Another Super Bowl is in the books, and with it, another round of expensive Super Bowl commercials. Below, we sort through the winners and losers from this year’s crop.
Winner: Tide, specifically, and David Harbour, in general
These were pretty fun. It felt… right that someone would get all meta about Super Bowl ads in a Super Bowl ad. That’s not to say the degree of difficulty wasn’t pretty high. It was. This could have been real dumb. Instead, thanks to America’s Fun Dad David Harbour, there was just enough winking to remind us how silly this all is without bashing us over the head with a frying pan and all.
This is easily the most opinions I’ve had about Tide. Like, in my entire life, combined. So mission accomplished, I guess.
Winner: M&Ms
I don’t think I wanted to like this commercial, but I did, very much. There were, as far as I can tell, four reasons for this:
- I love Danny DeVito
- Danny DeVito is probably the most anthropomorphic-M&M-shaped person alive
- I always think of him as Frank from It’s Always Sunny now and doing so allows me to pretend this was all part of some debaucherous scheme
- It reminded me of the thing in Meet Joe Black where Brad Pitt gets walloped by a car out of nowhere after a long dramatic scene
Solid.
Loser: Dodge, by a lot, hoo boy
Brands were very woke this year, between multicultural baby lineups and tributes to first responders and such. I have no qualms with that on a macro level, even if a tiny part of me is a tiny bit grossed out by multibillion-dollar conglomerates attempting to monetize, like, tolerance. But whatever. Fine. None of the multicultural babies said “Dilly Dilly.” I can worth with that.
What I cannot work with, however, is this. Repackaging a Martin Luther King, Jr. speech to sell pickup trucks is gross, especially when you look into his feelings on consumerism and this exact kind of thing. Brands, please. I get what you’re trying to do here. I respect that you’re making an effort. But do not do… this. Take a day or two to think about why this was bad and then come in on Wednesday and start hiring people who can sit in the room where these decisions are made and say things like “Hmm. What if we… didn’t, though?”
Baby steps.
Winner: Doritos, Peter Dinklage, Busta Rhymes, fire
Look, I am a simple man, and not an overly cynical one. I’m sure someone out there didn’t enjoy seeing Peter Dinklage as a fire-manipulating demon-god who was rapping along to a Busta Rhymes song, but I’m also sure that person isn’t a lot of fun to talk to at a party.
Loser: Dilly Dilly
It is unbelievable to me how much time and money has gone into the goddamn Dilly Dilly campaign. Perhaps I’m biased because I hate these commercials so much and if someone says “Dilly Dilly” to me on the street I might melt into a puddle of bubbling silent rage-ooze right there in front of them. Perhaps. But this commercial had a CGI dragon. Look at it, swooping in right at the beginning. The Dilly Dilly commercials have CGI dragons. There’s a lot of stuff going on in the world right now that should make us question what we’re doing as a society. I’m not crazy enough to suggest that this should be at the top of that list, or even in the middle. But it has to be on there somewhere.
If these commercials are still running during the World Series, like with an ongoing story that continues expanding the universe, I will scream until my lungs fly out through my mouth. I’m fine.
Loser: Pringles
Wasting Bill Hader’s time and talent should be at least a misdemeanor.
Winner: Australia
So here’s what happened: This whole misdirection was revealed last week, so the Very Online people at your Super Bowl party probably ruined the twist for the civilians. Which is a shame. Everyone deserved the right to get livid about yet another reboot and start to pop off about “This is what’s wrong with movies these days” only look silly once the ad itself was revealed. Hopefully someone at your party did this out loud and everyone laughed at them.
(I totally would have been this person.)
Winner: Jeep
Somehow a Jeep commercial got me more amped up about the Jurassic franchise than the actual trailer for the next movie, which appears to be about a team of lunatic scientists trying to save the dinosaurs from an island-destroying volcano. My guys, your hearts are in the right place here, but just hear me out for one second: Maybe we should let nature handle this one? If these movies have taught us anything, it’s that there should not be an island full of dinosaurs. Let’s just file it under “lessons learned.”
Loser: This Giants commercial
This commercial was fine. Kudos to Eli Manning and Odell Beckham for playing along. I guess. I don’t know. A Super Bowl between the Eagles (the Giants’ hated divisional rival) and the Patriots (who lost to the Giants in the Super Bowl twice) probably wasn’t the ideal time for it. I imagine seething hatred of this commercial was the only thing the more passionate corners of the two fanbases had in common. Screw the Giants. Go Eagles. There, I said it.
Winner: Alexa
Man, let me tell you this: If I ever ask a machine for help and a menacing Anthony Hopkins responds to me, I am heaving that machine out the window, just to be safe. This sentence also serves as my review of the first season of Westworld.
Loser: American digestive systems
The subtext here, which is buried so shallow that you can see the outline of it on the surface, is that consuming all of the food and drinks advertised in the other commercials will make your bowel movement smell so aggressively offensive that you’ll need to purchase a product that masks the scent enough that friends and loved ones won’t worry about your physical health. I do not need that sort of hypothetical health crisis during the Super Bowl.
Bring back the damn Bud Bowl.
