The scam ignited on October 8, when an AI-generated image exploded across platforms like Facebook and Instagram: a somber Reba, clad in black, clutching Dolly’s hand at a hospital bedside, the pair looking frail and forlorn under fluorescent lights. Captions screamed “Final Goodbye?” and “Dolly’s Last Days,” blending the queens of country into a fabricated funeral scene that preyed on fans’ deepest fears. By midday, it had infiltrated TikTok duets and X threads, amassing 5 million views before fact-checkers could catch their breath. The user post in question? A polished variant, twisting the grief-bait into “breaking news” of a voluntary health hiatus, complete with Reba’s alleged quote: “Dolly has always been the light… Now it’s time for her to pause.” Shares surged past 2 million on Facebook alone, per social analytics from Hoaxy.ai, as users flooded #PrayForDolly with candlelit covers of “Jolene” and “Fancy.” But the truth? As Dolly quipped in her own video rebuttal, “I ain’t dead yet!”

Dolly Parton, the 79-year-old Tennessee trailblazer behind 11 Grammys, the Imagination Library (which has gifted 200 million books to kids worldwide), and hits like “9 to 5,” wasted no time setting the record straight. On October 8, she posted a bubbly Instagram Reel from her Sevierville home—blonde wig askew, sequins sparkling—addressing the uproar head-on: “I wanted you to know that I’m not dying. I’m not ready to die yet. I don’t think God is through with me.” She roasted the AI abomination with her signature wit: “Somebody had done this computer generation of me and Reba laying in the hospital. I mean, it looked like we needed to be buried! We both looked like we were about to croak.” No health scare, no step-back—just Dolly, vibrant as ever, prepping for her November Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction performance and a holiday album tease. Her team confirmed to People that the image was “100% fabricated,” traced to a low-rent AI generator on a Russian-hosted site churning celeb deepfakes for clicks. It’s the latest in a string of assaults on icons: remember the 2024 AI “final photo” of Betty White, or last month’s fake Tina Turner obituary? Graphika reports a 300% spike in such grief-hoaxes since mid-2025, timed to election-season emotional volatility.

Enter Reba McEntire, the 70-year-old Oklahoma powerhouse with 25 No. 1s and a Broadway run under her belt, who’s been Dolly’s ride-or-die since their 1970s Nashville heyday. Far from trembling, Reba clapped back with fire and fun on Instagram October 9, sharing the offending image with a video rant: “Y’all, this is the biggest bunch of hogwash I’ve seen in a long time. Dolly and I are alive and kickin’!” She dubbed it an “AI mess,” joking, “You are out there dying, I’m out here having a baby,” nodding to her recent embryo transfer announcement amid fertility journeys. The clip, set to her hit “The Night the Lights Went Out in Georgia,” exploded to 3 million views, with Reba flashing peace signs and urging fans: “Don’t believe everything you see on the internet, especially if it’s got us looking like ghosts!” Her message? Pure solidarity: “Dolly’s my girl—we’ve shared stages, secrets, and more laughs than you can imagine. She’s tougher than a two-dollar steak.” No Nashville dispatch of doom; this was a Dallas dressing-room dispatch of defiance, shot during her Not That Fancy tour stop.

Their bond, forged in the ’70s when Dolly mentored a wide-eyed Reba at Oklahoma’s Reba’s Place bar gigs, runs deeper than sequins. They’ve dueted on “Does He Love You” (a 1993 chart-topper), co-hosted ACM Awards, and rallied for wildfire relief—Dolly’s My People Fund aiding Sevier County post-2016 blaze, with Reba matching donations dollar-for-dollar. In a 2023 People sit-down, Reba gushed: “Dolly’s the epitome of grace under fire—teaching me that vulnerability’s your superpower.” This AI affront? It only amplified their sisterhood. Fans on X hailed it as “country queens vs. the bots,” with one thread from @enews racking up 13K likes: “Dolly and Reba shutting down fakes like they shut down stages.” TikTok erupted in duets: users recreating the deepfake with filters, captioned “When AI tries to kill country… and fails.”

The hoax’s virality underscores a toxic trend: deepfakes preying on aging icons’ legacies. Dolly, post-2022 Rock Hall nod and Run, Rose, Run novel, has faced whispers of frailty since a 2021 COVID bout (“tasted like dish soap,” she joked). Reba, battling breast cancer in 2012 and rebounding with Annie on Broadway, knows the drill. Snopes rated the deathbed pic “False” within hours, linking it to a template from Clickbait Central, a network of Eastern European farms netting $0.05 per share via scam redirects. E! News detailed the fallout: “The image looked so real, even TMZ bit before pulling it.” Broader ripples? Calls for AI regs from the RIAA, with Dolly teasing a “tech-savvy” collab with grandson Jason Owen on watermarking tools.

Yet amid the mess, silver linings shine. The uproar boosted streams: “Jolene” spiked 40% on Spotify October 9, per Chartmetric, while Reba’s “Consider Me Gone” trended on TikTok. Fans, from Nashville’s Bluebird Cafe diehards to Parton Library donors, pivoted to positivity—#DollyAndRebaAlive amassing 1M posts, sharing real clips of their 2019 ACM duet “9 to 5.” As one X user posted October 9: “This ‘hoax’ just reminded us why we love ’em—unbreakable, unfiltered, us.” Dolly wrapped her rebuttal with a wink: “God ain’t through with me, and neither are y’all. Keep the faith, and the fakes at bay.”

For Reba and Dolly, this isn’t the first rodeo—nor the last. Reba’s gearing for her November CMA hosting gig with Jelly Roll, while Dolly eyes a 2026 gospel project with the Gaither Vocal Band. Their “message”? Not of mourning, but mirth: a heartfelt reminder that in country’s core, friendship trumps fiction. As the viral post fades to farce, let’s heed Reba’s real rallying cry: Celebrate the living legends, not the lies. Dolly’s light? Still blazing brighter than a Dollywood fireworks show. And with pals like Reba by her side, the show goes on—sequins, sass, and all.