Super Bowl Sunday provided as good a game as can be played without the Eagles, and that in-game excitement helped to bail out the very lackluster crop of ads. Here I give out awards to the ones that were notable IMHO:

We’re Crashing the Party Award – Cash 4 Gold

I was thinking this was going to be a spoof, but no it was a legitimate ad to take your valuables, put them in an envelope and trust someone on the other side of the Postal Service will send you back a check. That’s one shady outfit that should not have been there.

Why Are We Here? Award – GoDaddy

Different than the crashing the party award because they make sense having Super Bowl ad space, they just weren’t at all interesting in utilizing it, instead using lurid poses and choppy edits to get to you to their website. I didn’t bother.

WTF Award – Sobe

Ballerina football players, dancing lizards, 3D. I have no idea WTF Sobe is trying to say.

USA! USA! Award – Budweiser

Budweiser may be the King of Beers but it appears to have even higher aspirations, as being the epitome of Americana with apple pie, baseball and Coca-Cola. That’s at least my interpretation of the goal behind these Norman Rockwell-esque Clydesdale series of ads, including this one that tackled immigration.

Funniest Ad Award – Doritos

This had some tough competition, but the Doritos fortune telling ad had a 30 Rock quality to the humor that did make me laugh out loud.

Artsiest Ad Award – Coca-Cola

We didn’t see much of Coke this year (and not until after halftime, cheapskates), but when we did one ad was a beautifully designed and animated ad of bugs heist a picnicke’rs bottle of soda that could easily be a submission for the next Fantasia, it was that well done.

Best Ad Award – Hulu

Their first big exposure (that I know of) was taking the most obvious criticism of their service, that people watch too much TV already, and turned it into a premise for their ad in a very out-of-the-box sort of way. Brilliant.