Has the tour been ruined? Justin Timberlake’s ‘Forget Tomorrow’ comes to the Wells Fargo Center

In the court of public opinion, Justin Timberlake’s career would seem to be in big trouble.

The former NSYNC star, who brought his Forget Tomorrow World Tour to a packed Wells Fargo Center in South Philadelphia on Friday, has been in the news of late for the wrong reasons.

In June, a few weeks after his concert trek scheduled to run through next summer was launched, Timberlake was arrested and charged with driving under the influence in Long Island.

His remark that “this is going to ruin the tour” to a young officer who reportedly didn’t recognize him has been widely mocked online in memes. (He pleaded guilty to a lesser charge in September and was ordered to pay a fine, record a public service announcement, and do community service.)

In recent years, Timberlake has faced criticism about his conduct in the 2000s over his treatment of Britney Spears after their breakup and how Janet Jackson absorbed the brunt of the backlash for the “wardrobe malfunction” incident at the Super Bowl in 2004. In 2021, he issued an apology to both.

Then this week, Timberlake outraged some fans when he postponed a concert in Newark, N.J., just one hour before start time due to what he vaguely referred to as “an injury” in an Instagram post.

So as Timberlake’s Philly Forget Tomorrow date approached, there was some question about whether it was even going to happen. And if it did, how warmly would the native Memphian and his band, the Tennessee Kids, be received.

It did indeed take place, with the song and dance man hitting the stage at 9 p.m. sharp following an opening set by well-named DJ-hype man Andrew Hypes. Timberlake showed no signs of any physical impairment through a two-hour, 28-song performance that was seamless in its slick professionalism.

At 43, Timberlake — who, like the eight musicians, three backup singers, and five dancers accompanying him, was dressed in black with white sneakers — is still a skilled, light-on-his-feet hoofer, as well as a practiced entertainer whose resume reaches back to his days as a Mouseketeer on The All-New Mickey Mouse Club in the mid-1990s.

The set pulled heavily from Timberlake’s middling new album Everything I Thought It Was, and songs like the bloated “Sanctified” and overbusy “Technicolor” were lowlights of an otherwise briskly paced, expertly choreographed evening.

Timberlake’s longtime collaborator, Philly bandleader Adam Blackstone, is not on this tour, with his bass-playing duties ably filled by Derrick “Swol” Ray. But Blackstone’s presence is still felt in his offstage role as musical director and music programmer.

The band is punchy and the show is fun to watch, with everybody on stage except powerhouse drummer Michael Reid Jr. and keyboard player Justin C. Gilbert putting dancing shoes to use.

The four-man horn section moved along with Timberlake and his singers and dancers for a mini set on second stage on the opposite end of the arena in the smoothest such transition I’ve witnessed.

The ensemble traveled through the crowd on the way out playing Everything’s “Play,” and without missing a beat, made their way back while Timberlake dug into the groove of “What Goes Around … Come Around” from 2006′s FutureSex/LoveSounds.

Timberlake made no mention of his travails, but eased up in the comfort zone of a loyal crowd — probably 70% female, and racially mixed, though mostly white, and in his age cohort or a few years younger — delighted to be in the presence of a dance music-making pop idol that they’ve been following for decades now.

The enthusiasm of longtime fans was spotlighted in the carefully plotted show’s one interlude of seemingly off-the-cuff spontaneity, when Timberlake interacted with women near the front of the stage who came armed with handmade signs with messages like “Sold My Plasma to Be Here,” aiming to get his attention.

One that caught his eye read “Got My Tickets With My Divorce$$.” When a woman nearby hollered out, “Congratulations, girl!” Timberlake ad-libbed, “Oh, I know I’m in Philly now!”

Another woman brought a sign asking for “Help With My Gender Reveal.” She handed him an envelope and FaceTimed her husband at home who was watching the couple’s 2-year-old. Like an Oscar presenter, Timberlake coyly opened the envelope and revealed, “It’s a baby … boy!”

The visual star of the show was a 30-foot high rectangle/high-definition video screen with a shape reminiscent of the mysterious godlike monolith in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey.

For the most part, Timberlake and the TK’s let the music do the talking, with an easy flowing R&B and pop blend that kept the crowd on its feet and moving all night. It never cuts too deep, but is almost always agreeable.

But the big rectangle provided state-of-the-art, expensive-looking digital showmanship. It could be made to look like a giant water tank filling up and threatening the life of a giant Timberlake trapped within it on “Drown.”

in “SexyBack,” Timberlake’s signature 2006 hit with producing partner Timbaland, the star’s oversize head glowered from a screen threateningly tipped at an angle so it appeared it might fall and crush the singer and band even as they were busy grinding out the funk vamp’s chunky groove.

For the finale, the monolith turned into a platform for Timberlake to be fastened to while it was lifted above the crowd to finish off the evening with “Mirrors,” from his 2013 album The 20/20 Experience.

It was an awkward ending, in part because the de rigueur stunt of arena spectacle levitation is so prevalent that it’s starting to seem silly.

And also because while he was up there, his feet were fastened in for safety reasons, rendering him awkwardly immobile, when he’s much more engaging when he’s footloose, back on solid ground.

Earlier, before backing himself on “Selfish” on acoustic guitar, Timberlake asked the crowd if it was their first time seeing him with the Tennessee Kids or “if you’ve been rocking with me for 20 or 25 years.”

The fans whose allegiance dates back to his NSYNC days at the turn of the millennium won by a deafening margin. “We grew up together,” Timberlake said, at ease amid an adoring crowd that wrapped him in a warm cocoon of security, no matter what the haters might say.