‘In Her Words’ details Megan Thee Stallion’s triumphs and hip-hop’s failures
As I watched Megan Thee Stallion: In Her Words, the documentary about the rise of rapper Megan Thee Stallion, I couldn’t help but think of Serena Williams.
When Williams retired in September 2022, she was met with unanimous praise from the tennis community, celebrating her Hall of Fame career. But so much of the fawning felt disingenuous because I remember what it was like when Williams’ career was taking off. Those of us who were there when the Williams sisters were on the rise remember the body-shaming, the racism, the micro-and-macro-aggressions they experienced. We remember how many in the tennis community tried their hardest to cut the Williams sisters down at every turn.
At some point in the future, Megan Thee Stallion will wind her career down as one of the most decorated rappers of our generation — she’s already the first woman with three number one hits in one year and has earned three Grammys and six nominations. And when her career ends, many people in the hip-hop community will come to her side to celebrate her career, and so much of it will feel disingenuous because we have a full two-hour documentary that highlights exactly how much misogynoir is at the heart of hip-hop and what it takes for a woman to succeed in the face of such abuse.
Directed by Nneka Onuorah, Megan Thee Stallion: In Her Own Words takes us through the parallel worlds of Megan’s greatest public achievements and her deepest personal tragedies. The first half of the documentary highlights Megan finding her footing as an MC and performer under the guidance and hands-on management of her mother, Holly Thomas. In the doc, viewers learn that it was Thomas who was filming Megan’s guerrilla-style freestyle and twerk videos and get a firsthand look at just how close they were. Thomas’ passing from a brain tumor in 2019 is a devastating moment in the documentary and a real crossroads moment for Megan, who spends the rest of the film searching for the community, happiness, and calm that her mother provided.
As the documentary shows Megan’s drive and rise to superstardom, we also see a person trying to put flimsy Band-Aids on her scars. It’s particularly telling that Megan was back on the road three weeks after her mother died. The juxtaposition of Megan’s public success and personal sadness is heartbreaking. And it all culminated in a July 2020 night when rapper Tory Lanez shot Megan in the foot.
The documentary gives us Megan’s story from that night in full — from her and Lanez’s friendship to the nature of their argument. It also includes an animated reenactment of the shooting. Megan also explained why, as a Black woman being approached by police mere months after Minneapolis police killed George Floyd, she refused to sic them on a Black man even at her own physical peril. Meanwhile, the same Black man she tried to protect launched into his own series of disgusting public attacks.
The Lanez shooting and fallout dominate much of the second half of the film and indicts Lanez by showing us the extended trauma his act of violence created for Megan. But Lanez is merely a vehicle to discuss the overall hatred Megan has experienced at the hands of far too many Black men.
The most damning moment of the documentary comes from a video montage of all the men who defended Lanez after Megan admitted he shot her. The montage features Joe Budden, DJ Akademiks, 50 Cent, DaBaby and Chris Brown. All of the men cast doubts, insult Megan and defend Lanez. Meanwhile, all of them have had their own accusations of abusing women. The clip ends ominously with Sean “Diddy” Combs endorsing Lanez with a foreboding admission that he has a dark side, too. Not to be lost in all of this is also a clip of LeBron James playing Lanez’s music on Instagram Live.
This also comes after another montage where rap’s most prominent men, including Snoop Dogg of all people, criticized Megan and her fellow female rappers for showing off their bodies and rapping about sex. While we could all assume just how deeply these moments would impact Megan, the documentary showed us the moments of her crying while scrolling through social media, second-guessing herself, and being overly critical in moments where she may have previously been more secure.
The media also shares much of the blame here, with bloggers and headlines featured prominently in the pile-on. And in a cruel turn of irony, many of these publications haven’t learned anything. Megan’s admission in the documentary that she lied to Gayle King about not having a sexual relationship with Tory Lanez has become a main takeaway from the same publications and social media accounts that have spent the last half-decade demonizing her. Again, headlines are all over the internet calling Megan a liar and using her revelation about her relationship with Lanez as a way to disqualify her testimony about what happened the night of the shooting.
All of the hatred and trauma culminated in a mental breakdown for Megan, who had to take a month away at a wellness camp. At the documentary’s end, she finds a semblance of peace in Lanez’s guilty verdict. While the moment created a level of catharsis for the rapper, I was saddened by it all. The notion that Megan had to turn to the same criminal justice system that so often victimizes Black women to feel her safest and that she couldn’t find safety in a community that should have shunned Lanez and gotten her back in the first place. Sadly, she couldn’t rely on her community to shield her from the trolls and abuse. Megan’s story is a direct rebuke of so many “girl dads” and toothless “protect Black women” performative gestures because so many of these men opted to rally behind an abuser instead of standing by the woman he abused.
Megan Thee Stallion has persevered and overcome so much, and that’s a huge part of what makes her rise so special. But it’s hard to appreciate that perseverance without also acknowledging that she shouldn’t have had to be so resilient. There shouldn’t have been a world where she had to endure so much abuse and public backlash for simply surviving an assault and telling her story, for being at the forefront of a revolution about women’s bodily autonomy in hip-hop, for being one of rap’s biggest female stars ever.
In Her Words doesn’t allow anyone to skate by. It’s an accounting of everyone on the wrong side of history and a preemptive rebuke of anyone who tries to pretend otherwise.