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Taylor Swift hypothetically announcing reputation (Taylor’s Version) at the AMAs seemed like the most compelling reputation re-recording theory to date. But as the 2025 AMAs aired with incredibly weird vibes on Monday, May 26, it became clear that this round of fan speculation would end up in the Swiftie theory graveyard with all the other incorrect theories.
Swift has been releasing the Taylor’s Version re-recordings of her catalog for a while now: She released Fearless (Taylor’s Version) and Red (Taylor’s Version) in 2021 and Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) and 1989 (Taylor’s Version) in 2023. This leaves only two albums: 2017’s Reputation and her 2006 self-titled debut Taylor Swift.
When Swift first brought us reputation back in 2017, she wrote some of the wisest, most quoted words about her career up to that point: “When this album comes out, gossip blogs will scour the lyrics for the men they can attribute to each song, as if the inspiration for music is as simple and basic as a paternity test,” she wrote in her reputation prologue letter at the time. “We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them that they have chosen to show us. There will be no further explanation. There will be just reputation.”
While we wait for the inevitable release of reputation (Taylor’s Version), let’s remember the biggest failed fan theories as a reminder that we can all choose how to spend our one wild and precious life.
TOKYO, JAPAN – NOVEMBER 20: (EDITORIAL USE ONLY. NO STANDALONE PUBLICATION USE (NO SPECIAL INTEREST OR SINGLE ARTIST PUBLICATION USE; NO BOOK USE)) Taylor Swift, Swift performs at Taylor Swift reputation Stadium Tour in Japan presented by Fujifilm instax at Tokyo Dome on November 20, 2018 in Tokyo, Japan. (Photo by Jun Sato/TAS18/Getty Images)
Jun Sato/TAS18/Getty Images
Reputation clownery: Grammys 2024
Back before the 2024 Grammys, Swift had changed her profile photo to a black-and-white image, following the theory that her friends and loved ones (including Travis Kelce, Blake Lively, Gigi Hadid, Jack Antonoff, and more) had changed their avatars to black-and-white photos to build anticipation.
To be fair, it would’ve been fitting move to announce a re-recording at the Grammys. Why? Because in the iconic historical document Miss Americana, Swift is shown reacting to the news that reputation — a polarizing album at the time that has since aged well, especially among fans — didn’t receive any main category nominations. “I need to make a better record,” she tells publicist Tree Paine in the documentary. Paine responds, accurately: “Well, reputation is a great record.”
After all the teasing, however, she surprised everyone by announcing The Tortured Poets Department instead, ushering in a new era. The move echoed her last award show album announcement when she broke the news that Midnights would be coming soon at the 2022 VMAs. She loves a mountain top moment. Still, the conversation later turned to reputation (Taylor’s Version) once again.
Reputation clownery: Eras Tour
Throughout the Eras Tour, fans clocked that she had played every reputation song except “I Did Something Bad,” which she could’ve been holding to perform tied to an announcement. She had previously applied this formula when she announced 1989 (Taylor’s Version) back in August 2023, having held off on performing “New Romantics” until the L.A. stop of the tour to coincide with the announcement.
But this, too, was debunked. Swift finally performed the song during her second Eras Tour residency in London’s Wembley Stadium on August 17, 2024, saying: “So I’m going to do a song I’ve never done on the tour that’s one of my favorite songs ever just because you’re that awesome and you deserve something of this caliber.” Fans also noticed Swift made a snake-like gesture while exiting the stage during the same concert.
Reputation clownery: American Music Awards 2025
This one stung the most so far, as the theory seemed so intentional, so wide-ranging that it won over even the most intense of skeptics. Th AMAs theory sort of felt like Swifties’ magnum opus, as it combined a whole bunch of things fans love overanalyzing — numerology, award show appearances, alleged music video easter eggs, music licensing, and Instagram post cadence and color.
The theory first appeared sometime in spring 2025, when Swifties noticed that the American Music Awards would be held on May 26, 2025. Swift was nominated in six categories: Artist of the Year, Album of the Year, Collaboration of the Year, Favorite Pop Album, Favorite Female Pop Artist, and Favorite Touring Artist. The AMAs are a fan-voted show, so it sort of made sense Swift might use the opportunity for an announcement.
The number “26” is crucial: two 13s, Swift’s favorite number, added together. (Fans also found a bunch of 26s in her work.) Then, there was the website situation. Fans noticed that the TaylorSwift.com merch store was changed from its previous format to a four-block of purchasing options, “Apparel” “Music” “Accessories” and “Sale.” Take the first letter of each word and you get “AMAs.” There was also reportedly a reduction in reputation-era items in the store, with only five products remaining in the days leading up to the AMAs. Certain items were discounted by 26%.
Six days before the AMAs, the first Taylor’s Version song off reputation, “Look What You Made Me Do,” appeared in an episode of The Handmaid’s Tale. This gave a lot of credibility to the idea RTV would be coming soon, as previous re-recordings were announced after songs appeared in movies and shows like The Summer I Turned Pretty.
Tiffany Haddish was also a presenter at the AMAs, and fans clocked that she’d be a fitting presenter for a Taylor Swift award win, given her role during the Reputation Stadium Tour. In a recording on tour, she made a cameo during “Look What You Made Me Do.” But Haddish presented Favorite R&B Song instead, giving the award to SZA’s “Saturn.”
What is the point of all this reputation (TV) theorizing?
Swift didn’t even attend the AMAs, and fans donned their clown noses appropriately. Something about this round of speculation feels like a breaking point. It’s natural to dream of your favorite musician’s future projects, and we’re in a rare scenario where we’ve been given a blueprint of what Swift will release next. But it’s all just starting to feel incredibly tiresome. Parts of the fandom are over this endless speculation.
The theorizing has almost eclipsed the joy of the actual music release. There is an incessant greed for more and more and more from Swift, a capitalist desire that she has often stoked, sure, but has got to be growing weary of — especially after the immediate reaction (fair or not) to the 31-track Tortured Poets Department. Forever anticipating what’s next turns art into pure consumption.
Better to put the whole re-recording business out of our minds and enjoy the music we have.
Read Taylor Swift’s entire original reputation prologue below:
Here’s something I’ve learned about people.
We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them they have chosen to show us. We know our friend in a certain light, but we don’t know them the way their lover does. Just the way their lover will never know them the same way that you do as their friend. Their mother knows them differently than their roommate, who knows them differently than their colleague. Their secret admirer looks at them and sees an elaborate sunset of brilliant color and dimension and spirit and pricelessness. And yet, a stranger will pass that person and see a faceless member of the crowd, nothing more. We may hear rumors about a person and believe those things to be true. We may one day meet that person and feel foolish for believing baseless gossip.
This is the first generation that will be able to look back on their entire life story documented in pictures on the internet, and together we will all discover the after-effects of that. Ultimately, we post photos online to curate what strangers think of us. But then we wake up, look in the mirror at our faces and see the cracks and scars and blemishes, and cringe. We hope someday we’ll meet someone who will see that same morning face and instead see their future, their partner, their forever. Someone who will still choose us even when they see all of the sides of the story, all the angles of the kaleidoscope that is you.
The point being, despite our need to simplify and generalize absolutely everyone and everything in this life, humans are intrinsically impossible to simplify. We are never just good or just bad. We are mosaics of our worst selves and our best selves, our deepest secrets and our favorite stories to tell at a dinner party, existing somewhere between our well-lit profile photo and our drivers license shot. We are all a mixture of our selfishness and generosity, loyalty and self-preservation, pragmatism and impulsiveness. I’ve been in the public eye since I was 15 years old. On the beautiful, lovely side of that, I’ve been so lucky to make music for a living and look out into crowds of loving, vibrant people. On the other side of the coin, my mistakes have been used against me, my heartbreaks have been used as entertainment, and my songwriting has been trivialized as ‘oversharing’.
When this album comes out, gossip blogs will scour the lyrics for the men they can attribute to each song, as if the inspiration for music is as simple and basic as a paternity test. There will be slideshows of photos backing up each incorrect theory, because it’s 2017 and if you didn’t see a picture of it, it couldn’t have happened right?
Let me say it again, louder for those in the back . . .
We think we know someone, but the truth is that we only know the version of them that they have chosen to show us.
There will be no further explanation.
There will be just reputation.
Originally Appeared on Teen Vogue
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