On Feb. 11, we got to witness the Chiefs and the 49ers play a down-to-the-wire showdown on the big stage of Super Bowl LVIII. In between all of the tension and excitement about the big game we saw a handful of entertaining commercials starring A-list celebrities and familiar faces. Here is a list of some well-done commercials and some not-so-well-done commercials.
CeraVe — ★★★★★
Prior to the Superbowl, Michael Cera was already gaining attention on social media platforms for being seen shopping for the skin care product CeraVe, so when fans saw him on a commercial for the product, it felt like a dream come true. The ad presents itself with the authentic beauty commercial mood and ambiance. What makes it so funny to watch is all the wacky and odd scenes it throws at us. Not to mention the cherry on top of the whole clip being that Michael Cera is the last person you’d ever expect to see in a skin care commercial.
Doritos — ★★★★☆
For the past decade, Doritos have always been a top tier advertisement during the big game. This year, their commercial starts off with Jenna Ortega shopping at a grocery store with two older women. When a young man takes the last bag of Doritos, they spin into this intense chase to get the tasty snack for themselves. The commercial does a good job advertising the product and delivering it to viewers in a funny way. You don’t need to be a football fan to like the commercial, and, not to mention, it stars a favorite celebrity of many: Jenna Ortega.
Google Pixel — ★★★★★
The Google Pixel commercial was really well done and was given an A-grade by the Kellogg Panel. The commercial shows a man with sight problems who is capturing his life on the new Google camera. The phone has a unique feature that helps the man know what is seen in the frame before he takes the snapshot. It was cool to watch because it was directed in a way where we were seeing the world the way the man does — the man was not seeing the world clearly. We were living through similar daily experiences as he did and it makes us understand how difficult it must be to live with visual impairment. What makes the ad so compelling is all the pictures he takes with his family and how emotional it feels.
Temu — ★☆☆☆☆
Temu ran their same, short commercial several times during the Super Bowl. The online shopping app that offers low priced items to its members displayed an animated advertisement of their users getting items delivered to them. The commercial feels cheap in a way with strange animation and an unpleasant song that plays over the ad. To make it worse, they showed it a total of six times over the course of the game and it got tiring to see.
SquareSpace — ★★☆☆☆
Squarespace is a company who offers software for website building. They give users pre-made templates for their webpages. The commercial for Squarespace was widely seen as a flop because the commercial failed to depict what the companies product is and what they are actually selling. The ad had a lot going on; it showed an alien invasion while people on Earth were too attached to their technology to see what was happening. It left people watching completely confused on what the message was.
The biggest game of the year is not just for the teams going head-to-head, but it is also for big brands putting themselves on display for the entire country. The once-a-year showcase of commercials never fails to make the game so much more entertaining.
