בהתחלה לא היה לי מושג מה קורה,
אבל קראתי ניתוח שעזר לי להבין..וזה דיי גאוני. למי שיש כוח לקרוא, למרות שזה באנגלית: Before the song starts, we see Gaga walking down the road, decked out in black and (later revealed) she’s part robot and there is blood on her feet. Now, the premise of this video is that Gaga is walking from New York to Nebraska to get her man back, and this is exactly what she’s doing. During this scene, there are flashes of a man caressing her, surgical tools (with electricity crackling in the background), her dropping ice-cream and the ice-cream man giving her a doll, Gaga in the laboratory/barn thing with the man doing stuff to her, like electrocuting her, operating on her, etc, Gaga submerged in a tank and Yuyi the mermaid. This is to symbolise Gaga’s journey from being a young girl in New York to the superstar she is today. The ice cream and doll both symbolise her innocence/purity before she got into the industry, before being exposed to the whole world. The scenes of Gaga/Yuyi in the laboratory symbolises how she changed throughout her career, the man (presumably) operating on her, turning her into Yuyi the mermaid, etc. The song starts and Gaga (decked out in black) is walking down the road again, and we can clearly see she is part robot. This is the Gaga after she broke into the business. Remember how she used to say “I don’t want to be part of the machine, I want the machine to be part of me.” This is exactly it. Gaga knows that she still loves Nebraska, and is going back there to get him back after two years of working her ass off, because she realises that she still feels empty without him. Gaga in the laboratory with the man flashes again through this scene. Now, we see Gaga in a white dress and ballet flats, sitting at a piano and playing, with Jo Calderone on top of it. She’s wearing a white dress to symbolise purity, as in, Gaga before her fame. Jo is supposedly Nebraska, and this whole set up is to make us picture her and Nebraska happily being together, playing the piano and whatnot. Once again, flashes of Lab!Gaga and Robo!Gaga are interspersed with this scene. Next, we see a bit of Gaga in what seems to be a wedding dress and the guy who has been experimenting on her, kissing. My guess is that this guy is the personification of pop and pop culture. Gaga has said once before, as referenced in the Lovegame video, that there is a horrid love triangle between love, fame and pop culture. In this video, it’s clear that she chooses pop. We then see Gaga being pushed back on a chair by Pop!Man and she is being experimented on. This means that she was willing to change, to give up everything, to be famous. We then see the mermaid tail, of Yuyi. This is Gaga when she finally got famous. She had changed herself completely, becoming a mermaid. This also fits with the whole idea of being halfway between reality and fantasy, she fantasised herself to be completely different, so as to not ever look back at her life in New York. However, we can see Gaga feels like she’s being tortured, meaning that maybe, just maybe she doesn’t want this at all, but she accepts it anyway. This whole transformation can also be proven by the black-haired Gaga turning into the teal-haired Yuyi. Mermaid sex time! Remember how Gaga used to say that it is our duty to have irresponsible, condomless sex with our work? Yep, she’s doing it right now with Pop!Man. The following scenes are then just choreography between Pre-fame Gaga, Fame Gaga/Yuyi and Robo Gaga. Note that when she sings “we can’t buy a house in heaven” she opens her arms and spins around in Nebraska, and she says “6 whole years” while being Pre-fame Gaga. More alternating scenes of the three Gagas, and we can clearly see that during the lab parts the camera is shaking, showing torture, meaning that Gaga has an inner conflict, love/fame/pop. The last line, “It’s been a long time since I came around, been a long time, but I’m back in town, this time I’m not leaving without you.” is said by Robo Gaga, who finally realises that with fame and pop now achieved, she can go back and get love as well. The blood on her feet implies her suffering through it all, without Nebraska.
