Last year was the dot-com bowl. This year was the boring bowl.
In some respects, I think the talk of recession made its mark on the Super Bowl. Advertising is a barometer of the situation in the economy, and I saw a lot of conservatism in the creative for spots in this year’s Super Bowl.
Last year was wacky and nuts—maybe not terrific, but the spots were part of the party that is the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl is a big, wonderful extravaganza. It’s rock ‘n’ roll. It’s fun. This year, only some of the advertisers were true to that.
E*Trade [directed by Bryan Buckley of bicoastal/international hungry man for Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, San Francisco] was brilliant, with the monkey riding through the western town on horseback. A new dot-com frontier—the Wild West—opened up last year. Since then, there have been some victims—but E*Trade was not among them. The humor in that spot was multi-layered. The discarded sock puppet. The monkey’s crying, which was reminiscent of the classic commercial where the American Indian sheds a tear over littering and pollution. Yet the monkey goes on, as if declaring, "My friends are gone, but I must carry on." E*Trade has become the establishment, in a sense. The tag, "Invest wisely," sounds like it’s from Salomon Smith Barney. As for how they made the monkey cry, I think I know. They made him watch Mighty Joe Young movies —it’s Method acting.
Another of my favorites was Budweiser’s "Whassup," translated into, "What are you doing?" by white guys [directed by Lloyd Stein of bicoastal Headquarters for DDB Chicago]. The whole essence of that is true; African-Americans leading and creating cool trends, with white guys trying to get with it. I also thought the animation spot with the special effects for Budweiser—with the alien disguised as a dog—performed well [directed by Rick Schulze of Industrial Light+Magic Commercial Productions, San Rafael and Los Angeles, for DDB Chicago]. I didn’t see the knockout punch line coming. Kudos to the agency guys. They took something ["Whassup"] from a film and brought it into their brand. And now they’ve taken it in different directions—from white guys to sushi to aliens from another planet. If you came to America from outer space, you’d have to think "Whassup" is an important part of earth’s culture.
I also thought EDS had the right idea. They had a lot of fun [with "Squirrels," directed by John O’Hagan of hungry man for Fallon, Minneapolis] and the idea was simply to watch out for the little guy. I got their point. Last year, when EDS ran "Cat Herders" on the Super Bowl, inquiries to the company went up seven-fold. They were smart to try to keep the same flair this year.
For me, the overall losers are the movie trailers. Why is it that people who make their livings on entertainment turn out the most boring commercials on the Super Bowl? They take cuts from their films and splice them together. These guys are experts in entertainment, but they’re blowing it big time.
But I guess the biggest losers have to be those you don’t remember as being bad or good. If they’re not talking about you after the Super Bowl is over, then you’ve totally missed the mark.
