Latest / Presented by Speaking Human / #204: Burying the Decaying Corpse of Super Bowl Advertising

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#204: Burying the Decaying Corpse of Super Bowl Advertising · Presented by Speaking Human

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Speeding Human.
• 0:06
  Speaker 2: Today, on Speaking Human, we exhume the bloated remains of
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: this year's Super Bowl commercials to argue whether the biggest
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: night in advertising has flatlined for good.
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: Speeding Human, Welcome to Speaking Human, where we simplify the
• 0:32
  Speaker 3: world of marketing for humans.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: I'm Shad Conley and with me is my co host
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: Patrick Jebber. It's very dramatic, especially when you're exhuming bloated remains.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Oh, you know, I always like to be dramatic in
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: the biz.
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: We call that melodrama. I love when you share terms
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: from the biz. You know.
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  Speaker 2: I got to give the listeners some insight into our
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  Speaker 2: world as celebrity entertainers.
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, that's where we are. Speaking of celebrity entertainers.
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  Speaker 1: We're going to get to some of those in a minute.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Here with some of the Super Bowl sixty trivia questions,
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: I'm going to ask you let's start a little simpler
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: right at the top here. See if you can answer
• 1:15
  Speaker 1: this without multiple choice first, and then you know, depending
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: on where you land here, I'll give you the multiple choice. Okay.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: According to Marketing Dive, how many Super Bowl ads were
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: aired in twenty twenty six. I'm going to say sixty.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Oh you you are really close. You don't even need
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  Speaker 1: the multiple choice here the answer is sixty six. Oh okay,
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: how'd you get to the number sixty?
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  Speaker 2: I don't know it was either going to be here's
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: the two numbers. I was thinking about giving you sixty
• 1:48
  Speaker 2: or seventy two, which both actually were pretty close. They're
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: both six off.
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: Actually, yeah, yeah, you're on one side of the other. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: I don't know why, but yeah, you were owned in
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: like a pigeon. So yeah, sixty six three more than
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  Speaker 2: in twenty twenty five. Here's another one. Okay, how many
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: advertisers made their Super Bowl debut this year? So first
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  Speaker 2: time airing a Super Bowl ad? Mm, so it's for
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  Speaker 2: sixty six, I'd say, I want to say thirteen or
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  Speaker 2: twenty two.
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  Speaker 1: Both in the ballpark, twenty two a little closer. The
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  Speaker 1: answer is eighteen. Okay, what is that? A quarter? A
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: little more, a third, manscaped ai, dot Com, Liquid iv, Anthropic,
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  Speaker 1: just a few of the brands appearing for the first
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  Speaker 1: time in the Super Bowl. All right, your final question,
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: you're doing great.
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: You really have a my numbers, I'm a number three knowledge.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you're really just right in the ballpark around these
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: You're just swarming around those numbers.
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  Speaker 2: No multiple choice needed, No, you.
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: Don't even need it. I don't know why I wasted
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  Speaker 1: my time on that aspect. All right, How many celebrities?
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: Here's where we get to celebrities. How many celebrities appeared
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  Speaker 1: in Super Bowl ads this year?
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  Speaker 2: That's tough. How many celebrities? Yes, so there's sometimes multiple
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  Speaker 2: celebrities per ad, And i'd say probably, I don't know,
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  Speaker 2: thirty five.
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  Speaker 1: Not super close on this one. Now, much less, much more?
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  Speaker 1: Oh much more? Okay? Yeah, do you want the multiple
• 3:35
  Speaker 1: choice here? Yeah, give me the multiple choice. I'm kind
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: of curious. All right, so you guess thirty five. Here's
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  Speaker 1: the multiple choice. Your choices are A forty seven, B
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  Speaker 1: eighty nine, C one hundred and two, or D sixty five. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: I was not super close. Yeah, obviously yours was lower
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: than all of those.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, well then maybe I would maybe go with sixty five.
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  Speaker 1: I guess that is incorrect? Really less or more? What
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: do you think?
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  Speaker 2: I think it's If it's more, that's insane. I don't
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  Speaker 2: remember that many, So i'd say less and say forty
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  Speaker 2: seven or whatever.
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  Speaker 1: It was also incorrect. Is eighty nine also incorrect. What
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: one hundred and two is the correct answer? One hundred
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  Speaker 1: and two.
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  Speaker 2: So that averages out to two celebrities per commercial.
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  Speaker 1: Well, probably ninety nine of them were in that duncan Ad.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, I was thinking about that duncan Ad while I
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: was doing the math. I'm like, what is it like
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  Speaker 2: eight ten people in that one?
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  Speaker 1: And I don't know how many exactly, but that's the
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  Speaker 1: number that I was like, that's insane and maybe something
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  Speaker 1: we'll touch on here as part of the part of
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  Speaker 1: some of the problems we're having. But that's getting ahead
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  Speaker 1: of ourselves, I think a little bit. It is.
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  Speaker 2: Let's talk a little bit about how this show came.
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  Speaker 2: Why are we doing this show? Why are we doing
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  Speaker 2: this show so late?
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  Speaker 1: You might even ask, Yeah, the super Bowl old news.
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  Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, old news. But this is the kind of
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: show that lives on beyond the super Bowl because it
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  Speaker 2: is more about conceptually how we feel about the ads
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  Speaker 2: and the commercials coming from the super Bowl this year,
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  Speaker 2: but maybe that it's a trend that we're potentially going
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  Speaker 2: to be seeing. So Shad and I were talking about this.
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  Speaker 2: We weren't even planning on doing a super Bowl show
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: we'd said, no, we don't need to do one.
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  Speaker 1: We've done so many, we don't need to do it again. Yeah,
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  Speaker 1: we've done this.
• 5:38
  Speaker 2: You know, if we ever come back to it, it'd
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: have to be a unique angle. Blah blah blah, not
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: going to do it. And then last week we were
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: recording another series episode and you know, we were talking
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: a little bit about the Super Bowl ads after the fact,
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  Speaker 2: and Shad just had a level of disc gust that
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  Speaker 2: I have never seen him have with such painstaking devotion.
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  Speaker 2: He was adamant that it was the worst Super Bowl
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  Speaker 2: for commercials ever, ever, in the history of ever. And
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  Speaker 2: I was like, wow, you really, you're really passionate about this.
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  Speaker 2: You know, this be a great episode only because I
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: didn't think it was that bad. So you have these
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: two opposing viewpoints that I think we bring to this episode,
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: and that's why we decided to do it. And it's
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  Speaker 2: also kind of like, to me and you might agree
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  Speaker 2: with this, Chad, is that it almost feels like one
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  Speaker 2: of those episodes where you say email is dead, print
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  Speaker 2: is dead, you know, like there's been so many and
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  Speaker 2: now we're talking about Super Bowl commercials are dead. You know, actually,
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  Speaker 2: maybe they're a little bloated. Their carcasses are on display.
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  Speaker 1: Dead and bloated.
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  Speaker 2: So this is how we got here. And so that's
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  Speaker 2: what we're going to be talking about today. We're going
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  Speaker 2: to be talking about the Super Bowl ads in general,
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  Speaker 2: and then we have a little uh treat for you
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  Speaker 2: because we have one choice from each of us, the
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  Speaker 2: best commercial and one of the worst that we felt
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  Speaker 2: that was the worst.
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  Speaker 1: Anyway, Yeah, who doesn't love a best and worst.
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  Speaker 2: Let's just go over the generals. Okay, because I know
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  Speaker 2: this because I'm setting you.
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  Speaker 1: Up for it. Yeah, team me up.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: What did you think of this year's Super Bowl commercials.
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: As a whole?
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  Speaker 2: Because I think this sets the tone which I've already
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  Speaker 2: alluded to, So don't be afraid tell us how you feel.
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  Speaker 1: I will try not to hold back here. I thought
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: this year's commercials were a heaping pile of trash, you know,
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  Speaker 1: maybe a burning, heaping pile of trash. I just thought
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: they were garbage all around, to the extent that, as
• 7:45
  Speaker 1: I reported to you, it made me feel like maybe
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  Speaker 1: this whole experience where people have an interest and excitement
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  Speaker 1: for Super Bowl ads is over. It's just done. It's over,
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: and maybe that's not such a bad thing. Maybe that's
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: like it should be nothing last forever. We had a
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: good run here, right, you know, it's what's it been
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  Speaker 1: like forty or fifty years where people like cared about
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  Speaker 1: the ads. Yeah, and it definitely is peaked and now
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  Speaker 1: it has come crashing down and we are standing in
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  Speaker 1: the rubble. And that's what this year was the rubble.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know for years our podcasts thirteen years, right,
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  Speaker 2: and all this time we've talked about it as more
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  Speaker 2: of the interest and the excitement around them has gotten
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  Speaker 2: bigger every year. And so it surprises me that now
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  Speaker 2: you're saying that you think that it just hit this wall.
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  Speaker 2: Is that what you're saying? Or are you saying that
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  Speaker 2: like we were on this trajectory and we just couldn't
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  Speaker 2: sustain it and now boom, it's just hit the bottom.
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  Speaker 1: By no means, am I saying super Bowl commercials are dead?
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  Speaker 1: But they're the walking dead is what I would say.
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  Speaker 1: You know, they're like a zombie at this point. You know,
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  Speaker 1: there's been a little bit of a colmdown, but this
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  Speaker 1: was like a this is like the stock market crashing.
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  Speaker 1: It's like black Sunday in that way, because it was
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  Speaker 1: just a moment where watching this ads, I was like, ah,
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  Speaker 1: I mean I used to think Super Bowl ads were this.
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  Speaker 1: You know what made them fun was there were kind
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  Speaker 1: of this combination of like artistry and entertainment, so there's
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  Speaker 1: something like creative to watch and it was interesting to
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  Speaker 1: see what everybody was gonna do. Even if we're ultimately
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  Speaker 1: just getting sold a bunch of which we always were,
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  Speaker 1: that didn't matter. But I just feel like that stage
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  Speaker 1: of like people actually putting something creative into them and
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  Speaker 1: being able to even enjoy watching them. It feels like
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  Speaker 1: over this year just felt so everything felt so average,
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  Speaker 1: so redundant, so unmemorable. Like it didn't you feel like
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  Speaker 1: brands were really trying. We're getting like dancing cgi robots.
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  Speaker 1: It was just brands putting their name out there and
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  Speaker 1: like not a lot more. And this could be me
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  Speaker 1: getting old, It could be the types of products advertised
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  Speaker 1: on that stage, but I really think this thing is
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  Speaker 1: losing whatever spark or cachet it once had.
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  Speaker 2: Do you think that maybe that's just a little bit
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  Speaker 2: of the time that we're living in right now. I
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  Speaker 2: feel like it could be a lot of advertisers felt
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  Speaker 2: like they had to play things very safe and very comfortable,
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  Speaker 2: be a little conservative in their creative execution, that kind
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  Speaker 2: of thing.
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  Speaker 1: It could be, yeah, I mean it could be, and
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  Speaker 1: it could be also like AI or GLP, you know whatever,
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  Speaker 1: like these certain types of products. So many of these
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  Speaker 1: just feel like redundant, Like we're doing this same ad again,
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: We're doing this again. And you know, we talked about
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  Speaker 1: the one hundred and two celebrities. It's out of control.
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  Speaker 1: I mean, it used to be such a big deal
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  Speaker 1: when a major celebrity would show up in a Super
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  Speaker 1: Bowl ad, and now it's like zero impact. They're so
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  Speaker 1: meaningless and so purposeless, and it's just let's point a
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  Speaker 1: camera at this person and like say the name, and
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  Speaker 1: most of them just landed like nothing to me. Case
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  Speaker 1: in point, the Dunken ad.
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  Speaker 2: I see what you're saying. To some degree, I'm with
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: you on that. I try to find happy little accidents
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: or whatever you want to call them, ads that I
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: didn't expect. And I'm like, well, it wasn't the biggest ad,
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: it wasn't the most powerful necessarily, but they did something
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: creative with it. They tried. I like those and give
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: those more points.
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: Tell me, did you what did you think of like
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: this year as a whole. Do you think it's better
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: or worse than years past? Without saying, you know, even
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: without you saying the whole thing is crumbling down.
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't think it's crumbling down. But I think
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: this year was pretty like it. There's been like maybe
• 11:28
  Speaker 2: a few that I liked, a handful that maybe would
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: make it into like my top five, since it's a handful.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Top five of the year, top five of all time,
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: no of the year.
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: You know, like I can usually find five commercials that
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: I can find good things that were happening in them.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: This is you. You're just like I'm just going to
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: pick out the positive and ignore the negative.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I mean there are definitely negative ones, and
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: some of those are like subjective to me, I think,
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: you know, yeah, I even listed this my short list
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: of worst is if I have to see another one
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: of these Draft Kings or Fanatics sports book, I get it, gambling,
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: it's the super Bowl, it's a sporting event. But dear god,
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: man and the one with Kendall Jenner, oh god, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: so bad.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's probably another example of like a now you know,
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: a now product that's really just kind of like taking
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: over the space, pharmaceuticals AI like mm hmm, gambling. Do
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: we need all these things? Is this what we want
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: the Super Bowl to be? You know? These things? But
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: it is I mean, isn't that what it was?
• 12:37
  Speaker 2: And back to the future too with Biff's.
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: Sports all minute. So you find it just to be
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: like just another year.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just another year. Like there are some positive
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: things this year.
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  Speaker 1: I thought it was apocalyptic, Like every ad to me
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: like took me to a new level of I'm like,
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  Speaker 1: this is awful.
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  Speaker 2: So in our quest to have one best and one worst,
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: you couldn't even come up with the best.
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: No, there's a handful that I'd still say, I'm like,
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: this is all right, okay, but they it's like grading
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: on a curve. The curve is so low, you know.
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  Speaker 1: So there were a few that yeah, I'm like, okay,
• 13:15
  Speaker 1: this is decent.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they weren't necessarily the cream of the crop and
• 13:19
  Speaker 2: rise to the top. They were more like, ugh of
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: the crop.
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: Yeah, if you're putting them with the best of some
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: like years past or decades past, yeah, you know, they'd
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: probably be on the bottom. The best of this year
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: would probably be the worst of the worst of the best. Yeah,
• 13:35
  Speaker 1: I'm picking up what you're laying down. I get it.
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: So let's talk best and worst. Do you want to
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: share it? What do you want to do first? Best
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: or worst? Do you want to go worst first? Yeah,
• 13:44
  Speaker 1: I'll tell you my worst.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: It's a pretty easy one for me, and you sort
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: of set me up for this was the good willed Duncan.
• 13:51
  Speaker 1: M that's your worst?
• 13:53
  Speaker 3: Huh.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I could have picked some.
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: Of those other ones, like the GOP, the AI, the
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: sportsbook with the Kendall Jenner was awful, But this one,
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: this is what I call star fatigue. Yeah, it's exactly
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: what it tastes like. I mean, it does like that.
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: It's activating your senses.
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: But you know, like the cameos that have been happening
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: in Super Bowl commercials, it's not so much a fun
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: surprise anymore.
• 14:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like been beaten to death, like a clown
• 14:27
  Speaker 1: in a back alley or something.
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: Like the clown from Billy Madison. Yeah, so you've got
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: all these people in it. It felt very much like
• 14:37
  Speaker 2: we had the budget and we used it. It was
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: a sort of a flex we can do all these things.
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: It wasn't even like a cohesive thought, what does Goodwill
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: Hunting have to do with all of these sitcoms?
• 14:51
  Speaker 1: That to me was the worst part. Yeah, you know
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: what I mean, Like, why did they even need to
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: insert Goodwill Hunting in there and smear the good name
• 14:59
  Speaker 1: of that film?
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: And I've told you this before, and I'm sure listeners
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: might argue with this. Ben Affleck as a spokesperson, I
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: don't think it works, but this one especially, and it
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: was like bad with deaging the characters and stuff that
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: I just it was terrible. It was just terrible.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the combination of celebrity overuse and de aging. The
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: only other ad that compared to this was the uh
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: the Comcast Expinity Jurassic Park one. I don't know if
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: you liked that one, but that also gave me the
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: same I was like, Ah, why you get all these
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: people and then you're doing this deaging for such a
• 15:37
  Speaker 1: dumb ad.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: Even watching it, I felt like there was this tension.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: I guess that's how the kids they describe it as
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: a cringe, right, there's like tension watching.
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: That, Like your muscles tense up.
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's like, ah, this is this is terrible.
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: It's whom I word of the day. It's terrible. The
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: way I felt during every ad break of.
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: The Super Bowl, it sounds that way you you definitely
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: hated everything.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: I agree that one was terrible. It probably wasn't my worst.
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: The actual worst is probably that Savedka Vodka Dancing Robots.
• 16:13
  Speaker 1: I mean, that was pure slop. The worst that I
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: picked out, and it's the one I've shared with you,
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: is the Maha Center Inc. Mike Tyson ad oh Okay.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: I thought that was the most awkward. I mean, in
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: some ways it's the best because it's just so bizarre,
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: and you know Tyson and close up in black and white,
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: rambling about how fat and nasty he was and how
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: he would eat a cord of ice cream every hour.
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: As a viewer, you're kind of like laughing and going,
• 16:41
  Speaker 1: what is this for? I think they put the part
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: up front where he talks about his sister dying of
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: obese so that you're not quite laughing, but it's it's
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: just a weird concoction. You don't even know what it's for.
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: Even you get to the end, you know, and it
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: says like processed foods kill and you're like, what, what?
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: What have I been watching this whole time? I mean,
• 16:59
  Speaker 1: Mike is just rambling the whole time. I want to
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: send like flowers to the editor because you could tell
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: the work he had to do to make something semi
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: coherent out of what was probably like let's just put
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: this guy on camera and let him ramble. And it
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: feels like it's edited, you know, within an inch of
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: its life. And there's scenes of you know, Mike Tyson
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: just crunching down on apples and eating carrots, and it
• 17:21
  Speaker 1: looks like what somebody would as a parody of like
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: an art film or something. Yeah, we were watching this
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: honestly with our jaws drop. Me and my family like
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: what is this? He starts talking about how we're the
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: most powerful country in the world, we have the most obese,
• 17:37
  Speaker 1: fudgy people. I mean, it's just like all these lines
• 17:40
  Speaker 1: he's thrown off in You're life again, you have no
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: idea what this is for or why this is happening,
• 17:45
  Speaker 1: and then you just get to the end. It was
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: kind of the epitome of a lot of this stuff
• 17:49
  Speaker 1: where it was like just scratching your head, and this
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: was something that was trying to get a serious message across.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: I was really confused by what the message was actually
• 18:00
  Speaker 2: you're trying to get across you know what I mean.
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, I get processed foods. I don't remember exactly
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: the words he said.
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: He talked about himself being fat, nasty, and then he's
• 18:09
  Speaker 1: talking about America having you know, fudgy people, Budgie, the
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: most fudgy people, the.
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: Most fudge people. There's so much to unpack there. You
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: know a why this was greenlit? Who thought that this
• 18:23
  Speaker 2: was a good idea or was this one of those
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: things where he convinced like, yeah, let me do it,
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: let me do it.
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: Like nobody was, nobody watched. He was like, this is hilarious.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Now show me the real ad.
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: Yeah, when you're too close to the celebrity and you
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: got to make decisions and you're like, oh, they see
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: it and they're like, oh, I can't tell him how
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: bad this is.
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: He'll call me fudgie and he'll bite my bite my ear.
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: That's a that's a good one. That's a good one.
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: I think it's more like you could argue there's worse ads.
• 19:01
  Speaker 1: I agree because I in some way I enjoyed it. Yeah,
• 19:05
  Speaker 1: but I don't think I enjoyed it for the right reasons.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: I thought I literally thought it was a comedy until
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: the endgame.
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the awkwardness. So my favorite I ended up going
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: with Helman's Sweet Sandwich Time. And I think I told
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: this to you off air last week. I said, you
• 19:21
  Speaker 2: know the thing about that this one is it It
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: was just a silly, good fun time and it had
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: these like little easter egg type of comments in it,
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: so that if you watched it multiple times, you'd be like,
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: that's kind of funny.
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 19:36
  Speaker 2: He's almost like a demented, crazy version of Neil Diamond,
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: clearly because his name on his jacket is Meal Diamond.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: Also funny to me, you know, just silliness with Andy
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: Samberg as the lead here, and he does a musical
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: number too Sweet Caroline but it's Sweet Sandwich Time and
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: just changes the lyrics.
• 20:00
  Speaker 1: It's a good time. You know, overall it's a good time. Yeah,
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: this one, this one to me falls in mildly amusing,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: So I'm like just positive on It didn't blow me
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: away or like super but it was one of those
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: things that kind of gave me a chuckle at the end.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: It does have the moment where it's like I think
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: el Fanning shows up at the end and I'm like,
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: okay and necessary like celebrity throwing. And it's kind of
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: a stupid dad type joke, you know type joke, but
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: it kind of works a little bit enough to just
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: give you like you're like, huh, okay, it's fun. So
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: it wasn't bad. Didn't blow me away, but I was
• 20:37
  Speaker 1: like this one, I was like, not bad.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: Now like Samberg, Yeah, he's got that sense of humor,
• 20:42
  Speaker 2: you know, still it still shows through and some of
• 20:45
  Speaker 2: these ads that he's in, even all these years later.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: The one thing I'll say is, you know part of
• 20:51
  Speaker 2: this pick is too is I recognize the fact that
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: I'm partial because I'm a Neil Diamond fan.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: For you, because you're soaking up the Neil Diamond content
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: like bread soaking up mayo.
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: It's true, like an ajou, you know, you dip your
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: mayo sandwich in the ajo.
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's good.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: I didn't realize this, but you know, West of the
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: Rockies Helmans, the brand Helmans.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: Is actually sold as Best Foods.
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: Like it's not even called Helman's out there, It's called
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: Best Foods. It's the same exact recipe everything.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: What's up with that? That sounds like a generic people
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: go into the they go to the grocery store and
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: they're like, I want some Helmans and then they hand
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: them best Brand or whatever it's called, foods Best. It's okay, Like,
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: what the hell is this? That's not what Meal Diamond recommends.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: Meal Diamond said that it was gonna be sweet sandwich time.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: It's not. It's not, so that'd be my pick for
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: the for the best.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: But I'm more interested, really, honestly, I'm more interested in
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: what your best pay is because how much you hated.
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, there wasn't a lot. Again, there were
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: things like that there where I was like, this is mildly,
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: mildly positive. You know. I liked the instacart ad, but
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: that was mostly the longer one online, which is another
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: kind of issue I have with a lot of these
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: where it's like we're releasing this good, long version online
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: and then kind of a lesser version during the Super Bowl.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: I have some beef with that. I think that's like
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: starting to take away from what we're actually seeing during
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: the game, which is kind of like a half or
• 22:33
  Speaker 1: like just not that good commercial because there's like this
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: online version that's three minutes long.
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: Well, remember years ago and again, you know, kind of
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: going back to how long we've been covering stuff like
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: this with the super Bowl, but remember we were talking
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: about like movies and stuff where they'd play just a
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: portion of the trailer and then send you online to
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: get the rest of it, and we're like, this is
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: going to be it. You know, this is the future
• 22:58
  Speaker 2: because they know people are they're on their phones during
• 23:01
  Speaker 2: the super Bowl, you know, and so this change over
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: that's happened over the years I think has played a
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: big part in that.
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah. No, that's a good point, and they're trying to
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: draw those eyes, you know, get that additional engagement. Mm hmm.
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: Everybody's favorite word, love the engagement. So anyway, that being
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: the case, my you know pick for my best probably
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: someone unexpected. But this is the one I thought just
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: did the most things right, which is the Square Space
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Unavailable ad with Emma Stone. So this one, I'll tell
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: you why I liked it, then you can tell me,
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: with your grumbling words, why you didn't. It had an aesthetic,
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: you know, this is directed by your ghost Lanthe Moost
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: like real director made Poor Things in Begonia also with
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Emma Stone, and so it had kind of a unique
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: look to it compared to a lot of the other
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: pretty generic looking commercials Fit's with. That's the Square Space brand,
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: what they've been doing with commercials in the past. I
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: think of like ten years ago when we were talking
• 23:59
  Speaker 1: about like dreaming with Jeff little odd, little offbeat, but
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: you know, just enough to kind of like get your attention,
• 24:06
  Speaker 1: And this is one that actually used celebrity in a
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: meaningful way. You know, it could have been anyone. This
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: could have been like Joe Smith searching for their name online,
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: but we wouldn't have known that was actually Joe Smith.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: We know this is Emma Stone, so it makes sense
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: when she's looking for emmastone dot com. I liked the
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: kind of over dramatics of it, the black and white,
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: the music, you know, her smashing multiple laptops when she
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: can't find the domain. It kind of fits the emotion
• 24:33
  Speaker 1: of that situation that people would feel. You know, You're like,
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: I just want this so bad, why can I get this?
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: And I thought, you know, it had a simple message,
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: you want your domain, here's where you come to get it.
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: It's probably gone because they're all gone at this point,
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: but nevertheless, the idea there I thought was like pretty
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: simple and straightforward. So that was basically all the reasons,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: you know, it was. It wasn't necessarily like an A
• 24:56
  Speaker 1: plus for me. It's probably like a B plus. But
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: in a year when and there were a lot of
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: d's and f's, I think it was doing all those
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: like simple things, right. So I just was like, Ah,
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: this is a good solid ad, Now why do you
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: hate it?
• 25:10
  Speaker 2: Tell me I didn't like it. I didn't like it
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: during the super Bowl. The longer form version is a
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: little bit better.
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I kind of actually liked almost the shorter form
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: version of this. I thought it actually because it just went,
• 25:24
  Speaker 1: you know, it was simple.
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I just didn't understand it, like I thought that
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: the shorter one, it just felt like there was something
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: missing in it. This is the problem with some of
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: the longest short versions is that they put the short
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: version out and it feels like there's something missing. There's
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: some piece of the story that's missing for me. Because
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: in the short version, she just keeps screening like whatever
• 25:51
  Speaker 2: she does.
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: She like types that, yeah, searches for the domain it's unavailable,
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: smashes the laptop, searches again unavailable, matches the laptop. She
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: does it like three times, right, Yeah, it's kind of
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: like it's either two or three, you know, and there's
• 26:05
  Speaker 1: like a reaction and you see like a pile of
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: broken laptops.
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: And my biggest question, this is the why I had
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: the biggest problem with it, was why would she search
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: for her name again if she saw that it was
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: I mean, she clearly knew it was accurate, because she
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: threw the laptop down and crushed it. If you were
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: just like, oh, I'm just gonna go check this other
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: thing and check it again the second time, then you
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: throw your laptop, you don't throw the first time. So
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: why is she going crazy?
• 26:37
  Speaker 1: Well, it's absurdist, you know. I mean, the whole idea
• 26:40
  Speaker 1: that someone's getting this like crazy about a domain is absurdist,
• 26:45
  Speaker 1: and the whole thing is kind of absurd, like, no,
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: it can't be it can't not be available, it's my name.
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: They had this whole like part of this extended one
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: where she talks about the fact that she's on a
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: stone and she had a problem getting the domain and
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: so she bought all the other versions of that domain
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: from something years ago. So I think that's all needed information.
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: It's necessary. And on top of that, like I don't
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: think that. I mean, other than just saying, oh, Emma
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: Stone was in that commercial, it doesn't really make me
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: feel like I need to use Squarespace.
• 27:21
  Speaker 1: I agree with that in the same way that I'd
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: agree with that about every single ad, including the Helmet's
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: ad that aired. They'd be better off not using the celebrity.
• 27:31
  Speaker 2: You need Andy Samberg to sell the mayo. He squirts
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: it on your sandwich for you.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: So you think someone else should have been searching for
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: emmastone dot com.
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that would actually be funny, you know, the troll
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: who is actually trying to squat on someone else's domain.
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: I have seen some Squarespace ads since then, like in
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: the Olympics, that I think work better. I forget the
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: exact tone of it, but it's basically kind of a playoff.
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: Of these Emma Stone ones.
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: The one I saw today, I think it was today
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: or yesterday, was this person wanted to start a business
• 28:11
  Speaker 2: for their exercise video classes or something like that, so
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: they bought a domain through squarespace, and it was implied
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: that they build a website so people could schedule classes.
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: And I thought that was smarter and it was very short.
• 28:29
  Speaker 2: It actually might have been shorter than the Emma Stone,
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: and I thought it was way more powerful. Again, maybe
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: just some of that celebrity fatigue.
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: Well, I think that's all over the place. Again. I
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: think everybody's ads would be a little better without the celebrities.
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: And I mean even to you know, question the whole
• 28:44
  Speaker 1: premise here. It's not like squarespace solves the problem of
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: your domain being unavailable, you know what I mean. Yeah,
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: it's either there it's not. Yeah. So very as you
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: can see polar opposites on a lot of these super bowls,
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: didn't see the same. I don't think we watched the
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: same super Bowl.
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: Here's the one thing I will say that we agree on.
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: We do have some negative feelings for some of the ads,
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: Like I didn't love them, all the ones that I
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: didn't like. You were sort of defending squarespace, and I'm like, yeah,
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: you know, like that wasn't wasn't one of my favorites
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: and I can find all of the flaws in it.
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: So I guess for the listeners, the real question is
• 29:29
  Speaker 2: did we pick the right title for this episode bearing
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: the decaying corpse of Super Bowl advertising or some of
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: the old titles that we had.
• 29:38
  Speaker 1: Super Bowl ads suck now, Comma fight me. That's clearly
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: how you felt. Yeah, yeah, that's what we got into
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: a little bit. There's, you know, the simplistic the death
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: of Super Bowl ads, which is, you know, after seeing
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: the death of the death of email and the death
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: of print, can't go about rap mm hmm, but rip
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: rip super Bowl commercials. Put it on the tombstone. It's over.
• 30:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's basically saying it's done, because in our title
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: it's we're actively bearing the decaying corpse.
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: Yeah, so it's it's still in process. We're throwing some
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: dirt on it, but it's it's not doing well. Sums up.
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: I mean a lot of how we feel about things,
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: you know, as we're sort of like getting older, we
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: talk about this all the time. Our curmudgeon side comes out.
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: I think this super Bowl brought out your curmudgeon.
• 30:35
  Speaker 1: It must have. You know, we'll see what happens next year,
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: you know, will I have a turnaround? Will the corpse
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: be reanimated or will it be deader? Will it be
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: like completely decomposed at that point? Will it be deader? Well,
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: let's let me wrap up here with a final takeaway.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: I don't have our typical takeaway have more of a challenge,
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: I think based on our conversation. So you know, I'm thinking,
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: after we're talking here, how can we bring Super Bowl
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: commercials back? If they're decaying, they're in the ground, how
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: can we bring them back to life? Give them a
• 31:06
  Speaker 1: little charge. So here's what I'm proposing. Maybe next year.
• 31:12
  Speaker 1: You know, this year was like eight million dollars for ads.
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: Maybe next year we drop the price down to like
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: five million. But we've got some conditions. One, you can't
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: use any celebrities, okay. Two no CGI or AI or
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: mention of AI. Whoh. Three no early release ads or
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: extended versions.
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: That'd be tough for almost every single advertiser.
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: They could do it, well, I will say they could
• 31:39
  Speaker 1: do it. They can't do the early release, but they
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: could do an extended version, say something like two weeks
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: after the super Bowl. So there has to be some space, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 31:48
  Speaker 1: And it can't be just made for that purpose, So
• 31:51
  Speaker 1: there has to be some kind of like guardrails around that.
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: Or maybe it's you know, maybe it's even like each
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: year it gets a specific theme or different set up
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: parameters ads have to follow, just different ways to like
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: let's throw a loophole in this, make it even like
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: a challenge. Maybe it's even that's part of the game,
• 32:07
  Speaker 1: you know. Maybe it's like, okay, the ads or advertisers.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: If you go and you follow these parameters, you're like
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: competing in this thing, and then people can vote at
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: the end of the night to see who wins it.
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: So we have like a super Bowl winner and a
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: commercial winner. Mmmm, that would be cool. Yeah, we need
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: some kind of something to throw in there to kind
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: of you know, mix this up a little bit.
• 32:30
  Speaker 2: Those are great takeaways or a great takeaway with multiple parts.
• 32:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but I'm sure brands and you know, the network
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: who's hosting the super Bowl will love Yeah.
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: Well, you never know, you know, everything has to shed
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: its skin and become a new again.
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: Yeah, born again.
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: So that's it for today's episode. You can find current
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: and past episodes of the podcast on Speaking Human dot com.
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: We'll be back in two weeks with another episode of
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: Speaking Human. Catch you then Humans
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: Speaking Human