I hear there's a game on today. Nah, I'm just messing with ya. I know today is the Super Bowl. Here's the thing: I don't care.
In fact, on of my list of five things I couldn't care less about, four of them are the Super Bowl.
It won't come as a surprise to anyone who knows me, despite my rigorous workout routine of Double-Double's and Neapolitan shakes, that I'm not the sports guy. I'm the movie guy. The theatre guy. The concert guy. The comedy club guy. The TV bingeing guy. The horse racing guy. The car racing guy. The "let's drop everything and go to Vegas" guy.
The football guy? Not so much.
My feeling is every year, Super Bowl Sunday is the best day to do anything else. Between 3:30pm and 7pm, you'll never have a better day to go shopping at the mall. See a movie. Go to Disneyland. Try that restaurant you can never get reservations at. Traffic is non-existent. Crowds disappear. And parking is plentiful.
Of course, because I'm in advertising, there's pressure and a certain amount of obligation to watch the Super Bowl commercials. Every year, ever since the brilliant, industry-changing, Ridley Scott directed Apple 1984 spot, clients blow a shit-ton (technical term) of cash on their Super Bowl spots.
There's a lot of creativity on display. But that's also a lot of cash that could've been better spent much more effectively in any number of different ways. Or maybe not as effectively. As one of my creative colleagues at the agency told me, "Do you have any idea how many banner ads no one looks at that kind of money could buy?"
As I write this, it's about an hour and a half into the game. Here's my take so far:
The Doritos/Mountain Dew spot with Peter Dinklage and Morgan Freeman in a lip-synced rap battle is pretty fun.
The Tide series of spots, with Stranger Things David Harbour show a surprising amount of creativity for a brand not known for it with the premise every ad is a Tide ad.
The Pringles spot with Bill Hader tries way too hard to recreate the success of "Wasssupp!" from a few years ago, only now the word is "Wow!" I think the word is "Yawn."
The Australian Tourism spot with Danny McBride and Chris Hemsworth was going along nicely, until the shot of original Crockadile Dundee star Paul Hogan, who's 78-years old and looks every second of it 'mate.
I'm not offended easily, but in what I believe will be a monumental backfire I'm fairly certain Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. never intended his voice and words to be used selling Dodge RAM trucks.
Obviously I haven't seen them all yet, but I can already tell you my favorite, whether I like it or not, will be the one my agency did (Team player, hello?)
Super Bowl is also where the studios break out trailer premieres for their most anxiously awaited films. It's a testimony to the enormously talented Ron Howard—who was brought in after original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller were fired with only weeks to go in production—that the Stars Wars movie Solo looks unbelievably awesome.
Who couldn't use a movie where dinosaurs are running amok—again. Thankfully, Juraissic World Fallen Kingdom looks like it's going to fill that vacuum just swell.
Towering Inferno pedigreed Skyscraper with Dwayne Johnson looks like a few hours of mindless fun (just like my high school girlfriend).
That's all I have for now. I'm going to get back to not watching the game and thinking of unencumbered places I can go for the next two hours while it's on.
Right after I don't watch the Justin Timberlake halftime show.
