Synopsis

A strict suburban father demands to know what his son plans to do with his life, only to receive the answer, "I wanna rock!" The teenager transforms into Dee Snider, while the rest of Twisted Sister suddenly appears in the bedroom. As the band launches into the song, the family home becomes a playground for cartoon-style rebellion, with the father repeatedly outmatched, tossed around, and driven from the house. The video turns generational conflict into broad slapstick comedy and a triumphant rock fantasy.

Factoids & Trivia

• Mark Metcalf's performance deliberately recalls Douglas C. Niedermeyer, the authoritarian ROTC officer he played in the 1978 film "National Lampoon's Animal House." The connection is reinforced by the military-style shouting and the video's closing dialogue.

• The video's exaggerated violence was intended as cartoon slapstick rather than realistic aggression. Dee Snider later compared its visual approach to the old Wile E. Coyote cartoons.

• "We're Not Gonna Take It" became Twisted Sister's signature song and their only US Top 40 single, reaching No. 21 on the Billboard Hot 100.

• In 1985, the Parents Music Resource Center included the song among its "Filthy Fifteen," helping make it part of the broader US debate over explicit lyrics in popular music.

• Dee Snider has said that the song's writing was influenced by Slade and also contains elements reminiscent of the traditional Christmas carol "O Come, All Ye Faithful."

• The clip's success on MTV helped turn Twisted Sister from a long-running club band into nationally recognized 1980s metal stars. A similarly comic follow-up, "I Wanna Rock," brought Metcalf back in another authority-figure role.