Adolf Hitler famously appeared on the cover of TIME magazine in 1938 as Person of the Year, as did Stalin in 1939 and 1942 and Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, proving the magazine's annual line-up isn't always highlighting a figure who shaped the year for the better.
So perhaps it’s not surprising that one of the eight finalists announced this week for this year’s TIME Person of the Year is Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, self-declared caliph and leader of Daesh (ISIS).
However, Baghdadi is facing some pretty tough competition from fellow candidates on the shortlist. Take, for example, three of his strongest adversaries: Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and Hassan Rouhani. Putin may be trying to defeat Baghdadi on the battlefield, but can he win the coveted top spot on the front cover?
And what about Trump? He seems to have mobilized the fearful masses in the US—for evidence, take your pick from a grab-bag of outlandish statements from the last week alone.
But it was also a big year for Rouhani, who sought, TIME says, "to bring his country out of pariah status and repair its sanctions-crippled economy." Caitlyn Jenner, 'Black Lives Matter' activists, Uber CEO Travis Kalanick and German Chancellor Angela Merkel are also among the finalists.
Meanwhile, Baghdadi hasn't publically appeared since last year, rumors of his death have overtaken social media more times than we can count and his estranged ex-wife has appeared more in the headlines than he has.
But as TIME says, the elusive Daesh leader "has inspired followers to both fight in his self-declared caliphate of Iraq and Syria, and also stage attacks in countries like Tunisia and France."
Unfortunately, like Hitler and Stalin years ago, that presence might end up being too big to ignore.
