MTVs tagline for the2018 Video Music Awardswas Everything might happen.
Hey, they saidmight.
The 35th VMAs had some fiery performances, but the show never quite sparked.
Credit: Kevin Mazur/WireImage
The excess trended mythic.
Nicki Minaj performed in downtown Manhattans Oculus.
The transpo hub already looks like some Kryptonians terraformed a Sam Goody inside a leviathan spinal column.
Meanwhile, Ariana Grandes stunning number restaged an all-female Last Supper.
God is a woman she sang, and the Leonardo da Vinci homage implied a Jesus-y deity.
But then the Greek columns gave strong Athena vibes.
Given the context, the swirling black hole in the background looked outright vulvar.
There was a sprinkling of solid performances, Shawn Mendes gettingFlashdanced under indoor rain, Panic!
Meanwhile, Camila Cabello took over as the resident awards-ceremony Audience Dancer.
When Bazzi performed Beautiful, the camera cut to Cabello mouthing along.
Imagine, someone with talent singing a Bazzi song!
Little bits felt amplified.
The Radio City Rockettes took the stage as a punchline for some Blake Lively-Anna Kendrick banter.
Travis ScottZardozzed himself during hisAstroworldmedley, performing in front of a giant replica of His Own Head.
Some pulse was missing, though.
Maybe a host wouldve helped?
The ceremony started strong with Tiffany Haddish and Kevin Hart.
At this game, you guys are allowed to kneel!
said Hart, before just deciding to tell the president to suck it.
Haddish comparedJersey Shoreto herpes, smirkishlyshaded the remaining four Fifth Harmonies.
Jimmy Fallon made a joke about Post Malones face tattoos, so thats the box marked topical comedy checked.
(Ha ha,buymusic!)
Certain personalities were absent, no Carters, no Childish Gambino.
Karlie Kloss but no Taylor Swift, which is how Generation Tide Pod describes sizzle sans steak.
I grew up on MTV, said Jennifer Lopez,accepting the career achievement Video Vanguard award.
She couldve meant it either way: Growing upwatchingMTV, growing upliterally onMTV.
And 16 actual years ago, Lopez was releasing an album, two movies, a perfume line.
We blinked, it was 2018, here she still was.
Cabello danced with her mom offstage, Grande brought mom and grandma onstage: Cool!
But the big Lopez performance felt listless, especially compared to past Video Vanguard medleys.
It was some Vegas-y song and dance, iTunes previewd into unfulfilling microdoses.
One line of graffiti just said SEXISM, another declared AGEISM.
You feel relevance grasped towards.
Pause to imagine the street artist spraypainting AGEISM outside a construction yard.
That graffiti summed up the VMAs, actually: Stretching for big moments, imitating provocation.
This generation gap is funny to talk about Im so old!
is something you hear 24-year-olds saying lately but its starting to go dangerously textual.
The first one is my daughters favorite!
McLean, beard guy from Backstreet Boys, describing a current nominee.
Ken Jeong gave a shout-out to Barenaked Ladies, Smash Mouth, and Chumbawumba.
Kevin Hart had a PSA for rappers half his age: Stop writing on your face.
The old ways werent necessarily better.
The horrific final performance trotted out Aerosmith.
Onstage with Post Malone, they personified an utterly mummified notion of rock.
(Any children watching will flee into EDM forevermore.)
More horrific, yet freakishly watchable,was the appearance by Madonna.
In a demonstrably failed effort to honor Aretha Franklin, she told a very long story.
She said quelle horreur and LOL in consecutive sentences, pretentiously French and then pretentiously millennial.
She was bleeped twice.
It was a ludicrous moment that kept going and going.
Surely there are a thousand better ways to honor Aretha Franklin.
And yet somehow this moment was the first to feel definable VMA-ish.
At long last, we hadliterally no ideawhat was going to happen next.
Finally, Madonna announced the big prize was going to Camilla Cabello.
It was verynice, and Cabellos a star, and you expect a brighter future.
Imagine all the crazy stuff Cabello will say when she takes the VMA stage in 2042.
God, just blink and the years will go by.B-
