Long before she was MJ, Athena, or an Emmy winner, Zendaya was a cheerful young kid who followed in the footsteps of other Disney star kids by starting her own vlogging channel. She uploaded her very first video on November 28, 2010.
It was a short, sweet clip where she introduced herself and welcomed all the “happy smiley faces” to her little corner of the internet.
The very next day, on November 29, she was back with a follow-up. This one had a more practical mission. She listed her official website, her YouTube handle, and her Twitter account, so fans could tell her real pages apart from the fake ones already floating around.
Both videos are pure Disney-kid energy. They were bubbly, polished, and endlessly upbeat. And years later, Zendaya herself could not get through them without cringing at them.
Zendaya Critiqued Her Former Persona as a Fake Disney Kid
In a July 2017 video, Zendaya sat down with her assistant, Darnell Appling, and pulled up a few of her very first videos. It clearly wasn’t a nostalgic trip down memory lane, as she couldn’t stand her younger self. What followed was a very public roast.
Before hitting play, she gave some context. She explained that as a kid, she felt she had to build a persona that was very similar to her hit Disney Channel character. She shared, “When I was little, like when I was younger, I genuinely felt that I had to make a persona that like matched Rocky, which is the character that I used to play.” She played Rocky Blue in Shake It Up, which ran from 2010 to 2013.
Watching that first video back, she admitted she had been running an “entire alter ego” at the time, and she did not hold back on how “obnoxious” she found the whole thing. Then came the part she found hardest to defend.
Zendaya recalled that she believed by building a brand around relentless positivity and smiling, she would earn Disney’s love. She shared, “I seriously thought I was a f**king mogul because I was like, ‘Yo, this sh*t is so smart. I’m about to create this whole brand about positive, smiling sh*t—Disney’s going to love this.'”
Zendaya further shared that she needed to delete those videos because it was “so fake.” She even shared that she understood exactly why people found her annoying back then.
Zendaya Has Gone From Child Star to One of Hollywood’s Biggest Stars
Zendaya’s fake-it-till-you-make-it strategy worked because she ended up becoming one of the biggest Hollywood stars today. Zendaya closed out her Disney chapter with K.C. Undercover before joining Marvel as Peter Parker’s love interest, MJ, in Spider-Man: Homecoming.
She then tore up her old image entirely with Euphoria, winning an Emmy for Rue and becoming the youngest person ever to take that category. She became a franchise favorite when she joined as Chani in the Dune movies, completing the pivot from her Disney roles.
2026 has been her loudest year yet. She opened with A24’s The Drama opposite Robert Pattinson in April, then returned as Rue for Euphoria‘s third and final season. In July, she was part of two blockbuster box-office releases. She appeared in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, followed two weeks later by Spider-Man: Brand New Day.
She is also set to appear in Dune: Part Three on December 18. She is also being paid like a proper A-lister. Her turn as the goddess Athena in The Odyssey adds up to only a few minutes of screen time, but The Tab reports she walked away with an estimated $5 million for it.
What do you think of Zendaya’s old videos? Were they cute or cringe? Let us know in the comments below!
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