Beyoncé, "Why Don't You Love Me?"

Perhaps taking all the Bettie Page references to her hairstyle in the “Video Phone” video to heart, Beyoncé has released a video for “Why Don’t You Love Me” in which she plays the retro-pinup role to the hilt, complete with sexily staged household mishaps, a bit where she dusts… her Grammys, bubble-bath interlude, and shots of her smoking. (Gasp!) There is also, oddly, what seems to be an homage to Britney Spears’ red-carpet outfit from the 2001 Video Music Awards. The song, however, is quite the banger, even if it was at first sabotaged by the abysmal sequencing of I Am… Sasha Fierce, not to mention the labels’ insistence on releasing it in 523 deluxe/platinum/a-plus configurations.