The video for Needed Me, Rihanna’s third single off of ANTI, is everything one might expect when matching Spring Breakers director Harmony Korine with legendary music icon Rihanna. It’s equally a Spring Breakers sequel as it is a Man Down + Bitch Better Have My Money evolvement.

Because RiRi is no stranger to revenge videos, we know (and love) that. In Man Down she guns down her rapist.

In Bitch Better Have My Money she tortures and kills the accountant that exploited her.

In Needed Me, it’s not as obvious what the killing is actually about. All we know is that she’s living in a mansion, that the environment around her is violent and that the target for her revenge is throwing money around him at a strip club. When she walks in, dripping of confidence and determination, he initially throws money at her as well, treating her like another stripper. She responds by killing him point blank, his own gun lying in his lap.

Her presence in the strip club is in contrast to the other women present. While they are portrayed as sexual objects under the male gaze, Rihanna is something different. She walks through the entire establishment without any engagement in the activity going on, her only reason for being there is to make the kill. Met by the male gaze, she puts a bullet in it’s very face.

I see three possible plot lines.

1. The Spring Breakers version: Rihanna and that dude, played by Jboy, are competing crime lords. He has done something like taking her clients, killed her friends, tried assassinating her… Something crime lordy that calls for revenge.
2. The fed up girlfriend: She’s waiting on her man to come home but instead of being with her he’s at the strip club. She decides she’s had enough of the bullshit and goes to the club to kill him.
3. Work: She’s an assassin who’s payed to kill him (she’s very good at her job, hence the mansion). ”You was just another n**** on the hit list”.

I have no issue with not getting the motive served to me in the video. I know she’s done explaining herself at this point. She knows what she’s doing and why she’s doing it, that’s all we need to know.

Another evolvement from the two previous revenge fantasies we’ve been given from Rihanna is the weapon introduction. Man Down and Bitch Better Have My Money both display a special moment where she connects with the weapon of her choice. While the revenge itself is still highlighted and emphasized in Needed Me, the gun is in her hand from the very beginning. Fact is, throughout the entire video she never parts with it.

When it comes to Harmony Korine, there’s no surprises. Most of the elements given to us in Spring Breakers are still here. The pink ski masks have become motorcycle helmets and the cheap hostel have turned into a luxurious mansion but the Needed Me has just as much of a ”look at all my shit” attitude as the original flick.

The way Rih walks in and out of the club is basically a reenactment of the ending scene in Spring Breakers, with the female leads making their way to the patriarch chosen for execution with guns in hand and no fucks given. The target is located at the heart of the house, surrounded by naked women.

/Alex