Honors College Pulse: Bad Bunny

The Seattle Seahawks defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl LX, but headlines were dominated by the halftime show featuring Bad Bunny, the Puerto Rican singer and rapper who just won the Grammy Award for album of the year for Debí Tirar Más Fotos. The cultural zeitgeist spiked the next day as coverage of Bad Bunny outpaced reporting on the winning team by 42%, according to a LexisNexis analysis of global news coverage.

To be fair to football, CBS Sports ranked the game No. 8 on its list of the worst Super Bowls of all time, citing an “extremely rough” night for the Patriots. Meanwhile, Bad Bunny’s performance drew 135 million viewers, surpassing Kendrick Lamar’s previous halftime record by 1.5 million.

On social media, viewers fixated on the show’s imagery, from speculation over the meaning of Bad Bunny’s jersey number to his ascent up electrical poles that spat sparks and flashes as he performed “El Apagón.” The show drew a range of reactions: some praised it as an expression of Puerto Rican pride and a celebration of the Americas, while others criticized it for being largely in Spanish or framed it within a broader political debate. The selection also aligned with the NFL’s ongoing international expansion efforts as the league works to grow its audience beyond the United States.

The upcoming Honors College Pulse Panel Discussion: Bad Bunny will bring together faculty with expertise in digital culture, Latin American and Latino studies and music to explore the viral performance and controversy storming the digital gridiron.

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