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Super Bowl XLV: Game Day For Movie Ads
(Live-blogging; refresh for updates): 
Christina Aguilera can’t remember the words to America’s National Anthem, the Super Bowl XLV was a great game that ended with controversy, and the Green Bay Packers won over the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25. (As for that awful halftime show, I know where all the Tron: Legacy jumpsuits went to be recycled.) But now we can start judging this year’s crop of $3 million-for-30 seconds Super Bowl ads.
The car and tire ads are back with a vengeance, and Kia’s Optima commercial looked like an Indiana Jones movie on steroids with all those cool backdrops and special effects. The Doritos ads are great, especially the gross one where a guy sucks Doritos crumbs off his co-workers’ fingers and pants. But the Pepsi Max commercial sucked. Really, there are people who think hit-him-in-the-nuts gags still generate yucks?
The Coca-Cola ad was ridiculously over-the-top with dragons losing their firepower. I was surprised by the fabulous Volkswagon Passat ad featuring a pint-sized Darth Vader (see the longer version here) as well as by that Teleflora commercial starring Faith Hill and “your rack”. But that Ericsson Android phone ad with the human thumbs was, in a word, creepy.
Snickers received a lot of ink last year with its Betty White commercial during the Super Bowl. This year its parent company Mars tried to get hit by lightning twice and … missed. The new ad campaign featured Richard Lewis and Roseanne Barr and I have to ask, Why? I’m told the candy company was at odds over which commercial to run as Snickers also produced a commercial featuring Joe Pesci and Don Rickles but only had one 30-second spot purchased. After much back
and forth, the Lewis-Barr spot won out. Well, it sucked.
On the other hand, no one couldn’t love dogs cooking and serving Bud Light. I’m clearly a sucker for animal ads. That Bridgestone commercial featuring the driver and the beaver was sorta great. And who in Hollywood hasn’t sat through a pitch meeting just like that Chevy Camaro ad spinning a story around the red-headed schoolteacher.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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Faith Hill spot was the best so far. Pepsi Max, the worst.
The second Doritos commercial was funny . The first Pepsi commercial was funny , when she said “I’am sorry”
Mini Darth Vadar is my favorite so far.
I have been obsessed with that ad since they posted it on youtube a couple of days ago. I LOVE it!!!
You MUST see the full version, the superbowl version is truncated and not as funny. The kid is freaking priceless. He has perfect timing!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R55e-uHQna0&feature=aso
@the black chick – Totally. The :30 version lost all the charm of the original. Needs the full minute for the payoff at the end to have any impact.
My favorites so far: Kia Optima, the Motorola Xoom (1984ish ad), and the Darth Vader Passat spot.
I actually hated the Doritos finger thing.
Yes, the Doritos finger licking and pant smelling was disgusting! Made a lot of people here want to puke!
I would like to call the Doritos commercial creepy, but that would be an understatement.
A follow up commercial should involve the HR Department and the authorities.
The Doritos commercial was totally nasty. Ditto calling HR and the authorities. Not sure how the commercial would want to make me eat Doritos. As a matter of fact, I’ll remember that disgusting commercial a very long time. Who thought of that?
The Xoom ad was great… AND I think that was a not so subtle swipe at Apple for their excellent 1984 Macintosh Ad. Clever.
The Doritos finger thing GROSSED me out to no end. I will NEVER eat a Dorito after that.
Star Wars volkswagon was great
I love the spots more than the game!
“Fast Five” looks awesome, but it’s mostly old footage, I am SHOCKED to say that I think “Transformers: Dark Side of the Moon” looks really great as I detested every second of “Transformers 2,” “Super 8″ looks good, but might be a kiddie movie, “Kung Fu Panda 2″ is going to rock (sorry, “wok”), but we knew that as the first one is such a hoot.
Biggest loser so far? “Cowboys and Aliens.” Looks dumber with every new frame of footage they release. Second place loser? “Thor.” Just looks dull and uninteresting.
And oh, wow – they just showed the “Captain America” spot. Hadn’t really cared that much but that trailer was kind of great. Interest piqued!
“Fast Five” should go direct to video. So not creative
I watch the Puppy Bowl when they go to commercial. Never lets me down.
Mini Darth was great, though I wish they had shown the extended version that went viral
Android commercial was a bit disturbing
But the Sony Ericsson PLAY is going to be AWESOME!! I can’t wait. A phone supported by PSN with downloadable games a la a PSP and a phone in one!
The VW Star Wars was cut to 30 seconds. The 60 second spot is perfection. Easily findable on youtube.
Captain America did look good. Has that been in development since WWII?
Why can’t they get the sound mix right for half time shows? What’s up with that?
Did you really want to hear that? It hurt to watch!
I thought it was a really good half time show. Last year’s was good too. Fergie looked Fergalicious too.
“Captain America” is going to be the greatest fake WWII movie since “Inglorious Basterds!”
The Coca-Cola ad with the two border guards in the middle of nowhere was good.
Pepsi Max was good. The others were unimaginative and the others and over animated
The best was the one where the guy said I LOVE DORITOS and proceeded to lick the stuff off the guys fingers and pants.
The car ad in the old folks home was funny
I loved it too. It’s a cruise for plus sized individuals!
Ok the NFL fans commerical was cool.
The Chrysler ad with Eminem was the best in my opinion. Buy from the motor city!
100% agree. Marshall Mathers is back
I didn’t care for that one. I think the reason why Detroit doesn’t know about luxury is because they’re too busy spending my tax dollars.
For the record, that commercial was my favorite too.
And Zach, get over it. Every city is spending your tax dollars.
I don’t think you understand what he was saying. He was referring to the auto industry bailout. Detroit is synonymous with that industry, unlike other cities.
Nope, I understood. Yes, Detroit got a bailout. But every state is getting some sort of financial help from the government these days. The economy affected everyone and every industry.
Either Chrysler has decided that only urban city youth or gangbanger buy their 300 series cars, or none of those executives in Detroit has a fu&*ing clue who Eminem is. Here’s a tidbit of one of his songs, “Stay Wide Awake”
Fe Fi Fo Fum
I think I smell the scent of a placenta
I enter central park, it’s dark, it’s winter in December
I see my target with my car, and park and approach her tender
Young girl by the name of Brenda and I pretend to befriend her
Sit down beside her like a spider, hi there girl you mighta
Heard of me before, see whore you’re the kinda girl that I’da
Assault and rape and figure why not try to make your pussy wider
Fuck you with an umbrella then open it up while that shits inside ya
Yep, that’s just the kind of spokesperson Chrysler needs. No wonder Detroit’s in the shitter.
Umm. Hate to tell you this but it was Urban PROFESSIONALS who put Chrysler back on the map the first time the company failed with the 300 series. That car was a HUGE hit thanks to them (or us. I liked it but didn’t buy it. My pharmaceutical sales rep sister did though).
So now, the second time the company needs help, why wouldn’t they go back to the market that saved them before? This time, with the 200. That’s just smart business sense.
I personally HATE M&M. His music makes me want to kill myself. But he’s the biggest rap star in the world making a personal impassioned statement about the city he loves. I see nothing wrong with it. I personally think it’s admirable and the heart strings it pulls in me to root for the underdog will make me give Chrysler another look.
The 200 is just a rebadged Sebring, a mainstay of rental car fleets. I rented a Sebring with only 4K miles and the fake brushed aluminum trim on the door handle was already wearing off! Getting styling cues from Detroit, the city abandoning schools, trying to consolidate residents in inner city neighborhoods so they can plow under outlying neighborhoods and trun them back into farmland to save the city. Downtown Detroit should be kept as a monument to Union Greed and laziness.
The halftime show: I haven’t seen choreography that bad since the Oswald prison transfer.
Dennis Miller just called and would like his joke back.
That’s where I heard that joke!
Lamest set of Super Bowl commercials I’ve ever seen!!!!
Ditto
DETROIT.
The worst had to be groupon, where they began with all the problems facing Tibet then segue into half off coupons for Tibetan food. Tacky to say the least.
Hahaha. I was wondering the exact same thing. The civilization and the culture is dying but everything is ok as long as I can buy Tibetan curried fish from Groupon? WTF?
Yeah, that was weird and just wrong. And not in that good way.
Agreed. That ad was jaw-droppingly inappropriate. It felt like the bastard brother of the tacky Kenneth Cole tweet that referenced the bloody protests in Egypt.
I loved the Tibet commerical!! Lets be honest, if it was a serious “free Tibet” ad, the message would be lost on deaf ears. Groupon’s ad was ironic and slyly sarcastic. It was like say, “hey America you don’t care about Tibet, well neither do we, just sit back and stuff your face with cheap Tibetian food.”
Of course Groupon does care since they donate money to the cause. They just should have put their Tibet website at the end to let everyone know they were just being snarky. No one can get irony these day.
Chinese special, Free Tibet with every Tibet purchased of equal or lesser vaule. See that’s Irony
I hate commercials