The Five Best Super Bowl Commercials (That Aren't Beer Ads)

[Note: Every Friday on First Thoughts we host heated, half-serious, half-cocked arguments about some aspect of pop culture. Today’s theme, in honor of Sunday’s game, is Super Bowl commercials. Have a suggestion for a topic? Send them to me at jcarter@firstthings.com]

Contrary to the trite assertion made every year by people who don’t know how to appreciate football, it is not really true that the commercials the best thing about the Super Bowl (at least not always). Sure, it seems that way because the television viewer is seeing commercials than actual game play (in an average game, the ratio of commercials to playing time is seven to one). The reality, however, is that most of the commercials aren’t all that memorable. Only a few stand out every year and they are almost always beer commercials.

But maybe (like me) you don’t like beer, or are a Southern Baptist (like me) and aren’t supposed to condone beer commercials, or maybe your just tired of the anthropomorphizing of Clydesdale horses (again, me). Then it becomes much harder to choose the best Super Bowl commercials of all time. Harder, but not impossible, for I’ve found the five best Super Bowl commercials that were hawking something other than beer.

5. Monster.com, “When I Grow Up”

4. Apple, 1984

3. E*Trade, “Wasted Two Million Bucks”

2. Reebok “Terry Tate — Office Linebacker”

1. EDS, “Cat Herders”

I’m not sure how anyone could disagree with these five superb selections, but just in case I’ll ask: Know of a non-beer commercial that is better than one of these five?

Comments (9)

9 Comments

Andrew
February 5th, 2010 | 9:40 am

Terrible Terry Tate has to be one of the funniest advertising characters ever created. They made a whole series of them, for anyone willing to look around.

SL
February 5th, 2010 | 10:21 am

http://adland.tv/commercials/fedex-alien-2004-030-usa

Fed-ex is all you need to know. :)

Trish
February 5th, 2010 | 10:35 am

The Pepsi ads featuring a guilty Coca Cola employee enjoying a Pepsi were good. My favorite was when the entire Pepsi cooler emptied out on the floor as the Coke guy tried to “sneak” one out.

John
February 5th, 2010 | 10:54 am

Fedex – alien would definitely bounce the Apple 1984 ad, which just doesn’t belong on the list. The pet shop ad where a couple animals were trying figure out how to use a mouse, with a real mouse, was pretty good as well. I’m not sure, but I think that was an Apple ad as well.

John Thayer Jensen
February 5th, 2010 | 12:43 pm

They are all amusing, no doubt – but I was struck by the fact that the EDS cat herder ad – which I have seen before – has something the others have not got. The EDS ad is beautiful.

I confess I go back to youtube every now and then and listen to it. I suppose it is the iconic music and ‘open plains’ stuff – brings tears to my eyes.

Andy Bolen
February 5th, 2010 | 4:51 pm

Are you kidding me? How can the etrade baby not be on the list? Funniest super bowl ads ever.

https://us.etrade.com/e/t/jumppage/viewjumppage?PageName=etrade_super_tv_ads&SC=GSSSWEB&WT.mc_id=GSSSWEB&wt.srch=1

Andy Bolen
February 5th, 2010 | 4:54 pm

my favorite: