Is Katy 'Waking Up' to her past?

Katy Perry is one of the planets biggest sensations and has brought a very unique pop vibe to the music industry which in turn has brought her immense fame and fan loyalty. However, the artist first began her singing career with a church choir in Santa Barbara, CL. Due to her instant fame and glory, Katy eventually seemed to forget her religious roots and the church. This song relates to the singer looking back at her past and also how she overcomes obstacles in her path with the help of a younger version of herself. To evaluate this music video, we will be looking at three main conceptional tools: semiotics, intertextuality and next-step reality.

We will begin by looking at the next-step reality aspect of the video. Whereby Next-Step Reality is embedded in how media messages get produced and why certain messages attract large audiences whereas other messages so not (p. 164, Potter). The video begins with Katy in her dressing room as she looks through her window and all of a sudden, she enters a completely different world that is dark and is a huge maze. From here on out she is in this world walking through this maze which is not something that people do in their day to day lives. However, it could be linked to the fact that through life, we all go through mazes in our journey and encounter various losses and triumphs along the way. Another scene in the music video shows the singer looking up to the sky as she releases a spark of light from her chest. This is used to symbolize her asking for help after noticing she is cornered and can’t do anything about it.

Next, we will examine the intertextuality aspect of this video. Intertextuality occurs when a film includes other films or texts explicitly through references and quote, mainly in its diegesis. (pg. 85, Haastrup) One of the very first visuals we see is Katy Perry looking through the mirror in her dressing room. This is directly related to the movie ‘Alice in Wonderland: Through the looking glass’ whereby Alice enters a different universe by looking through this mirror; thus, we see the same act in this music video.

In relation to both these tools we’ve looked at so far, we will look at the semiotics that can be seen in the music video. Semiotics as defined by Danesi states “– in a phrase, anything that is used, invented or adopted by human beings to produce meaning (pg. 4, Danesi). As you get further into the video, Katy can be seen reaching out to a red strawberry in the midst of the darkness and taking a bite; this can be a symbolic reference to Adam and Eve from the bible whereby Eve takes a fruit from the forbidden tree which then leads to their downfall. In the same manner, the artist is eating the lone strawberry as a sign of her falling away from her roots. The video comes to an end as young Katy Perry escorts the older version towards an exit door that is guarded by two men with animal masks. Outside the door awaits her fake prince charming who seems to only be using her. The young girl is able to defeat the two guards and convince the artist that not all Prince charming’s are worth it. All these are signs of Katy coming back from where she left off and trying to bring back the past as a strong independent woman.