Writer's challenge: At odds over the ads

Writer's challenge: At odds over the ads

By DANIEL B. HONIGMAN and JENNIFER GILLAN

Staff Writers

Judged by DANIEL GVERTZ, and special guest judge JEREMY BURTON

Sports Editor and News Editor

Donovan McNabb made mistakes, and the Patriots won by an Adam Vinatieri field goal - just like everyone knew but nobody wanted to admit would be true.

But what was the real story behind the Super Bowl this year?

It wasn't the players on the field, or Joe Buck's amazing play-by-play. No, we're here to find out what the best commercials were for this year's Super Bowl. Let's get to the writers!

Sex sells best

Daniel B. Honigman

After the 2004 Super Bowl halftime debacle, it was known that the 2005 version would be more sterile than a dog adopted from the Humane Society, and less interesting than Ben Stein on Valium.

Exit Janet and JT, enter Paul McCartney.

Let's face it: the Super Bowl is the one football game of the year that draws in peripheral fans. In addition to that, it's the one time of the year that people actually are anxious, believe it or not, to watch commercials.

Most of you probably agree the 2005 crop of ads were devoid of anything groundbreaking. When originality and inspiration are lacking, one must revert to a time-proven method of selling a product.

Sex.

Hey, it sells. Sex sells lots of useless junk that nobody in their right mind would buy if their fancies weren't tickled and titillated by the product image.

So think for a second - what's the most boring thing ever that you would never buy without being sexually coerced? For some people, it might be an $8.95 web domain.

Bring the bombshell with the skimpy top before a Senate subcommittee promoting www.godaddy.com - keep in mind that these people were the same seemingly anti-fun Senators who chastised Janet and the MTV Network last year, and the end result is a very entertaining commercial.

It's probable that the hit count for www.godaddy.com rose as much as the old conservative Orrin Hatch types who were left reaching for their Viagra and oxygen tanks.

All in all, it was an amusing, delightfully chauvinistic, yet sexy commercial in an otherwise off year for Super Bowl advertising.

DG: I don't care what anyone says, any time you have "Viagra" and "oxygen tanks" in the same statement, let alone the same sentence, you've struck gold. I watched that commercial, very closely as you all might assume, and I didn't have a single clue as to how much the web domains actually cost.

Statistical evidence: 6 of 10

Strength of argument: 8 of 10

Overall entertainment: 9 of 10

Total: 23 of 30

JB: Struck gold? Please. I'll give kudos for bringing up Ben Stein in this argument, but that's just about it. And you make it seem like a bad thing that McCartney was brought in for Janet and JT. The former Beatle put on the best halftime show I've ever seen. As for the www.godaddy.com commercial, it was flat-out stupid. End of story.

Statistical evidence: 5 of 10

Strength of argument: 4 of 10

Entertainment value: 7 of 10

Total: 16 of 30

MC Hammer: The Return

Jennifer Gillan

Gold sparkly pants, a '72 Impala, cute little kids and a dog were the best way to emblazon a product on Super Bowl viewers this year.

No matter who you are or where you are from, you've had "that" neighbor: the one who cringes at the laughs of children, gloats in the misfortune of a lost wiffle ball, and refuses to return items that are rightfully yours. If only I knew that a bag of Lay's potato chips were the correct bartering material, maybe I could have saved Hollywood Hair Barbie from her horrible fate after my brother threw her over Mrs. Sullivan's fence.

Rest in peace, Hollywood Hair.

But, that's beside the point. Frito-Lay struck gold with their advertisement and I'm not talking about MC Hammer's pants.

Who would have thought that in the year 2005 Hammer would make his comeback during a commercial spot that cost $2.4 million? To see Hammer sport that ridiculous outfit, haircut and glasses that were so hip back in the day left the inner child of the 1980s inside all of us smiling. Way to go, Frito-Lay.

Honigman, you can't touch this.

DG: This is going to be close, I can feel it. The references were there for the taking, and you took each and every one of them. I'm only left wondering two things, why in God's name would they pick MC Hammer? And how much did they have to pay him to be tossed BACK over the fence at the end of the commercial? The hair, the glasses, THE PANTS! Like Napoleon Dynamite's mean uncle, I wish it were 1982 again.

Statistical evidence: 8 of 10

Strength of argument: 7 of 10

Entertainment value: 9 of 10

Total: 24 of 30

JB: I can't say much here since I missed the MC Hammer commercial, but it's still automatically better than the godaddy.com ad. And any commercial that brings to mind "The Sandlot" is a winner in my book. (Though where's the love for the cat-murdering boyfriend commercial?)

Statistical evidence: 9 of 10

Strength of argument: 8 of 10

Entertainment value: 9 of 10

Total: 26 of 30

Looks like got Honigman got rocked! Final score: Jen "The Mightiest Maniac" Gillan over Dan "sorry man, sex didn't sell us on this one" Honigman, 50 to 39. So much for this being a close one.