There is a particular kind of insult reserved for women who know what they want: your expectations are too high. Olivia Rodrigo and Chappell Roan take that old line, dress it for television, and make it look ridiculous. Their new remix of Rodrigo’s “expectations” is not a polite celebrity handshake. It is two pop stars comparing notes on desire and declining the consolation prize.
The original lives on Rodrigo’s third album, you seem pretty sad for a girl so in love. This version gives Roan her first-ever guest feature, produced by the women’s shared collaborator Daniel Nigro. Roan brings a queer verse to a song already suspicious of the distance between what love promises and what it actually delivers. It feels less like an extra name on a tracklist than a second witness taking the stand.
In an Apple Music conversation reported by SPIN, Roan welcomed the space Rodrigo made for an explicitly queer perspective. That is the interesting bit. Pop collaborations can be an exercise in audience arithmetic; this one lets the guest change the angle of the song.
Then the video turns the whole thing into a competition. Directed by Bardia Zeinali, The Big Expectations Show drops Rodrigo and Roan into a gaudy, retro game-show universe. David Byrne plays the host; Nigro makes a cameo. The set is all artificial cheer and bright surfaces—the perfect place to ask why wanting basic honesty can make a woman seem like the difficult contestant.
The joke works because the pairing is real. Rodrigo and Roan have the same producer, a friendship, and two distinctly different ways of making romantic humiliation sound enormous. Here, they do not compete for the last word. They hand it back and forth until the song’s private frustration becomes a shared spectacle.
The remix is out now, with limited-edition vinyl, CD and cassette editions also announced. The packaging is cute; the point is sharper. Nobody wins this show by pretending they wanted less.
