Ten Super Bowl ads–perhaps not the top ten, but ten memorable ones
Admit it — if one lacks have a rooting interest in Super Bowl LIV (and this writer doesn’t, coming from the Washington, DC area, where the local NFL team hasn’t come close to the Big Game since the first Clinton administration), there are two big motivations for watching the game: the halftime show, which this year features J.Lo and Shakira, who must each keep paintings of themselves that age instead of them in their trailers, and the commercials.
Some are silly, borderline offensive, or somewhat pointless, but a few become remembered or even cherished in the annals of Super Bowl and marketing lore. Here are ten of the top Super Bowl TV ads:
10-“Wazzup”, from Budweiser in 2000. This one still gives me nightmares. I have a twelve year old son. Enough said.
9-“Where’s the Beef?” from 1984. This may have been one of the greatest television commercials of all time thanks to its staying power and utter hilarity. That fall, presidential candidate Walter Mondale even incorporated it into his stump speech, and Clara Peller became one of the biggest celebrities of the decade.
8-“Save It”, for E-Trade featuring the adorable E-Trade day trader baby.
7-“Hilltop” was a Coca-Cola ad in 1971, which is probably more remembered now as “I’d like to teach the world to sing.” It aired before I was born, but continued as a cultural touchpoint throughout the 1970s.
6-“When I Grow Up” was Monster’s first ad in 1999, with kids stating some pretty unambitious professional ambitions — like a boy saying “I want to have a brown nose” and a girl saying “I want to get paid half as much for doing the same job”.
5-“The Force” by Volkswagen from 2011, in which a little boy in a Darth Vader costume thinks he’s starting the family car using his Force abilities because he hasn’t seen his dad’s remote starter key fob.
4-Cindy Crawford getting a Pepsi from a vending machine in 1992. Amazingly, she remade the ad in 2018. She must also have a painting of herself in her house that ages instead of her.
3-Those Budweiser frogs from 1995. Yes, we did repeat “Bud-weis-er” nonstop for about a year afterwards.
2-Another Coca-Cola spot was “Hey Kid, Catch” from 1979, with Mean Joe Green exchanging his game jersey for a bottle of Coke.
1-Apple Computer’s Macintosh “1984” ad. Featuring a female track and field athlete taking a hammer to a menacing screen, hearkening to George Orwell’s novel. Watching it with my family at the age of twelve, all of our mouths fell open.
Bear in mind that these aren’t necessarily the authoritative best — just the most memorable. But enjoy the game tonight for whatever you watch it for: the commercials, the music, or perhaps even the football.
