‘Something happened up there’: Did the wrong Katy Perry come back from space?

Yesterday Katy Perry went to outer space. The pop icon blasted away from her home planet aboard Jeff Bezos’ New Shepard rocket, traveling to just above the Karman line, the boundary between outer space and Earth’s atmosphere. Eleven minutes after liftoff, the capsule touched back down, with Perry returning safely to Earth.

Or… did she? Social media has seized upon a conspiracy theory that while Perry did indeed go into space, she never truly returned. So who – or what – is strolling around in her skin?

That’s not her. Something happened up there. https://t.co/YEQ7RgutvX

— cory snearowski (@corysnearowski) April 14, 2025

The most likely answer is aliens, as scientists have concluded that space is, by definition, where they live. But we shouldn’t count out the existence of some kind of atmospheric ghost, or even an earth-bound cerebral parasite already inside Perry’s brain that was somehow activated by celestial radiation bombardment.

All that said, the consensus is building that the Katy Perry we now have to deal with is some kind of polymorphic shapeshifter that assumed her form for nefarious alien reasons. After all, if you were going to launch a stealthy invasion of Earth, Perry might be an ideal vehicle. Even better, there’s a telltale sign that everyone should look out for. If she’s now a secret alien, her music might get better:

and then suddenly her music starts getting better…. hmm

— Olive Maigo (@NonaiDenpa_) April 14, 2025

If she starts releasing good music you’ll know they replaced the real Katy Perry with a clone. https://t.co/8b22sbFWqI

— Chris Hardiman ☕🎸🚨🏈📺🏳️‍🌈🇮🇪 (@AJoyForever83) April 14, 2025

In another cruel twist, some theorize that, as the speed of radio waves means aliens may only now be hearing radio from 2010, they might have inhabited Perry only to be disappointed that she’s now much less relevant than they’d assumed:

the shapeshifting alien that came down in katy perry’s rocket is probably really confused why they don’t have access to the resources of a relevant celebrity rn

— femmepire 🌹🩷🪽 (@dykengard) April 15, 2025

All of which makes us wonder what happened to the “real” Katy Perry? If she were jettisoned from the capsule, she may now be forever drifting through space, still traveling the cosmos as a frozen pop star popsicle long after humanity has consumed itself in nuclear fire and environmental destruction. Who knows, maybe millions of years from now some bizarre future alien civilization will retrieve the frozen Perry and defrost her to discover mankind’s secrets?

Then again, if she starts singing ‘Woman’s World’, we have no doubt the aliens will immediately blast her back into space once more for the next intergalactic empire to deal with.