Ferris Bueller, Clint Eastwood, Karl Rove

Inside Television 590
Publication Date: 2-10-12
By: Hubert O’Hearn


I rarely look back at a sporting event for content. No matter how important the three hours of viewing on a Saturday or Sunday afternoon may have seemed at the time, by the time the last shredding of shiny confetti hits the ground, audience interest has already joined it in its drift. That was fun. What’s next?

Then again, I’m not really writing about this year’s Super Bowl, which was a nice game with the requisite controversial call (the safety) and fourth quarter heroics to keep the largest audience in US television history engaged in watching the commercials. Yes that’s a truism and is equally true of every advertising medium ever invented. Watch the ad, be intrigued by the ad, buy the product. Nothing to see here, move along now.

Except it really was different this year. In following the Tweets and Facebook status updates during the game, that activity also being a still fresh experience, one couldn’t help noticing there was a more concentrated and playfully argumentative reaction to what was going on during the injury and TV time outs than the game being played.

People have made a bit of a game for the past twenty years in picking their favourite Super Bowl ad. The advertisers and their agencies finally took serious notice of the public interest and fed it. I think the first ad to be pre-released the week before the Super Bowl was Honda’s updated version of Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. I just took a quick peek at YouTube: 14 million views. Honda would have paid upwards of $5 million for the 2:25 spot and while that is a ghastly amount of money which doesn’t even take into account the production costs including Matthew Broderick’s fee, you would have to say it was money well spent.

110 million people watched the Super Bowl in the US last Sunday. During the time the Honda ad played, some or many of those would have been getting beer, relieving themselves of beer, opening Doritos or engaging in silly bets; not concentrating in other words. However 14 million people actively seeking out and engaging with a commercial message is huge.

The ad that has captured the most attention post-game was one of the few that were not pre-released, that being the Clint Eastwood voiced 2 minute spot for Chrysler: It’s Halftime in America. A generally uplifting message about stick-to-itiveness and optimism for the American auto industry found its way into public discourse with former George W. Bush master strategist Karl Rove suggesting that Chrysler and Eastwood were endorsing the Obama administration. Eastwood essentially replied that he is no one’s pupper, but the message is there if any candidate wants to run with it.

Clint Eastwood through the eyes of a child ... or as seen by the
curiously baby-shaped  Karl Rove 

There is much here to absorb and analyze, which is going to take a little while. However, for now, ask yourself these questions: What does it all mean when the ads meant to support the product actually become the product? Is this the final Borg-like assimilation of independent thought into Consumer Man? Or was that battle fought and won a long time ago?

Be seeing you.