Today's question: Top Super Bowl commercial?

A popular Volkswagen commercial during the Super Bowl features a boy dressed as Darth Vader.

Reporters from Tribune newspapers around the nation give their take on the question of the day. Leave a comment with your opinion, and check back all day for updates.

Which Super Bowl commercial was your favorite?

Steve Johnson, Chicago Tribune

With its masterful storytelling, the VW Darth Vader spot was perhaps technically more admirable. But there was no ad I enjoyed more than Richard Lewis playing a lumberjack for Snickers. Seeing the hipster comic give Hollywood attitude -- "I'm just not feeling the wood-cutting thing today" -- in a Hollywood suit amid giant felled logs was an inspired example of casting a celebrity against his image for humor. It was funny again when eating a Snickers turned Lewis back into a woodsman.

While the ad didn't need to end with Roseanne getting smacked by a giant log, she does still have that national anthem to atone for, and it was at least more creative than Pepsi Max's can to the privates. With Ozzy Osbourne, the Bieber, Faith Hill, Kenny G and Adrien Brody being trotted out, who would have thought Lewis and Eminem (for Chrysler) would be the only two celebs put to really good use?

VIDEO: See all the Super Bowl ads here
Diane Pucin, Los Angeles Times
 
I think I have to cheat here and offer two favorites.

The first is the bear who takes her kid bears on a trip to McDonalds for fries because they got good grades. OK, that might not be the healthiest way to reward good behavior, but, heck, it's what my mom did sometimes. And who doesn't love bears?

And the Emimem salute to his hometown of Detroit, through Chrysler, was as good as a mini-documentary. Could he expand on that, give us more? That was our sense at our gathering when it was over. Maybe if I'm Chrysler I'd have preferred more of the car to have been celebrated, but clearly Emimem has strong feelings for his roots and that transferred over to Chrysler. And the production value? Wow. The film noir-ish sense added to the mood and made the spot a bit edgy, but the chorus at the end made it feel traditional.

Most of the spots I liked had a family theme. Or animals. Or a family of animals. Might be time to take the dogs to McDonalds.

Hal Boedeker, Orlando Sentinel

This year's Super Bowl commercials showcased animals, from the Bridgestone beaver to the CareerBuilder chimps to the hard-working dogs of Bud Light.

But my favorite spot featured the Doritos pug dog, who was lovingly photographed like a glamorous Hollywood star.

The commercial had a straightforward underdog story: A man behind a glass door teases the little dog. The dog gets its revenge by knocking down the door and flattening the man. The dog wants those chips.

There was a good story behind the commercial as well: It was part of the Crash the Super Bowl contest that allowed the public to submit spots for Pepsi Max and Doritos.

The story gets better. The pug dog connected with viewers and tied for first -- with the Bud Light dogs -- in the USA Today Ad Meter.

So there's a big payoff for JR Burningham, the web designer behind the Doritos ad. He will collect $1 million from Frito-Lay, Doritos' parent company.

Super Bowl Sunday is about winning the big prize. There's something so right about a Super Bowl commercial yielding a big prize.

I liked other commercials: Volkswagen's little Darth Vader, Best Buy's wacky use of Justin Bieber and Ozzy Osbourne, and the Snickers spot in which a log flattened Roseanne.

But for me, the pug dog make the biggest impression. There was something so beautiful about the way that animal ran across the screen.

Dom Amore, Hartford Courant

First, a confession: I've never completely bought into the Super Bowl commercials hype. I've always seen it as brilliant, but transparent commercial-for-the-commercial, to make us pay attention instead of going to the remote, the john or the buffet area.

But rather than be left out of the water cooler conversations, I do sneak a peek. Nothing Sunday really jumped out; it won't go down as a great game for commercials. Danica Patrick has no more shock value. The one commercial that did get me to say, 'oh,  that was cool,' was the Bridgestone commercial called "carma," where the guy swerves to avoid the beaver, then six months later the same beaver knocks down a tree to keep him from driving onto a washed-out bridge.

It was warm, fuzzy and funny, it was tasteful and, most importantly, it was effective. I'm talking about Bridgestone's product this morning, am I not?

Source: http://www.chicagobreakingsports.com/2011/02/todays-question-top-super-bowl-commercial.html

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