Imagine Dragons - Radioactive Analysis

The video starts with just a slight ambient background noise and a long shot of of an enigmatic character with their hood up. The colour grading is dark and slightly depressing, but it is set in quite a beautiful setting with leaves and trees. The shot quickly switches to a variation of an over-the-shoulder shot, and the song starts.

This is quite an artsy shot, and the dark colour grading is consistent throughout the introduction to the song.

This is setting up an enigma code for the audience, making them ask questions like "who is this person?" and "why is there underlying tones of sadness or fear?".

After showing the characters face, revealing her to be a female, the shot quickly changes to an insert on a clothed cage she is holding.

This is further setting up enigma throughout the video, intriguing the audience, making them want answers from the video. At this point, it is quite clear the video is going to be driven by narrative. I make note of this, as if I am going to create a narrative centric video, I need to make this clear from the get-go.

This continues until we get shots of some members of the band, flowers and close ups on the mysterious character's eyes. The shot then focuses in on a shed in the distance, as the song's beat drops. 

Inside the shed there is a lot of hectic diegetic background noise of shouting, cheering and grunting. This fulfils the enigma of the dark and mysterious colour grading, as it's clear our character has been on her way to this location.  

Inside the shed is a unique play on a chicken fighting concept. Without explaining thoroughly, the audience still understands the concept of people bringing in their trained "stuffed animals" to bet and win money. All of this happens within the first 30 seconds or so, showing how easily 

The video spends quite a lot of time on this character, who is clearly some form of crime boss or leader in the shed. The stuffed animal winning/killing all of the others is represented as a very 

intimidating and scary creature. And given the rich and powerful nature of the crime boss character, he is clearly the owner/trainer of this animal.

 

The way the band is incorporated within the video is also very unique and interesting. Whenever we get shots of them, the music usually cuts out into an ominous, mysterious ambience and they are represented as "fallen opponents" of the monster.

All of these elements will be helpful when I am crafting my music video. The abstract elements of the narrative along with the enigmatic colour grading and general plot points like the identity of a character are great aspects of the video, that fit well in the genre.