And here’s a five-star review of tonight’s electric half-time show:

Some of the best moments from tonight here:

“What a beautiful and extraordinary thing, Bad Bunny at the Super Bowl reminding the US who they are and where they are,” The Secret Agent director Kleber Mendonça Filho wrote on Instagram.

“Thank you @sanbenito for taking the California stage and using your voice at #SuperBowl LX. A beautiful moment! Together, we are America,” wrote Gavin Newsom on X.

Bad Bunny, Little Monster for life

You’d be forgiven for being a little confused by Bad Bunny’s choice to bring out Lady Gaga for his centerpiece guest tonight, but he’s been a devoted fan since day one. Exhibit A: Voting while wearing a Chromatica shirt in 2020. Exhibit B: Sitting court side at the game while sporting Rain On Me rain boots. Exhibit C: Rocking Joanne merch back in 2017.

The respect is mutual. When asked this week if she had any advice for Benito ahead of his halftime show Gaga said, “Honestly, I don’t think he needs any from me. He knows who he is, and that’s the only thing that matters when you step onto that stage. All he has to do is be the beautiful person he already is, and the world will feel his heart.”

John Krasinski is a reckless driver

If you’re an actor who used to star in the Office US, then you’re pretty much guaranteed a steady stream of Super Bowl ad money until you die. Not that John Krasinski, Quiet Place director and Jack Ryan gun-toter, really needs it but here’s an easy beach house downpayment anyway: the actor selling a Hyundai with the promise that it’ll make you think you’re in an action movie.

AI ads are car ads now

No, you’re not imagining it – the AI ads were non-stop this year. What has been a trickle in years past is now a full-on flood, with spots nearly every break for AI products, taking up space like car companies used to.

From Google’s Gemini to Matthew Broderick for Genspark, Microsoft’s AI assistant Copilot and those Oakley x Meta “Performance AI glasses” (lol), and of course warring ads from rivals Anthropic and OpenAI…it’s just inescapable now. And I won’t even speak of Svedka’s deliberately creepy AI-generated ad. Welcome to the future! Who else is feeling a pervasive sense of dread?

“Incredible Half time show Bad Bunny,” wrote Ben Stiller on X.

Kellogg’s go for scatological warfare

The Raisin Bran ad is one long poop joke starring William Shatner rechristened as Will Shat, a kind of patron saint of restroom regularity. It’s stupid, childish, and often pretty funny, with Shatner appearing at a tailgate and sports bar to get people to switch their buffalo wings for Raisin Bran.

The annual Scientology ad…

Well, here we go again. Every year, the, um, “Church of Scientology” appeals to viewers via vague, would-be inspirational cliches and soaring music, and this year is no different. Here we get an “anthem” for “the great untapped power in this universe: you”…followed by a nudge to check out their website. Or maybe Alex Gibney’s 2015 doc Going Clear?

“I don’t know what Bad Bunny is saying, however, I do know he is standing up for Puerto Rico and I am standing up for him. His half time show was great,” wrote John Mellencamp.

He’s just Ken (and he just wants a vacation)

A bit of a baffling one here. Expedia has decided to use Ken, yes the Ken, to promote the ease of its product, but the ad never really explains why or does all that much with him (despite promoting it with a People exclusive interview!). He’s just Ken but frankly here, he could be anyone.

Hold the mayo!

Andy Samberg dressed as Neil Diamond and singing “I’ll squirt you while I’m walking by”... Sir, this is a family show.

The half-time show featured nearly 10,000 pyrotechnics

Wired have broken down the hurdles of transforming the Levi’s Stadium field into Bad Bunny’s half-time stage, and it’s a fascinating insight into the spectacle. Due to rules limiting the amount of equipment carts allowed onto the field, producers came up with the idea of having nearly 380 people become sugar cane and other kinds of foliage. The team had only a few weeks to figure out how to bring Bad Bunny’s vision to life. “It was very dramatic and intense,” says half-time show co-producer Bruce Rodgers. That intensity was topped off by 9852 pyrotechnics, with fireworks that lit up the sky with huge Puerto Rican flags.

“Well. That made me feel more proudly American than anything Kid Rock has ever done,” wrote Kacey Musgraves after the half-time show.

Bad Bunny just wiped his Instagram

Bad Bunny has followed up his historic performance by deleting (or at least archiving) all his Instagram posts. That’s crazy for an artist who just had the biggest night of his career, but it’s very new album behavior. Could BB8 be incoming?!

A bunch of celebrities also want you thinner

First Serena Williams, now Kenan Thompson, Danielle Brooks, John C Reilly and DJ Khaled, et al, for GLP-1 weight-loss drugs. In this case, it’s the new pill form sold as Wegovy, which these stars bill as a pill “that makes other helpful things possible”. Of course Hollywood has gone all in.

“They need to give me several hours to even begin processing the tsunami of emotions I’m feeling,” Ricky Martin wrote on his socials, sharing pictures of his incredible night sharing the half-time show with Bad Bunny.

At one point during the half-time show, Bad Bunny passed a sign reading “CONEJO” and handed his Grammy to a little boy – prompting speculation that he enlisted Liam Conejo Ramos, the five-year-old boy wearing a blue bunny hat when he was detained by ICE with his father in Minneapolis, and who is now a symbol of immigration enforcement’s indiscriminate cruelty.

We have confirmed, through a spokesman, that Liam was not a part of the show – that would be a lot for one little boy (and the administration is in fact still seeking to “expedite” his deportation) – but the moment remains a potent symbol of the many children impacted by the administration’s immigration crackdown.

Bad Bunny’s choreography came courtesy of a half-time vet

Charm La’Donna keeps going from strength to strength. After choreographing Kendrick Lamar’s 2025 half-time show and Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter-themed “Beyoncé Bowl” – winning an Emmy for the latter! – she choreographed tonight’s half-time show in collaboration with regular Bad Bunny collaborator Karina Ortiz.

The band who brought salsa to Gaga

Per a press release, that inspired new version of Die With A Smile was performed and arranged by Los Sobrinos. The band was first formed by thirteen Puerto Rican musicians and performed with Bad Bunny throughout his No Me Quiero Ir de Aquí San Juan residency last year as well as his great Tiny Desk performance.

While NFL maddeningly blocks YouTube embeds, here’s the full video of Green Day’s excellent opening performance.

Some more fun BTS footage of those had-us-all-fooled bush dancers:

There was no new SNL episode this weekend so no new Super Bowl skit but, well, knowing the current low standard of the series, that might not be such a bad thing. Instead, as I do almost every year, it’s a great time to rewatch every single one of their incredibly funny Totino’s sketches:

We’re getting more details now about the levels of detail that went into Bad Bunny’s performance – apparently he included several real businesses, such as Villa’s Tacos in Los Angeles and Toñita, the owner of the Brooklyn’s Caribbean Social Club, one of the last surviving Puerto Rican social clubs in New York.

“I want to give a huge thank you to @badbunnypr for hand-selecting me & giving me an opportunity to represent my people, my culture, my family & my business,” wrote the Villa’s Tacos account on Instagram.

Chris Hemsworth vs AI

I’m reluctant to say anything nice about Amazon or Jeff Bezos, but the Alexa+ ad is one of my favorites of the night so far: it’s basically Final Destination without the boring talk-y bits between the gory deaths. Chris Hemsworth is game to poke fun at his doofy image as he imagines an AI assistant trying to kill him by garage door, swimming pool cover and a venomous snake. Knowingly silly, well-executed fun.

Bad Bunny’s bushes were … people?

Those high grasses that Bad Bunny wove through looked pretty real (and heavy). Amazingly, this footage shows that they were made by an army of extras in hedge-suits. I need every detail of how they created this performance.

Non-stop ads tonight suggesting you follow the game with Keke Palmer’s TV remake of The ‘Burbs. Should you? Maybe!

While we await the full official video, here’s some Associated Press footage of Bad Bunny’s stunning half-time show:

Move over Super Bowl, enter the Poké Bowl

Following Lady Gaga’s half-time guest spot and belting out Won’t You Be My Neighbor in tonight’s Redfin ad, she makes her third appearance of the evening to duet with the only diva that can truly rival her. And by that I mean of course the Pokémon Jigglypuff. “She has a 12-octave vocal range,” Gaga informs us, before breaking into a duet of the powder-pink artist’s signature lullaby. Trevor Noah, Young Miko and Blackpink’s Jisoo also show up to ask us “What’s your favorite?”

Dinner with Clooney

Think of it as Temu Pasolini: the food delivery app unleashed a creepily baroque dinner party scene, in which a gaggle of greedy guests pine for another course – until they realize that course is “fees”. Suddenly, no one’s hungry anymore. Then, George Clooney pops in to save the day: Grubhub will eat delivery fees (over $50). One could read this as a meta-commentary on how this particular corporation gets rich off the backs of underpaid, overworked delivery drivers – but I don’t think that’s what Grubhub is going for.

Only the ritziest of celebrities …

So that’s what Bowen Yang’s been up to: the newly minted SNL alum joined Scarlett Johansson and noted Bad Bunny fan Jon Hamm in a truly star-studded cracker commercial.

A Jurassic Park nightmare

Just the smallest clip or sampling of John Williams’s glorious theme makes me want to do a full Jurassic Park rewatch, an urge I would recommend acting on rather than watching the entirety of this utterly cursed ad from Xfinity. Perhaps your nightmares would then not be populated by the haunting sight of de-aged Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum. It’s enough to put you off your nachos.

Though very much loaded with political Easter eggs, unity was the overarching theme of Bad Bunny’s performance tonight – from his football reading “Together, We Are America” to his packed casita, his listing of every North and South American country and even, apparently, a real union! His representative confirmed to Variety that that onstage marriage was, indeed, a real tying of the knot. Congrats to perhaps the most blessed couple of all time!

Budweiser goes back to the basics

The ever-patriotic beer behemoth truly out-America’d itself with an ad that one assumes was created by typing “Budweiser commercial script” into ChatGPT. Yes, there is a Clydesdale horse, and here we find it teaching a baby bald eagle how to fly. Naturally, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s Free Bird plays as the baby bird finally gets its wings. Of course, this all makes the two barley farmers cry into their beers. Check, check, check.

Sabrina Carpenter’s hot date with Mr Pringle

Sometimes it feels simpler to curl up with junk food than trying to find an actual warm body to do that with. Enter “Pringleleo”, a man made entirely of Pringles and the love interest for pop star Sabrina Carpenter here. Unlike the much-memed Mariah Carey Walkers ad where she nibbles a chip with the enthusiasm of a toddler forced to eat broccoli, the singer tucks into the chip – and her date – with gusto, racing through meet-cute scenes with her crisp-man, and rolling around in bedsheets, crumbs be damned. The ad really works because it feels like it could come from the same visual world as Carpenter’s goofy, knowing videos and performances. Between this and the Muppet Show, she’s carving out a niche as America’s new princess of light entertainment.

Bad Bunny’s incredible performance look was by ... Zara?

Yes, your favorite mall standby is behind Benito’s halftime show look. We stan a humble king! The Spanish brand created his whole outfit including his custom sports-inspired jersey with “64” on the back: fans are speculating that the number is a nod to his mom’s birthday year, 1964.

For more context on that segment with the sparking utility poles – highly recommend watching the short film Bad Bunny released for El Apagón (“The Power Outage”) in 2022, detailing the blackouts, among other injustices, plaguing Puerto Rico since Hurricane Maria in 2017:

Plus there was Pedro Pascal! He of every other film you saw last year!

Anything can be Brat if they pay you enough

Poppi’s latest psyop to convince us that their probiotic soda isn’t utterly rancid finds Charli xcx and Rachel Sennott livening up a boring college lecture by throwing an indie sleaze-coded party. Sennott wields a flame thrower, a twink vomits up glitter, and a horse wears glowsticks as a collar.

Bringing up the rear

I’ll all in favor of seeing spandex-clad butts on screen but if Novartis haven’t ever seen tight ends this relaxed they clearly haven’t been to The Eagle on a Saturday night.

Bad Bunny invited a whole crew to party with him at half-time show

At the start of Bad Bunny’s show, he was backed by a slew of celebrities dancing behind him, and the lineup was as star-studded as they come, including Cardi B, Jessica Alba, Young Miko, Karol G and influencer Alix Earle.

If in doubt, cast a cute kid

Recruiting a child actor is the ad world’s oldest shortcut to warm and fuzzy feelings. But in the hands of Google Gemini the trick feels especially cynical, in an ad where a young boy and his mom use the AI assistant to see what their new house will look like with Ben’s stuff in. More likely to make you roll your eyes than tug on your heart-strings.

While we’re sourcing video clips – here are some photo highlights from Bad Bunny’s extravagant and jam-packed half-time show with perhaps the best production I’ve ever seen, which exquisitely transported us to Puerto Rico:

Big pharma brings out the big guns

After the heartfelt spectacle of Bad Bunny’s half-time show, it’s a bit of a whiplash to go into Boehringer Ingelheim’s advert. Styled like an action movie trailer and starring Sofía Vergara and her best “chica” Octavia Spencer, the duo are in a race against the clock to spot early signs of kidney damage. Someone give them a buddy movie, stat.

Still basking in the afterglow of that performance… under immense, unfathomable pressure, with many rooting for his downfall, Bad Bunny delivered. He deftly threaded the needle between political statement (those sparking El Apagón power poles, a nod to corruption and dysfunction within the US “commonwealth” – colony – of Puerto Rico), and unifying message, calling together the many people and languages which make up the United States. He nodded to the Latin artists who paved the way, with that clip of Gasolina and the smooth presence of Ricky Martin, singing from the two plastic chairs of the DTMF album cover. And above all, he provided the joy – upbeat, defiant, welcoming, a real dance party for the ages.

Melissa McCarthy es Melisa

Bad Bunny gave us four months to learn Spanish but, well, maybe some of us left it a little late. Melissa McCarthy is us here, her panic resulting in a car crash. Luckily, in a telenovela twist, she has a dashing doctor to teach her with the help of some e.l.f. lip oil. One of the better uses of a celebrity tonight, funny enough to have us demanding a full, Ben Falcone-free feature-length comedy return for the star.

Benito Bowl certainly registered as an unqualified success over here – one that many of the neutral, corporate ticket holders on hand couldn’t deny at a point. Gaga was a welcome surprise, and who knew Ricky Martin was such a belter. Amid the smoke and fireworks was a whole lot of hip swiveling. Benny hit it out of the park.

Humanity’s day off

The onslaught of grim AI ads continues with Matthew Broderick here selling part of his soul to the machines. Enough. Please.

Oh wow, what a statement, what a moment – Benito ends as he should, as he does: among the people, shouting out the many, many Spanish-speaking nations whose people have immigrated to the US, as well as the US itself, in front of a poignant banner: “The only thing more powerful than hate is love.”

Slop comes to the Super Bowl

The vodka brand Svedka say that the dancing robots of their new AI-generated ad celebrate “more human connection.” You have to wonder if the VFX artists who are being put out of a job because of crap like this feel the same.

If you thought Bad Bunny wasn’t going to shout out Puerto Rico … after playing a clip of his own Grammys speech from last week, in which he shouted out his home, he symbolically gifted his Grammy to a young boy and cut to Puerto Rican icon RICKY MARTIN (!) and, not to be outdone, climbed some sparking power poles for El Apagón, his protest anthem about local displacement, corruption and rolling blackouts in Puerto Rico.

This is the swiftest party of all time – Bad Bunny saves us from that Die With a Smile lull (no offense to Gaga), with two of his best uppers, BAILE INoLVIDABLE and New York anthem Nuevayol, for the best dance party of the set so far.

Surprise! The big guest appears to be not Cardi B but Lady Gaga, the 2017 half-time show performer and noted Bad Bunny fan, for a salsa-fied version of her Bruno Mars duet Die With a Smile. Not nearly my favorite song, but she sounds great.

Oh hell yeah, we’re really cooking now – in quick succession, Bad Bunny crashes through the house of the casita, nods to Puerto Rican reggaeton history with the opening chords of Daddy Yankee’s Gasolina, shifts seamlessly into DTMF track EoO and introduces himself to the crowd – in Spanish, of course.

Yo Perreo Sola!!!!! Accompanied by an army of female dancers and a casita full of partiers (is it just me, or did I spy Pedro Pascal?), Bad Bunny is now on the roof, presiding over a massive fiesta.

It looks like Bad Bunny will be bringing the salsa to halftime: the 88-year-old Costa Rican dancer Raúl Zúñiga is in the building.

Just dudes being dudes

After a controversy-rocked few years, Bud Light has been reverting to the mean with their ads, an attitude that reaches its nadir in this new one that invites you to laugh when people fall over. (Dramatically, rolling down a hill in slo-mo, while a Whitney Houston ballad plays.)

Kendall Jenner wants you to gamble

Now for the inevitable appearance of a Jenner in a Super Bowl ad break (last year had Kris pimping out Ray-Ban’s Meta glasses), and it’s inevitably to promote something just as toxic as their family brand. It’s the turn of Kendall here, showing off acting skills even worse than her half-sister, urging us to gamble more. Perfect!

Put your seatbelt on while crying

A dull, by-the-book attempt here from Toyota to get a tear or at least an awww out of us. When it comes to shameless string-pulling, I’m waiting for Google to pull out the big guns.

The Benito Bowl is officially incoming, with island and bodega vibes apparently in the offing …

Oikos gives Kathryn Hahn the power

Kathryn Hahn and Derrick Henry ride a San Francisco cable car together; when it stalls, a greek yogurt-powered Hahn uses her new muscles to save the day. My favorite part: the lower-third text reminding us that this is a “Dramatization. Do Not Attempt.”

We’re fast approaching the real reason we’re all here – the Benito Bowl – so let’s get into some parlor games. Speculation has run rampant all week: who will Bad Bunny bring out as a surprise guest? What will he sing? Will he say anything directly political? (I’d be surprised.) Betting is Not My Culture, but the markets have odds on Ricky Martin or Lady Gaga as the most likely surprise guest, followed by Cardi B, who featured Benito on her 2018 hit I Like It (and is at the game, as her boyfriend Stefon Diggs plays for the Patriots). Very high odds, as well, on his 2022 hit Tití Me Preguntó opening the show.

Dunkin’s grade-A nostalgia bait

Ben Affleck leads Dunkin’ Donuts to ask a question few of us have considered: what if the 1997 drama Good Will Hunting was made as a 90s sitcom? This is next-level nostalgia bait, in which Affleck and the likes of Jennifer Aniston (!), Matt LeBlanc, Jason Alexander, Ted Danson, Alfonso Ribeiro, Jaleel White and Jasmine Guy reference 90s touchstones including Friends, Cheers, A Different World, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, Seinfeld and Family Matters. Ahead of the game, Affleck pitched a “cringe” project with Aniston and … yeah, whatever digital de-ageing they’re doing here sure is.

Backstreet Boys: the real Super Bowl MVPs?

Here’s a sentence I didn’t think I would be writing: Coinbase’s karaoke-style commercial this is the second ad of the evening to feature Nick, Brian, Kevin, AJ and Howie. I guess they do have to split the money five ways.

Kinder Bueno goes to space

A silly bit of sci-fi that seems to revolve around how many times everyone can say “No bueno.” It’s a rather on-the-nose nod to our half-time show en español, but I can’t wait to tell my kids that I went to Halloween as the cunty alien from the Kinder Bueno ad.

A gross ad about piss

In what I can only assume is ragebait, the LiquidIV commercial features toilet seats singing Phil Collins’s Against All Odds, complete with overflowing urinals and a shot of a woman peering into her toilet bowl with overlaid text reading “Yellow?” I hope she was paid enough to now be able to retire.

I’m hard pressed to think of a Super Bowl half-time performer that’s ever been this anticipated. (Rihanna? Gaga?) It’s certainly the first time in the five title games I’ve covered en vivo to witness people rooting for their team and the concert – and the enthusiasm around town this week extended well beyond the game’s prescribed “activation zones.” On Saturday, while at lunch in Chinatown, I spied a young woman in a T-shirt with the letters BB in the middle of an NFL shield with bunny ears – just one in a slew of Bad Bunny merch models cat-walking downtown San Fran.

Excitement for the Benito Bowl – his first performance inside the continental US since hitting out against Donald Trump’s mass deportations, and just a week after his historic Grammys triumph, is very real. And the Turning Point’s alt-cast only seems to have made them more determined to counter that desperate, Kid Rock-led attention plea with avalanching support.

Project Hail Mary

Even if I remain a little disappointed with Ryan Gosling’s Reese Witherspoon-like declaration that he will no longer be delving into darker territory, Project Hail Mary is looking like a smart, safe use of his post-Barbie career bump. The Fall Guy might not have set the box office alight but this sci-fi adventure, which is essentially The Martian but with a cute alien pal, feels like an easier win. The third trailer offers more of the same (thankfully it’s the “final” trailer) and with a budget of $150m, expectations are high, but with a concept less reliant on his global starpower and more on effects-heavy space antics, this could be a much-needed leading man hit.

Adrien Brody wants more drama

Ever since winning his second Oscar for best actor, “two-time Holocaust survivor” Adrien Brody hasn’t picked his follow-up film, the one-time Hollywood pariah now unsure what to do now that he’s back in the spotlight (other than throwing his gum at Harvey Weinstein’s ex-wife). But those bills! Enter TurboTax …

Tonight also sees Turning Point’s All-American Halftime concert, an amusingly pathetic right-wing attempt to upstage the Benito Bowl. The D-list lineup features like Kid Rock, last seen firing a semi-automatic at Bud Light cans, and the country singers Brantley Gilbert, Lee Brice and Gabby Barrett. Was Nicki Minaj unavailable?

Doechii’s ‘Backstory’

It’s only fitting, for a Super Bowl at Levi’s Stadium, that’s Levi’s jeans make an appearance. Or, more accurately, a parade of distinctive Levi’s pockets from various eras, on a series of iconic backsides: a construction worker, a man posed like Bruce Springsteen – and the one and only Doechii, bent over and grinning.

Taking power tools to Flavortown

Guy Fieri is a national American treasure and I never want to live in a word where cable TV isn’t running Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives 24/7. Seeing his make-under by Bosch as “just a guy” absolutely worked on me as an OMG WTF moment, and in my opinion more French bulldogs should have frosted tips and soul patches. No notes!!

Parker Posey deserves better

Here’s one that’s really for the football fans: a solid minute of Matthew McConaughey, Bradley Cooper and others riffing on the similarity of sports terms to food items. A “scramble” is apparently something a quarterback does, while a pancake block involves getting knocked over. I’m clearly not the intended audience, so I’m listening and learning. But I can’t help feeling it’s a crime to waste Parker Posey’s comedic talents on sports terminology.

Andy Cohen is a nerd

Not quite sure who the target audience is for this one – a Super Bowl commercial for Nerds starring Bravo’s housewife referee Andy Cohen – but here we are! Hope that $8m was worth it.

He might not be giving a huge amount away here but if you want some pre-show hype, here’s the full Bad Bunny interview from earlier this week:

Are you crying yet?

This bit of mawkish nonsense featuring a lost dog and a lonely child of divorcing parents – soundtracked by Lady Gaga belting out the Mr Rogers theme! – suggests that fintech companies may not have the emotional depth to authentically tug on your heartstrings. Just a thought.

Cardi B is very much out here and has been having eventful weekend in San Francisco involving a robot lapdance gone wrong and lots of shots. When asked if she’d be guesting during Bad Bunny’s performance for their 2018 collaboration I Like It, the Bronx rapper didn’t deny it, saying only, “That would be exciting.” Hmm.

Taika Waititi’s Pepsi lies

Presumably as some sort of commentary on global warming, a blindfolded ex-Coke addict polar bear is being forced to choose between his old favourite and Pepsi Zero Sugar in a new ad directed by, and briefly featuring, Taika Waititi. He’s understandably haunted by his decision (Pepsi!), but no amount of self-awareness can cover the fact that not even an animal would choose Pepsi over Coke.

Backstreet Boys are back … for T-Mobile

This is the kind of Super Bowl commercial that might not be selling AI but could very well have been created by it. Nostalgia play – check, easily affordable celebrities – check, heavy branding – check, familiar song with words changed – check. The BackStreet Boys are back, again, after tweaking I Want It That Way once before in a laundry detergent commercial, they’re doing it again for T-Mobile. Tell me why.

The Adventures of Cliff Booth

While most of the trailers tonight were either confirmed by the studio or predicted by those in the know, no one really saw this one coming. It makes sense really, a surprise reveal of footage from a film that felt like a shock when it was announced, a Quentin Tarantino-penned sequel to Once Upon a Time in Hollywood directed by David Fincher for Netflix. The first tease of Brad Pitt’s return as Cliff Booth looks as stylish as one would expect (despite his move to the streamer, Fincher has remained well outside of the dreaded Netflix murk) while poking fun at what can’t be shown on network TV at such an hour. It’s a fascinating match of auteurs that should make for one of the year’s most unusual films.

Minions & Monsters

A pretty smart new direction for the consistently popular Minions franchise (perhaps the most reliable animated series Hollywood now has?), which sees them aim for movie stardom. As one would expect from a Minions trailer, there’s little to no understandable dialogue here (maybe kids would figure out more words after endless rewatches of the previous films) but it’s looks like another sure thing.

Yorgos Lanthimos’s Squarespace

Meet Squarespace at the intersection of art and commerce, where Emma Stone stars in an ad directed by Yorgos Lanthimos. The black-and-white ad plays out like one of his absurdist films: the Oscar winner, alone on an island in a beautiful home, screams as she realizes the domain EmmaStone.com is already taken. She smashes computer after computer, each one brought to her by a girl on rollerskates. Cut to tagline: “Get your domain name before you lose it.”

Today in things you don’t need

Those creepy filming Ray-Bans now come in wraparounds, which is great news for Y2K revivalists with a spare $400. As well as looking on-trend, these Oakley X Meta sunnies have the bonus of a built-in AI (or, ahem, Athletic Intelligence) assistant allowing you to share all your personal data and innermost thoughts with Zuck and co. Pretty cool to live in hell!

On Friday night at a pre-Super Bowl party in San Francisco, Green Day took aim at Jeffrey Epstein and Donald Trump by changing the lyrics of their song Holiday to “The representative of Epstein’s Island now has the floor.” While on stage he also addressed ICE agents, telling them to “quit your shitty job.”

If any deep-pocketed fans get hungies while watching the big game, they’ll be able to enjoy the artery-threatening Super Bowl super burger, which includes five wagyu patties, smoked brisket, onion rings and jalapeño aioli. Yours for just $180.

AI vs AI

Ooh, the tech oligarchs are fighting! Ads are coming to ChatGPT – and its rival company Anthropic took the time to remind us that “Claude will remain ad-free”. Let’s see how well this ages.

Serena Williams wants you thinner

No plot, story or special effects to speak of: the telehealth company must have spent all their money on Serena Williams. As far as Super Bowl commercials go, this Ro one is pretty straightforward.

The Mandalorian and Grogu

Disney’s Star Wars strategy – decrease quality of movies, increase amount of TV shows – hasn’t really been paying off all that well, Andor aside. While there is a fanbase for The Mandalorian and his little baby Yoda friend, it remains to be seen if a big enough audience is excited enough to see this as something other than an extended episode of something they’re used to watching on their smartphone. I do appreciate a specially made, or at least freshly packaged, big game teaser though, not purely reliant on the same cocktail of clips, more of that please studios.

The Michelobs are on Lewis Pullman

Nepo baby Lewis Pullman (son of Bill) meets father of Nepo baby Kurt Russell (dad of Wyatt) for an ad to celebrate the importance of being a cheapskate. Lewis must learn how to ski better to prevent paying for the beers being drunk by his far more accomplished Olympian friends Chloe Kim and TJ Oshie. Whatever it takes!

Ben Stiller gets out-flipped

Ben Stiller and Benson Boone? Sure, why not. Zoolander stars alongside everyone’s favorite back-flipping Mormon as the two act as 1980s pop stars performing a song about the grocery delivery app. But when Boone starts with the acrobatics – and why wouldn’t he? – Stiller cannot keep up. Cue a very Stiller-esque meltdown that involves the comedian failing backflips from unnervingly increasing heights. For such a random pairing, the two leads do have some sort of chemistry going on.

Hailee Steinfeld needs a lift

Hailee Steinfeld’s husband (Buffalo Bills QB Josh Allen) may not have made it to the big game this year, but the Sinners actor did – for a spot with State Farm, where she has to endure Keegan-Michael Key’s off-key cover of Livin’ On a Prayer (he’s an off-brand insurance broker, you see), until she’s rescued by none other than Patriots fan Jon Bon Jovi himself.

It was a lively crowded scene outside Levi’s Stadium, where a handful of protesters had gathered ahead of the largest sporting event of the year.

Santa Clara county had been on edge in the weeks leading up to the Super Bowl amid reports that ICE agents would be conducting immigration operations during the game.

The NFL announced this week that there was no planned ICE activity during the game and the governor said his office had also received a similar confirmation. But officials had been prepared for either outcome, and the area’s congressman Ro Khanna said he would be outside the stadium on Sunday to make sure ICE does not “harass a single American or immigrant”.

“ICE stay out of my district on Super Bowl Sunday.”

Outside one stadium entrance on Sunday, dozens of onlookers gathered to take in the scene. A handful of demonstrators from different religious groups handed out pamphlets, while vendors sold T-Shirts and snacks, and fans waited in hopes of somehow snagging a last minute ticket. There was a small crowd of protesters with signs and drums demonstrating against ICE, and one playing a xylophone; but most began clearing out before the game kicked off.

By the time the game began, Elisabeth Pitts, carrying a sign that read “United We Stand Against Fascism”, was among the only protesters left on the scene.

She came out to watch for ICE. She felt the administration’s move last fall to suggest immigration agents would be in the area was “petty” and wanted to take a stand against that.

“I just think it’s important to protect our rights and stand up against bullies and to protect ourselves from a fascist style government,” Pitts said.

Disclosure Day

Arriving at just the right time for increasingly energised UFO conspiracy theorists, Steven Spielberg’s big return to the sci-fi genre is still looking like a whole bunch of question marks (Good or bad aliens? Bad CGI? Why is every American played by a Brit?) but it is thrilling to have a summer blockbuster that’s actually original once again. The latest spot shows a giant ship emerging through clouds, Independence Day style, and some more questionable accents. Time will tell.

Puthers rise! Those opening jazzy keys made me a little nervous that we were heading into Fergie national anthem territory, but Charlie Puth, the niche-beloved pop artist (“You smoked, then ate seven bars of chocolate / We declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist” goes a choice Taylor Swift lyric) delivered a smooth-as-butter rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner. Complete with a flyover and cutaways to troops in the Middle East (eek) of course. I will once again be returning to his excellent and deeply underrated 2018 album Voicenotes.

Because it’s hard to put your shoes on, right?

Skechers here providing much-needed aid to adults struggling to put their shoes on without having some sort of breakdown. Their easy slip-ons are smooth enough to impress Sofía Vergara, an actor worth a reported $180m, who can probably just pay someone to put them on for her, I would have thought.

Hoppers

Pixar, a company that used to turn the wildest premises into both critical and commercial gold, has been struggling to impress either side in recent years. After Elio was a historic flop for them, they’re hoping Hoppers might turn the tide, and they might have a safer hit on their hands. It’s a fun, grabby premise – tech that allows humans to masquerade as animals – and while there’s not that much here in this big game spot, here’s hoping the recent billion-dollar success of Zootopia’s animated animals will help nudge it along.

Scream 7

Poor old Sidney Prescott. It’s almost been 30 years of menacing phone calls, non-lethal stab wounds, severed relationships (some literally), unwanted press attention, and now, as the Scream franchise continues to be more commercially successful than ever before (the sixth chapter was a record-breaker), here comes Ghostface threatening her teenage daughter. But as Sidney’s bad luck continues, Neve Campbell’s does the opposite. The actor was lured back after taking one film off over a pay dispute and it’s her most substantial role, and we assume salary, to date. The new spot offers more of the same, keeping the film’s long list of back-from-the-dead cameos under wraps, but the repetition is almost reassuring, the biggest secrets not being spoiled just yet.

Justin and Hailey Bieber are here, spotted entering a private suite to watch the game.

OK we’re back to the musical performances, with Americana singer-songwriter and Washington state native Brandi Carlile for America the Beautiful. We’re now 3 for 3 on solid performances – she sounds gorgeous, with just the right level of twang.

And for the New England Patriots, we have… Jon Bon Jovi? Ok this one confuses me as Bon Jovi is famously from New Jersey, home to the New York Giants and now the New York Jets, but I guess he is a Pats fan. Where are the Wahlbergs?

Your hair is sad

A quick moment here to feel bad for all your unwanted body hair which, according to Manscaped, misses being on you so much that it sings a sad little song before it’s washed down the drain. Pretty scary, honestly.

Nostalgia-bait goes boring

It’s hard to make accounting software sexy, and it’s some credit to Ramp that they don’t even try with their ad featuring The Office US’s Kevin Malone. But it doesn’t do much beyond prompting a watery smile of recognition, and I still have no idea what Ramp is actually for.

We’re drifting dangerously close to the football here, but the teams are taking the field with the now-traditional blessing of some celebrity fans. First up, longtime Seattle Seahawks diehard Chris Pratt, who introduces his hometown team with his young son.

As a procession of Super Bowl MVPs walk on to the pitch Green Day take to the stage, opening with Good Riddance (Time of Your Life) and segueing into Holiday. As the crowd on the pitch pump devil-horns foam fingers , the trio look like they’re having a great time, and Billie Joe Armstrong still sounds incredible. After a bit of Boulevard of Broken Dreams, the short set climaxes with American Idiot accompanied by a bizarre lineup of football legends like of Tom Brady, Peyton Manning and Joe Montana onto the stage. A fun, punchy opener.

Reason number 454984 to love Bad Bunny: he understands that when the 2014 banger that is Break Free by Ariana Grande featuring Zedd comes on, you gotta belt.

According to a feature in the Hollywood Reporter, the cost of booking a 30-second Super Bowl ad will now run you up to $10m, with most companies paying at least $8m for a commercial at the US’s most-watched TV event of the year. That price has doubled since the $5m going rate in 2017, leading brands to tighten their belts with A-list talent fees. “The days of a $10-or-15-million-dollar payday for a Super Bowl commercial are largely over,” WME’s Tim Curtis told THR. Lest you feel too sorry for the celebs, though, they can still expect to make $3-$5m per ad.

The musical performances have started! First up we have R&B star Coco Jones, singing Lift Every Voice and Sing, the hymn widely known as the “Black National Anthem.” In a dramatic outfit that recalls, to me, Whitney Houston’s iconic Super Bowl tracksuit, she sounds simply incredible, especially that last high note.

The Carter family have arrived to Levi’s Stadium, with Jay-Z, Blue Ivy and Rumi all clad in black game day looks. That only leaves Beyoncé as a conspicuously absent …

Expect to see a whole lot of AI in the commercial breaks, whether with mostly AI-generated ads (such as Svedka’s dancing robots) or commercials that show AI assistants like Google Gemini and Amazon Alexa interacting with real people. Last week, Anthropic released an ad poking fun at OpenAI’s move to allow ads, which Sam Altman quickly slammed as a “dishonest” take on what is in store for ChatGPT users. Super Bowl night will also mark a newcomer to the AI race with an ad for ai.com, the new platform from Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek. His product is billed as an autonomous agent that can organize your daily tasks and even update your dating profile.

Happy Benito Bowl day for all who observe! While I suppose some are here to watch the football, many more will be tuning in for Bad Bunny’s half-time show, the first ever performed in Spanish.

The Puerto Rican superstar, who sings almost entirely in Caribbean Spanish, has promised a “huge party” – and as a fan, I have no doubt he will deliver – but his very presence on the biggest stage in US pop culture is freighted with politics, especially as the Trump administration is actively profiling Spanish speakers for immigration enforcement. Numerous members of the Trump administration have denounced him. At the same time, many fans who now see him as a symbol of resistance are racing to learn Spanish ahead of his show. So last week, I spoke with several experts – Bad Bunny scholars, Puerto Rican scholars and half-time show historians – about how the artist born Benito Antonio Martínez Ocasio found himself at the center of a very heated US culture war.

Non-football celebrities are here! Many more to come…