In the past decade or so, the commercial breaks during the Super Bowl have become almost as highly anticipated as the actual game itself. It’s not just a bunch of advertisers interrupting the game anymore; it’s advertisers interrupting the game with [insert popular celebrity here] and that makes it fun! 

Motives and intentions aside however, as someone who doesn’t really understand or care about football, these commercials give me something to look forward to during the game, which I appreciate; it makes me feel more involved in the experience, even if it’s not the main part of it. 

I did not watch the Super Bowl live this year, but that didn’t stop me from watching the commercials; I found a 40 minute compilation of all of them on YouTube the next day, and hunkered down to binge them back to back. 

While a few stood out, for the most part, I thought the offerings were pretty weak this year. They signaled that the market has become oversaturated more so than any other set I’ve seen. A lot of them were incredibly lazy, expecting the celebrities featured to carry the entire thing. I didn’t have nearly as much fun with them this year as I have in the past. That being said, here are my picks for the five best and worst Super Bowl LVII commercials. 

Best 

1. Bradley Cooper and his mom for T-Mobile: Kicking off the list, we have the weakest of the top five. This one was little more than an excuse to feature Bradley Cooper. However, that little more was just enough to earn it a spot. The banter between Cooper and his mother as he tries to do a somewhat run of the mill T-Mobile commercial was fun and light. It wasn’t anything award winning, but in a pool of pretty lackluster offerings, it shined just enough to stand out.
2. Workday Rockstars: The connection between the joke of this one and the celebrities featured is a bit of a stretch, but there’s just enough there for it to still be fun and enjoyable. It centers around the idea of legendary rock stars such as Ozzy Osbourne and Billy Idol saying how corporate workers need to stop calling each other “rockstars.” It wasn’t anything amazing, but the angle was unique enough to be memorable.
3. David Grohl for Crown Royal: This one earned the spot it did more so out of lack of anything better to take its place. Foo Fighters’ David Grohl listing off a bunch of things that come from Canada, including Crown Royal, isn’t that funny in itself, but between some of the things they list, such as Micheal Cera and egg cartons, as well as the high paced energy with which it’s edited, its elevate high enough to attract attention. 
4. Adam Driver for Squarespace: I genuinely enjoyed this one for how plainly absurd and weird it was; it didn’t feel like I was settling for something “good enough” as it did with most of the other ads. For a brand that is more or less known for run of the mill, repetitive YouTube ads, this was a surprising, refreshing change. The observation that “Squarespace is a website that makes websites” isn’t that funny on it’s own, but the way they blow it out of proportion with this uber cinematic, Matrix style spectacle is just stupid enough without tipping into cringey, fake relatable territory. It walks the line well. 
5. Breaking Bad cast for PopCorners: I might be a bit biased as I just finished watching “Breaking Bad” for the first time, but of all of the 2023 Super Bowl commercials, I enjoyed this one the most. You can tell that Aaron Paul and Bryan Cranston, the show’s two leads, had a lot of fun with it, as well as Raymond Cruz, reprising his role as Tuco. They all did these really over the top, overacted performances that were a lot of fun to see, especially Paul. I’m sure there is a deeper appreciation for those who have seen the show, but even for those who haven’t, it’s just a fun, absurd ad about replacing the meth in “Breaking Bad” with chips. I appreciated that there felt like an actual purpose for the tie in, unlike many of the other ads. Although I’ve since tried PopCorners and didn’t think they were that great, I really enjoyed this ad and the genuine sense of fun it had. 

Worst

1. Ma&ya’s: This one failed from the beginning for me as I didn’t understand the tie between M&Ms and Maya Rudolph; their explanation that everyone loves M&Ms as much as Maya Rudolph was not only very random, but pretty untrue. I don’t have anything against Maya Rudolph per say, but I don’t think she’s all that funny, or at least she hasn’t been since SNL. Therefore, I didn’t think the humor of the ad was anything extraordinary; it felt like an attempt at random Gen Z comedy that completely fell on its face. The idea of clam flavored M&Ms isn’t that funny, it’s just strange. If they wanted to appeal to random humor, they should’ve done like…void flavored M&Ms or TV static flavored M&Ms. That would’ve at least elicited a chuckle from me. 
2. Will Farrell for GM: While I’m somewhat neutral on Maya Rudolph, I lean more towards dislike on Will Farrell, per the slightly lower ranking. I could see an argument that “everyone” likes Maya Rudolph more so than one that everyone likes Will Farrell. This was the epitome of “what ‘popular’ celebrity can we get to drive our car?” Will Farrell could have easily been replaced with someone else and it would’ve made little difference. The gimmick with him in different shows, some more easily identifiable than others, was incredibly weak. I don’t think anyone was flipping out to see Will Farrell in a Hellfire Club shirt. 
3. Garden of Eden Avocados: This one was just strange, but not in a good or funny way. It felt really random. What the tie is between Avocados from Mexico and the Garden of Eden, I couldn’t begin to tell you. It feels like they had the ad spot, but they were running out of time to come up with something, so this was the best they could do last minute. 
4. E*TRADE Baby Wedding: This one completely relies on this gimmick with the babies, and as soon as that fails, which is right out the gate, it’s just a straightforward commercial for this service. Sure, the babies were cute, but they didn’t carry the whole commercial like they wanted them to. 
5. Pringles Hand in Can with Meghan Trainor: For whatever reason, this one just really annoyed me. Of any I saw, it felt like the most unnecessary inclusion of a celebrity, being Meghan Trainor. She had no reason to be there other than that she’s Meghan Trainor. I don’t mind the celebrity tie-ins, but I like for there to be some kind of identifiable reason for it, and there wasn’t any here. Beyond that, it was just a stupid joke. 

Special Mention 

Temu: This one was just weird because neither myself nor anyone else I talked to seemed to know exactly what it was. I guess it’s short of like Shein but different? And they sell wigs? It seemed like an attempt to start buzz off of confusion more than actual promotion for the service.