The big game has been played, a champion has been crowned, and now there's nothing left to do but analyze the commercials!
The first one I'll take a look at is Matthew's Day Off by Honda.
I'm still peeved about these companies pre-releasing their Super Bowl ads on the internet.
I want to see these ads for the first time while watching the game. When everyone has already seen the best commercials ahead of time, it feels like much of the magic is gone.
But as for the ad itself...
Matthew Broderick's career clearly peaked with Ferris Bueller. The role was simply too iconic.
That's probably why he hasn't really been successful as an adult actor. Because no matter what the movie was, we couldn't help but see Ferris Bueller on the screen. As a result, we were disappointed by him.
Ferris wouldn't have allowed himself to be stalked by a cable guy. Ferris would have done more to stop Godzilla!
That's probably also a big reason why those movies fared poorly at the box office. Well, the fact that they sucked also might have had something to do with it.
When it comes down to it, nobody wants to see Ferris as an adult. We want to think of Ferris Bueller as an eternal teenager. We want to think that he always remained the coolest kid around, living life to its fullest and defying authority.
We certainly don't want to see him as a dumpy middle-aged man driving a CR-V, trying in vain to recapture past glory.
And here's the scariest thing about it. Ferris didn't go on to marry his high school sweetheart Sloan. No, this is what Ferris went on to marry:
Well, there goes my appetite.
Thank you for reminding us of that, Honda! Rating: 1 TV - We should all just pretend that this never happened. Don't watch the commercial. Just go put Ferris Bueller's Day Off into the DVD player and watch that instead.
Before the big game, I decided to do one final Retro ad. This commercial from the 2004 Super Bowl comes from Pepsi and is titled Bears.
There are obviously several major problems with the bears' plan.
First, I think they were extremely fortunate that they raided the cabin of a large, hairy man. If the cabin owner had been skinny, non-bearded, or a woman, they wouldn't have been able to use his ID.
I'm also confused why the bears chose to use subterfuge in order to purchase the Pepsi. They had no qualms about breaking into the cabin and raiding it of food. So what's stopping them from simply bursting into the convenience store and taking some Pepsi?
It is possible that they had scouted the cabin and knew that nobody was home, and they weren't going to encounter any resistance. On the other hand, there would obviously be someone working at the convenience store, and they'd have to deal with them in order to get the Pepsi.
Of course this ignores the fact that they're bears! If the clerk or his wife tried to stop them, they could simply maul them, and take all the food and Pepsi they wanted.
Maybe the bears were worried that mauling a convenience store clerk and his wife might draw unwanted attention from the law. But really, haven't they done enough already to merit some intervention by the authorities anyway?
Breaking and entering, robbery, and identity theft are all serious crimes. Perhaps not as serious as assualt or murder, but they are serious nonetheless. I think that these bears are already deep enough in trouble, that they shouldn't have restrained themselves. In fact, by leaving witnesses, they've probably gotten themselves into more trouble. Rating: 3 TVs - Maybe I'm being too hard on them. While their plan may have some flaws, I guess it is pretty ingenious for bears.
Often times, advertisers take beloved cartoon characters and use them to promote their products. It makes sense. People like the cartoon characters, so they'll have good feelings when thinking about the product.
This Pontiac commercial from the 1998 Super Bowl features the Road Runner and his arch nemesis Wile E. Coyote.
The commercial starts out in a familiar manner: The coyote is trying to catch the Road Runner. To gain an advantage, he utilizes technology from the ACME corporation. But the technology backfires, and the Road Runner gets away.
So far, this is just like the cartoons we all used to know and love.
But the next time around, something has changed! This time, Wile has wisely ordered a Pontiac Wide Track. Thanks to the Pontiac, he is able to stay in pursuit and eventually catch up to his feathered nemesis.
Wait a second...aren't we rooting against the coyote? Aren't we supposed to want the Road Runner to escape?
Why the hell did they give the featured product to the cartoon's antagonist? Is this the message they really wanted to send: It helps the bad guys win?
The commercial thankfully ends before we actually see the coyote catch the Road Runner, but it seems obvious how this is all going to eventually play out: The Road Runner is going to be the coyote's dinner.
I'm surprised that Pontiac didn't follow this up with a commercial where Bugs Bunny gets run over by Elmer Fudd's Grand Prix. Rating: 1 TV - If there was anyone out there who had really been clamoring to see Wile E. Coyote finally win, then this commercial is for you. For the rest of the country, I think it might be a little disturbing.
I've decided to provide you with a slight change of pace. Instead of the usual ad review, today's post will be a guest rant from longtime reader and correspondent Sweaty.
There are two things that really get me heated.
One is
shameless cross promotion.
Just look at the air space during the summer blockbuster
movie season. Ad time is littered with advertisers sixty-nining movie studios in order to hype each others’ products. I can’t wait to see how the
brilliant Madison Avenue types make the new Transformers film somehow relevant to
the next great chicken sandwich at Burger King. (Only available for a limited time!)
To quote the Chewbacca defense: It does not make sense.
The other thing I hate is shameless social media promotion.
Let me elaborate. Some people choose to “like” a product on Facebook because
they genuinely like it, or because they are enticed by coupon codes
or contests. For instance, I "liked" Old Bay's Facebook page because, aside from the
fact that I am from Maryland and have Old Bay coursing through my
veins, I enjoy using the product. They give out recipes, encourage fan feedback,
etc. That is good social promotion.
On the other hand, you have the results of an action
Facebook took a year or so ago. In another evolution of the social media giant,
they took users' preferences, such as favorite television shows, movies,
and sports teams, and made each of them into their own page. The supposed rationale was that this would allow users to connect with other like-minded "likers," which would enhance the
social media experience.
Skeptics would say that the real motivation was so that these pages could be
pimped out to the companies who made these products, thus giving them direct access to a consumer who, by their own admission, liked them.
If you use Facebook at all, you
probably know what I’m talking about. For example, a TV show that you have "liked" will contact you, reminding you
to watch next week’s episode, or offering a sneak preview.
Most of the time, this is
harmless space in the ever moving wall of Facebook. However, some things make you stand up and take notice. Specifically, I was quite turned off by what I saw from the Friday Night Lights fan page.
Friday Night Lights was one of
those NBC shows that had a small, but rabid fan base. Eventually, NBC
relegated the show to TV obscurity/DVR prime time on Friday nights, (Get it? Because it has Friday Night in the title, they showed it on Friday nights! Someone there at 30
Rockefeller Center is patting themselves on the back for that one) and didn’t
do a damn thing to promote it.
Since I had been a rabid fan of the show, I had "liked" the show's fan page on Facebook a few years ago. NBC hadn't done anything with it in a while, and I’m sure
that most people forgot that they even had a fan page. I had certainly forgotten about it. That was until I saw the following post:
Have any big plans following the Super Bowl this Sunday? Now
you do! Catch The Voice Season 2 premiere on NBC: (insert clip of some kid
auditioning before the gal who looked better when she was the dirty teenie
bopper). You can see what I mean on their Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/nbcfnl
Whoa, stop right there! We’ve got a lot of moving parts
there, but right away you can start to see that A + B does not = C-Lo.
I can
see it now: Someone who has a job title that includes “social media” or
“digital engagement” was sitting in a brainstorming session and said, “Hey, you know
how we have to drum up more promo for that show that’s a clear knockoff of
Fox’s American Idol? Those people who watch Friday Night Lights like football!
They’ll be watching the Super Bowl! Maybe there are some more 18-35ers on their
fan page that we can whore The Voice on!”
Therein lies the problem with social media engagement. If you make it too transparent, people will smell the bulls***. Social media
engagement is like guerrilla marketing in the 80’s and 90’s. If you do it well, it is effective. If you do it poorly, you alienate your potential customers.
And social media can be a double-edged sword, because your end user can respond back. Here are some responses from the page's
followers:
“I'm guessing that there isn't much overlap between fans of
Friday Night Lights and The Voice. Please don't do this again.”
“Well, I'm done following [Friday Night Lights] on Facebook
now.”
“Don't be pimping any other shows. You cancelled FNL and I
don't watch NBC at all now because of it. I am not a fan of FNL so I can get
your useless junk-mail/posts or otherwise. It was a show of support for a
fantastic show that some pinhead decided wasn't drawing enough fans. That's it.”
“I am no longer following or ‘a fan’ of [Friday Night
Lights] because you posted this. Shameful cross-promotion.”
And there you have it. This is what happens when you reach
too far on cross promotion.
If there are any “cross promotional geniuses” or
“social marketing gurus” reading this, take heed: A lot of your audience isn’t as stupid as your ads would make them out to be. And when you
bring in the element of social media, be prepared for your knowledgeable users
to lash back.
As I was trying to determine which ad to review next, I asked myself: What company do I most associate with Super Bowl ads?
While there are several companies who have produced good ads over the years, I think that overall, the most memorable commercials have been brought to us by Budweiser.
Every year, when people discuss their favorite Super Bowl commercials, a Bud or Bud Light ad is almost always listed among them.
So I figured that for my next review, I'd pick a Bud commercial. But with such a large catalog to select from, which one should I choose?
I went with this ad from 2006, mostly because it reminded me of a personal experience.
We learn that one of the company's employees - Davis - decided to spend his weekend hiding bottles of Bud Light around the office. He claimed that it was done to give his fellow employees a boost in morale.
Why would hiding Bud Light improve morale? If he really wanted to improve morale, shouldn't he have simply put the Bud Light in the break room? Did he think that the Bud Light would somehow be more satisfying if the people discovered it?
When I'm at a bar, I typically don't want to go on a scavenger hunt in order to get a beer. I prefer to have the bartender simply hand it to me. It tastes just as good, and it requires considerably less effort.
I am also confused why hiding the beer took him "most of the weekend." This seems like a task that would take maybe an hour at the most.
Then again, he works at a company that apparently is fine with their employees openly consuming alcohol during business hours. So maybe expectations are a bit lowered there.
I'd say that this is the type of company I'd like to work for, except I don't think I could handle wearing a suit to work every day.
As we can see, Davis' plan hasn't necessarily raised morale, but it has certainly gone a long way towards the destruction of the office.
At 20 seconds in, another question is raised when a man punches holes in the drywall and pulls out a couple of bottles.
How exactly did Davis hide the beer behind the drywall in the first place? Are we to believe that he planted the beer in the wall and then replaced the drywall over the weekend? That seems like a lot of extra effort. Although that would explain why it took him most of the weekend.
Normally, I'd say that the office workers tearing apart the office in search of Bud Light requires too much suspension of disbelief. But based on personal experience, I could see this scenario actually taking place.
In 2009, Mrs. Cutter and I decided to invite some friends over for an Easter party. We decided to fill plastic Easter eggs with candy, coins, and other fun surprises, and then hide them around our condo, so that people could look for them in an Easter egg hunt.
Unfortunately, quite a few of our guests had been drinking beforehand (Don't ask) and when we began the hunt, chaos ensued.
It might not have been the wholesale destruction we see in this commercial, but rest assured that we almost immediately regretted our decision. People tore through our furniture with abandon in hopes of locating a plastic egg that might contain a quarter or a Jolly Rancher.
So I have no trouble believing that these office workers would tear apart their office building in search of beer. And as they drank the beer, I can imagine the madness only got worse.
I'd say that Davis deserved to get fired for this, but considering the company openly condones drinking beer on company time, can they really hold him accountable?
Rating: 4 TVs - This is a very realistic portrayal of what happens when you tell drunk people to search around a room for prizes.
In the days leading up to this year's big game, I'll be taking a look back at commercials from past Super Bowls.
Since I covered 2011's commercials rather extensively last year, I'll start out by looking at an ad from 2010. This one is from Snickers and stars Betty White:
We start off watching a football game in which one of the players is not having a good game.
Apparently his hunger has caused him to transform into Betty White.
Personally, I'd be pretty excited if one of my teammates transformed into Betty White. She's one funny lady, and I can only imagine that having her at the football game would make it that much more memorable.
But Betty - or "Mike" as they call him - is not being appreciated by his teammates. In fact, they seem to be downright mad at him.
I can understand that Betty White might not be the best player out there, but the others should have recognized this long ago, and dealt with it accordingly.
In most pickup games, talent levels can vary greatly. Some players aren't going to be as good as others, and most people accept this. Once the weaker players are identified, those players typically don't get the ball as much. And if there is an effort to get those weaker players involved, expectations are usually lessened.
In other words, if a guy sucks, and you throw him the ball, you shouldn't get too upset when he doesn't catch it.
So they shouldn't have expected Betty to have caught the ball. And they certainly shouldn't have gotten so upset with him considering how off target the pass appears to be. That would have been an amazing catch had he made it.
It feels like there's something else going on here.
Look at how Betty is laid out by the defender. It seemed as if the defender could have intercepted the ball, but instead chose to deliver a big hit.
I think it is very telling that none of Betty's teammates got upset by what appeared to be a cheap shot. In the NFL, that hit probably would have resulted in a fifteen yard penalty.
You'd expect his teammates to be angry about the hit or at least check to see if he was hurt. But none of them even seem to care. They just yell at him for not catching the ball.
It seems clear that none of the other players like this guy, and it has nothing to do with him turning into Betty White.
I think the real cause for their dislike is sitting in the bleachers.
Mike was probably once a fun guy. He could be counted on to hang out with the guys and have a good time.
Now? He's just a whipped loser who can't go anywhere without bringing his girlfriend along.
You know what most guys enjoy when they're arguing with their friends? When their significant others interject themselves into the argument and feed them candy bars.
Yeah, THAT would have gone over well.
Mike should have been spending the rest of the game listening to taunts from the others. They should have been referring to him as "baby," and asking if he "needed a candy bar from mommy," or if he'd like to have his girlfriend sub in for him.
This probably isn't the first time this has happened, so they don't even bother anymore. Instead, they just try their best to get him to quit.
It's very possible that the QB might intentionally be throwing those balls to him in hopes that he'll get knocked out of the game. And the defense is probably hitting him with impunity, knowing that the guy won't retaliate with his girlfriend present.
Everything is supposedly better after he eats a Snickers. But in my opinion, things have gotten much worse.
I can see some advantages in being Betty White. But after he eats the Snickers, he's still whipped by his girlfriend, his friends still hate him, and now he looks and acts like a douche.
After playing like crap all game, he really has the nerve to shout "I'm open?" Who screams "I'm open!" anyway? What a tool.
The commercial's conclusion raises a very important question as well: Why would you make Abe Vigoda your quarterback?
He's 91 years old! They didn't have anyone else who could play QB?
Rating: 1.5 TVs - This commercial is saying that by eating Snickers, you'll transform from a beloved actress into a whipped douche bag. Is that really the message that Snickers wants to send?
Just be warned that I will not be reviewing any of the Super Bowl ads that been pre-released on the web, most prominently the Volkswagen Star Wars dogs ad.
I am not a fan of this trend where companies release their Super Bowl ads before the game itself. It's kind of like when a person is so excited about a Christmas gift that they bought someone that they give it to them before Christmas.
When I'm watching ads during the Super Bowl, I want to be surprised and entertained by new ads, not by something I've seen already!
But before we get into the Super Bowl ads, I'm going to review a current commercial that will not be shown during the Super Bowl. It is from DirecTV and attempts to show us the perils of having cable instead of DirecTV.
We start off with a man frustrated by being placed on hold by his cable company's customer service.
Now this is something I can relate to! I know just how hellish an experience it can be trying to deal with a cable company's customer service line. You have to navigate through seemingly hundreds of menu choices only to wait about an hour to speak to a living person, who usually ends up being less than helpful.
Trying to work off his frustration, the man engages in physical exercise - in this case, a game of racquetball. This seems like a healthy way to burn off stress, as I too enjoy a spirited game of racquetball from time to time.
Here's where the problem comes in: The man is both unskilled and unprepared to actually play racquetball.
At almost every racquetball club, there are signs that warn players to use proper eye protection. As an experienced player, I can tell you that the ball moves very quickly, and the threat of eye trauma is very real. By playing without any sort of eye protection, he pretty much invites disaster upon himself.
Aside from his lack of goggles, there is another major problem: Both he and his opponent don't seem to actually know how to play the game.
Racquetball is a game of quickness and agility more so than power. Simply standing there and smacking the ball as hard as you can is not generally an effective technique if you want to win the game.
If he had just moved around the court a little and used finesse instead of pure power, he probably could have avoided his eye injury altogether. He must also have extremely poor reflexes, as he was standing decently far back when the ball struck him. You're telling me he couldn't have dodged that ball?
Next, we see the man being treated by a doctor. Apparently the injury was severe enough that it requires him to wear an eye patch. It didn't look like the ball hit him THAT hard, but maybe it just was perfect placement.
I suppose it is possible that he just had LASIK or some other eye surgery, and his eyes are especially sensitive. But if that was the case, then by not wearing goggles, he really deserved to have his eye injured.
Now he has to ride the bus home wearing an eye patch.
He didn't have anyone who could give him a ride? What happened to his racquetball opponent? You'd think the guy might have at least given him a ride home.
Unfortunately, also riding on this bus is a gang of hoodlums. Based on the look of these guys, I think that it doesn't take much to set them off. They might have used the eye patch as their motivation to go after him, but I have the feeling they were just looking for an excuse to attack someone.
What kind of neighborhood does this guy live in anyway? When they show him running, it looks kind of barren. Maybe instead of spending his money on cable or DirecTV, he should look into moving to a nice neighborhood where he isn't in danger of getting attacked by gangs on the bus.
Finally, he ends up in a roadside ditch. Did the guys who beat him up dump him in the ditch? That seems like a lot of extra effort on their part. They probably would have just left him bleeding on the street.
In the end, he might like to blame the cable company for all of his problems. But by choosing to live in such a bad neighborhood, and by eschewing proper eye protection, it seems that going with cable was just one of several bad decisions he has made. Rating: 3 TVs - While I fully sympathize with being frustrated by a cable company, I feel this guy has brought most of this misery upon himself.
Rating: 1 TV - We should all just pretend that this never happened. Don't watch the commercial. Just go put Ferris Bueller's Day Off into the DVD player and watch that instead.
