SuperBowl commercials discussion

Submitted by michgoblue on

I haven't seen any discussion on the topic, so I figured I would start a Monday morning thread about the SB commercials. While people generally look forward to them, I found this year's crop, much like last year's, to be largely forgettable. Have the agencies just run out of ideas? Last week, I saw a rundown of the top 15 or 25 SB commercials of all time, and the new ones are just a step down.

What did everyone here think? Any favorites? Least favorites? Discuss.

AlbMichFan

February 4th, 2013 at 7:52 AM ^

How come nobody has an opinion on the GoDaddy commercial? That thing was one of the worst ideas ever. Whoever thought of that commerical should be fired or something along those lines.

GoWings2008

February 4th, 2013 at 9:40 AM ^

as I've gone on the free A-B tour at the St Louis brewery more times than I can count, this commercial will be your one and only look at a baby Clydesdale.  The reqirement for these horses before they can join the hitch is 4 yrs old.  (Did I mention that I have the tour memorized?  Yes, more times than I can count...field research and all).  Free samples at the end, too. 

Sopwith

February 4th, 2013 at 8:21 AM ^

And they also had one of the better tweets during the blackout:

 

Re: the Paul Harvey God-made-a-farmer commercial, I thought they were setting it up as an Archer Daniels Midland political ad to continue farm subsidies or something.  In which case, the script should have gone something like:

"So God made a farmer.  And God got angry at the farmer's highly paid lobbyist... and lo, he did strike down the Iowa Running Backs with a vengeance.  And that's the rest of the story."

BornInAA

February 4th, 2013 at 8:28 AM ^

The doritios goat was the best - the rest were flat.

About 60 seconds into Beyonce I asked my teen daughters if they recognized a coherent song yet or whas she just going to grind hips to a beat for the whole halftime?

gopoohgo

February 4th, 2013 at 9:17 AM ^

I second the screaming goat.  Thought it was hilarious.

I really liked the Chrysler ad at the end of halftime, donating cars to bring veterans home.  They used the theme song from "The Pacific", which was one of the best (and horrifying) Tv shows I've ever seen.

MGJS SuperKick Party

February 4th, 2013 at 9:17 AM ^

The commercials were super disappointing this year. The only ones that I remember I liked were:

The Rock "got milk" commercial,VW commercial, Budweiser baby Clydesdale,Bud Light Stevie Wonder Voodoo and the Big Bang Theory Promo

The rest were trying to hard to be funny (godaddy) or trying to pull on heart strings.

DonAZ

February 4th, 2013 at 10:29 AM ^

"The rest were trying to hard to be funny ... or trying to pull on heart strings."

Two major categories of Superbowl commercials down through the years.  An emerging third category would be the "shock element" commercial, which is where I'd kinda-sorta place the GoDaddy nerd/supermodel commercial.

Budweiser has done heart-string Clydesdale commercials several times in the past.  The general theme is always the same, and it resonates for the same reason the Farmer truck ad did -- the Clydesdales symbolize a kind of stoic work ethic ... a hat tip to honor and integrity and hard work ... and it's a timeless appeal.

By the way, that's exactly the appeal Brady Hoke is weaving into the fabric of Michigan football.

GoWings2008

February 4th, 2013 at 9:43 AM ^

Anyone seen the jello pudding commercial they started showing after the game?  Not sure exactly when it started but I saw it the first time this morning.  Free Jello pudding cups in San Francisco for finishing second.  Pretty good commercial and a good idea.  Cuz there's always room for Jello.

taistreetsmyhero

February 4th, 2013 at 10:14 AM ^

The jeep one with Oprah narrating, showing troops coming home to their families in jeeps. Thought it was really tasteless and shamelessly took advantage of people's respect for veterans. It was like the dodge truck commercial, except troops coming home has literally zero connection with jeeps.

NoMoPincherBug

February 4th, 2013 at 10:24 AM ^

the Go Daddy ad with Barf Rafeal frenching that nerd was uncomfortable, silly, unnecessary and was done just for shock value.  Im glad I do not have small children that were watching the game with me and saw that.  Im sure some parents out there had to deal with their kids seeing that.  It was trashy and reminded me that my web hosting is up in March and I have to switch to a new provider.  Bob Parsons is a greedy mf who thrives on the shock value while having the most expensive hosting prices in the industry.  It would be great to see them fall.

StephenRKass

February 4th, 2013 at 10:56 AM ^

It seemed like there were an awful lot of promos for CBS TV. None of the promos make me want to watch any of their shows. I would have rather seen ads.

While the jeep ad may have been a shameless tie in to the armed services, it did pluck my heart strings. Probably because my daughter starts boot camp at Great Lakes in two days, so I'm emotional about everything.

I also liked the Dodge Ram farmer commercial. I guess it would fall flat for youngsters and hipsters who are clueless about Paul Harvey.

And Bud can't go wrong with Clydesdale commercials. However, the two spots about some new kind of hip beer fell flat for me. I don't get why anyone thinks that drinking some particular kind of beer makes you cool or hip or anything else.

The M&M's commercial brought a smile to my face. So did the VW commercial, and the Mercedes Benz one with Daniel Defoe. And I agree that the Samsung meta commercial about commercials / ad campaigns was pretty good.

drewz05

February 4th, 2013 at 11:04 AM ^

I liked the Joe Montana miracle stain jersey commercial.  Haven't seen anyone mention on here but I thought it was well done and the ending made me remember that it's for Tide.

LSAClassOf2000

February 4th, 2013 at 11:56 AM ^

 I think the Budweiser and Doritos ads were probably the best ones this year. The Budweiser ad actually was a great variant on the theme that they've typically gone with in the past, and the Doritos ad actually had me watching it again on YouTube later. I liked the NFL's contribution too - Deion Sanders trying to get back in the league as Leon Sandcastle.

The two worst, I thought, were the Psy pistachio ad and probably Century 21's ad, which seemed like it was trying a little too hard to be funny.

chatster

February 4th, 2013 at 1:33 PM ^

Thumbs Up (in no special order, and OK to read with a Jamaican accent): Budweiser’s "Brotherhood" Clydesdale ad (typically great); Mercedes' "Coolest Man In The World" (Kate Upton, Usher, The Rolling Stones’ "Sympathy for the Devil" and Willem Dafoe as The Devil; I can handle that); Best Buy’s "Asking Amy" (liked Amy Poehler on SNL Weekend Updates, haven’t seen much of her Parks and Recreation show, but loved this ad); Oreos’ "Library Fight" was like "Animal House" meets "Breakfast Club" meets "Backdraft" and "The Naked Gun" (never have stopped loving Oreos, and got flashbacks to the epic Miller Lite "Tastes Great - Less Filling" campaign); Volkswagen’s "Come On Get Happy" ad with Jimmy Cliff and the angry people (fondly recall Coke’s famous, bring-the-world-together-on-a-hilltop-with-song campaign that this ad parodied); Jeep’s "USO/Whole Again" salute to the troops; Samsung’s "New Best Thing" ad (biased in favor of Paul Rudd, Seth Rogen and Bob Odenkirk; liked both the ad that ran in the days before the game and the ad during the game); Tide’s "Miracle Stain" ad; NFL’s "Leon Sandcastle" (fond memories of Jackmerius Tacktheritrix.)

Thumbs Down: Dodge Ram’s Farmville ad (not a Paul Harvey fan; neither a farmer nor a truck driver, though I respect them all, and will always love that plowed-over cornfield in Dyersville, Iowa; this was an interminable ad that won’t encourage me to buy a truck OR a farm); Go Daddy’s "Perfect Date" (understood the idea, not thrilled with the execution; Bar Rafaeli is fine, but Walter? - more inclined to prefer Will Ferrell’s Old Milwaukee ad that I’ve seen only online); Tostitos ads (liked the three they didn’t use better than the two they used); Toyota’s "Wish Granted" (would love to lose a spare tire, but haven’t watched "The Big Bang Theory," so didn’t know Kaley Cuoco and have no desire to own a RAV4 or have infinite witches or Christine O'Donnell circling my home.) 

M-Wolverine

February 4th, 2013 at 3:04 PM ^

If you like Horses, you "won" this year.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/02/04/clydesdale-ad-w…

And if you want to see where your favs ranked:

http://admeter.usatoday.com/articles/view/the-results

Spoiler: the GoDaddy commercial rounds out the bottom.

They also have links to some you may have missed.

Most disappointing to me was probably Iron Man 3, because it basically said "go see Facebook". Gee, thanks.

And people say this every year but I really thought the commercials were down a bit this year. It generally seems that we don't have cultural touchtone ones anymore, like "taste great, less filling", or "bud-weis-errrrrr", or even "WHAZZZZUP" that are memorable and even get sequels because of their popularity. But even they had a jump of real quality a couple of years ago with things like Darth Vader kid and the Eminem Detroit one that were standouts. Regressed back this year I thought.

maizenbluedevil

February 4th, 2013 at 7:43 PM ^

re. Go Daddy....  Thing is all of the other ads were so thoroughly mediocre and forgetable, that by being awful the Go Daddy one stands out.  They've created a lot of buzz and they've done this enough times now (made a really awful ad) that it indicates they're being intentional with it.  They know what they're doing and it's an effective strategy compared to all the other ones.  Someone in GoDaddy's marketing department (or the ad agency they hire) is pretty smart and knows what they're doing.