Super Bowl Commercials 2012: Best And Worst Of This Year’s Ads

Skip Perham, the Director of Marketing of Comcast SportsNet New England and NECN, issued this statement on behalf of the network:

I wonder if we can still pick up our Patriots championship gear?

I suppose Chevy’s going to have to be the one to come out and say it: in accordance with Mayan prophecy, this will be the last Super Bowl ever held. Drag. I was sort of hoping for a Chiefs-Falcons Super Bowl in my lifetime. Oh well. In this commercial, Chevy convincingly demonstrates that if you do not own a Chevy Silverado, you will die.

Well, actually, another condition: it looks like you will probably also need to wear a jean jacket. There will also be frogs, because no truck commercial is complete without a misinterpretation of the Bible. Anyway, this stands out to me as one of the better Super Bowl ads of the year, because it works with a proven formula: a simple gag and top-notch production value.

We heard about the NFL’s player safety ad all week and late in the Super Bowl, it finally aired. The commercial focused on the evolution of equipment and rules, splicing together footage from each era of football in a seamless sequence. It began with a flying wedge and players without helmets, and ended with video of the Super Bowl 46 kickoff.

Here’s the full commercial, as it aired on Sunday.

Will Ferrell apparently made a Super Bowl commercial that most of the United States didn’t see. The commercial in question appears to have only aired in Nebraska, which I guess would make some kind or sense ... or not. And it’s just about the most Will Ferrell thing imaginable.

The commercial consists of Ferrell walking slowly through a wheat field with a dramatic instrumental playing. He’s walking triumphantly, perhaps leading one to believe something big is about to happen. But nope, just more slow motion walking.

John Stamos made an ad for Dannon yogurt. It has no words, meaning it has been created for multiple international markets, where the spot may be dubbed as needed to appeal to many different audiences. These are a few samples of the different dialogue you would see in other national markets.

GERMAN TRANSLATION

The NFL kept its “Evolution” commercial, which focused on player safety, under wraps until it was aired during the Super Bowl. We were only privy to a handful of details, but said details seemed to indicate that the league would convey a rather ... not-completely-honest message. My concerns were laid out in detail here, but generally speaking, I was concerned that the League would cast the false impression that player safety was always the No. 1 priority.

It seems clear to me that it has not been. The ad does, at least, acknowledge that there is much more left to be done in the department of player safety -- in particular, of course, the prevention and mitigation of concussion-related dangers. The ad is well-produced to boot, and even incorporates a shot from the Super Bowl’s opening kickoff that occurred two hours prior.

We knew that for the second consecutive Super Bowl, we were in for a Chrysler commercial that highlighted the city of Detroit. We knew that it would probably be one of the more sober, serious ads of the night. I didn’t expect to think much of this ad, but then they busted out Clint Eastwood and all my cynicism went out the window.

Clint Eastwood has no outstanding ties to the city of Detroit, but it does not matter. The man talks, and you listen. He says it’s halftime in Detroit, and he ... wait, did he see the halftime show? That was not a very Detroit halftime show.

H&M ain’t dumb. You don’t buy your own underwear, gentlemen. Other people buy it for you: your mother, your girlfriend, your boyfriend, your wife, or perhaps your manservant. All male underwear buyers therefore by definition love David Beckham, and thus he’s a logical pick for underwear ads. (Your manservant is British, and therefore loves Beckham for soccer reasons.)

Still, this is a man in his drawers on your screen, which for the ladies and man-loving dudes is great, and for straight dudes is a problem because a.) he’s attractive and thin, which by the numbers you probably aren’t, and b.) because all you insecure guys are like, “LOL, I don’t need to see this because I’m not gay, and this hot dude on screen is totally unnecessary, what with his lithe figure and impeccably cut figure.”

H&M ain’t dumb. You don’t buy your own underwear, gentlemen. Other people buy it for you: your mother, your girlfriend, your boyfriend, your wife, or perhaps your manservant. All male underwear buyers therefore by definition love David Beckham, and thus he’s a logical pick for underwear ads. (Your manservant is British, and therefore loves Beckham for soccer reasons.)

Still, this is a man in his drawers on your screen, which for the ladies and man-loving dudes is great, and for straight dudes is a problem because a.) he’s attractive and thin, which by the numbers you probably aren’t, and b.) because all you insecure guys are like, “LOL, I don’t need to see this because I’m not gay, and this hot dude on screen is totally unnecessary, what with his lithe figure and impeccably cut figure.”

You can’t have Super Bowl commercials without including a few trailers for the biggest, loudest, explosionest movies of the upcoming year. Pretty sure The Avengers qualifies in all three of those categories.

Also pretty sure Marvel and Paramount have enough money to buy all the Super Bowl commercial airtime, so it’s a bit of a letdown to see they’re only going with a ten second blink-and-you’ll-miss-them preview of their superhero tentpole film.

Coca-Cola has purchased a full 60-second block for its Super Bowl commercial, which, as in previous years, features polar bears attempting to drink Coke and being very bad at it. Here’s video of the spot:

Need more? Check out our full list of Super Bowl 2012 ads and all of our Super Bowl XLVI coverage.

Early in the 2012 Super Bowl’s second quarter, we have a front-runner for most interesting commercial of the game. “Interesting” is not necessarily a good thing ... but maybe it is ... I don’t know, I feel as though I need some time to process this. They are making a Battleship movie. Like, the board game. Battleship: the board game: the movie. Here’s the full version of the trailer:

As far as I was able to tell, this movie involved a naval fleet that battles an alien race. Okay, and this is how they work in the board game nuance:

Elton John spends upwards of $38 million a month on flowers.* I understand that. He needs money, and Pepsi’s like, “Hey, Elton. Do you like money? We understand you do. Here’s some money.” He’s no victim here, and the economies of Guatemala and Honduras are safe with the knowledge that their single biggest customer is flush for at least another month or two.

It’s a lazy but successful ad, though. That is Elton John’s living room, and that is what he does when not buying flowers or singing duets with Leon Russell. So they didn’t even need a set, or costumes, for that matter. That is what Elton John wears on Wednesdays, and on select Thursdays if he’s feeling fancy. You watch the whole thing, and that’s more than you can say about whatever that GE commercial where people make stuff and electricity and zzzzz---

GoDaddy commercials have been a Super Bowl mainstay for years. They’re running a pair of ads in 2012, the first of which features Danica Patrick and Jillian Michaels. This formula should strike you as familiar: a meta-commercial in which Danica Patrick agrees to participate in a risque and mildly creepy commercial and remarks, “this is so crazy, I don’t know whether this is going to work, you guys!!!!” throughout. Take a look:

And as per usual, GoDaddy is asking people to either a) go look up a website during the Super Bowl, or b) make a mental note to watch it after they leave their Super Bowl party, realize that what was a day of festivities has bloomed into yet another desolate Sunday night in the middle of Winter, and despair for any measure of excitement, no matter how online or artistically banal. PARTY ON, DUDES!!!

I suppose Chevy’s going to have to be the one to come out and say it: in accordance with Mayan prophecy, this will be the last Super Bowl ever held. Drag. I was sort of hoping for a Chiefs-Falcons Super Bowl in my lifetime. Oh well. In this commercial, Chevy convincingly demonstrates that if you do not own a Chevy Silverado, you will die.

Well, actually, another condition: it looks like you will probably also need to wear a jean jacket. There will also be frogs, because no truck commercial is complete without a misinterpretation of the Bible. Anyway, this stands out to me as one of the better Super Bowl ads of the year, because it works with a proven formula: a simple gag and top-notch production value.

Hyundai has purchased several chunks of air time during the 2012 Super Bowl. Their first commercial of the game is an ambitious, yet simple, effort that leans on one of the very most familiar songs throughout popular culture: the “Rocky” theme. And at the party this author is currently attending, people are still humming the theme 10 minutes after the fact.

And now you’re humming it. Right now. All in all, a respectable advertising effort. In the fake-wacky, hyper-accessible world of Super Bowl commercials, one in which I’ve been trapped for the last few days, you eventually come to appreciate a well-executed, simple idea. STOP HUMMING! STOP IT RIGHT NOW!

Sasha Baron Cohen struck gold with Borat and watched his mockumentary empire crumble with the failure of Bruno. He’s hoping third time is the charm as he unveils The Dictator during the Super Bowl this year.

If you’re going to premiere a comedy during the Super Bowl, this is the blueprint. Open with a direct reference to the Super Bowl itself (“I know the final score.”), lead with footage of the most attractive women in the film (Megan Fox), insert a topical reality TV joke that everyone’s mom will get (“What do I look like, a Khardashian?”) and then find the closest scene you’ve got in the movie to actual sports because for some reason advertisers seem to think we need to see sports in the movie while watching a sporting event (track meet).

Budweiser is responsible for the greatest commercial of the 2012 Super Bowl, and at the moment I can’t even determine for sure whether it will air in the United States. It will, at the very least, air during the Canadian broadcast.

This is the full version of the ad, in which two rec-league hockey teams in Ontario are surprised by a flash mob of fans who flood into the arena. Take a look:

Alternative rock band OK Go has pretty much single-handedly revived the medium of the music video over the past several years. From low-budget choreographed dance, to treadmill theatrics, to stunning Rube Goldberg machines, to trained dogs, to the Muppets, they have continually set the standard for what you can accomplish in a music video.

Now the band has created yet another new video, which is also in part a commercial. The ad version will be part of the festivities on Super Bowl XLVI.

Out of all the celebrities to star in Super Bowl commercials, guess which one has appeared the most often?

If you guessed Go Daddy Girl Danica Patrick – who also happens to be a NASCAR driver – then you’re correct.

Toyota has purchased a big 60-second spot in this year’s Super Bowl. This commercial touts the reinvented Camry, as well as everything else they’ve reinvented, such as the person-couch, pizza curtains, and time-traveling poopless baby. Here’s video:

“Prototype shown with optional equipment,” the disclaimer reads at the start of the ad. We only see the exterior, and I can’t really spot any features on the car that I would describe as “optional.” Wheels are necessary for driving! I’ve driven several cars in my life, and if any of them didn’t have wheels, do you know what I would have been like? I would have been like, “aw, HELL no.”

The ad’s a winner because it covers every base. It’s got the nostalgia factor, reenacting one of the most famous football commercials of all time. Sedaris pulls in “the kids” or whatever demographic is said to be fans of Sedaris. And there’s a body function joke, the core of any good Super Bowl commercial. If they could have somehow worked in a fart or a guy getting kicked in the groin, it might have been an all-time great.

When Greene says this is the last commercial he’s going to do, let’s hope so. There’s only so many times we can go back to this well and I’m pretty sure we’re there.

During this year’s Super Bowl, the NFL will be allotted 150 seconds of commercial time to advertise its own products. The league is spending 60 of those seconds on a commercial that demonstrates how player safety has evolved over the years. From the New York Times:

The as-yet-unreleased ad, which will present the NFL’s evolution through a long kickoff return, sounds like it’s going to be visually impressive. It honestly (I think) expresses the League’s commitment to the safety of its players. The problem: from what we know of the ad, it sounds an awful lot like the NFL will be patting itself on the back.

Historically, Pepsi has been a familiar presence in Super Bowl commercials. This year they’ve chosen to call back to a popular ad from 16 years ago. Here’s video:

Indeed, this ad brings me back to a simpler time, when Regis Philbin was at the apex of his career and before I realized, “oh wait, soda is terrible for me and I should never drink it.” But as a culture, it brings us all back to this 1996 Pepsi commercial:

Super Bowl commercials, more often than not, are designed to be so over-the-top that they get noticed, the result being that a glut of wild and wacky ads sort of cake together at the top to make a new top that can’t really be vaulted. Does that make any sense? If Super Bowl ads can even stand out anymore, they can’t do it through absurdity anymore. That’s why I appreciate the relatively understated approach taken by Hyundai:

His heart works because of a car! Purchase said car! Through the course of finding this video, I stumbled upon a Facebook comment about it. I’m not going to link to it or drop a name, because that would be mean, but: