The Story Of Kanye West’s Kim Kardashian Sex Tape Recovery Got More Complicated

On the first episode of Hulu’s The Kardashians, Kim Kardashian saw a threat on her son Saint’s Roblox account that unseen footage from her infamous sex tape with ex-boyfriend Ray J would be released nearly 20 years after it was shot, causing her to break down in her closet and vow to “burn them all to the f*cking ground.” Cue Kanye West to the rescue. On the third episode, which premiered on April 28, the reality star revealed that her estranged husband managed to retrieve all of the footage from the controversial tape, and even went to great lengths to get it.

In Kim’s version events, the rapper, who was in New York City to support her during her SNL stint, flew to Los Angeles (in coach), met Ray J at the airport to retrieve the clips in question, and then returned to New York overnight to give it to his estranged wife. The Kardashians shows Kim calling her sister Khloé and mom Kris Jenner to her hotel room and showing them a suitcase with a computer system and hard drive that reportedly contained every second of footage from the sex tape.

After watched the complete tape from that 2002 day stored on the hard drive, Kim said she found that the threat of unseen footage being released to the world was unfounded and tearfully described her relief. “It was just footage of us at a restaurant, at a nightclub, nothing sexual, nothing weird,” she said on The Kardashians. “Now I can take a deep breath and not worry about this.”

Ray J, however, saw the scene from Kim’s new reality show posted on the Hollywood Unlocked Instagram account and took issue with the story presented. He showed that in the comments, writing, “All of this is a lie smh - Can’t let them do this anymore - so untrue.”

Still, Kanye’s account seems to match Kim’s. In a January interview with Hollywood Unlocked, he recounted taking a red-eye flight to get the laptop from Ray J, saying Kim “cried when she saw it.” For months, the music artist has made it no secret that he would like to mend his marriage to Kardashian and reunite their family, especially once she started dating SNL star Pete Davidson following her hosting gig. It seems that Kanye’s journey to reclaim Kim’s sex tape could be another one of his grand gestures to win her back, like the truckload of flowers he sent her on Valentine’s Day. However, Kim insists that he also shared her own motivation in wanting to conceal the tape: to protect their children, North, Saint, Chicago, and Psalm West.

“I know Kanye did this for me, but he also did this for my kids,” Kim said in a confessional. “I want to shield them from as much as I can, and if I have the power to, or if Kanye has the power to, that is just the most important thing to me and I’m so emotional because of it. It just means a lot to me.”

Ray J may not agree, but unless he provides receipts, it’s a his-word-against-theirs situation.