Five Super Bowl 2025 highlights: Taylor Swift booed, half-time performer arrested and Trump is first president to attend

Here are five things you need to know about last night’s Super Bowl – the most watched television event in the US.

Seal as an actual seal in the ads

Laughter dominated the commercials as the Philadelphia Eagles dominated the Kansas City Chiefs during this year’s Super Bowl.

British singer Seal became an actual seal, sad that he could not hold Mountain Dew with his flippers, while David Beckham and actor Matt Damon were long-lost twins bonding over Stella Artois.

Actor Eugene Levy’s eyebrows flew off and buzzed around after he ate some Little Caesars.

Four old ladies went on a joy ride in a commercial for WeatherTech, while sloths had a case of the Mondays in an ad for Coors Light.

Tim Calkins, a professor of marketing at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, said this was a complicated Super Bowl for advertisers.

Most ads were in development during last fall’s US presidential election race, so avoiding controversy was even more of a priority than usual, he said. The finalised crop of commercials features a lot of simple humour, nostalgia and few creative risks, he said. But even that approach can backfire.

“That’s the challenge this year. Everybody wants to be safe, but you also want to be interesting,” Professor Calkins said. “Safe advertising isn’t the advertising you notice or remember.”

And advertisers can’t afford not to be noticed. Some of the roughly 80 Super Bowl ads spots cost a record $8 million for 30 seconds this year.

Budweiser brought back its Clydesdales for its Super Bowl ad, including a foal that wants to join the delivery team.

Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal re-enacted their famous deli scene from 1989’s When Harry Met Sally, except this time Sally was expressing her enthusiasm for Hellmann’s mayonnaise.

The Muppets searched for accommodations with Booking.com, while an Instacart ad featured a parade of familiar mascots like Mr Clean, the Jolly Green Giant and the Pillsbury Doughboy.

Disney asked what the world would be like without the iconic characters it owns, including Elsa from Frozen, Bart Simpson and Marvel superheroes.

Advertisers are leaning on nostalgia more than they used to in Super Bowl ads, according to Kimberly Whitler, a marketing professor at the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business.

Nods to the past can broaden the appeal of an ad to different generations and connect products to positive cultural moments, she said.

Putting celebrities together in unexpected combinations can also broaden the appeal of a commercial. In their Super Bowl ad for Michelob Ultra, actors Catherine O’Hara and Willem Dafoe are pickleball champs.

Celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay and comedian Pete Davidson teamed up for a HexClad commercial, while Post Malone, Shane Gillis and Peyton Manning had a block party with Bud Light.

A slew of celebrities, including Matthew McConaughey, Martha Stewart, Greta Gerwig and Charlie XCX, appeared in an ad for Uber Eats.

Linli Xu, an associate professor of marketing at the University of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management, said celebrity endorsements can get people talking.

But with dozens of brands using them, there’s a risk of diminishing returns.

Celebrities can also get so much attention that viewers don’t remember which brand they’re advertising, Xu said.

“There is a balancing act in terms of having celebrities in the ads,” she said.

Charles Taylor, a marketing professor at Villanova University’s School of Business, noticed more gross-out humour than usual.

In a commercial for Dunkin’, actor Jeremy Strong emerged from a can of coffee covered in grounds and brown liquid.

A man’s tongue started dancing to celebrate cold foam from Nestle Coffee-Mate.

And in a star-studded ad for Pringles, Chiefs head coach Andy Reid, basketball star James Harden and actor Nick Offerman all watched their iconic moustaches jump off their faces and soar through the sky to help deliver cans of the chips.

But it was not all fun and games at the Super Bowl this year. Pharmaceutical company Novartis urged women to get early detection for breast cancer, while Pfizer promoted its own efforts to cure cancer.

Dove warned that half of girls who quit sports have been criticised for their body type. Hims & Hers, a telehealth company, talked about America’s obesity epidemic.

Several Super Bowl ads also made the case for AI as a helpmate.

Chris Pratt, Chris Hemsworth and Kris Jenner teamed up for an ad wearing Meta’s smart glasses, which use artificial intelligence to answer questions about what wearers are seeing.

Actor Walton Goggins pitched GoDaddy Airo, which uses AI to help build websites and social content. Google’s 50 States, 50 Stories campaign is showing viewers a small business from their state that’s using Google’s Gemini AI assistant.

But Cirkul, a water bottle brand, poked fun at AI, showing comedian Adam Devine accidentally ordering 100,000 bottles using the AI assistant on his phone.

Half-time performer arrested for unfurling flag

A performer in Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl halftime show was detained on the field and could face charges after unfurling a combination Sudan-Palestine flag with “Sudan” and “Gaza” written on it.

The NFL confirmed the person was part of the 400-member field cast. The New Orleans Police Department said in a statement that “law enforcement is working to determine applicable charges in this incident.”

The performer stood on a car used as a prop for Lamar’s performance and held up the flag.

“The individual hid the item on his person and unveiled it late in the show,” the NFL said.

“No one involved with the production was aware of the individual’s intent.”

Roc Nation, the entertainment company which produced the show, said the act “was neither planned nor part of the production and was never in any rehearsal.”

The show continued without interruption and it did not seem as though the person was shown on the broadcast of Lamar’s performance.

Taylor Swift booed by crowd at Super Bowl

Taylor Swift received a very different reception to last year at the Super Bowl as she watched boyfriend Travis Kelce and the Kansas City Chiefs play the Philadelphia Eagles.

The pop superstar, who was cheered loudly when she showed up at the big game in Las Vegas a year ago, was instead booed by the heavily pro-Eagles crowd when shown on the video boards inside the Superdome during a break in the first quarter.

Sitting next to rapper Ice Spice, Swift gave a bit of a side-eye and wrinkled her nose when she realised the booing was directed at her.

Swift and Kelce have been a sports-and-entertainment power couple since early last season when the four-time All-Pro tight end invited the now-14-time Grammy Award winner to watch him play in a matchup with the Bears. Kelce had tried to deliver a friendship bracelet to Swift when she played at Arrowhead Stadium, only to be thwarted.

Their relationship blossomed as the Chiefs pursued their second consecutive Super Bowl last year. Swift was part of the on-field celebration on a cold night in Baltimore when the Chiefs beat the Ravens to win the AFC championship.

Then came Swift’s star turn at the big game in Las Vegas.

She was in the midst of her Eras Tour and had played a concert in Tokyo the same weekend.

Swift made a mad dash from there to the airport, hopped on a private jet to Los Angeles and made it to Las Vegas with time to spare. Once inside Allegiant Stadium, fans and TV cameras watched Swift win a beer-chugging contest, party with celebrity friends such as Blake Lively and Lana Del Rey, and eventually make her way to the field following the Chiefs’ 25-22 win over the 49ers.

Kelce and Swift celebrated by locking lips as red and gold confetti fell around them like rain.

There was no closely watched trip around the globe this week, though.

Swift arrived in New Orleans in time to join Kelce on a double date with Kansas City quarterback Patrick Mahomes and his wife Brittany on the players’ night off on Friday. The couples dined at Lilette, a French restaurant near the Garden District.

On the eve of the big game, Swift was spotted with musicians Danielle and Alana Haim at Gianna Restaurant.

The 35-year-old Kelce has been noncommittal about playing next year, and some within the Chiefs organisation are bracing for his potential retirement. Kelce has been laying the groundwork for his post-playing career, building a lucrative podcast with his brother, retired Eagles centre Jason Kelce, and appearing on Saturday Night Live and other TV shows.

According to BetMGM, those willing to gamble on his plans could get 8/1 odds that Kelce would propose to Swift with a Chiefs victory.

The Chiefs are 19-3 with her in the crowd, including 9-0 this season. She has never seen them lose in the play-offs.

‘I’m serious about Canada becoming 51st state’ – Trump

US President Donald Trump has said he is serious about wanting Canada to become the 51st state in an interview that aired during the Super Bowl pre-show.

“Yeah it is,” Mr Trump told Fox News Channel’s Bret Baier when asked whether his talk of annexing Canada is “a real thing” – as Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau recently suggested.

“I think Canada would be much better off being the 51st state because we lose 200 billion dollars (£161 billion) a year with Canada. And I’m not going to let that happen,” he said.

“Why are we paying 200 billion dollars a year, essentially a subsidy to Canada?”

The US is not subsidising Canada – it buys products from the natural resource-rich nation, including commodities such as oil.

While the trade gap in goods has ballooned in recent years to 72 billion dollars (£58 billion) in 2023, the deficit largely reflects America’s imports of Canadian energy.

Mr Trump has repeatedly suggested that Canada would be better off if it agreed to become the 51st US state – a prospect that is deeply unpopular among Canadians.

First sitting president to attend the Super Bowl

Trump became the first sitting president to attend the Super Bowl in person – something he said he was surprised to learn.

“I thought it would be a good thing for the country to have the president at the game,” he said.

He was also asked about his dancing, which has become a popular meme on social media.

“I don’t know what it is. I try and walk off sometimes without dancing and I can’t. I have to dance because it’s just that – something special about it,” Trump said.