The Final Jab: Kendrick Lamar’s Super Bowl Halftime Show—A Petty, Perfect Victory Lap

Kendrick Lamar’s performance at the 2025 Super Bowl Halftime Show was not the typical high-minded, soul-searching spectacle expected of the Pulitzer-winning artist. Instead, the performance served as the ultimate victory lap—a cocky, catty party celebrating his recent and historic wins, specifically the dominance of his diss track, “Not Like Us.” As the first solo hip-hop artist to headline the event, Lamar stood at the “dead f*ing center” of American culture, using the highest-profile stage in the country to deliver a final, winking “death blow” in hip-hop’s nastiest feud. Flanked by a bizarre Greek chorus led by special guest Samuel L. Jackson, the rapper built a 13-minute spectacle around the central question on everyone’s mind: Would he perform the controversial track? The answer was a masterclass in tension and release, a smug, highly effective display of influence that traded intellectualism for unabashed, glorious pettiness.

The Prophetic Center of the Culture

Kendrick Lamar’s position on the Super Bowl stage in 2025 was the culmination of a prophetic journey. The performance came just one week after he swept the Grammys, earning five awards, including the coveted Record of the Year and Song of the Year for “Not Like Us.” That diss track, aimed squarely at his nemesis Drake, achieved one of the most remarkable commercial and critical successes in hip-hop history, becoming an inescapable global hit.

His presence at the Superdome in New Orleans was a powerful statement about the cultural prominence of hip-hop and his own influence. Lamar, renowned for his incisive social commentary and intellectual approach to his art, chose this pinnacle moment to shed his philosopher persona. He embraced his status as the victor of the year’s most vicious musical feud, adopting a smug, beaming confidence. The review notes that the entire 13-minute set was framed by the tension surrounding “Not Like Us,” a track whose explicit subject matter and ongoing legal drama made its inclusion on the family-friendly, corporate-sponsored stage a massive question mark and a potential legal minefield.

The Tension and Theatrics of Uncle Sam

The spectacle began with an unexpected and theatrical element: the appearance of Samuel L. Jackson as a special guest. Decked out in “starry patriotic regalia,” Jackson played a dual role as a circus ringmaster and a heckling Greek chorus, setting a tone of arch, self-aware irony. The actor introduced Lamar, then stuck around to “goad and heckle him” throughout the show, declaring, “It’s your uncle—Sam—and this is the great American game!”

Lamar’s initial song choices only amplified the tension. He kicked off the set with an unreleased cut used to promote his latest album, GNX, spitting a warning that the “revolution ’bout to be televised,” daring the audience to guess his next move. Jackson’s character soon stepped in to order Lamar to “tighten up” and stop being “too loud, too reckless, too… ghetto,” a moment of pointed satire on the commercial and societal pressure to make hip-hop “nice” and “calm.” Lamar’s response was impish: he and his dancers immediately formed an American flag for a highly controlled, “soldierly rendition” of his track “Humble,” a song whose lyrics are anything but humble.

The Game of Cat and Mouse: Edging the Audience

The core of the performance’s success lay in Lamar’s deliberate, 10-minute game of cat and mouse with the audience regarding the highly anticipated track. Knowing exactly what 120 million viewers were waiting for, he initially chose to bench major crowd-pleasers like “Alright” (a modern Black Lives Matter anthem) and “Bitch, Don’t Kill My Vibe” in favor of newer, more forgettable material, subtly frustrating the crowd.

The highlights arrived when he finally acknowledged the elephant in the stadium. Cozying up to a quartet of dancers with severely bobbed hair, Lamar started a call-and-response routine, confessing, “I wanna perform their favorite song, but you know they love to sue,” clearly referencing Drake. The dancers asked, “What song?” just before the unmistakable, squawky riff of “Not Like Us” arrived on cue. Lamar gave a triumphant Cheshire grin, only to then pivot away, slowing the pace with “Luther,” his new, innocuous R&B duet with collaborator SZA. Jackson’s “Uncle Sam” character saluted this “nice, calm” detour, suggesting that this was what “America wants.”

The Death Blow and the Final Act of Derision

Lamar’s detour was short-lived. Just two minutes later, the opening horns of “Not Like Us” crept back in, and the rapper, having edged the audience for the better part of the show, was off. He delivered the song with an elated, beaming intensity as he sashayed across the field. Though he strategically omitted the track’s most explicit line, he still looked point-blank into the camera to deliver the crucial, unedited smear: “Say, Drake, I hear you like ’em young.”

The ultimate mic-drop moment arrived in two parts. First, Lamar served up the track’s best line: “Tryna strike a chord and it’s probably A minorrrrr.” The audience erupted in cheers, joyously stretching out the last ‘R’ in unison, confirming the track’s status as a generational phenomenon. Second, adding a “nasty coda” to the entire feud, tennis pro and Drake’s ex, Serena Williams, popped up on the sidelines to crip-walk in celebration. To top it off, Lamar wore a chunky chain with a lowercase ‘A’ dangling from it, widely interpreted as a final, stylish jab referencing the “A minor” pun. The review concludes that the performance, while low-key and low on surprises, was the perfect smug, petty party celebrating Lamar’s apex, daring anyone to try and “kill his vibe.”