In August 2015 when One Direction was announced to go on hiatus indefinitely, it is not an exaggeration to say that millions of hearts were broken. I, for one, rejoiced in the news that the band that had defined all the lives of teenage friends and really drove me crazy as a result, was finally going to be over. While that view has changed over the years, and I do enjoy some of their music, solo, and band, and do wonder what a reunion tour would look like, I really don’t think it’s possible.
The first obvious reason why is some of the things that have been said and done this year to shatter the illusion. Firstly, and most importantly – the infamous recent Liam Payne / Logan Paul podcast. Liam spent the vast majority of the podcast being explicitly horrible about the way Zayn was brought up and his role in the band as a whole. He also massively hyped himself up as being ‘Simon Cowell’s vision for the band’, discrediting the roles of the others. He also said he’s been the most successful solo out of the other members when even just a mere glance in Harry’s direction could suggest otherwise. He’s also just been shrouded in a scandal over the past few years, causing unrest within the fandom and much contempt towards it. This proves my first reason why it’s unlikely – there is just such division and unrest within the fandom that a reunion wouldn’t be smooth.
Secondly, the solo careers. Both Louis Tomlinson and Niall Horan have two solo albums to their name each, Zayn and Harry have three each, with Liam having only 2019’s LP1 to his. Their solo careers are fusing so independent of the lives in the band that forming these new personalities they have and their individuality is just going to be so difficult to shoehorn into their old One Direction archetypes and it’s a big ask to put four or five polar opposite men on tour together when they’re much happier touring solo. And if the small bits of hope fans have been hanging on to mean anything, then Louis taking “1/5 of 1D” out of his Twitter bio, makes this fantasy much more of just a fantasy.
However, there’s some hope for it. I think maybe it would look incredibly different to One Direction, it would be a big Harry/Louis/Zayn/Niall/Liam tour with band and solo music and the shows wouldn’t look like they used to. It really depends on what the vision of a tour would look like, what fans wanted, and what was possible that would determine the direction (no pun intended) of a reunion.
It’s not a lost cause, that’s for sure! But I think with each passing day, it is looking unlikely that the band will get back together. Maybe a couple of sold-out nights at Wembley to celebrate each other and their history on the ten-year anniversary of the hiatus? But I seriously doubt a full tour. But please, boys if you could prove me wrong – I’d really love that.
