Bonnie and Clyde
The historical and cinematic figures of Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow: the doomed outlaw couple who robbed and killed together across the American South before being ambushed and killed. In Taylor's writing the allusion carries both the romantic excitement of the criminal partnership and the inevitability of its violent end.
Bonnie and Clyde stand in for the doomed romantic partnership - two people bound together by transgression rather than genuine love, whose shared flight from consequence is exhilarating but structurally unsustainable.
Appears in 1 song
“We were jet-set, Bonnie and Clyde Until I switched to the other side, to the other side It's no surprise I turned you in 'Cause us traitors never win”
Bonnie and Clyde as the outlaw-couple archetype, two people on the run together, doomed to fail. Uncle Jerry reads the allusion as carrying both the romantic excitement of the outlaw pair and their inevitable destruction. He also raises the question of whether Taylor is referencing the movie version (in which Bonnie and Clyde don't consummate their relationship), adding a possible layer of unfulfilled intimacy.