Rio De Janeiro Carnival: Festivities Return To Brazil With Pomp And Splendor After Covid Hiatus. IN PICS

After years of delays and cancellations caused by COVID-19, Brazil's world-famous festival returns in full force.

Rio de Janeiro Carnival 2023

The world's largest carnival, which officially began on Friday, reached a climax with an all-night procession competition Sunday and Monday, with sparkling floats, thunderous music, and thousands of singers, drummers, and dancers dressed in scant, feather-covered costumes. (Image Source: Getty)

Rio de Janeiro's legendary carnival parades began Sunday with a swirl of glitter, sequins, and samba, the conclusion of the festival's first full-fledged iteration since Covid-19 and Brazil's highly disputed elections. (Image Source: Getty)

The world's largest carnival, which officially began on Friday, reached its peak party level at the all-night parade competition Sunday and Monday, with sparkling floats, pounding music, and thousands of singers, drummers, and dancers in scant, feather-covered costumes. (Image Source: Getty)

Mayor Eduardo Paes proclaimed the party open on Friday, delivering the key to the city to "King Momo," the cheery "monarch" who "rules" Rio for the four-day extravaganza. (Image Source: Getty)

The event came after two pandemic-affected carnivals and a divisive presidential election in October, in which veteran leftist Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva defeated incumbent Jair Bolsonaro, an ultra-conservative carnival critic accused of authoritarianism. (Image Source: Getty)

Rio de Janeiro cancelled carnival in 2021 and held a scaled-back version last year, prohibiting massive street gatherings known as "blocos" and delaying parades by two months due to the pandemic, which has claimed almost 700,000 lives in Brazil. (Image Source: Getty)

The samba schools, the pride of Rio's impoverished favelas, spend months putting together the costumes and building the extravagant floats that are the parades' characteristics – in actuality, massive presentations that tell a tale on a chosen topic, as per reports. (Image Source: Getty)

During the Bolsonaro government, the parades were frequently politically contentious, with barely veiled criticism of the far-right government over problems such as racism, religious intolerance, environmental degradation, and Brazil's disastrous management of Covid-19. (Image Source: Getty)