Superbowl Ads

I wasted an entire evening of my glamorous life watching the superbowl last night, for two reasons. One, it was my first time playing some sort of football squares game that had to do with the score and the possibility of winning a fair amount of cash. I won nothing but chicken wing and meatball heartburn.


The second, and most important reason I watched was for the commercials, but like last year, I was sorely disappoint and at times outraged. Those who know me know I certainly am not a hardcore feminist, but a couple of these commercials boiled even my blood.

The most innocuous was yet another Go Daddy commercial staring Dana The Driver and someone who could have been Heather Graham, but I did not have my glasses on for this bit of TV gold so I am not sure. You have a pool in a spa-like setting, Dana draped in nothing but a sheet waiting for her massage, and the possibly Heather Graham ready to give her the massage. The next thing I see is something bordering on mild softcore porn. The Heather-thing takes down her hair and she and Driver Dana exchange brief kudos about GoDaddy.com in subtly sexy voices as Possibly Heather then rips her bodice open. I would like to know why GoDaddy.com thinks it needs to use nothing but sex to sell it's services. With the gazillion hosts out there, you would think they would at least toss in a fact or two as to why I should choose them as my web host over all the others. Is Dana or the Heatheroid gonna give me a massage too? Ick. Which brings me to the second reason this ad is crappy. I am a woman. Many women have websites. Why was George Clooney not half naked on a table for me, with Brad Pitt (from the 90’s, not the bewhiskered freak we see now) tearing open his shirt? But my biggest gripe (and really this is with all GoDaddy commercials) is Dana herself. Look, this woman could be the idol of so many. She is smart, sexy, and she can drive the hell out of any race car (as she proved this weekend). So why is she stooping to doing these insipid, sexist commercials for the Chuck E. Cheese of web hosts?

The other commercial that boiled my blood was for some car, the new Charger I think, or maybe the Challenger. It was one of those classic car remakes, those pathetic new cars with styling vaguely reminiscent of their superior grandfathers. Charger, Challenger, I am not sure, but it was as ugly as the rest of those wannabes. The commercial consisted of quickly moving headshots of various men, each speaking a line or two like "I take out the trash and separate the recycling"..flash to next head..."I pretend to listen and nod at the appropriate places"...flash to the next head that laments its dreary, controlled life with you. This goes on for a few more seconds, listing enough parts of life that tell women that men merely put up with us, and for what?...last head..." I do all these things so I can drive the car I want to drive". The Ugly Classic Car Wannabe. I was actually surprised when I felt the gnawing in my stomach begin. I had not been offended by a commercial in that manner for a good 25 years. Yes, many commercials are derogatory towards women (and more, I believe, are derogatory toward men) but anyone with a dab of self-confidence and a drop of humor can at least tolerate, at best enjoy, these sophomoric ads. This one, however, was too much. I felt unappreciated and invalidated. And the woman sitting next to me had the same horrified look on her face too, so I am not the only one. So friends, if your Toyota is driving alone sans pilot right now and you need a new set of wheels, remember this commercial if you want to pick up chick. Don’t buy that car.

Many of the other commercials were just stupid and/or mildly icky. Why all the physically unattractive humans partially clothed? That just does not go well with hot wings, ya know? The animal commercials were cute, but I expect more than cute if I am to tolerate 4 hours of football. There was one exception to the animal ads, which brings me to my vote for best Stupidbowl ads.

This year the second place winner is Doritos with this ad:



My favorite this year has to be the Snickers ad. Weird, funny, familiar yet scarce faces, violence, it has it all and is just plainf funny:

New Video

At the bottom of this page is the cutest video I have seen in a long time. So cute, I have made it a permanent part of my blog. Please scroll to the bottom and click the arrow to start playing. It is only a few second long and no, it is not some mean joke video with a scary screaming face, it truly is adorable.