TV

Tom Holland’s Iconic Performance Of ‘Umbrella’ Is Still The Best Thing On The Entire Internet

The best performance that's ever been on 'Lip Sync Battle'

by Patrick Lenton  5 July 2019
Tom Holland Lip Sync Battle 'Umbrella'

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There are some pieces of culture that not only define, but also effectively end a medium. For the TV show Lip Sync Battle, the show peaked when Tom Holland went on and performed Rihanna’s ‘Umbrella’.

There is honestly no need for anybody to ever try again. He won. Cancel the show. Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone. Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone, etc. God bless this gorgeous little Spider-Man and his dancing butt.

The performance is iconic, undeniably sexual, brave, camp, earnest, silly — it’s everything. He didn’t need to go this hard, but he absolutely did.

What strikes me is that it starts off with a vision of how easily he could have coasted through this whole thing, as he comes out for a swanky and undeniably talented dance to ‘Singin in the Rain’. Cool. But then, he disappears behind those umbrellas, and shirks off any notion of being safe or pedestrian, and reappears as an icon.

From the recreation of Rihanna’s outfit, to the assured and extremely hot dance moves, everything Tom Holland does works. It all culminates in a perfectly choreographed splishy-splashy dance in water. It’s perfect.

Tom Holland’s performance of ‘Umbrella’ manages my depression in a mature and realistic way, pays off all my student debts, and haunts all my erotic dreams.

Sometimes I think about the person I was before I was able to watch this lip-sync, and all I can think about is a lonely, crumbling lighthouse on a cloudy day.

Let’s watch it again.

Pretty much the entire world has placed this ‘Umbrella’ lip-sync into a rare canon of perfect moments.