The Super Bowl is an event that generates a lot of excitement every year; not just from football fans, but from fans of advertising. This year produced adverts featuring a plethora of celebrities and with humour making a big comeback.
The name of the game was entertainment.
Given the political climate in the US this is hardly surprising and there was a shying away from any type of commentary.
Super Bowl 2025 ads as lacklustre as the game, with an overflow of celebrities and very little risk-taking
Danette Breitenbach 1 day
Humour makes a big comeback
But let’s give humour some credit. This is not a new trend, it is one we have seen making a comeback since Cannes 2024.
In 2024, Boundless chief creative officer & co-founder, Roanna Williams asked what happened to humour.
Humour in advertising, she says, is not just about getting the laughs. “It is about creating a memorable and emotional connection with consumers.”
Why has humour taken a backseat over the past few years? While the past few years have seen brands’ preoccupation with purpose-led marketing, it is not only this, brands have been avoiding controversy and so have crafted messages that prioritise corporate responsibility over entertainment value.
This she says has stifled creativity, sidelining the once-vibrant tradition of humorous advertising.
“Crafting effective funny ads requires a delicate balance of insight, creativity, and risk-taking. It involves understanding the audience deeply, exploring unconventional ideas, and allowing room for experimentation. Successful campaigns often stem from a collaborative effort between creative minds willing to push boundaries and challenge conventions.
She adds when it done right, “humour can disarm scepticism, enhance brand recall, and foster positive associations. Its importance lies not only in entertaining but also in humanising brands and making them relatable.”
While the Totino’s Super Bowl Commercial 2025 Alien
A red carpet of celebrities
At the 2024 Creative Circle’s Full Circle event that gives feedback on Cannes, TBWA Hunt Lascaris JHB’s executive creative director, and a 2024 Direct Lions jury member, Keith Manning, mentions that celebrity endorsements are getting more popular.
#Cannes2024: Insights on some of the world’s best creative work
Danette Breitenbach 29 Jul 2024
This year celebrities featured strongly in Super Bowl adverts from Chris Hemsworth, Chris Pratt, and Kris Jenner, Antonio Banderas, Matthew McConaughey, Matthew McConaughey, Martha Stewart, Charli XCX, Michael Strassner, Orlando Bloom, Drew Barrymore, Harrison Ford, Adam Devin, Bill Murray, and Doja Cat, amongst others.
Brands that featured celebrities included MSC cruises, Taco Bell, Meta, Jeep, Bosch, Novartis, Coffee Mate, Bud Light, Stella Artois, Dove, FanDuel, Pringles, Yahoo, and Cirkulln to name a few.
I counted 29 ads that featured celebrities (and there could be more). The celebrity count for these 29 was 57!
I enjoyed this ad from Michelob ULTRA, Pickleball Hustle with Willem Dafoe, Catherine O’Hara, Sabrina Ionescu, Randy Moss, and Ryan Crouser.
A sea of dullness
But the Super Bowl adverts were not mind-blowing (in keeping with the on-field game). And perhaps this has to do with what Cannes forecaster Ann Nurock, calls ” a sea of dullness”.
In an era of burnout, disconnection, and emotional fatigue, 77% of individuals state they “just want to feel something, to feel alive” she says quoting the VML Intelligence Report.
In the article, Nurock talks about salesmanship vs showmanship.
She quotes Adam Morgan, that “emotionally engaging advertisements are significantly more likely to drive profits compared to uninspiring, non-emotional ones”.
The opportunity for brands to “showmanship” at the Super Bowl is massive. Was it taken up though?
What was certainly not dull was Mountain Dew’s Super Bowl ad for Baja Blast. Bizarre is probably a better word.
As MSN calls it a “terrifying version of him (Seal) with his head CGI spliced onto the body of a seal”.
Some fans loved it (many did) but some felt like me, and found it creepy.
AI puts in an appearance
While celebrities and honour are not new themes, this year saw AI and AI products a consistent theme in several adverts, from OpenAI’s Super Bowl debut to Google’s Gemini chatbot sharing cheese facts (incorrect facts apparently).
This is not surprising and AI will become more commonplace. This year the One Show, recognising the evolving role of AI in creative work, has introduced a new discipline, the Creative Use of Artificial Intelligence.
But doing AI adverts is far from foolproof. Remember Coca-Cola’s disastrous Happy Holidays AI generated advert that had consumers up in arms?
VML’s Jarred Cinman has tackled the topic of why generative video is so difficult in the ACA’s column AI in Advertsing.
Kantar’s GenAI for marketing: Fear or FOMO found that, despite senior marketers believing that GenAI is going to be a game-changer, most marketers are unprepared for GenAI.
Most watched Super Bowl spots
- Michelob Ultra’s The Ultra Hustle
- Disney+’s What If?
- Dove’s Keep Her Confident
- Ram’s Drive Your Own Story
- Mountain Dew’s Kiss From a Lime
- Uber Eats’ Century of Craving
- Dunkin’s DunKings 2: The Movie
- Coors Light’s Case of the Mondays
- Google Pixel’s Dream Job
- So Win
The New York Times
- ChatGPT’s The Intelligence Age
- Nike’s So Win
- National Football League’s Somebody
- Stella Artois’ David & Dave: The Other David
- Squarespace’s A Tale As Old As Websites
- The Foundation to Combat Antisemitism’s No Reason to Hate
- HexClad Cookware’s Unidentified Frying Object
- He Gets Us’ What is Greatness?
- Ritz Crackers’ Ritz Salty Club
- Science Moms’ By the Time.
- Mountain Dew
- Ritz Crackers
- Dunkin
- Nike’s commercials
- Duracell’s Brady Reboost
- Angel Soft’s The Big Game Potty-tunity
- On’s “Elmo and Roger Federer’s letters of the day
- Dunkin’
- Ritz Crackers
- Uber Eats
- Mountain Dew’s ads
- Häagen-Dazs’ Not So Fast, Not So Furious
- Booking.com’s Get your stay ridiculously right
- Novartis’ Your Attention, Please
- Little Caesars’ Whoa!
- Pringles’ The Call of The Mustaches.
USA Today
The USA Today’s Ad Meter contest, based on an open panel of regular TV viewers rating ads on a five-point scale, found the top-ranked ads:
- Budweiser’s First Delivery
- Lay’s The Little Farmer
- Michelob Ultra’s The Ultra Hustle
- Stella Artois’ David and Dave
- NFL’s Somebody and Flag 50
- Bud Light’s Big Men on Cul-De-Sac
- Uber Eats’ Century of Cravings
- Hellmann’s When Sally Met Hellmann’s
- Pfizer’s Knock Out
Retail Wire’s Tom Ryan compiled this list.
Booking.com’s most-watched Super Bowl spots viewed on you Tube was Jim Henson’s Muppets, with Ram Trucks: Goldilocks & the Three Trucks featuring Glen Powell second and Made by Google: Dream Job – Google Pixel SB in third place.
