There were some truly awful ads on during yesterday's insanely competitive Super Bowl. The economy is changing, America is changing, and the past two Super Bowls have been some of the best games in Super Bowl history. I remember watching some Super Bowls that were atrocious, lopsided affairs that were over by halftime. It didn't matter for me, though -- I was much younger and enjoyed the commercials more than anything. Advertisements have become more and more clever over the years, and even though I despise most commercials, some of them are unique, clever and fun to watch. Pepsi, on the other hand, produces commercials that are manipulative, boring and completely hackneyed. They befuddled me and the majority of those watching the game with me with their most recent effort, "Refresh Anthem." A further examination of the commercial, and the video itself, follows after the jump.
Yeah, Bob Dylan and Will.i.am teamed up to write that piece of shit. Why pair these two up? Why change your logo? Why subject viewers to such a trite, manipulative video like that? When I drink Pepsi (which is never), I hardly think of the correlation between Shrek and Gumby. I would probably think about why America's children are so obese, most likely from drinking Pepsi and all it's empty calories. It's no secret; I am not the biggest fan of Bob Dylan. Will.i.am, on the other hand, used to be a unique musician, leading the Black Eyed Peas in their pre-Fergie, pre-total sellout stage. Behind The Front remains one of the coolest, most unique albums to come out in a long time. Now the dude works with Estelle and writes jingles for Pepsi, when he's not appearing as a hologram on CNN. Pepsi could have used two artists I actually like and the commercial would have still sucked. And now they might sell the song on iTunes. Just great.
So we had Bob Dylan, Bruce Sprinsteen, and Billy Corgan all lumped into one Super Bowl Sunday. It's an interesting mix, and perhaps my little bitch-fest doesn't mean a damn thing since the Super Bowl was such an entertaining and compelling game. My favorite commercial, and what I think was the best commercial I saw yesterday, didn't even win the Doritos "Crash The Super Bowl" contest it was entered into. It didn't even run during the broadcast of the game -- it appeared during the pre-game festivities. It was produced by the fine people at Front Page Films and features a new (albeit hilarious and fake) flavor of Doritos. Please to enjoy: New Flavor Pitch.
You don't know me!
