Statistics show 43 percent of people watch the Super Bowl just to see the commercials, according to Statista.com. Sixty percent of women say that's why they watch they championship game, while 24 percent of men say they tune in for the commercials as well. Here's what BYU-Hawaii students said were the commercials that stood out to them during the 2022 Super Bowl.
Mac Bradshaw, a junior from Tennessee majoring in political science, said in one commercial, children and a pregnant woman are shown drinking what appears to look like beer cans, but to his surprise, the cans are actually filled with water.
At the end of the ad, the audience is informed, “Don’t be scared. It’s just water.”
Bradshaw said the brand, liquid death, has a slogan which reads “murder your thirst.” The humor is found in the shock of seeing children drinking but learning that it is only water they are drinking, he added. He said the ad subverted his expectations and made him laugh.
Football nostalgia
Sheridan Manaea, an upcoming anthropology major from Kapolei, said she enjoyed watching the Super Bowl LVI “Bring Down the House” commercial. She shared her admiration for the graphics and how each player’s design and expression were personalized.
Two kids are seen playing a football video game and the characters come running through the screen and wrecking their house. The characters, she added, were animated and caricatured versions of famous former football players like Troy Polamalu, Jerome Bettis and Walter Payton. She said it was nostalgic and entertaining to watch the different players performing their signature moves and celebratory dances.
According to the website Little Black Book, creative agency 72andSunny Los Angeles used 3D technology, realistic puppetry and human physicality to animate 25 major former National Football League players. Symbolizing football altogether, the spot illustrates the “NFL’S past, present and future through a totally new innovative approach,” the article says, quoting NFL Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer Tim Ellis.
Love for cars
Matthew Hekking, a freshman from Kaysville, Utah majoring in business management, said he was intrigued by BMW’s commercial sporting the new iX M60, an electric motor model. Electric cars are becoming more popular due to rising gas prices, he added. “They’re not putting as much emission out into the atmosphere as cars that use gas.”
The ad stars actor Arnold Schwarzenegger and actress Salma Hayek as Zeus and Hera retiring from Mount Olympus and residing in Palm Springs. Zeus is frustrated because he is supplying electricity to multiple citizens in Palm Springs. Phillip Ellis, on the MensHealth website, explains, “Sensing he could do with a ‘pick me up,’ Hayek’s Hera treats Zeus to a new car: the BMX iX … which won’t require any jumpstarts from a lightning bolt.”
Upcoming Marvel series
Accompanied by phenomenal cinematography, Hekking said he is interested in seeing how the multiverse will expand in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Seeing Wanda Maximoff go from being a hero to a villain was very eye-dreaming, he added.
Hekking shared how Doctor Strange and Wanda Maximoff both possess magical powers. Doctor Strange, he shared, is also known as Sorcerer Supreme because he is a sorcerer in the MCU who is depicted as a hero. Wanda Maximoff is known to be an antihero in the comics but has been depicted in “WandaVision” as a young hero harboring magical capabilities because of the infinity stone, he explained.
Journalist Justin Carter, in an article on the Gizmodo website, says following the events of “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” “the multiverse is in disarray, and it’s up to Stephen Strange to set things right again.”
The upcoming film is linked with Disney+ “WandaVision” and “Loki,” and sees Benedict’s Cumberbatch’s Dr. Strange seeking the assistance of Wanda Maximoff, played by Elizabeth Olsen, whom he considers “the closest thing to an expert on the multiverse,” says Carter.
Hekking said he recalls hearing Disney+ announcing the upcoming series back in 2018, which excited him. The trailer offers a dark vibe while introducing the title character fighting people, he added. “For me, that’s something that really got me excited, just to be able to see how much detail Marvel’s putting into the show, to the character itself.”
On the website Deadline Hollywood, Tom Tapp, a deputy managing editor, says in the series, Oscar Isaacs plays Steven Grant, who suffers from dissociative identity disorder and shares a body with mercenary Marc Spector. Together, Tapp explains they must “navigate their complex identities while thrust into a deadly mystery revolving around the powerful gods of Egypt.”
Tapp says the series has a hard edge to it, according to Marvel Studios President Kevin Feige. Quoting Feige, Tapp shares, “There are moments when Moon Knight is wailing on another character and it is loud and brutal.”