Here is my annual critical ranking of the Super Bowl commercials. Included are the new, national ads that were shown during the game itself.
The trends? Nothing controversial, as you would expect, but also — and perhaps for associated reasons — very little creativity. It was a bad year for ads; the ones at the top of this list aren’t much better than average. More spots than usual depended entirely on the appeal of a relatable celebrity (who was almost certainly male). Concepts beat ideas — there was a lot of fussy, overly complicated silliness and not much in the way of simple, effective storytelling or mood setting.
(The many regional ads, movie and TV trailers and house ads for Fox broadcasts are not included. And whatever that thing with Bill Murray was, it didn’t count.)
Artificial intelligence may bring about the end of human life as we know it, but this pixelated, pulsating animation was the most purely pleasurable spot of the night.
No. 2