Taylor Swift – “I Knew You Were Trouble”

  We start things off with Taylor passed out on the ground somewhere, at sunrise, with what looks like a violated roll of toilet paper near her head, so things already look very exciting. Taylor awakens from her impromptu slumber and we learn a couple of things: one, she’s been napping among the debris from a probable outdoor concert,  and two, she kind of looks like Gwyneth Paltrow when she was going through that “there’s no such thing as too much mascara” phase.

  As Taylor arises from her near-death experience and shakes he her head so we can better study her Avril Lavigne tribute-hairdo, she starts getting flashbacks to the evil concert where people apparently left her behind as a parting gift for the cleaning staff. We don’t learn much from the jump-cut footage (it’s night, and happy people are bouncing to a beat) so Taylor decides she would understand things better if she stood up. So she does, in a slow, tortured way, because Taylor is an artist and realizes that things are more emotional if you do them slowly.

  Speaking of artistry, Taylor has decided to do a nice voice-over before we rush into the actual song, some spoken-word poetry about the end of a relationship, poorly-considered choices, how blame should be shared because that makes better song lyrics, and the benefits of having extremely straight hair. While she does this, we get more flashes from her past, a “kaleidoscope of memories”, about meeting her latest beau and the various points at which she should have just changed the channel or read a book instead.

  Apparently she met this man (we’ll call him Dex) while she and several girls were standing around in some dive of a place where people work on cars with questionable ownership papers. (Red flag number one, right?) Taylor lets us know that Dex had bad mojo from the first glimpse she had of him impersonating one of Johnny Depp’s movie roles, but that she just couldn’t help herself once he glanced her way. (Red flag number two: Just because someone looks at you doesn’t mean that you should sleep with him. He might just be needing directions to his parole officer’s house.)

  Taylor continues with her voice-over for quite some time (something else that Gwyneth Paltrow thinks there can’t be too much of, especially in her movies), letting us know that Dex really won her heart, she just didn’t know about some of the unsavory side effects of that victory. (This is accompanied by images of Dex standing up in a car when he should be driving it, recreating adrenaline-fueled moments from the Rocky movies while Taylor looks on, both terrified and horny.)

  Then we have a questionable bit where Taylor blames the devil for arranging that she should manage to hook up with a naughty-boy angel. I’m no religious expert, but I seriously doubt that Beelzebub had anything to do with you playing fast and furious with Johnny Depp’s stand-in. Hormones and self-validation and the never-can-rule-out possibility of daddy issues? We can leave those on the blame checklist, but I think we can let Satan have a timeout on this one. He’s got bigger fish to fry, like making sure that Republicans keep inexplicably winning elections.

  Anyway, the song proper finally kicks in around the two-minute mark, and we’re back to images of Taylor and Dex having a real festive time playing around on train tracks (red flag three), eating lunch at places where apparently something on the menu makes them scream with laughter and annoy everyone around them, more of Dex holding the car steering wheel with his knees while Taylor both gasps and tingles in her special places, some kissing, some sharing of hats, and romantic moments on the iron balconies of unnamed apartments in the meat-packing district.

  Meanwhile, Morning-After Taylor is still wandering around the deserted concert venue, tripping over empty energy-drink cans and glow sticks and interestingly warbling the bit about “you found me” even though no one has or she still wouldn’t be there. Then we’re back to the couple in the few hours that they were happy together, with more bar-hopping, kissing while standing on diner tables, and some presumed sex in a seedy room where simply walking by the bed can result in an STD.

  Oh, and we also have a separate montage of Taylor and her hair fretting about whether or not she’s doing the right thing, as they both stare into dirty mirrors and lean against dirty walls. She’s sensing “trouble, trouble, trouble” but it’s not clear if she’s referring to Johnny Dex, the fact that everywhere her beau takes her needs a good scrubbing, the fact that Dex would prefer to play his guitar despite her doing the splits in the air above the bed where he is laying and ignoring her (flag four), or the voice mail from her accountant questioning certain expenses at a tattoo parlor.

  Then the couple is headed into a nightclub, and we know there’s going to be a misunderstanding because Taylor has brushed her hair and Dex hasn’t. Sure enough, while an unnamed band performs a song that is not on the soundtrack, Dex appears to get extremely violent with his dancing. I don’t believe anyone actually gets hurt, but couture has been damaged, and that’s even worse.

  Another bit with Taylor and her hair singing to the dirty mirror, and then she and Dex are back in that seedy room where sex is no longer on the table, with both of them glaring at each other in that way of couples being mad but no one is saying anything so they get even madder. Taylor shows her dissatisfaction by curling up in a chair, looking despondent,  and Dex shows his by taking off his shirt and flexing his pecs, looking pleased with his musculature but not much else.

  Next up is another bar (Surprise! Flag five.), with Taylor and Dex wandering in, and everything is beautiful for roughly five seconds. Then Dex starts messing with some guys playing pool, guys you don’t want to mess with because both of them are bigger than apartments in New York City. Taylor tries to get him to knock it off, because she’s still got a few more rounds of the chorus to sing, but he doesn’t listen, and there’s an altercation involving shoving, messed-up hair, unhappiness, spilled beer, and a startling glimpse of Dex being bent over the pool table in an entry-level position. Oh?

  But we don’t go there, instead we cut to Morning-After Taylor as she sings back at the abandoned concert where no one has bothered to check on her. I guess this stretch of the song is really powerful for her, because she’s flopping around on the ground and rending her hair. But she does get points for her ability to go from lying flat-out in the dirt to kneeling on her knees without using her hands.  That girl has done some serious work with her inner core, kudos to her trainer, even if it does look kind of Lazarus-like. (“Behold, she has arisen from the rave grave!”)

  Then we have more bits with Sad-Mirror Taylor, questioning her family values, followed by another visit with Morning-After Taylor, as she emotes in the Woodstock Ruins. By the way, was the big target-symbol on her t-shirt intentional (Needy person right here. Apply within.) or just one of those music-video wardrobe choices that we never understand?

  I guess it doesn’t matter, because we cut to the concert that we’ll presume took place the night before Taylor awoke to toilet paper as her only companionship. Everyone’s having a swell time, because that’s the only time you can have when strobe-lights are involved and no one can actually see what you look like until it’s too late. During this surely drug-free experience, we have another montage of various people hooking up with people they perhaps shouldn’t pursue, but we really can’t tell who anybody is. Oh wait, yes we suddenly can tell, thanks to the light from either an exploding amp or the flare set off by someone who stupidly ordered the nachos and is trying to warn others. Dex’s tongue appears to be doing a geological study of a woman’s face, someone who clearly isn’t Taylor.

  Uh oh.

  Taylor takes one look (okay, a very long look, to heighten the dramatic effect) at that mess and then runs off to sing to the dirty mirror again. Dex doesn’t run anywhere, content with where his tongue currently is and where it soon might be.

  Then Taylor rushes out of the tawdry restroom and collapses on the ground, because you aren’t feeling any real pain unless you are inspired to drop to the earth like Scarlet O’Hara in Gone with the Windbag. We get a final montage of all the trouble in Taylor’s life (well, the main trouble, anyway), including a quick bit where we see Dex seeing that Taylor is face-down in the mosh pit, but he just grins and heads off to suck face with the next woman who might write a hit song about him. And pay his bills.

  Final shot is of Morning-After Taylor ripping off the necklace that Dex presumably gave her during those thirty seconds when they were actually in love, and then she hurls the tainted jewelry to the ground, next to the ghost of Scarlet O’Hara, a burnt-out glow stick, and some tossed-aside bean dip that no one should ever eat.

  White flag. Number one.

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Taylor Swift - "We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together"

  We start out with a shot of a city skyline, which could be anywhere from Ontario to one of those previously-backwoods places that suddenly got skyscrapers and wi-fi overnight due to the passing of tax-evasion laws. Then the camera kind of tilts in a weird way and we find ourselves looking into the retro-chic apartment of Taylor, as she looks a little bit sad and wears both a ponytail and some pajamas that scream “wardrobe decision based on possible product tie-in with Target”.

  Then we have to forget about the questionable pajamas because it’s time for Taylor to sing, and she launches into the opening of the song where she expresses dissatisfaction with how her boyfriend, or at least her one-night-stand, has been acting lately. To make sure that we understand she is serious, Taylor, in the midst of some nicely-dramatic hand gestures, dons a pair of geeky glasses. (So she’s aiming for the science-fair teens now? As if there aren’t already 40 billion hormonally-wrecked young males out there praying for the chance to be the next teardrop on her guitar.)

  Taylor, unnecessary glasses firmly in place, marches into another room of her habitat where she confronts the apparent loser of a boyfriend. He seems incredibly hot, which might explain some of her poor decision-making in the past, but he’s obviously done something dumb-ass or she wouldn’t have written a song about him. She sends him out the front door, with more hand gestures, probably because it’s about time for the super-perky chorus and we don’t need no scrubs when it comes to that.

  Banished Hot Guy doesn’t immediately go away once kicked out, instead choosing to stand outside the door and peek through a full-length plate of glass that someone has conveniently designed into the apartment for dramatic purposes. His expression indicates that he clearly doesn’t understand why his natural hotness isn’t enough for a relationship, a misunderstanding that affects many young men who grow up in red states where boys are taught that having a penis trumps everything.

  Then things get a little cray-cray.

  Taylor marches into her living room (I’m just guessing that’s what room it is, her apartment seems to have some time-space reality issues) where she encounters a band composed of people dressed like animals and Venetian royalty from the 1600’s. (I have no idea.) Instead of calling 9-1-1 about this discovery like a normal person, Taylor joins the furry and feathered gathering and proceeds to dance with them. I obviously missed something somewhere about this song that would make a video director think “okay, this is where we need woodland creatures and a World Wildlife Fund tribute”.

  But it gets even better. One of the animal-people, I’m not sure if he’s supposed to be a bear or a jacked-up panda or what, seems super invested in the supposed role that he is playing. He’s bopping around with a hyperactive grin big enough to swallow Newark whole. His enthusiasm is so mesmerizing that Taylor is shoved out of the scene so the cameraman can focus on the dude with an obvious history of recreational drug-usage.

  Happily, we cut away from that mess and focus on a vintage TV where Taylor is singing, because you can’t turn over a rock anywhere on the planet and not find her. Then the TV and a section of wall slide out of view, since you can do that when your Old McDonald apartment is not real anyway, and we see Taylor wearing a modified L’il Abner outfit (was Dolly Parton a consultant on this?) sitting at a table with Hot Guy, who is wearing headphones and listening to an actual vinyl record (is it 1982?). And what’s up with the coffee cup plunked at a place where no one is sitting? I’m starting to think there are multiple reasons for this relationship hitting another brick in the wall.

  Then Taylor, after singing the line where she disses indie records, (not gonna get any fans from that bit of lyric, just sayin’) leaps up from the table and answers a phone on the wall, which leads to a conversation  with… well, the Hot Guy that was just sitting across from her two seconds ago. He’s now in a nightclub where an army of Janeane Garofalo look-alikes are desperately wanting to have his baby (these things happen), but Taylor doesn’t care, even if the Janeanes are wearing the same glasses she just wore during the opening of the song. She slams the phone down and runs off to another room in her Twilight Zone apartment.

  Brief transition scene where we see that the Odd Animal People are also in the Janeane Garofalo Bar, playing instruments and seeming very satisfied with their furry outfits and importance to society. This could possibly explain how the Tea Party continues to exist despite the obvious insanity of the members. Not sure, I’ll keep you updated with my findings.

  Cut to Taylor and Hot Guy riding in a car that appears to have been made out of… I don’t know what. That is not a normal car, with shades of The Flintstones or some such. Taylor and HG are having yet another argument in the front seat (is anyone surprised at that?), but then the car turns to the left and we can see that the back of the not-right car is a pickup truck where we have lots more of those furry band members who have clearly not been advised of the dangers of adding too much sugar to your cereal bowl while watching cartoons on a Saturday morning.

  And, of course, we have Weird Panda Man front and center, bouncing around with glee like somebody just found his prostate. But you can’t write off his little friends, either, because the whole Truck-bed Band is far more excited than any humans or cognitively-aware creatures should be whilst playing musical instruments as Taylor Swift ponders relationship evaluations. The happiness they are expressing is just not natural, unless one of your parents mated with a Care Bear.

  And we cut again, this time to Taylor and Hot Guy heading into some forest where it was important that a low-paid set designer should scribble “Happy Days” on a giant heart that the bickering couple could walk through to get to the next scene. The duo seems to be quite content at the moment, but then Taylor suddenly runs off to a conveniently-nearby bed where she can pick up a phone and diss about how Hot Guy is not proving to be a satisfactory partner, as she and her golden tresses sprawl near a Benetton monkey. (And just who is she talking to? Hillary Clinton?)

  Doesn’t matter, because Taylor throws the phone down (a servant can pick that up later) and we transition to another room where Weird Panda Man is once again given the spotlight (has he signed a contract with Simon Cowell yet?) before we pan over the other occupants of this room. It’s a mix of real people and pretend animal people (there’s one guy dressed as a squirrel who bounces a lot, this could mean a lot of things in many ways), but Taylor is up in the grill so I’m sure she had some kind of vision in mind.

  Taylor dances with her furry homies for quite some time, along with some un-costumed folks who might have been pulled out of the line of people waiting to get into the David Letterman show, and everyone seems to be having a good time. (Including the now completely-annoying Panda Man who clearly read too many self-affirmation pamphlets as a child.)

  Then I guess the doorbell rings, because Taylor heads toward the front door and throws it open, which is not something you should instinctively do in urban environments. Turns out that her gentleman caller is Hot Guy (because that type of guy doesn’t give up, the penis thing and all), but Taylor is having none of it, especially if he’s not bringing pizzas to feed the mystifying pretend zoo in her living room. She slams the door and marches into another special room in her apartment, one where the cast of The Wizard of Oz is now doing a line dance, and she perches herself near a window where she can affirm that we are never getting back together. Then the camera does another odd movement and we revert to the original shot of the anonymous city skyline.

  Meanwhile, in the other room, Weird Panda Man is exchanging numbers with a zookeeper sporting especially large biceps. (Two nearby people dressed as gorillas agree to be Best Man and Cater Waiter at the wedding.) I’m sure Taylor will keep us updated on what happened after that on her next single, “Well, I Thought We Were Never Getting Back Together But Then The Jacked-Up Panda Showed Up And I’m A Little Confused”…

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Taylor Swift - “Back To December”

We start with some guy trudging out of the woods in some small town. He’s bundled up and there’s snow on the ground, so we’ll have to assume it’s December, just like the title. He looks kind of sad, but that might be because the director decided to shoot somewhere cold instead of the Bahamas where all the cool rappers make videos. Cut to Taylor, wearing shabby chic clothing in what might be her house, also looking sad, so I’m guessing we won’t be seeing any dance routines any time soon.

Taylor warbles for a bit, glancing around her house like she’s really sad about her decorating choices, then we cut back to the guy (let’s call him Joe Dean, just because) walking along a street, still with the sadness. Back to Taylor, sitting on her bed and still sad. Back to Joe Dean, with a close-up of his eyes, still sad. Back to Taylor… well, at this point it’s very clear that neither of them are very happy or have bothered to wash their hair lately.

Now Joe Dean is sitting in the bleachers at a football field. We should probably tell him that there’s not an actual game going on, but he’s hunched over like he ate some bad nachos from the concession stand and he probably needs some alone time. Oh look, Taylor is hunched over in her bedroom as well. This must be one of those towns where you really shouldn’t eat anything.

Then Joe Dean is on the move again, trudging along in the snow in that meandering way that misunderstood boys have, then he’s back in the bleachers, trying to get warm. (At this point we have to assume that the local school system is not really preparing its students well, if they don’t understand about going inside when its cold.) Then he hops up and heads across an empty baseball field, where there still aren’t any games being played. I’m afraid life is going to be very difficult and confusing for Joe Dean.

Meanwhile, Taylor is still shuffling about her house, singing and all, but never putting on some shoes or finding a better sweater to wear. She decides to take a bath, but this doesn’t really help much, probably because she forgets to take off her support garments before doing so. Then it starts to snow inside her house. This is the part where I would start to question the wisdom of remaining in that house, but Taylor doesn’t seem to mind the snowfall and keeps singing.

Joe Dean is walking around in the snow again, but I’m starting to not care about his activities, since he’s not managed to go anywhere interesting. At least Taylor has more things to do, like staring out windows and bathing, even if the weather is jacked up in her house. As if to prove her versatility, Taylor picks up a tablet and starts scribbling something. Joe Dean keeps just walking. To nowhere. See? Who would you pick to follow? That’s what I thought.

I think the camera man agrees with us, because we spend a long series of shots with just Taylor, as she wanders around her house, fiddling with water glasses and ignoring the indoor snowstorm. (The snow is piling up on things like furniture and fireplace mantles, so it’s kind of hard for folks to ignore, but Taylor is a professional, having been on the CMA’s a hundred times and all.)

There’s a bit where she sinks lower in her bathtub, probably not a good sign, but she seems to be staring at a snow-dusted stuffed bunny nearby, so we know she’ll probably be just fine since bunnies like to save people and be cute. Then we see Taylor back on her bed, scribbling on her pad and wearing that oversized sweater from The Gap (available in a rainbow of colors!) so the bunny apparently did it’s job and Taylor will be able to release more singles.

Joe Dean, of course, is still just walking around and looking displeased with everything.

Long montage of Taylor getting a little angsty about her sweater sleeves being too long (honey, just roll them up, I think the snow everywhere is a bigger issue), then she seems to have an issue with being able to keep the sweater on one of her shoulders. Perhaps Taylor should just find another sweater, ya think?

Joe Dean, walking.

Taylor, posing in various positions in her house, not walking, still troubled.

Brief shot of Joe Dean with his head stuck to a telephone pole. (No idea.)

Finally, after managing to look anguished in every room of her house, Taylor pauses on her staircase long enough to shove her apparently-finished letter into a leather jacket that just happens to be lying on a nearby step. Cut to Joe Dean in a car (where the hell did that come from?), where he gazes at an unrelated jacket, then he hops out and starts walking somewhere again. I really don’t understand this boy.

Taylor sings for a bit, still not properly attired, then we see Joe Dean back in those bleachers. He suddenly pulls out Taylor’s note from one of his coat pockets. He seems to be surprised at finding it (despite having had his hands in his coat pockets throughout most of the video), and even more surprised by what the letter says. Then he jumps up and starts walking somewhere again. Fade to black.

Do the people in this town just not have phones? Sure would save on the aimless wandering and extended time spent wearing sweaters that don’t fit. Just sayin.


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John Mayer, Taylor Swift - “Half Of My Heart”

  We start out with John wandering into a cocktail bar, mixed with quick glimpses of what might be a church. While John presumably swigs a beverage, he fiddles with a boutonniere and then tosses it aside. (Maybe he doesn’t care for baby’s breath.) Quick shot of a tiny flower girl, and then suddenly John is in another room with strange décor, strumming his guitar that he apparently had in his back pocket.

  John sings for a bit, with the camera showing that, yep, that’s really him playing. Another shot of the flower girl doing something, then back to John in the bar, singing to himself in the mirror. He may not like little flower buds in his buttonhole, but he sure doesn’t mind studying his reflection.

  Back to this church, where it becomes clear that people are getting frustrated waiting for someone to show up at a wedding. We’ll have to assume it’s John, because everyone else seems to be there: a bride, a secretly-lustful bridesmaid, a best man, and at least two women who look like they could fill the role of bitter mother-in-law. Back to John singing and playing and not showing up.

  Cut to somebody wiping “Just Married!” off of a car window, but not really doing a very good job because they’re just smearing the shoe polish around. John’s still in the bar, proving in one scene that he’s a ventriloquist, and in another scene that he can drink while either sitting down or standing up, whichever makes us more happy. More shots of disgruntled people leaving the church, possibly calling people named Guido to come put a cap in John’s self-indulgent ass.

  John continues to play his guitar in that one room with the outer-space thing on the wall and the weirdly-carved wooden screen. These things are totally distracting and they really need to get rid of them. Does John not understand that if we’re looking at the props in confusion then we’re not looking at him?

  People are still leaving the church, which is also starting to get a little old. Everyone’s very pretty, yes, but they’re still just people leaving a church. I think we all understand that nobody will be getting to throw rice. Let’s do something else for a bit, shall we? Wait. The best man just made a smirk that no one else could see. Interesting. Okay, which one of them is he sleeping with?

  John’s not telling. He just wants to play his guitar in the poorly-decorated lobby of the Chinese buffet restaurant. Oh, and he wants to drink, too. We keep going back to that as well.

  Now we have the bride packing up her wedding dress and shoving it back in a box, while the bridesmaid looks a little peevish, irritated that her friend got to wear something so sparkly and she didn’t. They’re both wearing rubber bracelets, so they probably really liked Madonna back in the day, before she got super-famous and started buying entire countries.

  Cut to the best man showing up in the bar, so it’s apparently not the first time that John either drank or avoided a matrimonial procession. He spies his buddy and wanders over. (The other John is still playing a selection for the all-you-can-eat diners waiting for a table.) The best man doesn’t stay long or even order anything, instead patting John on the shoulder and preparing to leave.

  Once the pointless visit from his friend is over, John pulls out a piece of paper with the words “I can’t stop loving you” scrawled on it. We aren’t sure who may have scribbled this (did John write it to his mirror image?) but it cues Taylor Swift to start singing her bit of the song. John then wanders out of the bar. We don’t see him leave a tip, so he’s one of those people.

  He walks down the street for a while, singing, interspersed with images of someone dropping flower petals. Turns out that those hands belong to the petite flower girl. The wedding may have been cancelled, but she’s still going to perform her floral distribution duties, damn it. Nobody puts the baby in a corner!

  John continues to sing to unknown pedestrians passing on the sidewalk, while other people put out wedding candles and look dispirited. Eventually, John hails a taxi and hops in. Final shot is of someone with enormous lips blowing out a candle, the smoke drifting upwards.

  Meanwhile, a thoughtful and musically-appreciative couple waiting in line at the Chinese buffet throws some spare change into the hat at the other John’s feet. He looks in the mirror and thanks himself…


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Taylor Swift - “Mine”

  We start out with fashionable Taylor wandering into some diner, her hair all strategically messy and wearing a little-girl dress that would look awkward on anybody else. She sits at one of the tables, where there’s a lone flower in a tiny vase, so we can know that she’s unattached but pretty. She glances over and sees a couple arguing at another table, which causes her to flash back to her life as a Little Taylor, when she had parents who argued while she stood in another room and looked sad. But her hair is still pretty.

  Then we cut to Big Taylor in some forest, where the trees bear fruit that are glossy pictures, showing scenes from Taylor’s life. Taylor fondles one of the pics, but we can’t see it so we don’t really care. Back to the diner, where a cute waiter struts up, ignoring all the other diners because they aren’t pretty and single, and locks eyes with Taylor. They instantly fall in love while the smell of patty melts fills the air.

  More shots of Taylor flitting about in the picture forest, pausing here and there to paw one of the glossies while making sure that the woodland breeze caresses her hair in a wafty manner. Then we’re in the diner again, with Taylor and the waiter ogling one another and planning a life together. Cut to the pair on a random beach somewhere, and we see that some clueless stylist has convinced Taylor that wearing one of those headbands you normally see on babies would be really hip. It’s not.

  Then Taylor’s new beloved does this really nelly hop-skip thing while they’re walking along the shoreline, and it’s very clear to me that the boy is gay. Not that there’s anything wrong with that, but Taylor, honey, don’t be surprised if you find a copy of “Dreamgirls” in pretty boy’s backpack. But they keep up the pretense, nuzzling on the beach and clutching at each other.

  Then we “flash forward”, according to the lyrics, and we have Taylor and RuPaul moving into a house together. She’s carrying more boxes than him, so all the warning signs are there if Taylor would just see them. Taylor proceeds to unpack some of the boxes, and she finds a picture of Little Taylor with her parents. So she has another flashback. Actually, it’s the same flashback, parents arguing and Little Taylor looking sad. What’s the big deal here? So her parents had a fight and she heard it. If that’s the worst thing that happened to her, she probably won’t even need medication or counseling. Move on.

  During the unpacking ceremony, RuPaul comes in to help with one of the boxes. He smiles excitedly while he pulls something out that looks like a giant metal flower, waving it about like his prayers have been answered. Wake up, Taylor.

  Well, she’s awake, but she’s back in that stupid forest with the pictures hanging everywhere. I really don’t like this place. Seriously, if you were strolling along in the woods and came across that mess, you wouldn’t think “this is really nice and soothing”. You would think “there’s probably a serial killer right around here somewhere and I don’t have my cell phone.”

  Another quick shot of Taylor and Pretty Boy in their new house, dancing around with the lights out. If that’s not a euphemism for their sham relationship, I don’t know what is.

  Then here comes that dang Little Taylor again, still looking sad and still listening to her parents have that same argument. This is an unhealthy obsession, Big Taylor. Let it go. I mean, it’s nice that it inspired you to write a song and all, but I’m starting to get bored. My parents fought all the time, about a variety of pointless things instead of just the one argument, and I got over it. Just ask my therapist.

  Now the couple is on a slim little boat somewhere, looking all “Vanity Fair” circa 1920, and Pretty Boy pulls out a ring and proposes. This is SO Elton John during his Denial Period when he married that odd woman with a penchant for lace. I guess Taylor likes lace and denial as well, because she accepts and hugs her little chorus boy.

  Oh look, now that they’re living together, Taylor and Ricky Martin are having a big fight in the kitchen, just like the one Little Taylor overheard back in the day before she was a pop star. (This always happens. You shack up, and you instantly hate each other.) It’s not clear what the fight is about, but my guess is that Ricky called her “Bruno” whilst playing slap and tickle in the bedroom.

  Anyway, Taylor runs out of the house and into the night, just like she did as Little Taylor after hearing that one disagreement her parents had when she was still impressionable and hadn’t learned how to play a guitar. Neil Patrick Harris runs after Taylor, grabs her by the hair, and then mashes her face together with his hands so that she will look more masculine if he has to kiss her. This causes Taylor to remember the good times she used to have with her sexually incompatible mate, back when they were running along the beach and she was wearing the dumb-ass headband. All is forgiven.

  Cut to scenes of Taylor and George Michael getting married, while their friends stand around and place bets. Two seconds later, Taylor gives birth, and we have a shot of Pretty Boy holding up the wee one and trying to figure out who the Baby Daddy might be. Then Taylor spits out another kid, so somebody’s getting some action, but I don’t think Pretty Boy’s name is on any birth certificates. Maybe the UPS man delivered more than just a package.

  Then we have scenes with Taylor and Pretty Boy playing with their equally-blonde children. The kids like to jump maniacally on the bed while Taylor laughs and thinks they’re cute, which is SO not reality. Any normal parent would be spanking some hyperactive little bottoms. We also have the family splashing around on the same beach where the whole lie of a marriage began. Appropriately, everyone gets salt in their eyes, and we have an image of the little boys all alone on a rock, presumably while their parents are busy dating outside the marriage.

  We wrap things up with another shot of Taylor back at that fateful diner, when she selected something that wasn’t on the menu. If she had just ordered the beef instead of the quiche, none of this would have happened…


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Taylor Swift - "Love Story"

 
We’re on a college campus, with Taylor walking along and looking forlorn, when she spies a boy sitting under a tree. While she rudely stares at him, she starts getting flashbacks of a past life they apparently shared.

We’re transported back to old-timey days (which would be 2004 for Taylor, but a couple hundred years for the rest of us), and Taylor is now standing on a balcony opening off a humongous house. If you haven’t figured it out yet, she’s playing Juliet, and she’s wishing for a Romeo.

Then she’s in a ballroom, lots of candles and everyone is beautiful. In walks tree boy, all dappered up, and they only have eyes for each other. Then everybody joins together for a waltz, and I guess they didn’t have a lot of time to practice, because the extras are really bad at it. But everybody’s still pretty, and Taylor and Tree get to do cute things with their hands.

Later that night, or that century, who knows, Taylor is trudging through the forest, holding up an oil lamp, acting like she’s using it to see with, but really so the camera can get good shots of her dewy skin. Suddenly, there’s Tree Boy, standing next to one of those creepy statues from “Interview with the Vampire”. (Seriously, stop the video at 1:42.) Hope she’s got a wooden stake up in that petticoat, just in case.

She goes up to him and discreetly puts her finger across his lips. (“Shhh. Don’t tell me you’re a vampire. It’s been a long day, singing on the patio for hours and then all that dancing, so I really don’t have time for any more issues.”)

Then they wander around a bit, holding hands and chatting, the oil lamp never more than 3 inches from her peachy face. (Girl, careful with that burning oil, that weave will go up in a flash.) Of course, this is a chaste little video (all those tween-ager fans out there, sayin), so they end up just petting a horse conveniently standing nearby instead of having sex.

Whoops, I may have lied. After he leaves, we see Taylor plucking a cherry off a tree. Umm…

Then Taylor’s back on that balcony, and I guess it’s been a while since she went to the zoo with Tree, because she’s singing the part about how she hasn’t seen him in so long and wonders if he’ll ever come save her. Lo and behold, she spies Hardwood walking out of the forest, headed her way.

Ecstatic, she starts racing down endless flights of curving stairs, the 20-foot train on her dress artfully billowing out behind her. Quick cut shots between the two of them, with his in slo-mo, ‘cause he only has to cover about 5 feet of grass and she has an entire plantation house to navigate.

They stand in the middle of a field, hold each other’s head, and glow at each other, while the camera swirls around them. But they never even kiss. Hello?

Back in the present, Taylor and Tree stand in the middle of the campus courtyard, unable to hold each other’s hands because Taylor is carrying some stupid books, and glow at each other. But they never kiss. What’s the name of this song, again?

Does Taylor Swift even know how Romeo and Juliet ended? Just wondering.


Click Here to Watch the Video on YouTube.