Taylor Swift unveils star-studded ‘Bad Blood’ video, Twitter shakes it off

18 May 2015

Taylor Swift in Bad Blood music video

Pop demigod Taylor Swift has been teasing her star-studded ‘Bad Blood’ video for weeks now by posting individual movie-style posters of the huge cast in costume via social media.

After a whole lot of hype, the video finally premiered last night as part of the 2015 Billboard Music Awards, and it certainly delivered on the celebrities front, with the likes of Selena Gomez, Jessica Alba, Lena Dunham, Hailee Steinfeld, Ellie Goulding, Paramore singer Hayley Williams, Ellen Pompeo and Cindy Crawford, among many others, all turning out for the four-minute cinematic epic.

Despite the star power, Bad Blood has no real storyline to speak of, but does see Swift’s character ‘Catastrophe’ indulging in various forms of bad-assery, from unleashing high-level kung-fu on a number of suited goons, to casually walking away from an explosions with her squad.

A real surprise, however, was Kendrick Lamar’s contribution. Though he didn’t feature on the originalBad Blood – which first dropped on Swift’s 1989 album last year – the Compton rapper provided not just one, but two verses to this new version.

Click below to watch the video, which is helmed by veteran music video director Joseph Kahn, the man behind Britney Spears’ Toxic  and Brandy and Monica’s The Boy Is Mine, among loads and loads of others.

The piece received thumbs up from most Swifties and, curiously, Faith Hill, who called it the best video she’d seen in years.

The majority of reaction posted to the social network seemed kinda lukewarm about the whole thing though, with the lack of plot, preposterous number of cameos and, y’know, the fact that it wasn’t Shake It Off among the weaknesses viewers pointed towards the video.


It was a happy night for Swift regardless of what you might think of her new video. She swept the board at the awards, triumphing in eight of the 14 categories in which she was nominated, including Artist of the Year, Best Female Artist and Best Streaming Song for Shake It Off.

Dean Van Nguyen was a contributor to Silicon Republic

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