Super Bowl Ads: Not So “Super”
Super Bowl XLIV featured some great entertainment on the field, both with the game and the halftime show featuring The Who. OK, maybe not so much with The Who, but the game was definitely amazing to watch. Kudos and congratulations to the Saints for pulling off their victory with some very gutsy moves.
I was really looking forward to the ads, obviously, but they just didn’t do much for me. After several of the spots, it left me asking, “OK, so what’s the point?” If you’re spending about $3 million per spot, and you’re on the one night that you know your audience is huge and actually looking forward to advertisements, you need to bring it. Sure, there were some gems, but over all I was underwhelmed.
Instead of loading them all up here and draining bandwidth, you can click here to view the spots.
Several of my friends were entertained with Bud Light’s spots, but I just didn’t care for them. Some were amusing, but the “Here We Go” tagline was lost on me. Here we go…what? There are a lot of options when choosing a domestic light beer, and it’s arguable if there’s even a difference between them regarding taste. So, maybe if you entertain with your commercials, the beer-drinking public will laugh all the way to the local store to pick up a 6-pack of your brand. If you find the spots funny, that is.
Doritos on the other hand, their spots were pretty entertaining to me. They seemed to be the most consistent among the other humor-themed spots (I would have to say the dog with the shock collar was my favorite of the Doritos spots, but the relationship I have with my dog might make me bias on that one).
Car ads seemed mixed; I liked the Kia Sorento spot with the old toys in the back seat, but the Dodge Charger spot left me scratching my head. I got what they were trying to do, but I guess I expected more from the struggling company, especially when you take into account the pre-game buzz Dodge received from opponents of their spending government bailout money for a Super Bowl spot.
My favorite ad of the night had to be the David Letterman/Oprah/Jay Leno creative. That was the only ad that really surprised me when the camera panned back to reveal Oprah, and then Leno. I had to rewind the DVR to make sure I saw what I thought I saw. The only thing that would have made it an absolute classic would have been the inclusion of Conan O’Brien (which was on the table, but just didn’t happen. Read here for more about that).
That’s just my take on the Super Bowl spots, and it’s all subjective, really. I’d love to get some feedback on ads you loved, hated, or didn’t care about one way or the other.
Stephen Young
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