SoundBite Bowl Part VIII

Toyota, "Corolla" –FG: good demonstration of a benefit, good use of fierce badgers

“Leatherheads”—incomplete: just because it’s a football movie doesn’t mean you can get away with a mediocre promo

Garmin GPS, "Napoleon"—FG: good punch line, good use of music

SoundBite Bowl Part VII

Budweiser, "Clydesdale - Team"—FG: People will like this one, but did it really need to be 60 seconds?

“Iron Man”—incomplete: how many times can you watch a hero blithely walk away while stuff blows up before it gets boring?

SoundBite Bowl Part VI

FedEx, "Carrier Pigeons"—FG: this one will get a lot of watercooler buzz

Cars.com, "Warrior named Glondor"—FG: funniest spot of the night until...

Tide to go—Touchdown: My favorite so far, by far. Great job of selling the benefits. I know why I’d buy this product.

SoundBite Bowl Part V

Wanted promo—FG: Jolie as eye candy will get butts in seats

Gatorade "Jeter"—FG: Manning and Parcels at the end save this spot

Go Daddy—fumble: Go Daddy officially jumps the shark

Dell—FG: good use of surprise and Mick Jagger on vocals

SoundBite Bowl Part IV

Bridgestone—FG: you can’t go wrong with screaming animals

Doritos—incomplete: this was basically an ad for the artist, and for user-generated content. No one will remember Doritos.

“Unhitched” promo—FG: watching a guy lick a baby’s head is funny. Probably the only funny moment this show offers, but if you’re going to promo it, that’s the way to go.

American Idol promo—FG: made it seem like this season is something special, even though it’s probably not. With the Super Bowl and Idol, Fox is a juggernaut.

SoundBite Bowl Part III

Bud Light, "Wine and Cheese"–incomplete: I like the giant cheese, but it ended up with the same old beer commercial clichés

Under Armor, "Cross Trainer"–incomplete: Overambitious; looked like they watched 300, the Mac “1984” spot, and Spiderman too many times before putting this spot together. As my son Alex said: “That was all about shoes?”

SoundBite Bowl Part II

Pepsi Max – FG: lots of stars, good punch line tied to the brand

SalesGenie, "Salesman of the Year"– incomplete: Not as bad as last year’s, but still too infomercial-y. I thought their pregame spot was better, even though it looked like an eSurance ad.

Fox, “Terminator” promo—incomplete: nothing special

SoundBite Bowl Part I

Here are my scores for the first round of ads:

Bud Light “Fire” – FG: Funny spot from existing campaign that will work for the target audience. Remains to be seen how many bottles of beer it will sell, but it will get watercooler buzz tomorrow.

Audi "The Godfather: R8 Sports Car" – Incomplete (originally a fumble, but upon further review I'm giving this one an upgrade): So is this spot saying that the old Audi was inferior? How does that make me feel if I’m an Audi loyalist? Good use of a Godfather reference, and pretty car footage, but this seems like a step backward.

All night I'll be blogging about the Super Bowl ads, pretty much as they happen. Add your comments and let me know what you think about what you're watching (or what you watched, if you're reading this postgame).

Multitasking during the SuperBowl

In addition to watching the ads and blogging my response (starting with the first commercial break after kickoff), I'll also be following the live chat during AdFreak's special SuperAdFreak coverage.

Just a comment on Fox's coverage so far: between the Declaration of Independence thing, and the Giants' faux press conference, it looks like hyperbole meter is turned up to 11. (Shocking, I know, given Fox's usual restraint.)

SoundBite Bowl to keep score of ads

I'm planning to post during the Super Bowl tomorrow, giving each ad one of the following scores:

Touchdown: a game-changing ad, something that has a substantial, positive effect on the advertiser's brand

Field Goal: an ad that scores points for the brand, but doesn't quite go all the way

Incomplete: an ad that doesn't connect, moving the brand neither forward nor backward

Fumble: an ad that totally drops the ball and has a negative effect on the brand

As always, comments are welcome. I'd like to hear whether your initial impressions match mine, before we're all influenced by what we read in the paper and hear at the watercooler on Monday.

P.S. I'm posting this from my phone, so I apologize for any formatting errors.