I came away with the same impression, Rachel. But it seemed like men were whining about being emasculated, which sort of propagates the whole idea that they are emasculated. It did seem like there was a certain focus on men in underwear—sort of odd.The Dockers ad disappointed me. I really loved the print campaign at Christmas time, but this ad was not nearly the punch that was. And the Tim Tebow ad worked in an unexpected way. It generated more buzz before it ran and more controversy on what it *could* be than the actual ad could have ever hoped to generate. Sort of genius in an unexpected way. I liked the Doritos kid who protected his mama and his video game, though that wasn’t a new ad and it’s sort of a sad social commentary, too.

I figured the Tebow ad would end up being fairly tame, but I didn’t realize just how low-key it would be! I agree that emasculation of men was the popular theme, presented by a “man up” attitude and men in underwear, which I guess is better than women in underwear…

Ladies,

Totally agree—it seemed like all the skin was men in tighty whities. I guess selfishly I appreciated that more than all the bikini-clad women of years past because I didn’t have the spend the entire evening telling my boys to close their eyes.

Maybe next year, the ads will be men being men—progress!

You know, I was thinking of posting about the ads, but I wasn’t quite sure how to articulate it.  I was really surprised by the number of ads explicitly focusing on the gender gap.  In the past, beer ads with scantily clad women implied a gender gap, as did ads that just didn’t strike me as funny, but I was really disturbed by the theme that men are secretly resenting their lives, which I saw crop up in several ads.  Also, men are stupid and don’t read, but they do like beer and chips, so have those at book club and the guys will all show up?  The funny thing is that I think this ad is targeted to MEN—Danielle wrote in the past about men being portrayed as oafs in sitcoms as a way to amuse women, to sell detergent, etc, but we have so bought in to this image that you can use it to sell beer, too?  Or are they selling beer to women as a way to attract men?

Hi~
As with last year, I felt that many of the ads were very mean-spirited.  Interestingly, last year when I bemoaned that fact, my teen son agreed, but only by the end of the game when he too had “had enough”.

This year though, we were barely 2 ads in when he said “looks like another mean year”... and we had plenty of fodder to back that statement! 

But, I guess if I got talking points with my son, they were worth it!

Shirley

The little bit that my husband and I watched of the game and commercials, left us with us looking at each other after each ad and saying, “Huh?”
The ads just seemed to not make sense.  Is this what we call the dumming down of America?  Did anyone else feel the same way?

My husband really liked the ads for the new men’s line of skin care products from Dove.  I was disgusted by the ads with people all walking around in underwear (casual Fridays and some other ad where the men chanted about not wearing pants).  The Go Daddy ads were revolting as usual.  The Green Police ad was funny but scary at the same time.  The Dockers ad was ok, but I still won’t buy them as they are from Levis and on the pro-life boycott list.  Kind of bums me out because they are really good pants.  All the beer commercials were over the top as they usually are for the super bowl.  I really enjoyed the GAME this year, though.  What an edge of the seat game!  I am glad the Saints won.

Geaux Saints!  Who Dat!

I thought the Snickers commercial w/ Betty White was pretty funny.  “You’re just not yourself when you’re hungry.”  lol

I loved the Snickers commercial with Betty White and Abe Vigoda.  That was funny!  The google one was sweet.  My teenage son was NOT impressed with the Dove ads…“Let’s all watch dudes showering” was his sarcastic comment.  And the Tim Tebow ad—we were LOOKING for it, and it was so low-key we almost missed it.  I think it needed more of something, just so people who hadn’t heard of it ahead of time would knkow what it was all about!

My kids all really giggled at the guy sleepwalking in Africa for a Coke, and driving a delivery van over a human bridge.  I only had to change the channel for (all) the movie trailers, the rest were at least reasonable.

Our favorite by far was the guy eating Doritoes and teasing the dog with the bark collar on.  It was the only one that made us laugh out loud. 

I thought the Coke ads were untypically weak and we all kind of said, “Huh?” when the guys were singing about not wearing pants.

I loved the idea of the Focus on the Family ad, but honestly, after watching it wondered what the big deal was.  If I didnt’ know the story from all the hype in the news leading up to it, I would not have known it had anything to do with abortion at all.  At this point I think the controversy did more for the pro-life cause than the ad did.  Funny how that works isn’t it?

I think the Godaddy.com ads are disgusting.  I am NOT impressed with Danica Patrick’s choice to promote that sort of creepy stuff.  Not a role model for girls at all, IMHO.

I think you are right about the emasculation thing- but I loved the Charger ad! I think I would like to see it as the civilization of man- serious courtesy and compromise in all things necessary, but retaining that ultimate edge of testosterone in the pursuit of the protector provider capacity and role. Maybe it’s just because I have ALOT of boys…;o)