X Marks the Troubled

X Marks the Troubled

Based on ‘Never Too Late’ Music Video

By: Three Days Grace

Three Days Grace with Adam Gontier featured in the middle

One X album Cover

Could you change your life around with only three days left to live? This is how Adam Gontier, former lead guitarist and vocalist, described how the band Three Days Grace came up with its name. Ever since their debut in 1997, Three Days Grace became a well-known Canadian alternative rock band, and before their most critically accredited album, One X, was released in 2006, the band released music videos based on three singles from the album: “Pain,” “Animal I Have Become,” and their second most viewed music video of all time, “Never Too Late.” In the music video of “Never Too Late,” the band uses divine and metamorphic symbolism, a motif of color throughout the album, the theme of shadows and sight, and the conflict of sexual domination to portray hope in life- that it is ‘never too late’ to turn your life around after all the obstacles that you’ve encountered- and that you are not alone.

A closed up shot of the child holding her mother's hand

Symbolism is first shown in the video through the little girl as she is wearing a white dress that presents her upmost innocence. Her parents arrive and they each hold onto her hand, signifying safety and security under her parents. The girl then frolics with the parents in a circle, representing the happiness she feels with this unity. The second verse starts with “No one will ever see the side reflected”, and as that is being said, the parents hands are seen to be letting the child’s hand go, in a closed up view just like they were when they were holding hands, demonstrating the importance of this event as it symbolizes the release of the sense of security. For the first time in the music video, the girl is now alone and vulnerable. When the stranger is introduced into the video, he smiles, just how the parents smiled to the girl, and the girl smiles back hesitantly- in which we are reminded of her innocence and how she cannot sense this potential danger. As the woman is strapped down in the mental hospital, she sees the straps upon her hands and feet as the stranger’s hands holding her down, reminding her of how he molested her, that memory drags her down to the bed. The hospital bed represents her past at this moment of time, and the memory of the pedophile is still bringing her under, suffering her in the process.

As the girl walks away, feathers start to drop on the ground, signifying freedom and protection as it is the sign of an angel. The angel appears as a black man with black wings. Although, one could say that the blackness represents darkness, the guardian angel is seen to be protecting the little girl, implying that not everybody is perfect and neither are humans- which symbolizes acceptance of who she is. A butterfly emerges in the woman’s room, demonstrating major transitions in the soul and stops on what seems to be medications, then flies away. This indicates that she is now changed from the drug-addict past that she has followed due to the pain she endured. The woman is starting to understand that life isn’t always a blissful ideal and the imperfect guardian angel is her way to destroy this memory of such a monster after all he has done.

The dark angel makes an appearance

The hand prints in the room and on the girl symbolizes the damage this man has caused to her life, but as the angel fights off the stranger, feathers seem to fall from the sky in all three settings of the music video, symbolizing her freedom from her past memories and that she finally accepts her former life; thus, the woman is seen smiling in hope and happiness as more feathers seem to fall. The fact that the hand prints disappear and the room becomes clean once the stranger is taken care of represents change, as if the woman has decided to clean her childhood memory and attempt to forget the damage that has been done. As the man with the sweater finally lets go of his grip from under the hospital bed, she finally leaves the bed she was on while the little girl goes back to sleep, signifying how she put that past memory behind her by letting her younger self go back to sleep and is now able to let go of her past through leaving the bed.

The red and black color is used heavily in  'Animal I Have Become'

The color of black and red is used in the album cover of ‘One X’ and is seen in the other music videos of the album ‘Pain’ and ‘Animal I Have Become’, implementing a somewhat connection between them. The color is used in ‘Never Too Late’ on the little innocent girl’s wings and the molester’s sweater. Black and red are also used in the music video ‘Pain’ with a red and black ‘X’ on the back of everybody’s neck, while it is used excessively in ‘Animal I Have Become’ in wallpapers and backgrounds.

A One X from the music video 'Pain'

The colors seem to all go back to the album ‘One X’ signifying that it is possibly related to the actual song in the album called ‘One X’. In the song, it talks about people who have been through a lot of trouble in their lifetime – to the point of suicide, yet even though they ‘get knocked down’ they still manage to ‘… get back up and stand above the crowd’. The band uses the phrase “we are one” to describe the idea that those who deal with situations as such are not the only ones and this phrase, along with the repetition of “we” unifies the X’s together. That being said, the whole concept of being a One X connects the music videos together. You might be in a lot of ‘Pain’, or believe that you’ve simply become an ‘Animal’, just know that it is “Never Too Late” to go back and change all that. The group that had an ‘X’ on the back of their necks in the end of the ‘Pain’ music video are all One X, as well as the little girl in ‘Never Too Late’. In addition, the color of red and black on the man’s sweater implies that he is the reason the girl in “Never Too Late” is part of this group.

The little girl's wings as seen by her older, cognizant self.

The band is introduced in the first chorus in a lit room filled with shadows. Initially, one can only see the lead singer, but as the first chorus reaches its end, light shines on the rest of the composers, one by one, signifying importance, as if the shadows have come to help her. In the lit room, the shadow on the left of Adam Gontier (which is the viewer’s right), changes from being the parents and girl holding each other’s hands, to the stranger disciplining the little girl and then touching her, while finally showing a shadow of an angel moving its wings. However, when the angel's shadow appeared, a bright, glistening light formed, showing a contrast between darkness (resembled through the black angel's shadow) and light, and emphasizes the ironic situation at hand- where a dark angel is protecting the little girl; that being said, the angel is a paradigm of how it is never too late to alters one past and head back to the right track.

Overall, one can say that these shadows resemble the transition of thought, and that the band is really in the woman’s head, part of this whole experience and promoting the aspiration of change through their music. Also, there was a moment previously mentioned where the falling feathers were also in the room they were in which also emphasizes that they were somehow connected to these events- like voices in her head. Adam is the only person who is seen in her room, sometimes being a silhouette in a frozen time frame of the man touching the girl- elaborating the turning point of her life. Shadows have also been used to foreshadow potential danger, such as in the case of when the strangers shadow was the first thing made apparent as he approached the girl as she hid under her bed, signifying the evil that was to come.

Meanwhile, the theme of sight is made apparent through the absence of the stranger’s eyes in the video. Since, as viewers, we cannot see his eyes, we are obstructed from seeing the ‘window to his soul’, foreshadowing potential danger from the unknown. This makes the viewer fear the stranger even more as one is encumbered the person’s true intentions while also demonstrating a difficult life scenario that a One X can relate to.

The mother cannot see that her child is cut off from the circle

The parents are also seen in the woman’s memory still dancing but with bandages covering up their sight while still dancing in a circle, demonstrating their lack of knowledge towards what the girl was dealing with, as well as their failure to heal her from all the pain she was dealing with and provide support.

The woman is left helpless as she fails to set herself free

The idea of sexual dominance is portrayed in the music video of how men are seen as the strong and physically independent, although there is a conflict on mentality. As the woman is fastened to the bed, she tries to break free, but cannot escape the grasp of the man even as the grown woman she is now, demonstrating how she feels weak, and establishes the sexual dominance of male in the music video, and how if she was a male she might have been able to break through the deadlock- portraying that the obstacle could have been easier to endure. However, as the lead singer says “The life we knew won’t come back”, the little girl stares at the man straight into his eyes, then walks away- signifying the character’s understanding that this life is simply a memory and it won’t repeat itself. Thus, mental power is now restored to the woman in her head, who as the girl, escapes the man’s touching hand and walks away. On the other hand, as the angel descended to protect her and diminish this memory, the angel was seen as a male, and not a female, thus establishing the theme of male dominance through physical conflict as she couldn’t fight him herself and was only triumphant when a male was involved.

Through the music video “Never Too Late” and the album ‘One X’, Three Days Grace uses angelic and progressive symbolism, a black and red color motif, and the theme of shadows, sexual dominance, and sight to emphasize the idea that you can turn and change your life around, no matter what you’ve been through, as those who suffered are all one-never alone- and can stand above everybody else no matter how many times they get knocked down by life. The song “Never Too Late” overall reminds us that we must value our lives and not throw it away because of our past complications, as well as help those who are suffering through depression and are experiencing suicidal thoughts. As the ancient Roman philosopher Cicero once said: “Man’s best support is a very dear friend”. Thus, as listeners and viewers, we must try to acknowledge symptoms of depression from those of who we know, care and cherish and provide them the aspiring hope they need to escape from their black pit of misery.