The new documentary depicts who is the real Taylor Swift

S:: the world’s biggest pop star, a master of narrative, and a woman who's made vulnerability her brand—but who is the real Taylor Swift? That's the question that Channel 4’s “landmark” two-part series, Taylor, attempts to answer.

- Hannah Ewens, The Independent

Straight away, the documentary signals its intention to seriously interrogate her mythology. It opens with a youthful confession that echoes a longstanding public opinion — that Swift crafts her narrative as both victim and avenger. “For the first time | had the feeling that they could never really hurt me anymore, because | can write about it and | could dream about maybe somebody hearing it someday,” little Taylor is heard saying, over an image of her brandishing her weapon of choice, an acoustic guitar.

Across 100 minutes of carefully edited and contextualised archive footage, combined with talking heads interviews with journalists and music industry workers, director Guy King (Bombing Brighton, The Fall: Skydive Murder Plot) charts Swift's rise from ambitious teen to one of the most influential women in the world. Since there is no direct involvement from Swift or her team, or any famous collaborators, it leans hard into the myths of Swift — and looks for whether there is any weight to them.