{"id":1764257,"date":"2026-02-09T03:52:39","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T00:52:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1764257"},"modified":"2026-02-09T03:52:39","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T00:52:39","slug":"bad-bunnys-incredible-super-bowl-halftime-show-planted-a-new-flag","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/?p=1764257","title":{"rendered":"Bad Bunny\u2019s Incredible Super Bowl Halftime Show Planted a New Flag"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Bad Bunny\u2019s Incredible Super Bowl Halftime Show Planted a New Flag<\/h1>\n
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In one of the best halftime shows since Prince in 2007, the Puerto Rican megastar threw a killer party, broadened the definition of America, and made history in the process.<\/div>\n
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By <\/span>E.R. Pulgar<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/div>\n

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Kevin Sabitus\/Getty Images<\/span><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/header>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Backup dancers, some dressed as grass and others in head-to-toe Puerto Rican j\u00edbaro regalia\u2014traditional all-white clothes topped with a straw pava hat\u2014crowded the stage. The iconic pink casita that has played a central role in Bad Bunny\u2019s Deb\u00ed Tirar M\u00e1s Fotos<\/em> live show was being put together. The man himself was rubbing his hands together, hyping himself up as all around him a miniature Borik\u00e9n was being built in the middle of Levi\u2019s Stadium in San Francisco, transporting him back home before bringing the flavor of his island to the world yet again.<\/p>\n

Pre-show reports of Bad Bunny\u2019s long-awaited Super Bowl halftime show said it would be a \u201cbig party\u201d\u2014and it was. The man of the hour appeared in an all-white jersey emblazoned with \u201cOcasio 64\u201d and opened with Un Verano Sin Ti<\/em> standout \u201cTit\u00ed Me Pregunt\u00f3.\u201d He ran through the grass toward the casita\u2019s rooftop, running into boxers, baddies at a makeshift nail salon, a piragua stand, and a jeweler who gave him a ring, which he promptly gave away to a dancer: \u201cMuchacho deja eso\u201d (Man, leave that<\/em>).<\/p>\n

The perreo medley raged on, mashing together hits from across Bad Bunny\u2019s discography, including \u201cYo Perreo Sola,\u201d \u201cSafaera,\u201d \u201cParty,\u201d \u201cVOY A LLeVARTE PA PR,\u201d and a nod to OG marquesina parties that featured bits of songs by Daddy Yankee and Tego Calder\u00f3n before seguing into \u201cEoO.\u201d After violin-tinged \u201cMONACO,\u201d he looked into the camera and almost whispered to the viewer: \u201cNunca dej\u00e9 de creer en m\u00ed, y tu tambi\u00e9n deber\u00edas creer en ti.\u201d He never stopped believing in himself, so maybe you should believe in yourself.<\/p>\n

Bad Bunny\u2019s massive global fanbase is drawn to this authenticity. With 19.8 billion streams in 2025 and a historic Grammy win for the first Spanish-language Album of the Year, keeping it real has meant downing Smashburgers and having his therapist on speed dial. It wasn\u2019t Bad Bunny\u2019s first time on the field (real ones remember Benito in an all-silver getup playing second fiddle to Shakira during her co-headlined Super Bowl performance with Jennifer Lopez six years ago), but Bad Bunny\u2019s headlining slot for Super Bowl LX was the first time in the NFL Championship\u2019s 60-year history where the main performance was done entirely in Spanish.<\/p>\n

Talking to Zane Lowe on the Thursday before, wearing big sunglasses, a gray fur coat, and a bunny-eared beanie, Benito seemed visibly tired. He said he wanted to think of this latest career milestone, performing on the most-watched TV event of the year, as \u201c13 minutes doing something that [he loves].\u201d It\u2019s a sweet way to process the moment, and it showed in how he went about the affair\u2014with fun, love, pleasure, and unabashed joy.<\/p>\n

You can\u2019t say the man didn\u2019t have a ball. Watching him crowdsurf to \u201cNUEVAYoL\u201d and run around in his Sunday best, paying homage to Boricuas on the island and the rich Nuyorican culture thriving in New York City, was extremely satisfying. Latinxs who have found refuge in Williamsburg social club To\u00f1itas will have been moved to see the legendary Nuyorican stronghold\u2019s namesake matriarch where she is usually found: behind a bar, with a kind word to give, squeezing liquid courage into Benito\u2019s hand.<\/p>\n

In true Bad Bunny fashion, there was also a lot of tenderness and righteousness to balance out the shots of rum. In a heartwarming and time-bending set piece, Benito bequeathed his Grammy award to a small child who was just watching his acceptance speech on an old TV. Ricky Martin, one of the first Puerto Rican entertainers to go mainstream in a big way, sang the anti-colonial warning song \u201cLO QUE LE PAS\u00d3 A HAWAii,\u201d voice trembling. Nearby, dancers on telephone poles were electrified as the opening notes of \u201cEl Apag\u00f3n\u201d began, one of Bad Bunny\u2019s most overtly political songs about the ongoing blackouts on the island.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Bad Bunny\u2019s performance was not just a big party or a reminder to the mainland that La Isla del Encanto<\/em> is, in a sense, a part of the United States. As a Latinx viewer watching during a particularly fraught point of U.S. history, I also wouldn\u2019t say it\u2019s a performance that saves the world. (Donald Trump certainly didn\u2019t get it.) \u201cGod bless America,\u201d Bad Bunny shouted, waving the Puerto Rican flag, backed by dancers holding the flags of every country in North, Central, South America, and the Caribbean. As the a capella strains of \u201cDTMF\u201d played, he spiked the football at the goal line, proclaiming \u201cPuerto Rico, seguimo\u2019 aqui.\u201d Puerto Rico, we still here.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n

[analyse_source url=”http:\/\/pitchfork.com\/thepitch\/bad-bunnys-super-bowl-halftime-show-planted-a-new-flag\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/media.pitchfork.com\/photos\/6989408530a381a33ca12dbd\/16:9\/w_1280,c_limit\/GettyImages-2260108271.jpg”] Columns Bad Bunny\u2019s Incredible Super Bowl Halftime Show Planted a New Flag In one of the best halftime shows since Prince in 2007, the Puerto Rican megastar threw a killer party, broadened the definition of America, and made history in the process. By E.R. Pulgar February 8, 2026 Kevin Sabitus\/Getty Images Backup […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[226,54],"class_list":["post-1764257","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-crawlmanager","tag-pitchfork-com"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1764257","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1764257"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1764257\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1764257"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1764257"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1764257"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}