Justin Timberlake Surprises Super Bowl Selfie Kid on ‘Ellen’

One of the most memorable moments of the 2018 Super Bowl was the “selfie kid,” and Justin Timberlake recently surprised the teen on Ellen.

Ryan McKenna, a 13-year-old New England Patriots fan, became world-famous when he appeared next to Timberlake and took a selfie with the star during the halftime show performance.

McKenna turned up on Friday’s episode of Ellen to talk about the surreal experience, when the host revealed that Timberlake was on the phone and wanted to speak to him.

The former *NSYNC member came on the line and greeted the teen, who was then noticeably overcome with emotion.

After chatting for a bit, Timberlake then invited McKenna and his family to come to the singer’s concert later this year in Boston, Mass. while Ellen handed the tearful teen the tickets.

She then revealed that the NFL had also provided a gift basket for the family, which included clothing apparel and tickets to multiple New England Patriots games and passes to go on the field.

Justin Timberlake’s Super Bowl halftime show had been met with mixed reactions, but the event spurred a 534% sales gain for his music.

Tracks like “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” and “Filthy,” which is the first single off of his new album Man of the Woods, saw huge leaps in download numbers, with the latter selling an estimated 6,000 downloads on Feb. 4.

It also benefited the sales on Prince’s song “I Would Die 4 U,” which Timberlake performed in the middle of the set with a large video of Prince projected on a white screen behind him.

That track sold a whopping 38,000 downloads on Feb.4, whereas the day prior it had sold 6,000, according to THR.

While his halftime show turned out to be light on surprises, many had been speculating for weeks if *NSYNC or Janet Jackson would show up to perform with him.

In an interview from January, Timberlake opened up about that notorious Super Bowl wardrobe malfunction that took place while he performed with Jackson and admitted that he “stumbled” in the aftermath.

While speaking to Beats 1 host Zane Lowe, Timberlake was asked about the incident and replied, “Yeah and I stumbled through it, to be quite honest.”

“I had my wires crossed, and it’s just something that you have to look back on and go, like, ‘OK, well, you know, you can’t change what’s happened but you can move forward and learn from it,’ ” he continued.

Lowe asked if Timberlake and Jackson had resolved that event between the two of them, to which the “Cry Me A River” singer confirmed that they “absolutely” had, as reported by E! News.

“And I don’t know that a lot of people know that,” Timberlake added. “I don’t think it’s my job to do that because you value the relationships that you do have with people.”