Ah the Super Bowl, the one day out of the year where we are all actually marketers. Just kidding, you’re not a marketer. Actually, you might be considering our mailing list is predominantly B2B but I digress. The Super Bowl usually has something for everyone, it’s essentially a national holiday. In a lot of ways, the most important day in football is one of the most important day in marketing. The cost of running an ad during the game this year cost a whopping $14 million dollars per minute so the stakes are high for players and marketers alike.
At Kodeak, we thoroughly enjoy dissecting and discussing the ads that run during the big game. I’ll be totally honest with you early on in this post. I thought this year’s slate of commercials was pretty bad. Really bad, actually. Usually I have a handful of commercials I can remember verbatim, they’re usually very funny, or they’re outside of the box thinking like the Coinbase commercial last year 😉. But this year felt like a series of ads I’ve seen before. My family was subjected to my best Ongo impression every ten minutes.
And I know it’s easy for professional marketers to shit on other marketing but this year was just boring, it paled in comparison to years past. I’m not going to drag this out and I’m certainly not going through every spot. Here are my top three and bottom three commercials of the 2024 super bowl.
Before I unveil these coveted selections I will remind you. These are my favorite commercials, they haven’t been voted on in any way by anyone, just what I liked and didn’t like.
TOP 3
1. Sir Patrick Throws a Hail Arnold: Paramount+
In my opinion it was the funniest commercial by a long shot. It just has that “Super Bowl commercial” feel to it and theres a lot going on. Patrick Stewart is clearly the captain here so we got our Star Trek nod and he snaps “Shut your face Barrymore!”. I love that. For the football fans out there, Tua’s arm strength has been a talking point ever since his Alabama days so getting him to do this spot is super cool of him. Lt. Dangle is KILLING me in this commercial. This dude has an uncanny ability to be drop dead hilarious with less than 3 seconds to work with. Theres some Survivor stuff, Hey Arnold, Creed shows up to put a cherry on the pop culture car crash this commercial is. The more I think about it, maybe the commercial is a commentary on pop culture and how stupid it is. Bonus points.
2. Talkin’ Like Walken: BMW
The Walken voice is a bit of a guilty pleasure, I’ll admit. Any time someone breaks out the Walken voice I’m all ears, but what’s really interesting is how bad most people are at it despite thinking they’re really good at it, it’s fantastic. They managed to fit Usher in and he nails the Weapon of Choice move at the top of the stairs, nice. But the best part is the tagline they altered to suit the star “Ultimate Driving Machine, the rest are just imitations.” damn, that’s good. Goodby Silverstein & Partners are always good for winner. They’ve been making you laugh for damn near 40 years and I bet you had no idea.
3. Carl’s Jr.
I really liked this spot. It’s got some Top Gun vibes but there’s something to the simplicity of the straight man vs the wise guy schtick that just works. They hit on the idea of having food be the only thing on your mind when you’re hungry and then the pilot ejects while inverted right through the roof of a Carls Jr. and instantly snags a bite of a burger. Then the product position “Free Bacon Jr. Burger tomorrow”. I laughed, I remembered the company, and I remembered the offer.
Honorable Mention. Michael Cera: CeraVe
Ohhh HAHAHA. His last name is Cera and the lotion is CeraVe! My eyes rolled out of my skull, it’s a little “on the nose”, but Michael Cera made this sort of funny.
BOTTOM 3
1. Picklebabies: E*TRADE
Listen, commercials featuring babies with CGI mouth movement is a bad idea. It’s kitsch, its worse than kitsch.
“Dude you gotta work on your trash talk.”
“I’d rather work on saving for my retirement.”
Blah, yuck.
2. Judge Beauty: E.L.F.
This one hurts because I like the company. My wife and I are investors but just because something rhymes doesn’t mean you blow $20 million dollars on it. I have to assume someone pitched creative involving an elf and it was somehow worse than this. Just a brutal way to make a splash, more of falling in the pool as opposed to an elegant swan dive or even a Burgundy cannonball.
3. Foot Washing: He Gets Us
I won’t ever appreciate this shit.
This was the most viewed telecast in the history of television. So congrats to all the agencies out there that got to play in the game behind the game. The truth is, even bad commercials got a level of exposure you just can’t touch outside of Super Bowl Sunday. I have a deep respect for agencies like Goodby Silverstein & Partners who manage to tap into pop culture and make something as obtrusive as an ad, fun. I really don’t mind getting ads that make me laugh and I tend to remember almost everything about that ad, which is what we’re going for.
