shesnotreadingbooks-x

[shesnotreadingbooks-x]

It's hilarious when people are like "taylor swift's songs are engineered to be as generically relatable as possible" because then you actually listen to the songs in question and she's just like

"I am a SELF-DESTRUCTIVE MONSTER who ruins everything I touch, I MANIPULATED everyone into liking me, my potential has been WASTED due to circumstances of MY OWN CREATION, I go back to an EMPTY HOUSE because everyone in my life has moved on, I am a BLEEDING OPEN WOUND, all my kindness is really just NARCISSISM IN DISGUISE, I will BREAK MYSELF FOR YOUR ENTERTAINMENT, I STARVED MYSELF in order to be saved by an idealised romance, I can go ANYWHERE except for THE PLACE I CALLED HOME, I will SPIRAL UNCONTROLLABLY if left to my own devices, I AM THE INSTRUMENT OF MY OWN DESTRUCTION, THIS WAS INEVITABLE"

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You're Losing Me & lyric parallels

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Taylor writing song after song about how she worked so hard to make sure she would never lose him to her writing a song about how he didn’t even notice or care that he needed to try and keep her is

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I know we keep saying "this doesn't change Midnights" but actually over the last month it's been settling in for me that Midnights very much feels like an album written by someone processing the end of a relationship - revisiting old pain, revisiting deep love, reflecting on a lonely future... I don't know. I think this breakup was a very slow burn and you can hear that on Midnights.

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Thinking about the implications of the pipeline between “do I really have to tell you how he brought me back to life?” and her quite literally putting her heartbeat stopping in a song that repeatedly says “you’re losing me, I can’t find a pulse…”

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You know things are fucked up when hoax of all songs starts making more sense

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people on here really don't like re-contextualizing midnights as a breakup album but. with "hits different", with the news of their breakup, and now finally "youre losing me", it just. it makes so much sense as a break-up album. and even if we didnt consider it as one at the time, i dont think there's anything wrong with coming to see it as one now. looking at it at all at face value, it just makes sense. even if some people might not want to hear that.

taylor has always said midnights is an album about choices - the ones we treasure, the ones we regret, the ones we mull over until the early morning.

lavender haze, given all that we now know, was clearly about taylor trying to keep her head in the clouds -- blissful ignorance -- a la "lavendar haze" -- when its apprarent theres a big elephant in the room. i always found it interesting that whenever she referred to her and joe's relationship, she fixated a lot on when they first got together, and he was there for her when no one else was. its almost like that was her anchor and justification to stay with him anyway, despite the (now-implied) emotional neglect that was actually going on, despite the multiple breaks they've supposedly have had to take over the course of their relationship. she just wants to stay in that time period where everything was perfect, when everything was still rosy, in that "lavendar haze".

bejeweled -- the idea that, even though someone wants to keep her a secret, and dim her light in the process, it wont stop her from shining, and she cant help it. and if theyre not willing to let her shine, something has got to give. the idea of her being kept to the basement, by this person, when she just wants "the penthouse of your heart".

the same themes in bejeweled of doing all the extra credit, just to get graded on a curve, to youre losing me, where "i give all my best me's, my endless empathy, and all i did was bleed"

maybe calling midnights a breakup album is too reductive, since not all the songs refer to her and joe's relationship, and thus not every song is a breakup song. but to call midnights anything other than, at the very least, a melancholic, relationships-on-the-rocks (re: theme of staying up until midnight over decisions), break-up adjacent album, where its clear something has got to give, despite the good that they had - especially given the context we have now - is amiss.

like the wisdom that comes with looking back at her re-recordings with new eyes and revisiting those times knowing what she knows now, she also uses the theme of midnights to ponder her then-current problems. such as: do i have to lose the person that i love most, because nothing they are doing, and everything they have been doing, is not enough anymore?

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barbie: i just feel so out of sorts….like i’m thinking about death and the nature of my being and i feel like everything around me is suddenly changing and my usual hobbies aren’t exciting me anymore?? and all the parties and games and music aren’t distracting me like they used to :/// maybe something’s the matter with me but the only way to find out for sure might be to venture outside of the only world i’ve ever known and i have no idea what’s waiting for me out there. is leaving safety and comfort and parties worth facing the full truth of my existence and the world?

ken: idk babe but it sounds like a fun adventure to me!! i brought my rollerblades!! omfg i LOVE the indigo girls. do you think i’ll get to do an appendectomy?? THIS IS SO FUN-

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i'm sorry. but barbieland is so unrealistic. where's the murder? where's the public executions? where are the lesbian polycules?? no one plays barbies like this. it should look like game of thrones

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People getting upset about Ken being just Ken in this movie clearly never experienced Barbie: Life in the Dreamhouse. That show is basically a precursor to the new movie in the way that it shows the dynamic of Barbie and Ken pretty well. Barbie is the main character, Barbie is everything. And Kens stumbling over his own feet trying to be there for her however he can. Not obsessively, not creepily, just golden retriever himbo energy. Ken was never, by any means marketed to young boys, or intended to represent men. He was there to be by Barbies side in all her wacky adventures.

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The scene in the Barbie trailer when Barbie is skating around with Ken and asks "Why is everyone staring at me?"

THAT'S EXACTLY WHAT IT FEELS LIKE TO BE AN ADOLESCENT GIRL.

Living in Barbieland (childhood girlhood) but then suddenly you're all grown up in the real world subject to scrutiny and sexualisation (the guy slapping Barbie's ass) and feeling like existing is a crime?

Being forced by adult men into a box (which leads to the not like other girls syndrome) and exploring the 'real world' (being forced to grow up too quickly) while fighting the realisation that maybe the world sucks and being a woman is so difficult while hoping with all your heart that it's not always going to be this way.

Losing touch with the very things that made you happy because they're considered immature and girly? (The group of teens that said they hadn't played with Barbies since they were five.)

Older women telling you that you have to learn the truth about the world and that you can never have your old life back (Kate Mckinnon's Barbie) despite it being the only thing you yearn for, but also older women being a bright spot and support (the old woman on the bench) in the endless slough of life.

And this is just the trailer!!! I'm so excited for this movie I can't breathe, Greta Gerwig the woman that you are 😭

[shesnotreadingbooks-x]

People being like "why is Ken just Ken" and thinking it's a gimmick for girl bossing Barbie clearly never watched Barbie Life in the Dream House because if they had they'd know that Ken is a very smart and capable guy but chooses to dedicate his life to Barbie because he loves her. He literally has a sixth sense for if Barbie is unhappy or needs something and will drop everything to help/cheer her up. Ken chooses not to pursue careers like Barbie does because it would interrupt his Barbie time. Ken is a self imposed trophy husband and I won't let people question his decision!

[shesnotreadingbooks-x]

something people don’t appreciate enough is the fact that different songs on midnights explore the same topics in numerous, sometimes contradictory ways. on snow on the beach, she’s scared that a new relationship might not work out; on labyrinth, she’s terrified that it might. snow on the beach also talks about the celestial forces that bring two people together; mastermind confesses that she was the force in question all along. bejeweled describes the confidence and freedom of bending the rules of a relationship; high infidelity is filled with guilt and terror for simply dancing with another guy. she takes the money on you’re on your own, kid, but she feels stifled by it on anti-hero. she ends you’re on your own, kid with inspiring words; on dear reader, she warns the audience not to listen to her advice. she burns in hell on anti-hero, but karma is her god on karma. she can face any struggle fame throws at her on you’re on your own, kid, but she’s too soft for all of it on sweet nothing. she’s a diamond and a monster on the hill at the same time. it’s almost like each story is told from multiple perspectives like the love triangle on folklore, but instead of several fictional characters, the narrators all exist in different corners of taylor’s mind.

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[shesnotreadingbooks-x]

“your. ex. friend’s. sister. met someone at a club and he KISSED her!? turns out it was thatguyyouhookedupwithagesago some wannabe z-listeR . and all the outfits were tERRIble....2. 0. 0. 3. unBEARable. did you see the photos????????”