Taylor Swift: The Definitive Ranking of 57 Music Videos Done With a ‘Broken Heart’

Forgive the titular pun. This post wasn’t actually created with a “Broken Heart.”

My heart, instead, was actually very full, nervous, excited, and exhausted. Who knew it would be a crazy idea to rank all of Taylor Swift’s music videos on the same weekend I’m designing and launching a brand new website? Still, here we are.

Okay, so why am I doing this?

Last week, Swift released the music video for her latest single “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart” from the Tortured Poets Department album. The video, as with a few in her videography, avoids a constructed narrative. Instead, it provides a behind-the-scenes look from her Eras Tour and answers a few questions fans of the tour had including what happens to Swift when she “dives” into the stage? I have my thoughts on this video, but you’ll find that below.

Now, the ranking…

I designed this exercise to be as inclusive as possible of multiple perspectives. Meaning, I needed some method to rank them that didn’t solely rely on my opinions. Make no mistake, my opinions are heavily weighted (because this took a long time), but I’m not the only judge here. I also omitted anything on which she wasn’t the primary artist. There’s also an old video for “Long Live” that’s essentially a concert film, but it wasn’t available to stream on YouTube in the United States.

How’d I do it? I created a system that incorporated four aspects of a video’s success:

• Artistry – This is where my opinions weighted heaviest. I’m looking at theme, editing, cinematography, etc.
• Awards – How many awards did the video win? What was the industry/fan reception? Two of her most recent (“Fortnight,” “I Can Do It With a Broken Heart”) were limited by this rating as we haven’t hit the MTV Video Music Award nominations yet.
• YouTube Likes – How popular is the video online? Did the video inspire fans to click the “Like” button? Some videos received a massive number of likes (into the tens of millions), so I capped points here at 20.
• Cringe Factor – Is there something in the video that causes even a fan to grit their teeth? Think all of “Me!,” and you’ll have a good idea of my barometer here. Cringe points were subtracted from the overall score.

So, now that you understand the “how,” we’ll move on with the ranking. In some cases, I will post the video itself to support my points.

 

57. “Should’ve Said No”

Director: Louis J. Horvitz
Opinion: This isn’t really a music video. It’s a recording of a performance of the song at the Academy of Country Music Awards. That said, starting the performance in sweats and a hoodie was an odd choice, and the rain pouring on her at the end probably has the opposite effect of what was intended. The cringe was strong with this one.

56. “Beautiful Eyes”

Director: Todd Cassetty; Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: Taylor Swift sometimes uses home movies to create a music video. It’s probably a smart move from time to time as it makes the fans feel like they know her on a personal level. Here, it’s Taylor’s 18th birthday. It’s a fine assortment of scenes, although it’s strange that this video isn’t listed on her official YouTube page. Still, looks like she had a great time. I’m subtracting cringe points for that giant pink pickup truck though.

55. “I’m Only Me When I’m with You”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Another home video montage. This marks Taylor’s debut as a music video director, and it’s clear that it’s a deeply personal effort. Basically, the theming of the video is she’s only truly herself when she’s around friends and family. We’re treated to a series of home movies of Swift family vacations and nights out with friends. It’s fun to see glimpses of her family life, but there’s nothing earth shattering here.

54. “Change”

Director: Shawn Robbins
Opinion: If you’re looking at the chronological array of Taylor Swift videos, by the time you get to Change, you have the feeling that one too many videos came out of the debut album. This one is strictly a performance piece in a Scottish cathedral in Indiana. The only true plus sides are the occasional shots of her singing in front of red, white, and blue lightbulbs. That’s about it.

53. “Crazier”

Director: Peter Chelsom
Opinion: Another video not included in Taylor’s official music video channel. That’s probably because it’s a spliced together sequence of images from the Hannah Montana film from which this song stems. Definitely nothing special here, but the scenes of Taylor performing in a small bar are well shot. I’ve never seen a Hannah Montana thing.

52. “…Ready For It?”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: This one hurts. Ready For It? came out right after Look What You Made Me Do, and it’s barely better. The visual effects and cinematography are good, but what is going on? Is this her version of Blade Runner? It’s just ill-conceived in every way and doesn’t at all fit the tone of the song. The only thing distinguishing this from Look What You Made Me Do is the massive YouTube likes that video had. Otherwise, they’d both be at the bottom of the heap.

51. “Fearless”

Director: Todd Cassetty
Opinion: Concert footage from the 2009 Fearless tour nicely accentuated at times by CG imagery and color tinting. The main takeaway for me here was how closely Taylor’s Eras Tour performance of the song mirrors her earlier performances.

50. “The Last Time”

Director: Terry Richardson
Opinion: More concert footage! Again, nothing special here other than Gary Lightbody’s fully committed performance. Actually, she seems out of place compared to his emoting. Ready to be done with concert footage videos…

49. “The Best Day”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Since the song is about her mother, it makes sense that the video features Taylor’s long relationship with the beloved Andrea Swift. Another sweet and deeply personal video. The home movie approach completely makes sense here. No notes.

48. “Picture To Burn”

Director: Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: Early in her career, Taylor Swift worked extensively with director Trey Fanjoy. This time out, Taylor’s fantasizing about all the horrible things she’s going to do to a guy who cheats on her. It’s supposed to be comic and light, but everything feels forced to me. Taylor hadn’t quite found a way to act in a video without feeling inorganic. That comes later, though. Nice use of pyrotechnics though, and the video earns extra points for the nice silhouetted shots of Taylor against a spark-filled backdrop.

47. “Sparks Fly”

Director: Christian Lamb
Opinion: Yawn. Another concert video featuring lots and lots of sparks. Clearly, studios behind Swift pushed her to produce video after video, and were left with dull entries such as this one. But the sparks! All the sparks! They’re flying!

46. “Christmas Tree Farm”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: More Swift family home videos! Just like the song, it’s a pleasant throw away effort.

45. “I Can Do It With A Broken Heart”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Her latest music video and another concert-based entry. This time, it gives us a look behind the scenes at the Eras Tour. It’s well edited and all that, but it still gives an off-putting vibe as it makes the connection between the Eras Tour (something people have paid hundreds if not thousands to attend) and her abject misery. Maybe she should have done something akin to Wildest Dreams where she plays an actress walking through her lines while suffering from heartbreak. It would have had the same result, just in a less obvious way. Maybe there wasn’t time. Anyway, a minor entry in the Taylor Swift Videography.

44. “Tim McGraw”

Director: Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: Swift’s first major music video earns points for its filming location: the home of Johnny and June Carter Cash just before it burned down. While it earned points for a win at the CMT Music Awards for “Breakthrough Video of the Year,” it loses points for the way it launches her video career. Seen primarily laying corpse-like in the dirt next to a lake in a white dress, Fanjoy fails to give her a truly stand-out presence. Rather, she’s presented most frequently in an odd series of extreme close-ups on sections of her face, resembling photos more suitable for an autopsy.

43. “Teardrops On My Guitar”

Director: Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: Swift returned to Fanjoy, the director of Tim McGraw, for her sophomore effort. Despite only nominations and no wins from major groups, there are definite improvements here particularly the imagery of Swift as a love-sick potentially vengeful teenager in a gothic castle, although this video earns major cringe points for two sequences. First, a good quarter of the video is spent with Swift in bed cuddling and stroking the neck of her guitar. Ahem. Second, the school-set sequence includes a “meet cute” moment in which she accidentally spills a potentially acidic chemical all over her left hand when her crush surprises her during lab. Here’s hoping he’s the reason for the teardrops on her guitar and not the missing three fingers on her left hand.

42. “White Horse”

Director: Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: Another man-done-wronged her music video, but this time Taylor’s in a deep depression rather than plotting revenge. That comes later. It’s a well shot video, although it’s a Trey Fanjoy collaboration that is beginning to look like many that came before it. It’s not an offensive video at all. It’s just not very memorable.

41. “Fifteen”

Director: Roman White
Opinion: Taylor Swift discovers CG, and the results haven’t aged well. Sure, the images have a disconnected, otherworldly beauty to them, but toward the end of the video when Swift walks through the CG environments, something’s definitely amiss. I would have preferred a completely live action version that features Swift walking through her high school freshman year organically as she somewhat does at the end of the video. It was nominated at the MTV Music Video Awards but lost to Lady Gaga’s Bad Romance.

40. “22”

Director: Anthony Mandler
Opinion: Brought to you by the same director who gave us the seedy cinematic vision of I Knew You Were Trouble, 22 is a light piece of music video fluff. It’s actually fluffier than the song itself, which is an honest appraisal of someone’s early 20s and a sense of the future. But no, here we’re just riding trikes and baking and going to parties. Trouble is, I’ve seen earlier variants of this video a thousand times before.

39. “The Story of Us”

Director: Noble Jones
Opinion: It may be a popular video with fans, but this is one of my least favorite narrative Taylor Swift videos. The cinematography is too dark, the color scheme dull, and the staging incredibly monotonous. This is a huge missed opportunity for what could have been a more clever adherence to the “book” theming.

38. “Red”

Director: Kenny Jackson
Opinion: Concert footage alert! Nothing special here, which is odd considering Red is the title track of the album. For some reason, this is wildly popular on YouTube, thus the higher score.

37. “Me!”

Director: Taylor Swift; Dave Meyers
Opinion: When people say, “I don’t like Taylor Swift,” this is their primary reason. Here, she says goodbye to the black and white Reputation era and welcomes the Lover era with this kaleidoscopic pastel mess of a video. You watch it half in awe of the imagery and life within it and half in total abject horror that a) this was the lead song from the Lover album, b) the video still contains the “Hey kids! Spelling is fun!” sequence, and c) this is a thing that exists at all. Points are deserved for its vibrant colors, costumes, and special effects. Major cringe points assigned for the rest.

36. “I Can See You”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: The song comes from the Speak Now (Taylor’s Version) vault tracks. It’s a fun song, reminscent of Madonna’s Beautiful Stranger. The video is a strangely complicated affair with Swift herself locked in a vault leaving Taylor Lautner, Joey King, and Pressley Cash to break her out. Subtracting cringe points for the overuse of Lautner’s martial arts skills. There are also tons of easter eggs in here. Up to you if you want to look for them.

35. “New Romantics”

Director: Jonas Åkerlund
Opinion: Concert video alert! This one gets one point higher than other concert videos because it has that great shot of Taylor grinning like the cheshire cat when she says “The rumors are terrible and cruel, but honey most of them are true.” Plus, I just love the song and have fond memories of this tour.

34. “End Game”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: Call this a pallette cleanser after the 2-punch debacle of Look What You Made Me Do and …Ready For It. End Game doesn’t offer any great thematic opportunities. Instead, it’s an update of the “Look at us having a great time” video trope. Good cinematography and a laid back feeling that fit the song perfectly. The only cringe factor here is the visual presence of Ed Sheeran, who so clearly doesn’t belong here at all.

33. “Bejeweled”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Once you get back the cringe-inducing opening with Laura Dern and HAIM, Bejeweled is a totally fine music video. Swift revisits the Cinderella mythology here and sprinkles in more easter eggs than even the best Swiftie could untangle. Bonus points for bringing out Dita Von Teese. A minor entry that shows Taylor’s love of Game of Thrones (three dragons circle her castle at the end). I’m not sure why I brought that up other than it’s a fun fact.

32. “Look What You Made Me Do”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: A FLAW IN THE SYSTEM!!! This video has 13 million likes on YouTube (one of her highest), but this is one of Taylor Swift’s darkest hours in videos. I’m giving this the highest cringe rating possible. It’s as if someone constructed a parody of a Taylor Swift video, but it’s the real thing! It’s a bad song and a bad video, one of the worst of her narrative offerings. The only redeeming factor is the final shot with the lineup of Taylor’s “eras” before the Eras Tour was a thing. Wish the whole thing had been like that honestly. I’m ashamed it’s ranking this high, honestly. Blame the likes. Not linking it here. Not doing that to you. Not after I included …Ready For It? and Me! in the same post. Sorry about that.

31. “Back To December”

Director: Yoann Lemoine
Opinion: A very straightforward entry, Back To December finds its center in a place of deep regret and sorrow, reflected visually by the house in which Taylor laments her lost love filling with snow. Directed by Yoann Lemoine, it wisely humanizes Swift, avoiding the high gloss glamour most of her videos had featured until now.

30. “Mean”

Director: Declan Whitebloom
Opinion: Swift takes a 180 degree turn from the stripped-down aesthetic of Back To December and doubles down on artifice (overtly staged environments, hyper-stylized costuming, etc) in a way that we’ll see again and again throughout her career. Critics were definitely mixed on the messaging here, but this was one of the first videos where the LGBTQIA+ community started to embrace Swift (a young boy is bullied because he’s well dressed and grows up to be a fashion designer). It’s a good video, and one that fans seem to realy love.

29. “Ours”

Director: Declan Whitebloom
Opinion: This emerged as a nice little gem of a video with a clear concept, consistent theming, and a visual pallete that comes to life at the end of the video when Swift is reunited with her miliitary boyfriend. It’s not incredibly deep, but it’s a nice low-key approach to a nice low-key song.

28. “Out of the Woods”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: Out of the Woods plays with a vaguely storybook / Disney heroine trope of lost women running in the woods. It ends with a very Swiftian concept of losing the guy but finding herself in the end. That works thematically, but the video itself is just fine.

27. “Lavendar Haze”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: This is the perfect example of Taylor Swift creating things that quite possibly only appeal to Taylor Swift. It’s a lovely video, full of examples of lavender… well, lavender haze. Purple abounds in a narrative-free exposition of love and connection. There’s nothing wrong with it, but there’s nothing particularly great about it either. Just very middle of the road. By the way, if you haven’t heard the accoustic version of this song, you absolutely must check it out. Also notable because her love interest in the film is a trans man.

26. “Karma”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Swift united with Ice Spice to release this easter egg / symbol-heavy fantastia that includes allusions to The Wizard of Oz if you can believe that. Still it’s been replayed millions of times by people desperate — oh so desperate — to figure out when Reputation (Taylor’s Version) is coming out. Probably no one cares about that. LOL. I do wonder, though, what it must be like to watch this stoned out of my mind. Perhaps unwise given the already psychedlic visuals.

25. “Mine”

Director: Taylor Swift; Roman White
Opinion: Mine plays with time as it shows Taylor falling in love, marrying, and having children with her love (here played by British actor Toby Hemingway). It’s also the first performance-based video Swift co-directed (working with Roman White). It’s a very traditional, safe take on the song, made perhaps a little edgy by the imagery of a young child deeply impacted by her parents’ marital issues.

24. “Fortnight”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Swift’s latest narrative video is handicapped because the MTV Video Music Award nominations haven’t come out yet. She will presumably receive several for this black and white take on friend Emma Stone’s Poor Things. It’s another example where the artist’s vision and our understanding of the context probably wildly differ, but it’s a great example of Swift maturing as a filmmaker. It’s also a stunning document of how far she’s come as a recording artist, meaning she’s miles away from Teardrops On My Guitar territory here. She wants to burn everything down now, I guess.

23. “Safe & Sound”

Director: Philip Andelman
Opinion: This song written for The Hunger Games boats a beautifully haunting melody, and the video, while simple and straightforward, looks better than any of The Hunger Games films. Yes, it’s just Taylor walking through a desolate, burned out, foggy landscape, but it works for the theming of the song. This is one of her more cinematic music videos.

22. “The Man”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Swift won her first MTV director trophy for her official solo outing as a director of a narrative effort. Major points go to the fantastic makeup as I literally cannot tell that the “anti-hero” of the video is actually Swift. It’s a savvy take on gender inequality and stereotypes well handled by Swift as a director. It’s cringey, but it’s supposed to be cringey. This marks the beginning of Swift directing her own videos, something she has reliquished only one time since (see: I Bet You Think About Me).

21. “Anti-Hero”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Anti-Hero won nearly every award for which it was nominated at the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards, so that gives it massive point support here. Strangely, it’s not all that well regarded in terms of YouTube likes, falling below All Too Well, Lover, and You Need To Calm Down. The beginning, 70s-influenced sequences are clever and well constructed. It doesn’t get into trouble until the video stops for an incredibly ill-advised fight sequence where Mike Birbiglia, John Early, and Mary Elizabeth Ellis fight at Swift’s funeral. Woof.

20. “Begin Again”

Director: Philip Andelman
Opinion: Any video set in Paris earns big marks from me. Here, Begin Again serves as a foil to the cold, depressing Back To December but uses roughly the same approach. It features muted colors (save Taylor’s then-trademark red) and several scenes of her ruminating quietly. But here, she’s happy and full of the potential of new love. And there’s no better place to celebrate that than Paris.

19. “I Don’t Wanna Live Forever”

Director: Grant Singer
Opinion: I’m honestly surprised how popular this video is given how completely forgettable the song itself is. It has nice visuals, and Taylor looks great and more adult than she’d looked up until that point. But the best videos can’t really cover a bland song. Another case where the YouTube likes pushed this higher up the list than I would have personally.

18. “You Need To Calm Down”

Director: Taylor Swift; Drew Kirsch
Opinion: Conversely, I’m surprised at the relatively low (in comparison) YouTube like count on this video (4.7 million). That may be because the song put her into a tricky position within the LGBTQIA+ community. Some welcomed her advocacy, and some criticized her for using a “gay friendly message” to sell records. Who knows where the truth lies, but the video color palette and guest stars all make this a memorable outing and one of her best efforts.

17. “Cardigan”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: She enters the Folklore era with this video. I remember staying up until midnight to see it since the video and the album were surprise August drops that year. It’s a well made video with a confusing narrative. As with many of her later videos, the imagery seems to mean a great deal to Swift, but the rest of us are left in the dark as to their meaning. That isn’t a small problem.

16. “Willow”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Or “YAAASSSS WITCHES!” Another surprise album and lead single / video drop, Willow (coming from Evermore) ties nicely into the Cardigan music video through a seemingly “invisible string” (fans will know what I did there). It becomes an instant Swift classic thanks to the “witches of the woods” sequence which she replicates during the Eras Tour. Swift has long identified with witches and being burned at the stake, and she represents forest magic here extraordinarily well.

15. “Our Song”

Director: Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: Third time’s a charm as Taylor returns to working with Trey Fanjoy, the director of Tim McGraw and Teardrops On My Guitar. Here, she abandons a cloying narrative and focuses instead on her growing superstar image. The cinematography and color scheme are both outstanding, and the in-studio performance sequences highlight the fun, upbeat tempo of the song. This is the best video of her debut album hands down. The CMT crowd agreed: it won Video of the Year and Female Video of the Year.

14. “We Are Never Getting Back Together”

Director: Declan Whitebloom
Opinion: To me, this video marks the start of the modern era of Taylor Swift. It features the campy narrative approach that some of her earlier pieces had, but it also feels cleverly staged with the action transitioning playfully from room to room. There are also some easter eggs appearing here and there, including characters dressed as Lost Boys (Swift frequently uses Peter Pan/Wendy iconography throughout her songs). There also a certain scarf that may or may have not been left at someone’s sister’s house…

13. “Shake It Off”

Director: Mark Romanek
Opinion: Shake It Off comes from the guy who directed One Hour Photo. That’s probably the most controversial and quirky thing about it. It’s a HUGE presence on YouTube: one of the most watched videos in history with over a billion views. So, what to say about it? It’s not a deep song, and this isn’t a deep video. It’s Taylor adopting an “adorkable” persona and not letting it get her down. Because she just shakes it off. And dances erratically. There have also been several outcries about cultural appropriation stemming from dance moves and outfits used by Swift and her backup crew. Not sure she can shake that off.

12. “I Knew You Were Trouble”

Director: Anthony Mandler
Opinion: There are no bleating goats here (sadly), but Taylor makes a huge statement with the introduction of this video. I’d never seen it before watching for this exercise, and it was not what I was expecting in the least. The narrative here is that she falls for a bad boy who causes her to lose her sense of self. It’s another cinematic approach to her material, one that feels very squarely placed within the aesthetic of the 90s-00s American independent film scene.

11. “Bad Blood”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: Bad Blood won a slew of awards from various bodies including the Grammys and MTV Video of the Year (Swift’s first win), but awards aren’t always right. This video feels like money thrown at the screen to absolute little effect. It’s fun to see her menagerie of friends, but there’s nothing going on here. Toxic did it better. YouTube likes and awards drove this one higher on the ranking than I would have rated it. Another prime example of a flaw in the system. The cameos are fun though, including Zendaya before she was ZENDAYA.

10. “I Bet You Think About Me”

Director: Blake Lively
Opinion: Blake Lively, one of Taylor Swift’s very best friends and X’s newest punching bag, made her directorial debut on this fun track. The video, though, is kind of a masterpiece that blends a strong sense of fun / mischief, fantastic cinematography, and a red-dominated color pallette that sells it. Another instance of my personal opinions not jelling with fans, I guess. It’s one of her very best videos to date.

9. “Style”

Director: Kyle Newman
Opinion: This is a beautiful video, full of impressionistic and haunting imagery. There’s not really a narrative, but that’s OK. It’s full-on STYLE over substance! (Ha)

8. “Everything Has Changed”

Director: Philip Andelman
Opinion: This video totally had me when the young “Ed Sheeran” kid sits on the school bus reading newspaper comics and sipping from a coffee thermos. Swift and Sheeran don’t appear until the end (the video features their characters’ kids), but it’s a truly magical tour through childhood bonding. There are dozens of gorgeous shots here, but there’s a moment toward the end of the film where the two kids dance in a deserted gym that shifts to a mirrorball effect. That sequence made me audibly gasp. Loved this sweet, innocent approach to the song. One of my personal favorites of hers.

7. “Wildest Dreams”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: Swift plays an actress who has an affair with her co-star (Scott Eastwood) while filming an historic epic in Africa. Naturally, the cinematography is fantastic, some of the best in any of Swift’s videos. I also loved the quick edit of circular imagery at the beginning of the video. There was massive criticism, however, of the video glorifying African landscapes and wildlife without actually featuring any indigenous Africans. That unfortunately muted reactions to an otherwise outstanding video, but it’s worth noting that Swift did donate any proceeds from the video to wild animal conservation efforts through the African Parks Foundation of America. Still, visually, it’s top-notch Swift.

6. “Delicate”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: A masterpiece. Partially filmed at the Biltmore Hotel in downtown Los Angeles, the video features Taylor as an invisible being, finally able to escape press attention and bodyguards so that she can have fun and be herself. I truly believe this video — with all of the goofy facial expressions and vaguely uncoordinated attempts at modern dance — is our best representation of who Taylor Swift was at the time. It’s charming, gorgeously shot, and honestly infectiously fun to watch. Brilliant. Fun side note: I’ve stayed at that hotel. I wasn’t invisible though. I may have danced around…

5. “Lover”

Director: Taylor Swift; Drew Kirsch
Opinion: A work of art that deftly blends her need for easter eggs with a fantastic visual aesthetic. It also introduces us to the Lover house, which makes several appearances in the Eras Tour and forecasted (although we didn’t know it at the time) her next three albums. It’s a perfect ten on the artistic front, in my opinion. Too bad people don’t really seem to like it. Wonder if her co-star had something to do with that?

4. “You Belong With Me”

Director: Roman White
Opinion: This is the one that started the decades-long fight between Taylor Swift and Kanye West when she won Best Female Music Video at the MTV Video Music Awards. Thanks to thank, it’s a minor league video that has major league impact on the Swift legacy. As a video, it’s fine. It breaks away Swift from many collabs with Trey Fanjoy. Aesthetically, it’s going for the whole 90s-00s teen comedy look and feel. It’s a little funny how significantly they try to downplay Taylor’s appearance with bad hair and huge glasses. Of course, by the end, she appears at a high school dance looking beautiful in an angelic white dress (a Cinderella shift out of She’s All That). Bonus points because she also plays her rival in a dark wig and slutty (well, Swiftie slutty) red dress. Looking back at it, I can understand why Kanye would have been upset, although clearly what he did was ridiculous and wrong. She got a lot of press from it though… Just sayin’.

3. “All Too Well (The Short Film)”

Director: Taylor Swift
Opinion: Let’s all step back and remember the time Taylor Swift tried to get an Oscar nomination for Short Film by submitting this over 13 minute music video. Now, granted, it does feature two good performances from Sadie Sink and Dylan O’Brien as they act out some of the sequences included within the song. But make no mistake, this is a music video. What Swift as director does here is prove that she can handle sequences of real human emotion, something we may see next year as she finally sets out (supposedly) to make her feature film debut as a director. All Too Well (The Short Film) received several awards and squarely puts the song within the key canon of Taylor Swift 101. It’s not my personal favorite, but there’s no doubt that it’s emotionally affecting.

2. “Love Story”

Director: Trey Fanjoy
Opinion: A Taylor Swift classic. Beautifully filmed by director Trey Fanjoy, the video blends a visual aesthetic of Rapunzel, Pride and Prejudice, and of course Romeo and Juliet. It was her breakout moment, and the world still remembers this beloved video, which receives a slew of awards. Although, I must say that the 30 seconds of Love Story used in The Bear season two would make an excellent update. Hard to top the original though.

1. “Blank Space”

Director: Joseph Kahn
Opinion: Swift started an incredibly prolific run with director Joseph Kahn on Blank Space. Filmed at Long Island’s Oheka Castle, the video shows Taylor in her “crazy bitch” phase, and it’s full of both darky comic moments and moments of surprising brutality. The end sequence features some elegant editing as well. Rolling Stone recently listed this as 67 out of 100 best music videos. They’re not wrong. The system ranks it as her best video thanks to massive YouTube buzz, awards play, and undeniable artistry coupled with a nice sense of humor. Can’t argue with the system sometimes.