about us meant to be together" is completely censored. All references to the girlfriend in the trunk are censored, including the screaming in the background, and the line: "And had his girlfriend in his trunk, and she was pregnant with his kid." In the MTV short version, which was used for radio airplay due to time constraints, the second verse lines that are missing are from "I ain't that mad though, I just don't like bein' lied to" to "I even got a tattoo of your name across the chest"; the video cuts showing Stan meeting Eminem, talking about how his father cheated and beat his mother and showed him getting a "Slim Shady" tattoo on his chest. The missing lyrics from the third verse are of Stan talking about drinking while driving and referencing "In the Air Tonight", (Eminem quotes the title as "In the Air of the Night) which in the video, it skips from showing Stan near-missing a car, and swerving to avoid crashing into it. The lines that are missing are from "Hey Slim, I drank a fifth of vodka, you dare to me to drive?" to "I hope you know I ripped all of your pictures off the wall". It also removes the chorus after the third verse and goes straight to the fourth verse; the video then cuts to Eminem at last receiving the letter from Stan, and the car sinking more into the water. In Fuse's original state as a rock and alternative station, the same versions of the video were shown as on MTV. However, in later Fuse airings, more lines and words are silenced than on the clean version of the LP; half of one of the beginning verses are cut out, and then the song fades out about halfway through the second verse, after playing for approximately two minutes. "Stan" was also released on track 17 of Curtain Call: The Hits; on the clean and explicit versions, the live track censored only the profanity, unlike the clean version of the studio track. Critical reception "Stan" was met with critical acclaim, with praise directed to the song's epistolary narrative structure, emotional range and lyrical depth. Stephen Thomas Erlewine highlighted the song. Entertainment Weekly praised the song, too: "Eminem proves himself a peerless rap poet with a profound understanding of the power of language. Stan, an epistolary exchange between the artist and