Okay, yeah, I can’t believe it’s July. Freakin’ July. While I’m shaking my head in disbelief, let’s talk about June. Last month came in hot, loud, wearing a jersey and carrying gold, silver, or bronze lion statuettes.
Aside from Cannes, sports dominated the month, from the Knicks giving New York a long-awaited reason to lose its collective mind to brands already shifting into World Cup mode a full year ahead of the tournament. Nike went especially big, first serenading New York with Billy Joel after the Knicks’ championship run, then bringing global football to Hollywood with the massive six-minute “Rip the Script.”
FOX One leaned into World Cup obsession, SKYN found the emotional faces of football fandom, and even Reese’s Puffs got in on the fun by giving “Eat ’Em Up” a GloRilla-powered remix.
But June was not all balls, brackets and beautiful-game chaos. Pride Month brought campaigns rooted in visibility and celebration, Father’s Day gave brands a chance to get sentimental, or at least fake-sentimental with better lighting, and summer officially opened the door for food, travel, entertainment, and culture work to start making its seasonal push.
In other words, June reminded us why this business is still fun when brands swing big: a little sports madness, a little music, a little culture, and a lot of people trying to own the moment before everyone else does.
Without further ado, here is the creative that stood out to us in June.
Reese’s Puffs | “Eat ’Em Up”
Reese’s Puffs brought back one of its most beloved cereal anthems with some serious after-hours energy. Launched June 25, the brand’s new campaign from The Martin Agency revives its iconic 2009 “Eat ’Em Up” rap, blending early-2000s nostalgia with the unmistakable sound of multi-platinum artist GloRilla.
At the center of the campaign is a new late-night remix track and music video featuring GloRilla, who gives the fan-favorite anthem a full “Glo-Up.” The remix leans into the sensory appeal of Reese’s Puffs, pairing the cereal’s peanut butter-and-chocolatey crunch with electrifying beats and GloRilla’s signature confidence.
SKYN | “Faces”
SKYN looked at football fandom through a more intimate lens. Ahead of the World Cup, the intimate wellness brand launched “Faces,” a new global campaign created with L&C, capturing supporters in moments of pure emotional release.
The campaign is built around a simple observation. Football is one of the rare public spaces where adults freely surrender to emotion. For 90 minutes, fans scream, cry, hold their breath, jump into strangers’ arms, and let every reaction show. Their faces often say everything before they ever speak.
FOX One | “The FIFA World Cup Comes First”
FOX One made its pitch to soccer fans with a new campaign built around a simple truth: when the World Cup is on, everything else comes second.
The campaign, titled “The FIFA World Cup Comes First,” was developed in partnership with Anomaly and positions FOX Corporation’s direct-to-consumer streaming service as a one-stop destination for the tournament. FOX One will stream all 104 matches live in 4K, with features including multiview options, key replays, and additional viewing tools designed for fans who do not want to miss a moment.
The work leaned into the all-consuming nature of World Cup fandom with four 30-second films: Driving Test, Break, Lifeguard, and Birthday. Each spot followed fans as they attempt to watch a match while supposedly handling something important in real life, from taking a driving test to lifeguarding at a swimming pool.
adidas: “Backyard Legends”
adidas kicked off its FIFA World Cup 2026 campaign with a five-minute film that treats neighborhood football like myth.
Titled Backyard Legends, the new film brings together Timothée Chalamet, Lionel Messi, Bad Bunny, Lamine Yamal, Jude Bellingham, Trinity Rodman, Zinedine Zidane, David Beckham, and Alessandro Del Piero in a stylized story about free play, local lore, and the idea that legends can be made anywhere.
Created by LOLA USA and directed by Mark Molloy through Smuggler, the film continues adidas’ broader “You Got This” platform, which focuses on confidence, joy and self-belief in sport.
The story is led by Chalamet, who plays a football obsessive trying to assemble a team capable of taking down Clive, Ruthie, and Isaak, a local crew whose “win or go home” streak has supposedly survived generations of challengers. Their backyard legend is so strong that even 1990s icons like Zidane, Beckham, and Del Piero could not break it.
Nike | “Rip the Script”
Every few years, Nike delivers a film that reminds the industry why it remains one of the greatest sports marketers on the planet.
“Rip the Script” is that film.
At a time when much of sports advertising feels increasingly focused on data, analytics, systems and optimization, Nike has gone in the opposite direction. The brand’s latest global football campaign is a six-minute celebration of instinct, creativity and chaos — the qualities that made generations of fans fall in love with the beautiful game in the first place.
The premise is deceptively simple. Set inside a fictional Hollywood studio production, Nike imagines a world where football’s biggest stars refuse to follow the script. What unfolds is a joyful rebellion against predictability as the game’s most electric players abandon the playbook and trust their instincts.
And that’s it for the Best of June. See you next month!
Colin Costello is the West Coast Editor of Reel 360 News. Contact him at colin@reel360.com or follow him on LinkedIn.
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