I was definitely underwhelmed as far as anyone doing something really big on the Super Bowl. A lot of stuff tried to be clever but overall, a lot of it was just borrowed interest to make a simple point. I didn’t feel that many of the ads had anything to do with the product. I was disappointed by a lot of the brands that I thought might do something cool.
BMW has a lot to live up to, but I felt they haven’t really lived up to the brand, especially with that X5 stuff [directed by Laurence Dunmore of bicoastal RSA USA for Fallon McElligott, Minneapolis]. I just wasn’t buying that. Quite a few things were mildly amusing; I really liked the EDS cat herder spot [directed by John O’Hagan of bicoastal hungry man for Fallon McElligott] until they just stumbled at the end; it was a funny thing to watch for fifty seconds, but the connection was pretty tenuous to EDS. They had to take two or three sentences to explain their analogy.
I was disappointed by Monster.com [directed by Andrew Douglas via bicoastal Satellite-he’s now with bicoastal 8Media-for Mullen in Wenham, Mass.]. I liked their spots from last year so much-they were right-on and strategically insightful. I felt the whole Robert Frost thing was just way too lofty; it’s not going to register with people.
The Nuveen spot [directed by Douglas for Fallon McElligott] was a fresh idea, but I just don’t know how I feel about it. It’s kind of creepy, kind of over-promising, but I did like the chance that they took doing it-which most spots didn’t do at all. It seems crazy to me not to take any chances if you’re spending this kind of money on a Super Bowl spot.
I thought the Bud work was very ordinary; the spot with the horse being born made me laugh, but not in the right way. The "Whassup" spot [directed by Charles Stone of New York-based C&C Films for DDB Chicago] was funny; I get the connection to the word "true," but … it seems Bud is coming out of left field with that one. I think it’s funny once, but everyone’s been saying that here, so I already hate that.
The E*Trade spots are generally always funny; the one with the guy diving out the window was the most relevant. (E*Trade’s Super Bowl ads were directed by Bryan Buckley of hungry man for Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francico.) The one with the monkey was a cool idea; the basketball one was funny, but it seemed like there was a point that they wanted you to understand-[the importance of] having a backup plan-so they built up a funny situation that has nothing to do with anything. I got it, but feel it’s less relevant to an individual investor.
