The bond created between two women who endure endless trials and tribulations together (usually spurred by some sort of male-delivered trauma) can and should never be underestimated. Which is why it’s entirely within the realm of possibility that Tove Lo’s fierce protectiveness for her friend, “Uma,” in the Vania Heymann/Gal Muggia-directed “Glad He’s Gone” could extend to making her phone immune to ever dying as she pep talks her bestie through the depression brought on by loving a fuckboy.
Opening on Tove Lo ordering breakfast with a worthier male cohort than the one that has sent Uma into a tailspin, she proceeds to explain while on the phone with her friend, “I got a girlfriend, she’s got a boyfriend/She calls me crying every day ’cause they got problems/He likes complaining, she’s compromising/Coming to me for real advice when he just playing/I can tell she loves him way too deep/He loves being fucking hard to please/Cover the basics, it’s pretty easy/He’s a bitch with some expectations.” Clearly needing more than just a moment to walk Uma through her emotional tailspin, Tove Lo herself walks out of the restaurant to give her friend her complete attention, also, in turn, making her way through endless distances and tableaus (many of which look like they were stolen from Marina’s “Handmade Heaven” video) to persuade Uma to see reason: “I think you know it’s time to let go/You’re better off I’m glad that he’s gone.”
Yet it takes multiple reassurances to convince Uma of this, hence the seemingly endless duration of the largely one-sided conversation that finds her casually taking out a convenience store robber by plopping a fish bowl onto his head (see, this is why Scandinavian convenience stores are automatically better). Even though it was an act of heroism, she still gets arrested for her so-called crime, all the while continuing to chat with Uma despite the fact that her phone should have been dead long ago. But then, so should have most old white men still clinging to their old guard power.
And as the usual Orange Is the New Black-type fights erupt around Tove Lo, she still focuses solely on her chat with Uma (now transferred to the payphone-like communication of prison). Eventually, she gets a burner phone clandestinely passed along to her, plotting her escape as she persists in performing her best friendly chatting duties. Crawling through the tunnel beneath the toilet, a shoddy connection briefly interrupts Uma’s comfort before Tove Lo pulls a Franka Potente in The Bourne Identity and changes her name and, of course, hair color. All the while, even her burner phone has managed to transcend space and time long enough to never die at any point throughout this conversation.
When she finally returns to the breakfast table, her trusty male companion has still not touched his food, politely waiting for her to finish her call. Upon sitting back down across from him, she somewhat cruelly asks for the check, somehow still not having worked up an appetite through that harrowing bout of providing the requisite emotional support that comes with being a loyal female friend. Ride or die through any and all elements and obstacles. A requirement that clearly extends to one’s phone as well.
