The Super Bowl is never quite complete without a strange, sponsored, big-budget and completely over-the-top halftime show to go with it. This year, Katy Perry was tasked with wowing the 100+ million television audience who tuned in mainly to watch the New England Patriots and the Seattle Seahawks battle it out for Super Bowl XLIX (SPOILER: The Patriots won).
And what would a Super Bowl halftime show be without some ridiculous WTF moments courtesy of America’s entertainment industry? We’ve seen some huge acts take to the stake in the past — Madonna, Beyonce, Bruno Mars, The Black Eyed Peas, even Bruce Springsteen — but Katy Perry’s 2015 escapades have blown all previous performances out of the water, at least in the weirdness stakes.
So without further ado, here’s a play-by-play of eight WTF moments from Katy Perry’s Super Bowl halftime show.
1. The Satanic electro-tiger
Once the Pepsi logo had subtly made itself known, Perry parted the sea of light balloons as she approached on a huge red-eyed tiger which looked just about ready to destroy everything in its path. It didn’t, and so Perry was allowed to perform her hit song Roar.
The strange vision has already drawn some obvious comparisons:
https://twitter.com/ChiIlestposts/status/562064363105042432
https://twitter.com/drvnkk/status/562067618761564160
2. Katy Perry’s actual “roar”
At the end of Roar, Katy Perry found the strength to let out a literally huge roar, which filled the stadium and even scared the demonic tiger a little bit. Evidence in the footage, below.
3. The dancing chess pieces and mind-bending visual effects
For Dark Horse, Perry was joined by a troupe of strange dancing chess pieces, who proceeded to take her into their world of stadium-sized chess boards, brought to life by some truly incredible visual effects which probably only looked impressive on TV.
4. A wild Lenny Kravitz appears
For some reason, rocker Lenny Kravitz appeared to add some definitely-unnecessary guitar to Perry’s hit single I Kissed A Girl. Perry even teased the possibility of some twerking as Kravitz tore up the stage, which was nothing but creepy.
5. The dancing sharks and sentient beach balls
For Teenage Dream and California Girls, Perry was joined by a group of dancing and singing sharks, beach balls and palm trees, which made the thing feel more like a surrealist freakout than a halftime show.
That said, those sharks will probably have an album out soon enough:
6. Missy Elliott killing it in 2015
Despite not having release a studio album since 2005, rapper Missy Elliott was employed to bring the best of the noughties back into 2015. Missy performed Get Your Freak On, Work It and Lose Control.
7. Katy Perry’s wardrobe
Aside from how amazingly quick and how amazingly frequent Katy Perry’s wardrobe changes were (roughly every three to five seconds), she didn’t back away from showing off a number of interesting outfits.
Katy Perry wants to be Emboar so bad haha! pic.twitter.com/zHkecYMiQ5
— Funny Pokemon (@FunnyPokemon) February 2, 2015
8. The closer
Katy Perry closed with Firework, presumably in an attempt to close the show with a bang. Like a firework, see? She flew around the stadium in a Nikki Webster-esque attempt to capture hearts and minds.
https://twitter.com/FreddyAmazin/status/562068277464010753
Watch the full performance below.
