[12 to 12 Special Day 1] The Fate Of Ophelia

[note: this is simply a prediction post, and does NOT contain any leaked content]

Sourdough Swifties, you are in luck because you're getting a sourdough pun every day.

Welcome to the first installment of the 12 to 12 special, where I'll talk about each track from The Life Of A Showgirl every day until the album comes out! The first one is a very interesting one, The Fate Of Ophelia, which is not only the opening track of the album but also confirmed to be the lead single and first music video of the era.

At first I thought this must be a sad song. As most of you probably know, Ophelia is a character in Shakespeare's Hamlet who is controlled by the men in her life and descends into madness, and drowns in a brook under a willow tree (as depicted in the John Everett Millais painting "Ophelia", which is thought to be part of the inspiration of The Life Of A Showgirl's album cover).

Knowing it is the lead single changes my predictions a bit. Lyrically, a song I could see it paralleling would be Love Story, another song based on a Shakespearean tragedy. Taylor tells the story of Romeo and Juliet's forbidden romance, but ends happily with the two ultimately getting married. A common theory is that The Fate Of Ophelia will follow a similar romantic narrative, where Ophelia (Taylor) has been done wrong but later finds someone who truly loves her and treats her well (Travis). It could also be a song about owning her masters, which would fit the theme of losing control but finding happiness in the end. Musically, my prediction for what this song would sound like would be something similar to Bejeweled. Fun, smooth, sparkly, a little bit sultry. Considering what Taylor has said about this album, I do think it would be a bit more upbeat than Bejeweled, but with a similarly shimmering production style. It is hard to say however, and I would be interested to hear Taylor go an unexpected direction.

And as for the music video, the concept I have in mind is that Taylor will be playing Ophelia and it will begin with an aesthetic like the Folklore/Evermore music videos with Taylor falling into a brook beneath a willow tree, but then become bright, sparkly, and orange. This could represent the transformation and moving from the more sad indie eras into this new, joyful, glamorous Showgirl era (like the ME! music video beginning with a snake turning into butterflies symbolizing the transformation from Reputation into Lover). As I said in my last post, I am going to The Official Release Party Of A Showgirl the day after the album on October 4th, so I'm super excited and honored to be one of the first people to see this music video and behind-the-scenes.

And now... the moment you've all been waiting for.

Songwriting.

No, I'm not writing 12 whole songs in 12 days, or breaking my three-year AI-free blogging streak. But for each song, I've come up with just a few conceptual lyrics, like maybe one verse or chorus. I can assure you that I have not looked at leaks, and none of these are confirmed lines. Many of the lyrics I've come up with will contain the song titles and/or some of the vinyl variant names, but none are fully confirmed official or leaked lines. This is simply HFE94's version.

"Thinking I had met my doom
In a brook of sweat and vanilla perfume
But I reach my hands out and feel ya
I survived the fate of Ophelia"

That's all for now! Byeeeeeeeeee!