Super Bowl XLIII Commercials

Over fifty brand new, big name Super Bowl commercials premiered at Super Bowl XLIII on Sunday. You would think with the huge budgets and best advertising agencies in the world there would be lots of outstanding Super Bowl ads, and there were some gems, but there were lots of duds, too.

The Best Super Bowl Commercials

There were five truly outstanding Super Bowl ads this year. The themes included bizarre physical comedy, job hostility, and the legendary Super Bowl commercial--the talking babies.

E*Trade brought back "Talking Babies" to the Super Bowl. The starring baby all know and love gets into an argument with his buddy who just wanted to belt out the '80s pop hit "Broken Wings" by Mr. Mister. E*Trade knows the drill, little babies make for big laughs.

Pepsi Max introduced "I'm Good" to Super Bowl audiences by depicting men getting whacked in the face with golf clubs and getting electrocuted in home improvement projects. "Men can take anything, except diet cola," they say, declaring Pepsi Max is the diet soda for real men. So true, so funny.

Doritos "Crystal Ball" was a low budget piece assembled by aspiring filmmakers. Even though the budget was small, this Super Bowl commercial was big on laughs. One man looks into his "crystal ball" predicting free Doritos, then throws the ball, breaking the vending machine glass. His buddy tries the same method to get a promotion but ends up debilitating his boss.

CareerBuilder.com ran with the I-hate-my-boss theme in their Super Bowl contribution "Tips". We saw grown men cry, a woman riding a porpoise, a Koala bear getting punched in the face. It's all very strange but altogether hilarious.

Monster.com got in on the Super Bowl boss loathing with "Need a New Job?" In one single, swooping shot, the camera idolizes an executive with his feet up on his mahogany desk in a spacious office with a moose head mounted on the wall. We turn the corner to the opposite side of the wall to see a cubicle drone trying to get his work done underneath the moose's backside. It's sad since most of us can relate, but the message is effective.

The Worst Super Bowl Commercials

Hands down, GoDaddy.com had the worst Super Bowl commercials this year. Their ads were crass and bordering on vulgar. The first one featured three college guys watching Danica Patrick on a shower webcam. When she ends up with another woman in the shower at the end, you would think they were advertising a porn website. They totally failed in portraying what it was they were advertising. GoDaddy's second Super Bowl fiasco featured Danica Patrick in a courtroom referring to something as "enhanced". Of course, in the end we see a woman showing off her huge fake boobs.

Super Bowl commercials are supposed to bring innovation and creativity to the boring medium of advertising. GoDaddy dumbed down the whole idea.

Stellar Special Effects

GE aired two spectacular Super Bowl ads utilizing special effects and sentimentality. "Scarecrow" used the original "If I Only Had a Brain" recording from The Wizard of Oz, and designed a dancing scarecrow out of cables and circuitry. In "Wind Energy", a boy captures the wind in a jar and brings it home to his grandfather's birthday party. They unleash the wind to blow out the birthday candles, but blow everything else out of the house, too.

Also exceptional was Coca-Cola's "Avatar" in which a man walks through a world where everyone has turned into their online alter egos. It was an interesting examination on how we see ourselves as individuals and how others see us. Another Coca-ColaSuper Bowl offering entitled "Heist" featured insects conspiring to steal a picnicker's bottle of Coke. It was cute and adventurous.

The less entertaining special effects Super Bowl ads included Sobe's Swan Lake parody featuring gross, globby lizards, a boring NBC "Heroes" football promo, Firestone's potato heads in a car accident commercial, Bridgestone's "Hot Item" in which a lunar lander has it's tires stolen. (Is Bridgestone saying if you buy their tires they will get stolen? Very unusual concept.)

Physical Comedy in Super Bowl Ads

NBC's "LMAO"Super Bowl commercial was yuk-worthy with people who laughed so hard at NBC's comedy lineup that their bums fell off. It's a weird concept, but it worked. Bud Light's "Meeting" and "Ski Lodge" generated big laughs when a man is ejected through the board room window and skiers crash into trees and tables.

Celebrity Spokespeople in Super Bowl Ads

The Super Bowl commercials starring celebrities just didn't strike a chord with me. Of them I enjoyed "Pepsuber" by Pepsi starring the cast of Saturday Night Live. SNL cast members mock MacGyver with a character called "MacGruber", but then take it a step further, changing the hero's name to "Pepsuber". It was silly, but cute. Conan O'Brien hawked Bud Light in "Swedish". It wasn't quite laugh out loud funny but it was classic Conan humor. Ed McMahon and MC Hammer made a Super Bowl pitch for Cash 4 Gold, which was humorously ironic since they both lost all their riches and had to resort to selling their belongings to survive.

The rest of the celebrities, Alec Baldwin for Hulu.com, Carlos Boozer for Overstock.com, William Shatner for Priceline, Troy Polamalu for Coca-Cola and Usama Young for the NFL were just typical. They weren't bad, but there was no outstanding Super Bowl glamour about them.

Animals in Super Bowl Ads

What would Super Bowl commercials be without the fuzzy contingency? The Budweiser Clydesdales brought home three new stories, one of pedigree called "Generations", one of love lost/love reunited with "Circus" and one which pitted a dog playing fetch against a horse who brought back an entire tree limb. They were cute, but not as engaging as years past.

Castrol brought us a garage full of Super Bowl "grease monkeys". Who doesn't love monkeys? And Pedigree dog food gave us "Crazy Pets" in which rhinos, ostriches and warthogs were portrayed as lousy household pets. Cheetos contributed a Chester Cheetah ad with a flock of pigeons descending on an obnoxious woman.

Boring and Annoying Super Bowl Ads

The boring Super Bowl ads aren't even worth mentioning but they ranged from electronics to beverages to automobiles. Sprint's "Roadies" was the most annoying as they cut in that "chirp chirp" sound effect over and over again to promote their "Press to Talk" walkie talkie feature. And Hyundai had "Angry Bosses" yelling "Hyundaiiiii" over and over again. That was not fun.

Just Plain Cool Super Bowl Ads

Toyota's "Killer Heat" wasn't spectacular or funny, it was just really, really cool. It portrayed a Toyota truck ascending a spiral scaffold succumbing to flames and heat at the very end.