For Beyoncé fans, last Saturday was likely unforgettable.

The superstar dropped her latest album, “Lemonade,” following an hour-long HBO special that looked more like an art film than an extended music video of her 12 new tracks.

In what's now known as "pulling a Beyoncé," the album was totally unexpected.

The aftershock of the musical event is still reverberating, and there have been plenty of rumours, grabby headlines and online spats surrounding “Lemonade.” Here are five things you need to know about Beyoncé’s latest surprise project.

Are Jay Z and Beyoncé splitting up?

Beyonce, Jay Z

Nope, but the album seems to suggest they’ve struggled with some serious marriage issues.

During the first minutes that “Lemonade” aired on HBO, Twitter users were quick to assume that Beyoncé and Jay Z were calling it quits.

But you can’t blame them; the first few tracks drip with the anger of a wife scorned. In “Hold Up,” Beyoncé croons, “What’s worse, being jealous or crazy?” as she walks down the street smashing cars with a baseball bat. In the tongue-in-cheek “Sorry,” she sings “Today I regret the night I put that ring on.”

But the mood changes about halfway through. Beyoncé’s torrential anger shifts to inward contemplation in “Sandcastles,” a simple ballad on losing a grip on love. Beyonce seemingly struggles to resolve her conflicting emotions, singing, “And although I promised that I couldn’t stay, baby / Every promise don’t work out that way.”

Lyrics like this offered listeners a never-before-seen side to Beyoncé, an artist who (pre-“Lemonade”) kept intimate details of her marriage under lock and key.

“Lemonade” reaches its ringing catharsis in its final track, “All Night,” in which a montage of happy couples -- including footage of Beyonce and Jay Z -- flashes across the screen. All appears forgiven as Beyoncé sings: “But my love's too pure to watch it chip away / Oh nothing real can be threatened.”

It’s important to point out that all the marital strife talk is speculation. Beyoncé could’ve simply built a compelling story with no roots in her relationship. (She’s twisted reality before with her on-stage alter ego “Sasha Fierce.”) But fans seem convinced that “Lemonade” is a reflection of something deeper than fiction.

Who is ‘Becky with the good hair?’

In “Sorry,” Beyoncé sings about hitting the club with friends while a lover tries to call and apologize for an unnamed offense. Beyonce is mostly dismissive, appearing too busy having fun to pick up the phone.

But the song’s irreverent party vibes eventually come crashing down when Bey ends the song with: “He only want me when I'm not there / He better call Becky with the good hair.”

So who is this so-called Becky? And what’s so special about her hair? Beyoncé fans (known as “the Beyhive” in some online circles) wanted to know – and they quickly had an answer.

Enter Rachel Roy, an American fashion designer and one-time intern at Jay Z’s clothing label, Rocawear. Roy climbed the ladder at the brand, became creative director for the womenswear line and married brand cofounder Damon Dash in 2005. The couple split up in 2009, but Roy stayed tight with the Knowles-Carter clan and befriended Beyonce’s sister, Solange.

Rumours have circulated for years that Roy was somehow linked to the much-publicized 2014 elevator fight between Solange and Jay Z at New York City’s Met Gala, but those reports have never been conclusively confirmed.

And then, the night “Lemonade” dropped, Roy posted a photo on Instagram of her in a limo with a friend. The caption read: "Good hair don't care. But we will take good lighting, for selfies, or self truths, always. Live in the light. #NoDramaQueens."

The photo was quickly deleted and Roy locked her Instagram account, but the Internet manhunt had found a target. Roy has since tweeted saying, “I respect love, marriages, families and strength. What shouldn't be tolerated by anyone, no matter what, is bullying, of any kind."

Some have pointed out that critics have been quick to attack Roy, but have been mostly quiet on Jay Z’s supposed infidelity.

As a comical footnote, celebrity chef Rachael Ray also took some social media flak after some Beyoncé fans confused her for Roy. Her Instagram page was flooded with users posting emojis of lemons and lines like “Oh I loved hot chicken fajitas but I will never make them again after what you did you did to the Queen.”

Did Beyoncé plagiarize?

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Beyoncé has been accused of ripping off other artists before – and has even gone to court over the allegations -- so there was little surprise when “Lemonade” brought the usual cries of plagiarism.

The latest accusation surrounds the song “Hold Up,” which seemingly lifts lyrics from “Maps” by the group Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

In “Maps”, the chorus spins around the line: “Wait, they don't love you like I love you / Maps / Wait, they don't love you like I love you.”

In “Hold Up,” Beyoncé croons: “Hold up, they don’t love you like I love you / Slow down, they don’t love you like I love you.”

Beyoncé’s collaborators have come forward to defend the track, pointing out that Yeah Yeah Yeahs were credited for the song.

Ezra Koenig, the lead singer of Vampire Weekend who worked on Beyoncé’s new album, said the idea for the “Maps”-inspired song came to him in 2011, and he tweeted the idea at the time.

“Originally it was, ‘There’s no other God above you, what a wicked way to treat the man who loves you.’ I figured it was going to be a Vampire Weekend song but was easily convinced that it could be better/go to a new place as a Beyoncé song,” Koenig wrote.

He added that Beyoncé “100 per cent” made the song her own.

Why is it called Lemonade?

The album’s name is seemingly a triple entendre with links to Beyoncé’s Texas heritage, her grandmother and the obvious “lemonade from lemons” adage.

For starters, the “Lemonade” film is set mostly in the American South. There are images of plantations, the streets of New Orleans, oak trees draped in dreamy white moss and plenty of sleepy Texas porches. The project even includes what may be Beyoncé’s first-ever country song, “Daddy Lessons,” which includes shout-outs to rifles, the Bible and the second amendment. As the unofficial beverage of the South, “Lemonade” seems a fitting title.

In the video, Beyoncé outlines her grandmother’s recipe for lemonade. “You spun gold out of this hard life,” Beyoncé reads from poetry written by acclaimed writer Warsan Shire. “Found healing where it did not live. Discovered the antidote in your own kitchen. Broke the curse with your own two hands.”

The lines fit neatly into the old cliché, “When life gives lemons, make lemonade,” which just barely begins to capture the album’s nuanced story of anger, perseverance and hard-fought redemption.

What do critics make of Lemonade?

Piers Morgan

There have been plenty of reactions to the album, most of them positive, but the one getting the most traction lately is British journalist Piers Morgan’s piece for The Daily Mail titled “Jay-Z’s not the only one who needs to be nervous about Beyoncé, the born-again-black woman with a political mission.”

Morgan accuses Beyoncé of “going political” with representations of police brutality against African-Americans. Of her video for “Formation,” which includes a young black boy dancing in front of a line of policemen, Piers called it a “provocative statement” that was “seen, understandably, as an attack on U.S. police.”

As for “Lemonade,” Morgan calls it “shameless exploitation” for Beyoncé to include video of the mothers of Trayvon Martin and Mike Brown in the HBO special.

“The new Beyoncé wants to be seen as a black woman political activist first and foremost, entertainer and musician second,” Morgan writes. “I still think she’s a wonderful singer and performer, and some of the music on Lemonade is fantastic. But I have to be honest, I preferred the old Beyoncé.”

The review has been picked apart on Twitter, with many pointing out that artists should be celebrated for tackling issues of oppression and injustice.

Here’s what music reviewers have to say about “Lemonade”:

Jon Pareles, New York Times: "On their own, the songs can be taken as one star’s personal, domestic dramas, waiting to be mined by the tabloids. But with the video, they testify to situations and emotions countless women endure."

Carrie Battan, The New Yorker: "But while the album is Beyoncé’s most naked and personal yet, 'Lemonade' is also a collage of collaborative artistic effort. Even more so than her last record, she draws from every corner of popular music, new and old, to make a rich potpourri of songs."

Rob Sheffield, Rolling Stone: "Whether Beyoncé likes it or not – and everything about 'Lemonade' suggests she lives for it – she's the kind of artist whose voice people hear their own stories in, whatever our stories may be."

Craig Jenkins, Vulture: "'Lemonade'’s complex balance between its images, messages, confident musical sprawl, and pointed storytelling are evidence Beyoncé is still finding room to grow even at what feels like the peak of her powers. We may never know for certain whether this tale of deceit is truth or fiction, but it's compellingly told."