Your favorite movie or TV show may tell an incredible story, but no story is more incredible than the one that fans can tell themselves. The recent Stranger Things #ConformityGate conspiracy had fans of that series in an absolute tailspin, as a significant number of those fans had convinced themselves the series finale was some sort of fake-out, and that more of the show was on the way.
ConfirmityGate won’t be the last pop culture conspiracy theory from fans, nor was it the first. A very similar theory sprouted amongst fans of Sherlock when that final season didn’t end the way fans wanted. However, neither of these holds a candle to what may be the greatest pop culture conspiracy theory of all time. It’s a conspiracy I never believed, but that I’ve followed for decades.
Man On The Run Asks If Paul McCartney Is Dead
As a huge fan of the Beatles, I am always interested in any new material about any of the Fab Four, so I was happy to sit down with a Prime Video subscription to enjoy Man on the Run, a new documentary about Paul McCartney’s life post-Beatles. Though I was a little surprised to see it open with a sequence that dealt with the iconic “Paul is Dead” conspiracy theory.
The documentary points out that following the breakup of the Beatles in 1969, Paul McCartney, one of the most famous human beings on planet earth, appeared to vanish. Rumors of his death began to circulate. However, the rumors also kick-started an already existing theory that believed that, not only was McCartney dead, but he had been for years.
Paul McCartney Is (Not) Dead
The Beatles gave their last public concert in the summer of 1966, at which point, while they continued to release music, they stopped touring. The Beatles claimed that touring wasn’t good for them, that the concerts weren’t great because they couldn’t hear themselves play, and that they wanted to work on new ideas in the studio. However, the conspiracy theory posits that the real reason the Beatles quit touring was that in the fall of 1966, Paul McCartney died in an automobile accident.
It’s a wild idea at the outset of course, but the part that makes it wilder, which the documentary only hints at (it has more important things to discuss, of course) is that the reason fans “know” about the alleged death of Paul McCartney at all is that, like any great pop culture conspiracy theory, the Beatles left clues in their music revealing the truth to those few people smart enough to find them.
The Paul Is Dead Clues
Allegedly, Paul’s replacement was taken from the winner of a Paul McCartney look-a-like contest, and in some versions of the theory, went by the name Billy Shears, a character who is “introduced” in the second track of the Beatles’ first album following the “accident,” Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. Just ignore the fact that Ringo sings that song.
The album cover for Sgt. Pepper is supposed to be Paul’s funeral, with a crowd of mourners in attendance. An arrangement of flowers is either an outline of Paul’s bass or possibly his name spelled out. An image inside the album cover includes the other three Beatles facing the camera, but Paul has its back to it. The song “A Day in the Life” includes a man who “blew his mind out in a car.” Not the method of McCartney’s alleged death, but close enough.
The Beatles’ next album, Magical Mystery Tour, would include hints of its own. A bit of verbal gibberish at the end of “Strawberry Fields Forever” was interpreted by some as John Lennon saying, “I buried Paul.” The White Album would add its own hints, including a section of “I’m So Tired” that, when played backward, allegedly said, “Paul is dead, man, miss him, miss him, miss him.” Similarly, playing a section of “Revolution #9” backwards resulted in the alleged statement, “Turn me on, dead man.”
The two albums together would convince many that The Beatles really were leaving clues, or at least messing with them. John Lennon sang the song “I Am the Walrus,” but in the White Album song “Glass Onion he would sing…
Here’s another clue for you all. The walrus was Paul.
Here was Lennon literally saying, this is a clue here. How did the walrus being Paul mean Paul was dead? It’s been suggested that the walrus is a symbol of death or the afterlife in Viking or Inuit cultures, but that’s simply not the case.
One of The Beatles’ most iconic images is also connected to the conspiracy theory. The cover of the Abby Road album sees the Beatles in a crosswalk, allegedly creating a funeral procession. John, dressed in pure white, leads the way as St. Peter, a priest, or some other heavenly figure. He’s followed by a black-clad Ringo, who is representing the undertaker. A shoeless Paul follows him as the corpse. Then George, slightly more casually dressed, ends the procession as the grave digger.
Conspiracy Theories Are Wild, But They Can Be Fun
The above is not an exhaustive list of the alleged clues that Paul McCartney has been dead since 1966. Basically, every song and album from Sgt. Pepper forward apparently hints at the conspiracy. Much of it doesn’t make much sense.
Even after the Beatles were over and McCartney began his post-Beatles career, the conspiracy would not end. McCartney’s first solo album cover would be of an empty bowl of cherries, and if “life is like a bowl of cherries,” then clearly an empty bowl of cherries is a representation of death.
I’ve loved this particular conspiracy theory since I discovered it as a teenager. I approached it with a strange curiosity at first, not necessarily believing it, but assuming that if somebody had written a book on the topic (a book I can no longer find, I’m sad to say), there must be something to it, right?
Today, the Paul is Dead hoax is the stuff of legend, and nobody really believes it (I don’t think), but it’s difficult to look back at it and not see a lot of the hallmarks of modern pop culture conspiracies. Sometimes people just need to believe in something, even if it’s crazy.
