While the Big Game was a blowout as the Seattle Seahawks romped over the Denver Broncos in Super Bowl XLVIII, far less decisive were the assessments as to the creative merits and effectiveness of this year’s crop of Super Sunday advertising. The ad lineup had some hits, a number of misses and many that fell somewhere in-between, generating mixed reviews.
As for the impact of a one-sided game, there are two schools of thought. Did people tune out or at least become less attentive with the game’s outcome pretty much determined in the first half with the Seahawks up by a score of 22-0?
Or when the game’s suspense went out the window, did that mean all that was left after the halftime show was to hope for good commercials. Some might argue that the suspense of what was on the ad front had already been undermined by the lion’s share of Super Sunday commercials having already appeared online prior to the telecast. Still, though, many of the ads online generated buzz and ambassadors who told their friends to watch out for such and such on TV, thus whetting appetites and anticipation.
Continuing its annual tradition, SHOOT has sounded out creative artisans whose agencies did not have any commercials on this year’s Super Bowl so as to get unvarnished, apolitical takes on the advertising.
Here’s a sampling of the feedback we received on Big Game ads:
Paul Hicks
“The one headline for me is that Seattle won the Super Bowl,” said Paul Hicks, executive creative director at GodfreyQ, San Francisco. The Seattle victory he was referring to, however, was on the advertising gridiron in the form of Seattle area-headquartered Microsoft’s “Empowering” spot which showcases how technology has “given hope to the hopeless” and “voice to the voiceless,” the latter introducing us briefly to Steve Gleason, a former NFL player and young dad afflicted with ALS, who communicates with his child via computer.
“This spot was the real standout for me–it was captivating emotionally and extremely relevant to the brand,” assessed Hicks. “It did some real heavy lifting for the brand compared to a lot of other inspirational spots on the Super Bowl that were kind of a reach for the brands involved. Microsoft’s spot had just the right balance.”
Hicks also praised the creative risk taking behind a brand shift, the overriding example being Radio Shack for “The Phone Call.” The spot thrusts us into a typical Radio Shack when the phone rings and the clerk/associate behind the counter answers. It turns out it was the 1980s calling and they “want their store back.” A series of 1980s icons then descends upon the store and dismantle it–they include Hulk Hogan, Erik Estrada of CHIPS fame, the evil Chucky Doll, the California Raisins, mailman Cliff Clavin from Cheers, even Alf. The store is overhauled to reveal a sleek contemporary place with the latest in state-of-the-art technology.
Radio Shack shared “a self-deprecating truth,” observed Hicks. “Now what matters is what they are doing after the Super Bowl. Are the stores actually going to transform themselves into being more contemporary and relevant? That was a pretty exceptional spot, especially if they deliver on the promise.”
Hicks also singled out several tug-at-the-heartstrings spots, most notably the puppy-and-Clydesdale spot for Budweiser. He also liked the Cheerios commercial, describing it as “beautifully done” with a young girl who was “captivating.”
Under the “we do good stuff for the world” category, Hicks also found value in Chevy making a connection to this Tuesday’s World Cancer Day as well as Intuit which awarded Super Bowl air time to a spot promoting Goldieblox, a line of toys encouraging girls to pursue math and science.
Hicks added that the Bud Light spot which takes a real guy on a wild ride of a nighttime adventure played a lot better as a three-minute piece online than broken up into segments on the Super Bowl telecast. He felt that Bud beat Bud Light in the genre of taking an unsuspecting real person and surprising him–this in the context of a soldier who returns from home to a rousing welcome home from an entire town.
As for big production value, Maserati and Jaguar were certainly atop the list though Hicks observed that the former tapped too much into Beasts of the Southern Wild.
Hicks said that he found most disturbing and objectionable the five and 10-second promos for the new 24. “They were little slices of terrorism peppered throughout the day with no explanation. Fox continues to show poor taste in their promos–which would have been even worse if there had been some sort of event at the Super Bowl.”
Cameron Day
For freelance creative director and writer Cameron Day, this past Sunday “clearly belonged to Chevrolet Trucks and the Seattle Seahawks. I only wish I’d seen a more well-rounded game, from America’s advertisers and my Denver Broncos.”
As for upside, Day said he “warmed to the Chevrolet truck spot with the bull. It was great storytelling, had an unexpected musical track and avoided most of truck advertising’s well-worn clichés. Chevy ran an equally powerful spot in support of World Cancer Day that struck the perfect balance of product placement and corporate altruism.”
Other “bright spots over the course of an otherwise undistinguished commercial crop,” said Day, came from VW, Chrysler and Microsoft. “I liked the VW ‘Wings’ spot a lot. Who knew that Volkswagen had more cars on the road with over 100,000 miles than any other manufacturer? Not me. It was a powerful claim, nicely packaged.”
Meanwhile, continued Day, “the Bob Dylan spot for Chrysler was also a standout for me, although to a lesser extent than the previous Clint Eastwood spot. Maybe I was somehow expecting more magic this time round. Nonetheless, it continued to make this Denver fan want to root for Detroit.”
Day also cited Microsoft for “a smart spot, demonstrating how technology helps people overcome adversity.”
Beyond those, though, “that was about it for me” regarding the Super Bowl ad entries, continued Day.
“To its credit, Bud Light had me baited by their teaser ads during the playoffs but much like Denver’s offense, it never materialized. Two vaguely interesting spots ran showing an unsuspecting fan being whisked away for the night of his life. When a third, completely unrelated Bud Light spot ran touting a new bottle, I was left wondering where the other campaign premise went.
“Then there was good ol’ GoDaddy, who dropped their typical groan-inducing sexist crap. They can now join the ranks of the merely mediocre. Unfortunately, last I checked they don’t hand out trophies for mediocre performances. Just ask my Broncos, and 95% of the game’s advertisers.”
Pete Harvey
“We had an emotional tenor to the work that was very patriotic, nostalgic. It felt kind of like we were licking our wounds,” observed Pete Harvey, partner/creative director at barrettSF. “With the recession, the economy in recovery, coming out of a war, it was like we could be American again and be proud of that–we saw that reflected in the Budweiser ‘Puppy Love’ spot, Chrysler and the Budweiser commercial about the soldier coming home. There was a lot of flag waving, an acknowledgement that we’ve come through tough times together. And all of this didn’t seem like all that a deliberate effort. It’s just when you look at the body of spots as a whole, these same emotions came through. It’s quite a departure from the kick-in-the-nuts Bud Light humor. Things this time around were more deeply thoughtful.”
On the downside, though, within this context, there wasn’t much creative risk taking, noted Harvey who cited as the only risk being Radio Shack acknowledging the perception of their stores being behind the times. “Usually there’s a lot of chest beating in advertising, particularly Super Bowl advertising, but Radio Shack showed some real self-deprecation. They said to us, ‘This is your perception of us. We’re not going to lie about that. But we’re moving on and will show a new face of Radio Shack.’”
Otherwise, with little or no major risk taking, there was a lack of big public reaction to the Super Bowl ads. “Usually there’s major praise or condemnation about something but we didn’t have that this year. Everything seemed in more conservative territory, safety-first creatively.”
Harvey thought the biggest winner was Pepsi–not so much for a commercial but for sponsoring “a great halftime show. Attaching themselves to Bruno Mars, our new Michael Jackson, was a great bit of branding and sponsorship for them. Pepsi came away victorious with this one.”
Mike McKay
“The tone was mixed–serious spots, funny spots. There was a greater range than in recent years which were more dominated by humor,” observed Mike McKay, chief creative officer at San Francisco agency Eleven.
McKay cited Axe’s new Peace body spray commercial as his favorite Super Bowl spot this year, depicting warlords who make love, not war. “It was a huge message, very well done.”
McKay was also partial to Bud Light capturing an unknowing young guy and taking him on the adventure of his life one night. “It captures the imagination of those 20somethings who wish something like that could happen to them but never does.”
Again worthy of the Super Bowl, continued McKay, were the Doritos commercials that emerged out of a consumers/filmmakers competition.
McKay also “got a kick” out of the Radio Shack ad.
As for what missed, McKay said the Bud Light spots focusing on the bottle were inexplicable. “I don’t quite understand how you would spend that kind of money to show a bottle. It’s the kind of work that you’d see on mid-week television or maybe Monday Night Football but certainly didn’t have Super Bowl worthiness.” McKay added the same lack of worthiness held true for the TV show promos and movie promotional commercials. “They didn’t seem properly customized for the Super Bowl–again, stuff that you’d see on regular TV during the week.”
Jim Elliott
Jim Elliott, chief creative officer of Y&R New York, is another impartial observer–with the possible exception of yogurt commercials which SHOOT asked him not to comment on in that Y&R Barcelona was involved in the Dannon Oikos spot that was crowdsourced by Poptent.
Elliott ran down both the spots that stood tall and those who came up short. On the former score, the standout ads for Elliott were:
“The Maserati Ghibli spot because I thought it was powerful, and it caught me off guard. It surprised me, which is a hard thing to pull off with all the pre-game hype surrounding the commercials. But then, the element of surprise was crucial to the concept, so pre-game buzz would have undermined that ‘Now We Strike’ idea.
“I also really liked the evolving, episodic construct of Bud Light’s “Up for Whatever.” While I felt it could have been funnier throughout, the episodic construct brought something new to the Super Bowl equation.”
Elliott add that he “wanted to hate the Budweiser ‘Puppy’ spot. (I mean, really? You’re going to go straight for the Ad Meter jugular?!) Blame it on the booze, but it got to me. I’ll admit it: I got a little misty. Damn you, puppy. Damn you Passenger. sigh.
“And while we’re getting all sappy here, I thought Cheerios’ “Gracie” and Microsoft’s “Empowering” took gambles that paid off. They were serious, emotional and they worked.”
Elliott also thought Radio Shack’s “The Phone Call” and Audi’s “Doberhuahua” were “kind of funny too, if not slightly in the realm of expected Super Bowl over-the-top slapstick campiness.”
And finally on the positive side of the ledger, Chrysler’s “We Build Your Car” also resonated for Elliott. “Beautifully shot. Features Bob Dylan. Enough for me.”
As for commercials that missed for Elliott, he related, “I know that these were popular, but I felt that some spots that played up America were too transparent in wanting to win over the audience. From Heinz to Coke to Budweiser’s ‘Hero’s Welcome.’”
Other misses cited by Elliott were:
–Chevy’s “Romance”: “Totally expected and cliché.”
–SodaStream: “Poor use of a beautiful celebrity (Scarlett Johansson).”
–Subway: “Goes without saying. No effort whatsoever.”
–And Honda’s “Hugfest.” “With [Bruce] Willis and [Fred] Armisen, there was potential, but the rug pull fell flat. Real flat.”
