Classic Ed: Super Bowl XXXVIII Ads -- The Cool, the Crude and the Classy

As the showcase of commercials known as Super Bowl XXXVIII was about to begin, it occurred to me that growing advertiser concerns about the ad-zapping capabilities of TiVo and other personal video recorders, not to mention television remote controls, were about to be mercifully alleviated, if only for a few hours.  Millions of Americans whom advertisers believe typically look for ways to avoid commercials at any cost were ready, willing and eager to watch dozens of ads once the game began.  This was due in part to advance publicity about some of the new commercials that would debut during the show -- including one for Pizza Hut starring Jessica Simpson and one for MasterCard featuring Homer Simpson (no relation).  It was also the result of cultural conditioning; viewers for years have been systematically conditioned to embrace commercials during the Super Bowl as part of the event itself.

In other words, for a few hours one day a year, commercials are welcome, accepted and considered to be part of the fun of one of television's top entertainments.  This led me to wonder, is there no way to generate similar interest in commercials at any time throughout the rest of the year?  Might there be special premiere nights for certain commercials, perhaps during sweeps periods and connected to specific programs?  Could interactive contests be utilized to generate interest and drive viewers?

Of course, the quality and impact of the commercials would have to live up to the extra hype, or such endeavors would be largely pointless.  That's certainly true of the fresh advertisements that debut every year during the Super Bowl, the most costly commercial real estate on television.

Collectively, yesterday's new commercials were somewhat disappointing.  With the possible exception of one Pepsi spot, there wasn't a single ad unveiled during the game that will likely be remembered as anything special, if remembered at all in the weeks, months or years ahead.  It doesn't help that the media response to Janet Jackson's bare breast has eclipsed the usual post-Super Bowl buzz traditionally enjoyed by the new commercials.

All I will say on that subject is, does anyone really believe that the MTV producers responsible for that lame halftime show didn't know that Jackson was going to flash her breast?  Does anyone buy Justin Timberlake's pitiful excuse?  "Wardrobe malfunction," my ass.

Unfortunately, there wasn't one commercial that packed the pop-culture punch of last year's unforgettable spot for Pepsi Twist with Ozzy Osbourne, Donny and Marie Osmond and Florence Henderson.  Consider the car ads.  There wasn't an eye-catcher in the bunch, including all those for the new Chevrolets, the possible exception being the spot that featured several children with bars of soap wedged in their mouths because they had been moved to curse when admiring Chevrolet's new products.

That said, the standouts included two tuneful, eye-catching, crisply edited commercials for Monster, which seems to have dropped the dot.com from its name, perhaps to distance itself from the lingering stench of the Internet bust three years ago.  The first and best of the two crosscut between an employer and an eager would-be employee preparing for their day and finally meeting at the office.  Both ads were so upbeat that they accomplished the impossible: They made job interviews seem like happy business.  Four years ago the Super Bowl was packed with ads from dot.coms.  Last night only two Internet companies were represented: Monster and Expedia.

Another standout came at the very end, moments after the New England Patriots claimed victory.  It was a lengthy ad for Subway sandwiches that explained through a series of humorous scenarios that the company, which markets its fast food as a healthy alternative to its competitors, advocates occasionally eating bad things, such as donuts, rather than doing bad things, like snipping kite strings and trying to bring back "van art."

Also memorable, at least for fans of the Discovery Channel series American Chopper, were two spots for AOL Top Speed technology featuring Paul Tuttle Sr. and his sons, earnest Paul Jr. and goofy Mikey.  In both ads, the boys applied "top speed technology" to personal vehicles with comic results.  On the downside, these ads likely did not impact viewers who were not already familiar with the show.  Budweiser came through with its typical classy annual spot featuring the Clydesdales.  This year's commercial detailed the charming efforts of a donkey desperate to be accepted alongside the legendary Budweiser mascots.

At the other extreme, another Budweiser spot likely prompted arguments in living rooms across the land.  It showed a referee taking major verbal abuse from a coach as a voiceover mused, "He [the coach] is beating him [the ref] like a rented mule.  Where did he train to take such abuse?"  Cut to the ref at home catching a ration of (expletive deleted) from his screaming nag of a wife.

Numerous spots for Bud Light memorably reinforced its identity as the beer for boneheads.  In one, a talking monkey hit on its owner's hot date.  In another, a romantic candlelit ride in a horse drawn carriage was compromised when the horse released an explosion of intestinal gas, causing the candle flame to become a fireball and blacken a woman's face, hair and clothes.  Her date was safely out of range, having reached down to extract two bottles of Bud Light from a cooler.  "Do you smell barbecue?" he asked after the flatulent flare-up.

Among the other Bud Light spots was one in which two trained dogs displayed their talents: One dog brought Bud Light to his owner, the other bit the crotch of the man with the Bud Light, causing him to release the prized bottle.  (Why do we laugh when men suffer injuries to their genitalia?  Would we laugh at women suffering similar misfortune?)  In another Bud Light ad, a man (played by Cedric the Entertainer) inadvertently set himself up for a bikini wax and later commented on the breeze between his legs.

Interestingly, men's genitals and their immediate environs were the focus of numerous new ads targeted to the largely male Super Bowl audience. Besides the crotch biting and bikini waxing spots for Bud Light, there was one for Sierra Mist in which a kilt-wearing bagpipe player disappeared from a parade to stand over a subway grate, squealing in delight as steam blew up at his manhood.  (I've got to say, I won't be buying a can of Sierra Mist anytime soon.)  In the aforementioned ad for Subway, a fed-up waitress continually poured hot coffee into a man's lap.  There were also ads for erectile dysfunction medications Levitra and Cialis.  In the former, football legend Mike Ditka spoke of the superiority of football over baseball.  No matter the weather, "In football we stay in the game," Ditka declared, a not-so-sly reference to Levitra's motto, "Stay in the Game."  The Cialis spot took a more direct approach, showing adult couples acting frisky as a voiceover asked, "When the moment is right, will you be ready?"  Question: Was there a single beer-and-chip bloated American male watching the Super Bowl last night who was ready to be reminded of the possibility of this particular medical problem?

The MasterCard ad with Homer Simpson winningly played like an actual scene from an episode of Fox' The Simpsons.  As the familiar voiceover from MasterCard ads stated, "Getting your errands done quicker and spending more time with your family -- Priceless," an annoyed Homer tried to ignore it in favor of a brew at Moe's.  Also memorable, if not classic, was the much-hyped H&R Block spot featuring country singer Willie Nelson, now equally famous for his legendary problems with the IRS, and the Willie Nelson Advice Doll, which gave questionable advice to any tax-related questions.  There was another funny but forgettable commercial for Lay's Potato Chips in which an elderly man and woman competed to reach a bag of chips.  He tripped her and got to the bag first, but she was holding his dentures.  I'm not convinced that this spot will sell a single bag of chips, but it was funny and well made.

One of the most interesting ads of the night was the spot for Linux in which a fair-haired child who appeared to be a clone watched archival footage of an exuberant young Muhammed Ali as the present day Ali advised him to "shake things up" and "shake up the world."

The coolest commercial of the night came from Pepsi near the end of the game.  In it, a child identified as James Marshall Hendrix at age 11 in 1953 Seattle was faced with a choice: Buy a soda from a Coke machine located in front of an accordion store or one from a Pepsi machine near a pawn shop with an electric guitar in the front window.  The tag line: "Whew … that was close."  This is the commercial from last night's cavalcade that has the best chance of becoming a classic.

Pepsi also debuted a cute commercial in which two brown bears masqueraded as humans to buy Pepsi, but it was hard to tell if the bears have the stuff of memorable mascots or if they will simply fade into fast obscurity.  If Pepsi unveiled the finest commercial of the night it also debuted one of the most irritating.  The spot called attention to a new promotion in which Pepsi and iTunes are legally giving away 100 million songs through free online downloads.  The star of the ad was a teenager who smugly identified herself as "one of the kids who was prosecuted for downloading music free off the Internet."  She continued, "I'm here to announce in front of everyone we're still going to download music free off the Internet.  And there's not a thing anyone can do about it."  Then she giggled as I contemplated changing my position on the downloading of free music, a practice I have always defended.

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