REVIEW: Some Super Bowl commercials hit, some miss

PHOTO: Will Ferrell starred in a General Motors commercial set in Norway.

By Saul Israel,

BlueDevilHUB.com Editor–

In a Super Bowl unlike any of its 54 predecessors, many large brands known for their big budget commercials chose not to advertise. Companies such as Pepsi, Coke and Budweiser chose to sit this one out.

Despite the loss of several major brands, many still chose to bid. With 91.6 million people watching the Super Bowl, several new shows and movies were teased. Disney released the long awaited trailer for their new show “The Falcon and the Winter Soldier” and the trailer for the movie “Raya and the Last Dragon” which is set to release March 5 on Disney Plus. 

Also released was the trailer for M. Night Shyamalan’s new horror movie “Old” which plans to premiere in theaters this summer.
State Farm’s commercial was celebrity packed, including Drake, Paul Rudd, Aaron Rodgers and the losing quarterback of the night Patrick Mahomes. “State Farm always does funny commercials and Drake in it made it my favorite of the game,” Davis High senior Mathew Young said. 

“My favorite was probably the commercial with Will Ferrell, it was pretty funny and seemed like the best one,” senior Joey Traverso said. 

In a 90 second ad, Comedians Will Ferrell and Kenan Thompson, with actor Awkwafina, announced General Motors’ plan to sell 30 new electric vehicles by 2025. In the commercial, Ferrell shows his dismay that Norway has the highest per capita rate of electric cars. 

“With GM’s new Ultium battery, we’re going to crush those lugers,” he said as the group headed to Norway, before getting lost and ending up in Sweden and Finland. 

While many companies are spending tens of millions of dollars for air time, companies such as Budweiser chose not to this year. Known for their large budget commercials, Budweiser instead chose to donate to the Ad Council and COVID Collaborative’s Vaccine Education Initiative, programs that spread COVID-19 vaccine awareness and education. 

For other companies, this decision was as a financial choice.

Senior Dante Romero watched the game with his family. “None [of the commercials] really stood out, they just didn’t seem as good this year,” Romero said.

One company seeing this shift was Reddit. Paying for just five seconds rather than the standard 30, the company saved millions and kept their commercial simple. They chose to air a screen reading “If you’re reading this, it means our bets paid off,” and included more information about what their site was.

Some companies took this time to make comments about the state of the country. In a Bruce Springsteen narrated commercial, Jeep called for the nation to heal its divides and meet in the middle which was criticized across the internet for coming off as tone deaf. 

While this year’s Super Bowl game was unexciting and its commercials maybe below expectations, fans and companies can look forward to next year’s Super Bowl to hopefully be a good match and restore normalcy.