Annually, whenever we are all getting ourselves worked up to enjoy watching the Super Bowl, many people associate the fun of watching the game with the commercials that are shown during the contest. Some people don't. This particular blog isn't for those people.
This year's bunch of commercials included the usual kind. Ads featuring the E*trade babies, Doritos, Ford trucks and pizza to name a few products. Overall the opinionof most casual viewers and those in the media was that this year's offerings were not particularly good or original. A couple of standouts were the commercial starring Faith Hill for Teleflora (a nice Valentine's Day tie-in with someone representative of football)-sidebar-I think Jane Lynch's (Glee) spoof of Hill's opening theme song for Sunday Night football is hilarious and one of the best sketches of the past season of Saturday Night Live. The whole episode was classic, check it out on Hulu. There was also Roseanne taking Betty White's place in a Snickers bad ad. That was the main trend. Ads featuring celebrities. But isn't that the trend every year? Eminem plugged for Chrysler and repped for Detroit. Kim Kardashian was in a semi-sexy commercial for shape up Skechers.
Super Bowl weekend held a funny coincidence for me that I didn't realize until the day after the game. I didn't even see this commercial while I was watching the game. One of the most endearing, cute ads on Sunday had a tie to one of yours and my favorite movies (that I decided to watch out of the blue over the weekend). The VW Passat ad with the little kid in a Darth Vader costume trying to invoke "the Force" around the house. Ad executives know that if they expend a decent effort and include something that has a "Star Wars" reference, that movie franchise's faithful fans will gush worlwide. This a movie that defined a generation and has almost endless pop culture appeal. Back to the movie I watched which was the last (technically third installment of the "Star Wars" saga) "Revenge of the Sith" released in 2005. This is the only "Star Wars" movie I own. I'm a little too young to have been swept up in the popularity of the first movies that were made, so I think "Sith" is the most important film of the series. "Star Wars" director George Lucas has stated many times that the movies are essentially the story of Anakin who eventually devolves into the Dark Lord, Darth Vader. Everything in the saga comes back to this character. It is about his rise while becoming a Jedi and his fall into evil. The story was also meant to be a statement on the relationships of fathers to sons. Everything that was produced relating to the franchise over the past 30 odd years was leading up to the ultimate payoff of seeing Anakin's dark transformation into Darth Vader. Those old enough to remember seeing the first movie "A New Hope" in 1977 will tell you the Darth character stole the movie, caught people off guard and fans left the movie wanting more back story.
Now back to the commercial. Since everyone know that Darth Vader was such an imposing, evil character ( one of the most resonating villains in cinema along with the Wicked Witch of the West) it's really amusing to see a short, young person attempting an impersonation. The kid in the commercial is portrayed by two 6-year-old boys who made the rounds on daytime TV Monday. One of the boys has an inspiring story. He has overcome numerous surgeries since birth to repair a heart defect and is still in treatment at L.A.'s Children's Hospital. You can still see the interview with his Mom on the Today show.msnbc website.
Check back here for my annual Oscar awards roundup where I'll give you the rundown on my favorites, the movies that have the most momentum and the one category that always surprises but probably shouldn't.
1 comment:
The Darth Vader boy commercial was easily my favorite. I didn't watch the interview with the boy but heard they "killed" the joke by having him attempt to evoke the "force" on various objects.
I was neither overwhelmed nor underwhelmed by this years ads. This year certainly beat the .com era.
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