Music is a vital a part of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Specifically pre-existing music. Artists like Led Zeppelin, Redbone, Engelbert Humperdinck, and Cat Stevens have underscored essentially the most memorable sequences throughout this franchise’s motion pictures and TV reveals in each diegetic and non-diegetic types. These tunes can in a short time set up the tone of an ensuing film or large set-piece whereas additionally plucking on the nostalgia of viewers members. However, throughout numerous motion pictures and TV reveals, one explicit artist has by no means been referenced as soon as in a Marvel Cinematic Universe manufacturing: Taylor Swift.
There has been nary a name-drop in a forgotten Iron Fist or Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. episode, not to mention a outstanding shoutout in an Avengers film, for the singer behind tunes like “Betty” and “Love Story.” The whole absence of this singer on this franchise can’t assist however lead one to wonder if or not Taylor Swift even exists on this universe in addition to what sort of music the Marvel Cinematic Universe prioritizes.
The Marvel Cinematic Universe’s Musical Landscape
The tunes of the Marvel Cinematic Universe are primarily purported to evoke older time intervals. For Guardians of the Galaxy, they replicate a approach Peter Quill/Star-Lord retains tethered to his Earth dwelling. In Captain Marvel, the needle-drops are used to strengthen that Carol Danvers returns to Earth within the Nineties. The “Back in Black” tune that opens Iron Man, in the meantime, was an efficient technique to arrange Tony Stark as a rowdy man that wasn’t fairly like different superhero film protagonists. Even the one in-universe musical quantity in all the films, the “Star-Spangled Man” set piece in Captain America: The First Avenger, is rooted in classic musical sensibilities. The TV reveals have gone down the same route, with WandaVision most notably delivering a bevy of tunes designed to evoke theme songs of varied eras of tv.
The retro-gaze of those songs is a component of a bigger aesthetic strategy of the Marvel Cinematic Universe largely channeling aesthetics of older eras of popular culture. In hindsight, this might be seen as a approach of providing some insurance coverage for making motion pictures based mostly on initially obscure Marvel characters. Audiences might not know who Iron Man or the Guardians of the Galaxy are, however they know these tunes or these style hallmarks, these can operate as acquainted parts luring moviegoers to the theater. The default musical norms of the franchise, then, have emphasised traditional artists which have lengthy cemented their reputations as icons in popular culture.
Occasionally, fashionable pop music will get referenced in these motion pictures, however solely sparingly. It takes so lengthy for a giant blockbuster to go from being a script to a completed movie that some pop star Iron Man or Spider-Man name-drops might be completely forgotten by the point the film comes out. Still, Beyonce did get referenced in Doctor Strange, with a smattering of “Single Ladies” even being heard because of Wong’s headphones. Megan Thee Stallion acquired to indicate up as herself in an prolonged visitor spot on an episode of She-Hulk: Attorney at Law. These are the exception to the foundations, nonetheless, and most singers dominating the trendy Top 40 charts don’t get referenced in any respect within the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Not even Taylor Swift.
Why Else Hasn’t Taylor Swift Appeared within the MCU?
Another key factor stopping Swift’s presence within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, although, is the style she initially occupied. Taylor Swift began on the nation music scene, along with her origins being particularly obvious in early tunes like “Tim McGraw” or “Our Song.” Her sound rapidly advanced by the point the 2010s dawned to include a extra expansive tonal panorama. Still, whilst she started to develop her inventive horizons, as late as 2012, Taylor Swift songs like “We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together” had been dominating the US Hot Country Songs and US Country Airplay charts.
A 2013 collaboration with Tim McGraw and Keith Urban on the hit nation track “Highway Don’t Care” appeared to solidify that she was all the time going to have nation music in her veins. Nothing produced within the Marvel Cinematic Universe within the saga’s preliminary few years even approached rural areas (save for a second-act detour to Oklahoma in Iron Man 3) or concerned anybody with a keenness for nation music. There was no natural area for preliminary Swift tunes like “Fifteen” to indicate up. Now, beginning with the tunes on her 1989 album in 2014, her tunes began to fade from the nation charts and she or he moved in direction of being categorized as a “pop” artist.
A broader musical style classification, although, wasn’t going to robotically catapult Swift into being within the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The identical yr she shifted herself to the pop charts, Marvel Studios hit field workplace gold with Guardians of the Galaxy. That film and its profitable soundtrack cemented this franchise’s fondness for classic needle drops. Unless they’d the prospect to reference the gloriousness of Beyonce, fashionable pop tunes had been being eschewed for extra surprising yesteryear needle drops. The timing of Swift’s profession oddly paralleled key moments within the Marvel Cinematic Universe (together with how Swift kicked off her music profession simply two years earlier than Iron Man launched the entire the universe) in ways in which ensured she wouldn’t be exhibiting up on this franchise.
It additionally needs to be stated that the franchise, for therefore a few years, didn’t have room for the core fan base of Taylor Swift music. Women had been solely sparingly represented within the Marvel Cinematic Universe for its first eight years (and points with gender illustration endured properly afterward) whereas the saga was initially targeted on older superheroes, not the kids that go to Swift live shows in droves. This isn’t to say that individuals who don’t determine as ladies will burst into flames in the event that they pay attention to some bars of “You Belong with Me” nor that listeners who’ve graduated school might by no means get something out of her music. However, a big pool of Swift’s fanbase is teen ladies who actually relate to her lyrics and that demographic simply wasn’t the main focus of preliminary Marvel Cinematic Universe properties. No surprise Swift has by no means been referenced on this franchise.
Will Taylor Swift Show Up within the Marvel Cinematic Universe?
With all these bigger points informing Taylor Swift’s absence within the Marvel Cinematic Universe, this pop singer is, for now, non-existent inside this franchise. Granted, the Marvel Cinematic Universe is meant to be our universe simply with superheroes (even Jeff Bridges enjoying Obadiah Stane couldn’t forestall The Big Lebowski from current on this area), so Swift might nonetheless theoretically exist on the market on this universe. Just as a result of “Lavender Haze” isn’t blaring on each radio in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania doesn’t imply Swift isn’t actual on this world. Perhaps she’s all the time been simply off-camera, narrowly avoiding directing interactions with the primary Avengers, like Charlie in an episode of Poker Face.
Still, proper now, one of many world’s greatest fashionable pop stars has been completely absent from one of many world’s greatest fashionable movie franchises, an odd factoid reflecting two popular culture ships which have handed one another at evening. While classic James Bond motion pictures grew to become well-known for using the largest musicians on the time of their launch, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has opted for a special musical strategy that’s ensured that this saga has by no means discovered a use for Taylor Swift. That’s peculiar since, as bizarre as it might sound, nice superheroes and essentially the most unforgettable Taylor Swift songs can typically really feel the identical. That sentence might sound like the results of some A.I. algorithm tasked with writing about in style items of Twenty first-century media, however in a approach, it’s true.
Characters like Spider-Man endure as a result of audiences and readers see themselves inside this masked crime-fighter and different weak scrappy Marvel mainstays, like Ben Grimm/The Thing or Kamala Khan/Ms. Marvel. We’ve all felt like monsters like The Thing, overwhelmed with the world like Spider-Man, or pulled between so many opposing directing like Ms. Marvel. It’s difficult to confront such heady feelings on a day-to-day foundation, however these colourful superheroes, of their biggest comedian e-book and film/TV incarnations, enable us to confront recognizably human experiences in thrilling and visually colourful confines. Similarly, Swift tunes like “Fifteen” or “Snow on the Beach” assist to crystallize feelings you’ve all the time felt however by no means been capable of put into phrases earlier than. The intimate approach she sings, notably within the Taylor’s Versions of previous songs, makes it sound like she’s singing her tunes proper again to you personally. You felt alone earlier than you listened to those songs, however simply placing on one thing like “the 1” eases these remoted emotions and makes it simpler to understand paralyzing emotional experiences.
These items of artwork maintain up a mirror to ourselves, within the course of enable us to confront our foibles whereas clinging to hope. Given this shared high quality (which is under no circumstances unique to both Swift or comedian books based mostly on characters created by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby), it does grow to be a bit puzzling that essentially the most well-known fashionable incarnation of the Marvel characters has by no means as soon as discovered a use for Swift. However, maybe that can change sooner or later. Maybe Avengers: Secret Wars will hinge its greatest emotional scene on using “The Best Day”. Those of us who get equally moved by seeing superheroes assist folks or listening to Swift harmonize about inner turmoil can solely hope.