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Did Justin Timberlake just pay homage to Janet Jackson in his Super Bowl performance?

Oh… something very interesting and kind of subtle just happened.

Justin Timberlake might have just paid homage to Janet Jackson during his Super Bowl halftime performance.

In case you missed it, 14 years ago Timberlake and Jackson performed together during the Super Bowl and things didn’t go exactly to plan.

While appearing on stage with Jackson, Timberlake sang the lyrics to “Rock Your Body” that go “I’m gonna have you naked by the end of this song” as he accidentally tore off more of Jackson’s wardrobe than he intended.

As in, there was full boob on stage.

Jackson was widely criticised for the performance even though she was just the unfortunate woman who had her boob exposed to a packed stadium… and the rest of the world.

And while Timberlake was invited back to perform at the Super Bowl, Jackson was not.

In the lead up to this year’s performance Timberlake hinted that he was “doing a few things with this halftime show they’ve never quite done before”.

And he seems like he delivered on that promise… kind of.

Right at the top of his performance he brought back the song that got him into trouble all those years ago sans boobs.

Timberlake sang the song again and abruptly halted and shouted “STOP!” right before those infamous boob-exposing lyrics.

So yeah, probably not enough but something.

In the last few days the hashtag #JanetJacksonAppreciationDay has been trending with fans showing their support to Jackson – and kind of having a not-so-subtle dig at Timberlake.

Happy Janet Jackson Appreciation Day!

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Top Comments

Rush 6 years ago

It's more of a reference than an homage, a nod to what happened last time. I'm not sure we'll ever know the full truth of what happened, but I don't believe it was an accident at all, I think they were both in on it.


Stop 6 years ago

Oh come on Jackson was fully complicit in what was going on with all that. And it’s a very big stretch to say that one instance ‘ruined’ her career... rather than you know, a lack of hit new songs!!!