By Chris Copacino
This year’s Super Bowl had familiarities and uniqueness—as the event was staged against the backdrop of the ongoing pandemic. And given some of the uniqueness of the Big Game’s festivities, played in front of a not-full stadium, many of the same things of Super Bowls past persisted, like Tom Brady, a highly-produced halftime show that half of America hated and, of course, Super Bowl advertising.
Given the heaviness and doldrums of the past year, we’re going to focus on the positives in this year’s Super Bowl advertising. Were there flops or misfires? Of course. But let’s celebrate the good things we saw in the advertising industry’s main event.
For my money—and in my humble opinion—here were the best of the good this year: Super Bowl Advertising.
• General Motors: “No Way Norway”: I loved every part of this spot. The ridiculous narrative, the vehicle for Will Ferrell to be peak Will Ferrell and the hijinks along the way. It feels like what a Super Bowl spot should be creatively, and the message from GM is bold and cool as well. The longer form of the spot is even more entertaining. Good stuff and several truly LOL moments.
• Bud Light: “Lemons”: 2020 had a ton of things not to be celebrated. But for all the bad, Bud Light did a nice job of bringing light to the year and used it for a new-product launch. Strong production values and continuing vignettes of lemony disaster made this a fun ride.
• Amazon: “Alexa’s Body”: This spot was either panned or loved. I thought it was weirdly fun and had some great comedic moments. I appreciated the interesting “door in” for the brand message and Amazon spending big money on a Super Bowl spot more focused on female viewers. Also, seeing Michael B. Jordan shirtless in many scenes has me seriously considering the state of my core exercises. Or lack thereof.
• Cheetos: “It Wasn’t Me”: Fun ad with all the ingredients for Super Bowl gold. Celebrities, nostalgia, humor, surprise and playing on the ongoing Cheeto trope of pinpointing who is stealing the snack. I enjoyed every minute of it. Plus, you got to hear Shaggy without it feeling like a guilty pleasure. We all won.
• M&Ms: “Come Together”: Really smart writing and comedic performances across vignettes. Add Daniel Levy with a cameo at the end, capitalizing on his big year, and you have a fun, laugh-along Super Bowl spot for one of America’s favorite candy brands. The circle-back joke on “Karen” is gold.
With the Best mentioned above, here’s a quick summary of other takeaways:
• Levity: Uplifting humor, diversion and distraction seemed to be themes carrying through this year’s work. It makes sense, after the year that was, people just wanted a break. With that said, I was a little surprised we didn’t see more poignant or emotionally arresting spots.
• Where were the masks? I was a little disappointed that there wasn’t more responsibility in depicting commercial characters wearing masks. Symbolism matters, and I thought there was a chance to reinforce this behavior on a broad scale.
• Production wildness: Hearing some of the stories about what went into producing and finalizing Super Bowl spots this year made some of these ads just appearing in the game mere feats in and of themselves. With permitting, crew controls and testing being huge considerations for live-action shoots, many of the spots were delivered to CBS just under the wire, with the winner in just-in-time management going to Rocket Mortgage’s Tracey Morgan “Certain is Better” spots, which were delivered to CBS at 3am the morning off the game. Wild—and hopefully that agency team got the rest of February off.
I hope I’m back next year talking about a Super Bowl where Tom Brady doesn’t win. But until then, we’ll always have the ads. Thanks for reading.
Chris Copacino is a senior account and new-business director at Copacino Fujikado. Over his 17+ year advertising career, he has successfully managed several major agency account, including the Seattle Mariners, Ste. Michelle Wine Estates, Symetra Financial, Gesa Credit Union and Overlake Medical Center, among others. You can reach him at ccopacino@copacino.com.