Taylor Swift has been rerecording all of the older albums that she does not own so companies can stop profiting from her hard work. Although it will never stop them from earning revenue off those songs, these newer versions will be their competition so they will not perform as well. She started by rerecording her old album Fearless, and recently put out her 2012 album, Red, with her now more mature sound.

We all know some of her best songs are songs about love. While some people will be frustrated about that, it is just the same as most artists. Don’t hate the player, hate the game.

Releasing Red (Taylor’s Version) was a long anticipated short film she was making along with her song All Too Well (10 Minute Version). The song was about one of her boyfriends who she had when she was 20 going on 21, Jake Gyllenhaal, who would have been 29 years old when they started dating.

10 minutes is how long the song originally was, but due to how the music industry works, it was in her best interest to try and make it into 3 or 4 minutes, the length of most songs. However, with this new album she has control, so she decided to give the songs everyone loves, but extended. Now we can get a clearer view of how Taylor felt in her relationship and how much it crushed her back then.

Her short film, based on her song and real-life relationship, starred actors Dylan O’Brien, who has starred in movies like The Maze Runner trilogy. It also features Sadie Sink, known best for Stranger Things and Fear Street. These two portrayed a young couple, credited as Him and Her, but we know who they are.

This almost 15 minute movie can move anybody who has ever felt gaslighted or emotionally used by anyone, does not have to be in a romantic sense. You just get a sense how manipulative this dynamic was, him being older than her and her being so young and naive.

Warning if you have not seen the video by this point, I am going to discuss some parts of the video. So it does not get confusing and it is clear, when I say Him, it is the character Dylan O’Brien is portraying and Her is the character played by Sadie Sink.

The beginning of this video is sweet, innocent and beautiful. There are visuals of them as a loving couple matched with either romantic lighting or shots of them in a forest and by a lake.

Then the relationship shifts to a table surrounded by people, Him and Her are sitting together. Him looks like he is enjoying the company, while Her looks like she is uncomfortable, but trying to fit in. She seeks comfort in the situation by grabbing Him’s hand. However, he lets go of her hand and puts it to the side. Her is visibly distraught by this action, but does not say anything.

You can see the visual difference in their dynamic and relationship, they don’t seem like the same loving couple as before at all. The next scene is Him throwing his car keys on the ground, by Her’s feet and she has to pick it up while he angrily answers a call. Her timidly sits back in the car, but watches him concernedly.

Him seems to notice that she is scared, and consoles her. Reassuring her that everything is okay. But as a viewer, it is clear that this relationship might not be the best. Although, if it was not clear in this scene, it only gets worse.

Her is cleaning up dishes in the kitchen, we can guess this happens right after the dinner party earlier because they get into an argument after Her confessed to Him that she was uncomfortable at the dinner after he asks.

He gets frustrated with her, and we see him begin to gaslight her. Gaslight is a term that can be originated from a movie of the same name that was about a husband making his wife question reality as he tries to cover up a secret.

And He does that to her, Her brings up the moment he dropped her hand and that upset her. And his response was he did not even notice! So then it must not have ever happened. This blatantly disregards her feelings. Then turns it against Her by saying she is making this about her.

He tries to make everything better by saying he does not want to fight. When that is what just literally transpired between them. Only after she is crying does he apologize and act very loving towards her. It feels like he is just saying what she wants to hear.

Within the first 5 minutes of the film we can see all the red flags that Taylor Swift probably realized she missed. Looking back on it she probably sees how bad things were, but also all the good times that did happen. It is fair to point out that this is only Taylor’s side, and we don’t have Jake’s. So we can only take it from what Taylor says about their relationship.

After more cute scenes of them being lovey-dovey, we see scenes of their relationship breaking down again. And with a scene so painfully well done of Her breaking down crying on her bed, just curled up, I have to say I almost did the same watching that scene.

We also get another heart-wrenching scene of Her waiting for Him to come to her 21st birthday party. And She is painfully aware that he will not show up, but she still waited for him to come.

After this, we can assume they broke up and Her is trying to recover from the break up. She gets all these flashbacks of all the good moments they had, but as time goes on she can also see all the bad it was doing to Her as well.

A time skip happens and we see she published a book that is the title of the song. We see she is reading the lyrics of the song to a group of people listening to her book. And outside is Him, staring at her while wearing her old scarf.

This song has made the internet go crazy, her rerecorded album broke 2 Spotify records when it came out. You might not be a Swiftie, but she is swiftly taking over the music industry. Taylor Swift is the music industry. And it leaves us all wondering, Jake, where is Taylor’s scarf and when are you giving is back?

Article by Rylan DeHaven