Sabrina Carpenter and Jenna Ortega kiss in the “Taste” video

I am now going to say something outrageous for large parts of the queer community: I do not like Death suits her well. Don’t get me wrong. Meryl Streep, Goldie Hawn and Isabella Rossellini are iconic, and the way they deliver their many iconic lines is iconic. I’ll happily watch drag queens tease the movie all day. But the movie itself? The misogyny of the script and direction ruins it. The acting brings the movie back in parts – brought it back in our culture – but they can’t save the movie as a whole. Well, we’re in luck, because Sabrina Carpenter and Jenna Ortega took the fun of the movie and made it gay in the music video for Carpenter’s “Taste.”

Directed by Dave Meyers, the video follows Carpenter and Ortega as they repeatedly kill each other over a nameless boy. In the chorus, Carpenter sings:

I heard you guys are back together and if that’s true
You just have to taste me when he kisses you
If you want eternity, I bet you want this.
Just know that you will taste me too

I love how this song and especially this video takes the super gay subtext of every song about straight girl jealousy and turns it into lyrics. I mean, we can all agree Jolene is a lesbian song, no matter how much Beyoncé tries to change that. Being so obsessed with the person your ex is dating means spending more energy on that person than on the ex themselves!

Here, Sabrina Carpenter and Jenna Ortega are making out after lots of VERY bloody stabbings and shootings and voodoo dolls. When Ortega’s character realizes she’s kissing Carpenter and not the boy, she chainsaws Carpenter in half and pushes her into a pool. But just in case the homosexuality could be questioned, the video ends with the two at the boy’s funeral, and Ortega’s grief quickly shifts to a flirtatious hand in Carpenter’s hair and an even flirtier grin.

I don’t know if Sabrina Carpenter is bisexual or if this video is just for fun, but a gay music video that ends with the death of an ex-boyfriend seems like a great start to a post-Barry Keoghan queer awakening. And it would be a great way to end a summer marked by queer pop stardom.

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