Mashable72%
The internet reacts to the first-ever World Cup Halftime show 87%
7/19/2026, 8:26:10 PM
Keywords: World Cup, Halftime Show, Madonna, Justin Bieber, Bts, Shakira, Ted Lasso, Internet Reaction
BS Summary: This article contains 23 faulty reasoning types, including Negativity Bias, Appeal to Emotion, and Framing Effect, with Biased Writer Voice as the most egregious example at 80% saturation with 256 hits. Analysis detected 1,159 faulty-reasoning hits from 320 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 80.5% and a BS Rank of 87% (2,459 of 18,604 articles). This article is worse (more manipulative) than 86.80% of the article peer group.
The FIFA World Cup final between Spain and Argentina is living up to the hype.
And to add to the festivities was a fun but odd sight in the world of association football: a halftime show.
Soccer is normally a brisk sport, but with this edition of the World Cup being co-hosted in the US (the first World Cup in the US since 1994), it's fallen into the American Sports Entertainment Vortex™.
Which isn't a bad thing, minus the universal dislike for the hydration breaks, which many commentators have pointed out are glorified commercial breaks for the Fox network.
But given the lineup - Shakira, Madonna, BTS, and Justin Bieber, with a Sesame Street cameo and a Ted Lasso intro thrown in for good measure - the World Cup's first-ever halftime show was just fine .
The whole thing clocked in at under six minutes, which somehow made it funnier: FIFA spent months hyping a halftime show shorter than the ad break before it.
The internet noticed and acted accordingly.
Madonna kicks us off
Madonna's entrance into the World Cup halftime was mostly prerecorded as she sang from her new album Confessions II .
She was also seen on an ATV with Ronaldinho and R9, which was a strange sight.
BTS brings the dynamite
Probably the most anticipated performance, depending on who you ask, BTS did a quick and dirty set, performing "Dynamite" from their album BE .
Ted Lasso x Justin Bieber?
After the hype from the quick BTS appearance, Ted Lasso stars Jason Sudeikis and Brendon Hunt did a quick intro for Justin Bieber, "subbing" him into the half-time show as some much-needed heart to the game.
Bieber's song, unfortunately, slowed things down, and viewers were not kind about it.
Shakira finally made her appearance alongside her FIFA World Cup theme collaborator, Burna Boy, to perform "Dai Dai."
Analysis
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