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On 8 July, Sabrina Carpenter unveiled yet another cover for her forthcoming album Man’s Best Friend, leaning into her signature tongue-in-cheek style. The original artwork—Carpenter crouched on all fours while an off-frame man yanks at hair—sparked immediate backlash from fans and critics. Carpenter has never shied from controversy, but even die-hard supporters felt the BDSM-tinged image clashed with her coquettish brand of female empowerment (others suggested Carpenter is just a bit kinky and beholden to no one).
Two weeks earlier, on 26 June, she quietly dropped an “alternate” cover on her website, teasing it as “approved by God.” In that shot, Carpenter channels a vintage Marilyn Monroe moment—complete with a damsel in distress expression beside a tux-clad suitor – a nod to Monroe’s fraught marriage to Arthur Miller, of Death of a Salesman fame and possibly the hypocrisy of any fans who think this album cover alternative was a feminist improvement on the first.
Now comes cover three, and Carpenter has finally kicked the boys out of frame. Lounging solo in a duck-egg Rococo armchair, she resembles Sofia Coppola’s Marie Antoinette on a Champagne stay-cation: sheer black lingerie under a gossamer nightgown, burgundy stilettos dangling from pointed toes, a calling card marked “M.B.F.” poised for the toss.
Sabrina Carpenter’s New Album Cover’s Meaning Explained
Taken together, the trio reads like a breakup triptych. Cover one lampoons the male-dominance fantasy; cover two references a mythic bad romance; cover three delivers post-patriarchal bliss. It’s a lesson told in pictures: date, learn, delete.
One fan, still missing the point, commented, “Exactly… why wasn’t this the cover in the beginning?” The same could be asked of life: most of us endure a few man-children before earning the right to sip room-service bubbly in peace.
Need-to-know: streaming services will keep the original cover, while physical editions ship with the two new alternatives—proof that Carpenter is selling narrative as much as music. Consider it a visual syllabus on ditching bad apples and living your best life.
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