With advertising inventory reportedly still available a recently as a week ago, the 2009 Super Bowl ads threatened to be a mediocre lot at best. Rumors of Cash4Gold buying a spot prompted thoughts of a text-over-stock-photo 500 dollar production running in a million dollar time slot.

Advertisements were indeed bland. It’s kind of shameful when the network bumpers are better than the actual commercials. “If your Conan last longer than 3 hours..call a doctor.” -Tina Fey.

Continuing our tradition of pointing out puzzling Super Bowl commercial themes, we present the following oddities (video provided by Hulu, so not available outside the U.S., my apologies):

Smashing through glass or other structures

Used by:
Bud Light
Bud Light again
Doritos
Pedigree campaign

Wealthy African Americans and Bling / Gold

Used by:
Overstock
Cash4Gold
Career Builder

The smashing through glass and buildings meme just seems coincidental, like the slapstick fad last year, or the talking animal Super Bowl fad of the year before.

The bling meme sticks out like a sore thumb when you watch the ads back to back. The Overstock ad isn’t really offensive. It’s curious though that the other commercials makers would still push the line and endanger being accused of using offensive stereotypes.

This isn’t overreacting if you will recall the tragic story of Just for Feet’s Super Bowl ad that allegedly killed their business. These businesses are potentially one slow news cycle away from some bad press.

Tomorrow we’ll post our most hated ad of the Super Bowl this year.

Parrrr-taaay!!

Some marketing minds at the Dutch travel agency X-travel decided to try their hands at viral marketing with this gamble of a video.

In the clip, a plane comes dangerously close to crashing into hotels on the beach, then makes a water landing on the shore. The emergency slide opens and young kids ready to party slide down into the surf.

The idea sounds much more horrifying than the execution, and being that it is marketed outside of the U.S. they may not view this kind of imagery with the same negative emotions that other audiences might.

Hi I’m Bobby No-Hand

I found this collection of violent and funny Canadian PSAs via in4mador. Each ad features someone getting into a horrible accident, and then blaming it on the ladder. Even in the accidents that don’t involve a ladder!

Of the three, the one with the woman getting her face cooked by the deep fat fryer is probably the most disturbing, but maybe you have a fear of being bisected, and would find the woman falling off a ladder onto glass much more horrifying. The Deep Fat Face Cook can be found here, the Man Falling to his Horrible Death can be found here, and The Mystery of the Bisected Woman can be found here.
(Oh there is more…)

Shameful, shameful money

The ‘Life Takes Visa’ campaign has a fair number of detractors, notably the Consumerist who found this article on Credit Slips, which in turn criticizes the ‘Morning in Manhattan’ ad found on this page.

The ad shows a perfect clockwork of commerce, with everyone paying with Visa, until someone tries to pay with actual cash. Everything slows down as the man is sneered at, then given his change. Though the only actual slow down in the paying processes seems to be the amount to time it take the cashier to sneer. Don’t worry, before long automated payment systems will eliminate the need for your job at all, cashier lady.

Originally, I liked this campaign when the ads were comparing using credit / debit card as opposed to using a personal check, by far the slowest way possible to pay for anything. But using cash still tends to be faster than using a check or credit card, especially if you have to sign a slip or punch in your pin number. Or maybe the phone line has no carrier, or maybe your magnetic strip is dying and the cashier has to punch in the numbers. Then sometimes the bank service network is temporarily down. You know what, I have two dollars in my wallet how about I give you those instead?

Remember ‘Photoshop’ is not a verb

This video is part of Dove’s same campaign that brought us the Beauty Onslaught video. The advertising agency responsible is Ogilvy & Mather of Toronto, and the video won two Grand Prix at Cannes this year. Like the ‘Onslaught’ video, this production is a real triumph of editing and concept.