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When The Weeknd showed up at the American Music Awards in November wrapped in facial bandages people were confused, but intrigued. It wasn‘t the first time the singer showed up to an awards show looking bloody and bruised but this time seemed…. Different. As time went on people started to learn that the artist might be doing some sort of method acting for his latest album “After Hours.” There were even rumors that he had gotten plastic surgery. But on January 5th the world finally got to see the dramatic “results” of his “plastic surgery.” There is most likely a very deep and artistic meaning behind this project but the artist has a new nickname on social media, “Handsome Squidward.”
The artist uploaded a selfie with his new chiseled look and his new face had fans both terrified and laughing in the comments. One fan wrote, this ain’t the weekend this Monday 💀.” The most popular joke were the hundreds of comments, tweets, and likes, referencing an episode of “SpongeBob Squarepants” where Squidward turns handsome.
The Weeknd, real name Abel Tesfay released his latest album “After Hours’ in March of 2020, and since then he has been doing a lot of things to his face. The cover art for the album is Tesfay with a broken nose and blood running down his face. He had the same beaten look when he performed on “Saturday Night Live” back in March. Then in August he showed up to the MTV Video Music Awards and took home the award for Best R&B album video of the year for “Blinding Lights” with the same look. He went from bruised to bandaged in November at the AMA’s and performed live and accepted awards for best R&B artist and album wrapped in bandages.
It all led to the big reveal in the official music video for “Save Your Tears.” He dropped the video on Youtube on January 5th and it has over 22.3 million views and counting. The video is set at a masquerade dinner party and The Weeknd‘s new face was center stage. His puffy face looked like he had way too much botox and was about to film the show “Botched.” The singer had scars mimicking a facelift and dramatically large lips that look stuffed with filler.
There are a lot of theories surrounding the meaning behind it all. According to Page Six some, people think the facial features could be a dig at his model ex, Bella Hadid. “Is The Weeknd trying to look like Bella Hadid bc I can see it,” one person tweeted. “The Weeknd is definitely bashing Bella Hadid with the whole plastic surgery themes,” another wrote.
Per the New York Post, his new look was likely achieved through prosthetics or CGI. He has previously worked with Prosthetic Renaissance and the makeup effects studio already took credit for the transformation on their social media account. They said it took 4 prosthetic appliances in one of the posts.
The Weeknd is set to perform at the 2021 Super Bowl half-time show on February 7th and fans are eager to see what face he decides to show up with. On Friday he posted a promotional video for the performance on his Instagram and it was nice to see his old face again. One fan joked in the comments, “postponed Grammy’s are big mad lol.“ Referencing the fact that The Weeknd was not nominated for any awards this year.