re talking about, and it’s fucked up.”
He continued in this vein: “This person advocates for positivity and for kindness and for all of this stuff. Look in the mirror and tell yourself that you’re not a fucking liar and a thief, because that’s exactly what you are.”
This video appeared mere days after I asked his publicist, point-blank, if Apa would like to reveal himself as Mr. Fantasy exclusively in the pages of Rolling Stone. I am not so vain as to think I was the impetus for the Instagram video, but his publicist didn’t respond to multiple followups. Your move, KJ… er, Mr. Fantasy.
‘Karma’s a Bitch’: Boy George on Why Culture Club Recreated Their Biggest Hit With AI
More than 40 years after its original release, Boy George and Culture Club have rerecorded their chart-topping hit, “Karma Chameleon,” using AI to recreate the vocal characteristics of the original 1983 recording. Alongside digital formats, the release will be available on vinyl in red, gold and green, the colors referenced in the song, featuring reimagined cover art. The rerecord marks the launch of Artist Included, a music technology company co-founded by Boy George’s manager, Paul Kemsley, and entertainment attorney and film producer Jeremy Rosen. Boy George serves as creative director.
Asked why he decided to recreate the song, Boy George has a simple answer: “Control!,” he tells Rolling Stone. “Having some say over where it goes. ‘Karma Chameleon’ is a secret weapon. It’s a song you starve the audience for because they want to hear it, and live, it’s always been a real pleasure to sing it. But in terms of what it does commercially, it’s like having something really powerful with your name on it, and you have no say about where it goes.”
The idea for the rerecord was prompted by a commercial sync license for “Karma Chameleon” involving Richard Branson for Virgin Voyages. Culture Club signed to Branson’s Virgin Records in 1982, and Boy George has maintained a close relationship with the entrepreneur ever since. According to Kemsley, Branson paid approximately $4 million for the deal ($2 million of which went to the master recording rights holders), while Boy George received only an appearance fee because he has never owned the masters for his biggest song.
“Karma’s a bitch,” Boy George states. “When we wrote that song, we weren’t looking 40 years ahead. We weren’t thinking of longevity. That song, because of the context of when it was recorded, the social feeling has stayed with people. It’s become part of people’s lives. Having control over it again, to a certain extent, is very exciting.”
The rerecord has a warmer vocal tone and sits slightly lower in the mix than the original, but is faithful enough to it that it plays like a remaster. The rerecording was produced by JJ Blair and Culture Club’s guitarist Roy Hay with additional production by song’s original producer, Steve Levine. Prior to the session, the AI was trained using archival demos licensed from Levine who had preserved them for decades. The instrumentation was newly recorded by Hay, Culture Club bassist Mikey Craig and session musicians. Only the vocal performance is AI-assisted.
“When I went into the studio to record it, I was like a pub singer imitating myself,” says Boy George. “You listen to where you pace things [sings the first line of ‘Karma Chameleon’]. You listen to where you put the voice: in your nose or your throat or chest. What you do instinctively as a 22-year-old, you don’t do as a 40-year-old or a 65-year-old. There’s a clipped way of singing it, which you forget through playing it live so many times. It was very European-sounding and youthful. I’ve taken it somewhere much more blues-y over the years, dragging out the notes. It’s about the nuance. When you sing something live over 40 years, it changes shape. It’s interesting to take it back to the original recording and recapture that feeling.”
Getting close to the original vocal is a hurdle for most musicians whose voices change over time. It took 18 months for Artist Included’s AI to work out the kinks. In the first iteration, Boy George sounded like “Pinky and Perky, two pigs on helium in a cartoon,” says Kemsley, referring to a children’s television series where the titular characters sing in high-pitched, fast-paced voices. The technology is now refined, and the plan is to rerecord Culture Club’s and Boy George’s entire back catalogs. Kemsley claims this will take two weeks, or as long as it takes Boy George to sing every song.
“I was a naysayer,” admits Boy George. “I was like, ‘This will never work.’ But I actually prefer this version [of ‘Karma Chameleon’]. For me, as the person that sang it originally, and re-sang it, what I love about this version, it has the sound of that time, but the warmth and experience and integrity of everything I’ve learned in my life.”
Kemsley, who has managed Boy George since 2014, frames the project as an attempt to rebalance longstanding industry economics. “This record has been making millions of dollars for [almost] 45 years, and George hasn’t,” says Kemsley. “The whole thing seems terribly unjust. You sign your life away at the age of 22, then have to wait 35 years to get the reversions, but you still don’t get any master recording income. Over the years, bands try to get their masters back and they never get them, with the major labels claiming they are work-for-hire.”
To put this in context, a record company often owns or controls master recording rights, a term stipulated when it signs an artist. That covers the music; the lyrics and composition are an entirely separate right known as publishing, which, by contrast, follows the composition, and therefore the song through every new recording. As a result, rerecords create a new master recording, and can benefit publishing by re-engaging the artist and generating renewed interest in the underlying work.
When it comes to rerecords, many artists are restricted to a certain length of time during which they are forbidden from releasing a new, faithful version to the original. Longstanding artists sometimes use Section 203 of the U.S. Copyright Act to reclaim rights to their masters after 35 years. They are rarely successful, as record companies often argue the masters were created as work made for hire.
The way Artist Included is structured, the artist receives the lion’s share of revenue. “The industry I was in no longer exists,” Boy George points out. “Artists like me are expected to carry on following that model. I haven’t done that for years. I used to say I’m the only person who realizes the ‘80s are over. You want to keep the spirit of that moment to some extent, but you move on. AI is not going anywhere, so having that conversation is exciting. And being ahead of the game in terms of how people use it, is also quite exciting for me.”
Considering Culture Club’s acrimonious split with their former drummer, Jon Moss, which resulted in a hefty settlement, rerecords of their songs also have the benefit of bypassing the need for his approval to use the original master recordings, which have four-way songwriting credit between its members.
“He still gets something from it,” clarifies Boy George. “Jon is a part of what we did [originally as a band].” But Kemsley is quick to point out that Moss is not a part of what they’re doing now with the rerecords, and is not entitled to any percentage of it. The band will see an increase in publishing, and as a credited songwriter, Moss will continue to receive publishing income, while the new master revenues do not involve him.
The next song queued up for rerecord is another signature Culture Club hit, “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me,” and Artist Included’s AI is primed, having retained Boy George’s voice for training purposes. The company has also been in conversations with publishing companies and other artists, mainly from the Eighties and Nineties, though no names are being disclosed yet. Kemsley says the conversations have not been a hard sell.
“People will react to what they see and hear,” says Boy George. “It’s much more powerful when people see it released and see what can happen.”
Kemsley notes Boy George turns 65 the day before the release of the new “Karma Chameleon,” which is the retirement age in the UK. “We’re not retiring,” Kemsley clarifies. “Far from it. We’re going back to the beginning, and we’re going to do it all again. We’re going to change the way revenue flows through to the artist. And we’re going to have some real fun with it.”