The bowl-ed and the beautiful: Power ranking of Super Bowl LIV ads
In case you weren’t aware, last Sunday was the Super Bowl! Now there may have been a football game going on, but the real event, as always, is the advertisements. Companies pay huge amounts of money to get their advertisement airtime during the Super Bowl, so oftentimes they’ll go all-out with their ad. That means Super Bowl commercials are usually the highest budget and most creative ads you’ll see, and this year was no different! There were plenty of entertaining ads this year, but here are the Clog’s top five picks.
- “#PostyBar — Inside Post’s Brain”
Budweiser always has multiple ads during the Super Bowl. Sometimes they’re fairly tame and other times they can be quite out there. This ad definitely falls into the latter category. In the ad, the audience gets a view inside Post Malone’s head and body as he orders, and has, a drink. From the brain, to the tastebuds, to the spleen, each part is personified like his body is a business. It’s a creative and funny way to sell a drink!
- “Sonic the Hedgehog”
This year’s Super Bowl had no shortage of movie trailers. Most, though, don’t do anything fun or creative with it. Instead, all they do is show some clips of the movie and a release date. The “Sonic the Hedgehog” trailer shows that you can have your movie clips while also doing something creative. The trailer starts in a way that makes it seem like an ad for a sports drink or something similar, only to later transition into a decent short trailer. For that bait and switch, it has earned its spot on this list.
- “Groundhog Day”
Last Sunday also happened to be Groundhog Day. This Jeep ad decided to not let that opportunity go to waste. It uses the actors and setting from “Groundhog Day” (including Bill Murray) to say something about the car. That makes it an enjoyable ad to watch! Plus, the antics of Bill Murray and the stolen groundhog make it enjoyable even for those who have never seen the movie.
- “Rick and Morty X Pringles”
It’s fun to see companies get meta with their advertisements. This Pringles ad does just that by framing the ad as a nightmare scenario that the characters of “Rick and Morty” have been trapped in. It points to how artificial these ads can be while also calling back to one of their earlier marketing campaigns. All this has easily given it a place on this list.
- “As Good As The Original”
The best Super Bowl commercials toe the fine line between surreal creativity and not being utterly horrifying. This parody of “The Shining” does just that! It reimagines iconic scenes from the movie in creative ways that sell the drink. The added bonus is, if you find any of it horrifying (like Bryan Cranston as the twin girls) then it fits with the horror movie that the scenes are parodying.
When it comes to Super Bowl ads, who cares about the product? The point is to see what weird entertaining stuff companies come up with in an attempt to sell their product. Hopefully, your favorite commercial from this year’s game made the list. If you didn’t happen to catch the game, this should be a good summary of what really mattered.
Contact Zachariah Nash at znash@dailycal.org .