NFL fans were waiting for the Super Bowl LIV earlier this year with great excitement, but what made people even more interested in this event was the halftime with impressive performances of Jennifer Lopez and Shakira. This show became possible, as the NFL has a partnership with Jay Z and Roc Nation. Everyone who was watching the halftime show was expecting something intriguing, as Super Bowl halftimes are famous for multiple bizarre situations. Of course, the performances didn’t look like circus shows, but many weird situations happened because celebrities were trying to one-up one another.
Check out the 10 most extraordinary events that happened in the Super Bowl halftime show.
10. The «Red Hot Chili Peppers» band performed with unplugged musical instruments.
Of course, it is obvious that Super Bowl performances are always prerecorded, but plugging the musical instruments and pretending that the whole performance is live is expected from artists. However, Red Hot Chili Peppers decided to choose another path: they performed with unplugged instruments in front of the huge audience in 2014, and they didn’t even care.
By the way, Prince once played an electric guitar when it was raining.
9. Diana Ross left the stadium using a helicopter.
Celebrities truly care about impressive and unexpected entrance at the Super Bowl show. But Diana Ross decided that an extraordinary way of leaving the stadium would be more important. So after finishing her performance in 1996, Diana got into the helicopter that flew into the stadium and landed, and then she simply flew away smiling from the open cabin. She created such an extraordinary moment, while Red Hot Chili Peppers didn’t even care to plug the instruments.
8. M.I.A. gave a middle finger.
If you saw the performance of M.I.A. in 2012 but you were not too attentive, then you probably didn’t notice how she gave the middle finger to the whole world during the show where she was performing with Nicki Minaj and Madonna. The audience and NFL players were not thrilled. The league sued M.I.A. for millions in damages and asking her to make an apology in front of the whole world. Sounds a little bit superfluous for a quick middle finger showing.
7. Bruce Springsteen made an impressive power slide.
Bruce Springsteen got the chance to perform on the Super Bowl stage in 2009, and everyone still remembers how spectacular it was. He made a power slide that sent his crotch right into the camera, so every viewer around the world was impressed. Every single sports reporter was happy as that moment gave new information to write and talk about.
6. Michael Jackson spent 2 minutes on the stage not doing anything.
This situation will probably sound incredibly powerful… Michael Jackson was performing on the Super Bowl halftime in 1993, and during his show, he decided to stop for 2 minutes and do… nothing. It is necessary to mention that celebrities can have not more than 12 minutes on the stage, so MJ spent 17% of his show time to look at the audience in silence. Sounds weird but impressive, as probably only the King of Pop could do such a thing so confidently.
5. The whole Disney performance of children was really weird.
Try to imagine a person who’s watching a halftime show and suddenly says: «Oh, it would be much better if there were some children performing here». Sounds weird, right? You probably never had such feelings as well, but Disney decided that people would be happy to look at kids, so children were performing in 1991 in Tampa. Several hundreds of kids were dancing and singing, all of them put on apparel of famous Disney characters. It really looked like a circus, as the only appearances of grown-ups were a speech of George H.W. Bush (who was the US President that time) and a singing show of the «New Kids on the Block» band.
4. The left shark of Katy Perry’s team completely lost it, but the audience was excited.
The performance of Katy Perry in 2015 was truly exciting, as viewers saw «a chilling time on the beach after taking a huge amount of acid». But it became so weird not because of Katy Perry, but because of the member of her team who was…the Left Shark. The person who was wearing that shark costume was enjoying that show in a full way making some funny dance moves. The Left Shark crushed them and after that, became very popular online. By the way, the Right Shark was fired because it was too boring in comparison with its colleague.
3. Lady Gaga jumped off the roof.
Lady Gaga was performing on the Super Bowl halftime in Houston in 2017 and she decided to make her entrance extraordinary! Well… She did it! She jumped off the roof of the stadium; of course, this was prerecorded, but still, people were impressed. But the weirdest thing is the way Lady Gaga was jumping… Have you ever seen anyone who can do it like this? Well, probably only Lady Gaga.
2. The performance of Indiana Jones made everyone feel strange.
The whole performance was completely insane and it is impossible to choose a specific moment that was the weirdest. However, people were surprised and excited, as 5% Patti LaBelle, 5% Tony Bennett, and 90% Indiana Jones were doing choreographies pretending to be fighting. Sounds extraordinary, right? It is better to watch the whole performance to really understand what was going on!
This show was produced by Disney, and the company just wanted to advertise its new Indiana Jones ride at Disneyland. The company did everything to make the advertising successful, including lighting a guy on fire; can you believe that? The end of the show was also pretty spectacular, as LaBelle and Bennett were singing “Can You Feel The Love Tonight?” song from ‘The Lion King.’
It looks like Disney had no idea what else to include in this show, but they did everything possible to make it so strange.
1. Justin Timberlake showed Janet Jackson’s nipple.
Yes, it really happened: Justin Timberlake showed Janet Jackson’s nipple. Of course, they were trying to show it as an accident, but it’s clear that such things are usually planned. Actually, the audience was shocked anyway!
