Winter is coming – no, wait, wrong saga. Judging by the glittery countdown on her website, Taylor Swift is set to release something this Friday – presumably the first single from her forthcoming seventh album, known for now as TS7. And going by the inscrutable, pastel-hued clues she is unveiling daily, her winter of discontent is over.

Swift flipping the gothic aesthetic of her 2017 album Reputation, which surveyed her various feuds, her tumble in public favour and the relationship that put her back together, has led many fans to believe she is heralding a return to love songs and even her earlier country sound. (For anyone wishing to learn more, fans are going into Rain Man-level detail about the clues.) What it does for her, well, reputation – and her pop dominance – remains to be seen.

All will be revealed at about 5am UK time on Friday. The Guardian solicited six critics to discuss what’s at stake for Swift’s career in this new era.

‘A callback to her Nashville roots would be an on-trend reset ... Swift performing in Las Vegas, 2010. Photograph: Paul Sakuma/AP

Can she keep a foot in all genre camps or must she renounce her hip-hop dabbling?

Peter Robinson, Popjustice: The relatively underwhelming sales of Reputation would send some artists fleeing in the direction of the nearest life raft: a big-name DJ collaboration, a Latin-influenced smash-by-numbers, an unconvincing K-pop team-up. It’d be disappointing to see Swift on the back foot, and she’d be foolish to storm ahead as if her imperial phase wasn’t almost half a decade ago, but there is one retreat that would make sense without seeming defensive: if the hip-hop-referencing Reputation was the logical conclusion to the stadium-pop Swift perfected on 1989, a callback to Swift’s Nashville roots would be a partial reset that would be believable and on trend. It would also sidestep direct competition with artists who have stampeded towards pop’s iron throne in recent years.

Will she pivot back to country?

Brittany Spanos, Rolling Stone: Even when she moved to the bright synthpop of 1989 or the dark Reputation, Swift never totally abandoned her country roots. At heart, she is a Nashville storyteller with a flair for country anthems, which she makes clear on songs like 1989’s Style and Getaway Car.

I’ve always admired her for moving herself as artistically forward as possible. Following her self-titled debut, her next three albums made incredible strides towards new genres and showed she could turn her signature breakup songs into an art form. And she did it all without alienating her core audience, who were growing up with her. Going back to country in totality for TS7 would be a regression after taking so many risks – and mercilessly dropping her vocal twang! – to discover what she was capable of outside of it.

Even so, I can see her begin infusing a few elements of her past. But I can’t imagine her referencing sounds earlier than those on Red. That was the album that brought her into adulthood and helped canonise her as a pop star capable of unpacking love’s indescribable feelings and moments.

The cover of US Elle’s April issue, in which Swift alluded to Trump’s ‘disgusting’ rhetoric. Photograph: © Hearst UK

Will her political sentiments surface in her music?

Elle Hunt, the Guardian: At long last, Swift is revealing her politics, endorsing Democrats in US midterm elections and appearing to criticise Donald Trump for “disgusting rhetoric”. But if they’re to become any clearer, I suspect it will continue to be on her Instagram page rather than her music. As a songwriter, Swift is best when her lyrics train a laser focus on love and the loss of it – especially the small moments that capture the dynamics of a relationship. The weakest moments on Reputation are oblique and generic: compare “They’re burning all the witches, even if you aren’t one” to “And you call me up again just to break me like a promise / So casually cruel in the name of being honest” from her masterpiece, All Too Well, on Red. Whether she will become more politically outspoken remains to be seen. But for the sake of her songs – what she’d presumably prefer we measure her by – we should hope her scope remains small.

Are there more scores for her to settle on TS7?

Anna Leszkiewicz, New Statesman: In 2016, Taylor Swift’s reputation was a problem. After her high-profile spat with Kanye West and Kim Kardashian left many concluding that she was a manipulative liar hiding behind a victim narrative, it was hard to see what direction she could take on her sixth album that wouldn’t be derided. So Reputation as less of a heel-turn and more of a bulldozer – she leaned so far into the bad girl image, she smashed right through it.

I don’t think we’ll see another vengeance album from Swift any time soon. Nor do I think she can pivot back to the stories of wounded innocence that won her so many young fans. The only score she might have left to settle is the criticism she faced for being an apolitical pop star in an age when pop culture is hyper-politicised. But I don’t think her next record will be super-political. I have a feeling Swift might lean in to the domestic bliss she has hinted at achieving with her boyfriend, actor Joe Alwyn. After all, they say happiness is the best revenge.

‘The fact that her press strategy is impossible to call is weirdly exciting’ ... Swift performing in Texas in 2018. Photograph: Matt Winkelmeyer/TAS18/Getty Images

Is her no-interview press strategy likely to change?

Chris Mandle, writer: Although they are different pop stars in so many ways, I did watch Beyoncé’s Netflix documentary Homecoming and its controlled, high-end, faux intimacy and wonder if Swift might be curled up on the sofa taking notes. She did a Netflix doc last year – a live film from the Reputation tour – but given that Beyoncé reportedly did a three-film deal with the streaming service, I’d be surprised if Swift doesn’t have at least one more up her sleeve. There were headlines generated from Beyoncé’s quotes, but they were on the artist’s terms; and there was a peek behind the curtain, but just a peek.

Swift doesn’t need to give warts-and-all interviews at this point in her career, and she’s not alone: Rihanna is on the cover of Harpers Bazaar this month sans interview. Then there’s Swift’s recent Elle cover story, which consists of a piece penned by her titled Thirty Things I Learned Before Turning Thirty. That said, Swift has a role in the forthcoming live-action Cats remake, so I wouldn’t be surprised if she thinks that Hollywood press such as Vanity Fair or the Hollywood Reporter are best suited for her to tell her story. Still, she needs to do something to launch this mysterious album – an agenda-setting Billboard cover, or an internet-breaking Paper magazine shoot. The fact it’s impossible to call is weirdly exciting.

Can Swift’s classic brand endure in this genre-fluid, borderless era?

Laura Snapes, the Guardian: Rumours of pop’s demise have been greatly exaggerated. It’s fantastic (and long overdue) that pop’s top tier has opened up to make space for artists from around the globe, and the quicker someone like Rosalía becomes a global star, the better. But while acts like her and the K-pop band BTS have established a form of cultural dominance, they aren’t household names.

The pastel Poirot. Photograph: Angela Weiss/AFP/Getty Images

That kind of supremacy comes only from ubiquitous hits, something you’d imagine the competitive Swift is determined to maintain after scoring her first UK No 1 with Look What You Made Me Do. While that beguilingly brittle track wasn’t made for 22-style singalongs, Swift apparently breaking her tradition of releasing in the fourth quarter points to a desire for cultural cache: to see her comeback declared song of the summer.

And as trivial as her album release campaign is – hidden numbers in statements or images that point to 26 April; clothes that reflect the images’ pastel aesthetic – it’s dominating entertainment headlines. If she comes back with a copper-bottomed hit, she could easily find herself at the outset of a second imperial phase.