COLUMN: Super Bowl super ads super dumb
Whether you were rooting for the Bears or corporate America on Sunday, you couldn’t have been satisfied.
The Bears’ loss isn’t a big deal, but when Super Bowl commercials suck, everyone suffers. Just think of all the kids who won’t be influenced to partake in underage drinking because of awesome beer advertising. How will the nation survive with a sober teen population?
I should have seen this coming. I’m no prophet, but I have been able to predict some pretty remarkable occurrences – Cheney shooting that guy in the face, who didn’t see that coming?
But I missed this one. Like the rest of America’s couch-dwelling, TV-consuming machine, I should have noticed the trend toward terrible advertising.
If you’ve watched any TV lately – and I’m sure you have – you’ve been inundated with advertising ranging from effeminate, hyper-sensitive cavemen selling car insurance, to Toby Keith and John Cougar Mellencamp vying for the title of most patriotic singing truck salesman, to the bane of my existence, an SUV that has such a bumpin’ sound system it clears a parking lot out by the sheer force of its subwoofers. Just writing that makes me feel nauseous.
These commercials are so egregious in their breach of our consumer integrity they demand a closer look.
The caveman has to be first. I’ll admit, at first, it was cute to have a caveman be offended by a slogan that implied cavemen aren’t smart.
But we need to remember that cavemen weren’t out discussing Faulkner or attending independent film festivals; they were out killing huge, vicious beasts – like the woolly mammoth and the saber tooth tiger – with clubs. That’s way hard-core.
Cavemen didn’t give us stuff like “The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants,” introspective poetry, the keyboard solo or the new vegan cookbook for college students. No. They gave us important gifts like fire, the wheel, an animalistic love for meat cooked over an open fire and, in my estimation, the beginnings of what we would eventually – after years of tempering in the fire of awesome manliness – call the mullet.
Basically, cavemen aren’t sensitive. They don’t go to therapy. If they wear clothes at all, it’s a gnarly animal skin, not a terrible sweater underneath a windbreaker.
Moving on.
Toby Keith and John Cougar are pretty self-explanatory. If you don’t drive a huge truck, you aren’t an American. Just know that if you don’t drive something big and American-made, your phone conversations are probably being listened to.
And the Dodge Nitro commercial with the bumpin’ sound system that literally bumps cars out of the way with magical sound-wave power is … I’m sorry I have to stop. I feel my brain decaying just thinking about it.
Some people may have thought the Super Bowl commercials were good. These people are entitled to their opinions, no matter how asinine they may be.
But, there was one bright spot – the Sierra Mist “Beard Comb-Over” commercial.
This wasn’t just a funny commercial; it was the start of a facial hair revolution. So guys throw away the razors and forget about hair plugs, because either you’re with the beard comb-over or you’re against it, and we take no prisoners.
I don’t want people to think I’m saying making commercials is easy, but … well … maybe I will say that. Yes, it is easy to make a commercial.
All you need to do is put a beautiful woman in the most advanced state of undress you can get away with and have her in close proximity to your product. To reel in the female demographic just substitute man for woman.
There are very few products that aren’t conducive to this strategy. I can only come up with hemorrhoid cream, Christmas sweaters for your pet, adult diapers and infant education videos, but I think I could make those work too. If you have any ideas, I’m currently accepting suggestions for other products sex won’t sell.