SNL's Super Bowl Ad: MacGruber Drinks Pepsi?

Debate all you want about who had the best or the funniest Super Bowl ad on Sunday (two of the "amateur" Doritos contest entries placed in the top five in USA Today's insta-poll, with one winning $1 million for coming out on top), but only one of these ads was not like the others. Did you pick the Saturday Night Live "MacGruber" sketch for Pepsi, aka PepSuber? If not, you should have.

SNL's PepSuber spot ranked 44th out of the 50 ads surveyed by USA Today, and Nikki Finke over at Deadline Hollywood Daily called it her least favorite of the night. MediaBistro's AgencySpy and Stuart Elliott at The New York Times were among many observers who couldn't figure out exactly what was going on. Let me help explain what happened. Especially since Entertainment Weekly's PopWatch tried to yesterday but has since removed its post?! Interesting. That post had alleged that Pepsi wanted to buy promotional space during SNL, and if you saw SNL this past weekend with host Steve Martin, you noticed not one, but three MacGruber-Pepsi sketches, each one ramping up the amount of Pepsi content to ridiculous proportions in the third and final spot. For my full recap of SNL #34.15 with Steve Martin, click here.

Truth is, the sketches with Will Forte (MacGruber), Kristen Wiig (assistant Vicky) and special guest assistant Richard Dean Anderson (reprising his role as TV's MacGyver) were never originally supposed to be part of the SNL broadcast, which is why all three bits aired during the commercial blocks. According to my sources, SNL agreed to produce three Super Bowl ads for Pepsi, but as Sunday approached, the show started to think that they might not air during the big game. In fact, PepsiCo only informed reporters on Sunday that they'd air SNL's PepSuber ad, according to the Wall Street Journal. But NBC didn't have this information on Saturday night, and the show didn't want to have put in all of that time, effort and money for nothing. So they aired them as in-house ads during breaks of SNL. Which only confused viewers more that night, and frustrated folks on the show as well. Are these ads or sketches? Is SNL in the product-placement business now? Are we heading back to the early days of TV comedy, when Milton Berle was emcee of The Texaco Star Theater? So many questions. Actually, I only brought up three just then, but you may have more to add to the proceedings. If Pepsi had shown all three of the ads on Sunday, viewers would have enjoyed the surprise and bought in to both the comedy and celebrity aspects of the MacGruber/MacGyver/Pepsi triangle. Only airing the second spot threw non-SNL viewers for a loop. They didn't see humor so much as they saw SNL comedians hawking Pepsi. And NBC's decision to air the ads during SNL also threw viewers for a loop. They saw the humor in MacGruber -- Forte is always very funny in this anti-MacGyver character -- but couldn't help asking why he was drinking Pepsi, and thinking, is SNL now sponsoring products? It's one thing for SNL to spoof advertising -- this past weekend included a spot for "Chewable Pampers," after all -- or for the actors from SNL to endorse a product in a commercial. But when you cannot tell if an SNL sketch is an actual advertisement or a spoof, then where's the joke in that?

Comments

[nodadchad]

As a long time SNL fan (haven't missed a new episode since the late 80's) I thought that the commercials during the SNL broadcast were genius points of advertising. They appeared during commercials breaks where they should. I would much rather see McGruber than freecredit­report.com jerks again.

[CFAmick]

Lorne Michaels is one of the most underrated business geniuses of our time.

[Yat1954]

Hey, I kept getting hassled by a koala once in a bar, and I finally waltzed his Matilda right off the barstool, if you know what I mean. Flattened that little sucker, and he had the nerve to demand I buy him another eucalyptus martini!

[Testiculus]

What is so new about SNL hawking a product, they just got finished with their campaign of hawking a political neophyte into office.

[irisda]

yeah I watched that bit and got confused. I didn't like it honestly

[L. Rozner]

Now I remeber, it was a take-off of the "Call for Phillip Morris" ad that "I Love Lucy" made. That's how I remember that Phillip Morris was one of their sponsors. Sorry about that.

[Dukedraven]

We're back to the old days of Milton Berle and Johnny Carson, embarassingly hawking products on-air. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

[L. Rozner]

Funny this whole MacGruber thing was mentioned. I know it's not exactly the wittiest part of SNL (I've always regarded the Robert Smigel TV Funhouse segment the best part - Why haven't they done it at all this season?) but there's just something about MacGruber that you just can't seem to ignore. I think it's the theme song. Then again I shamelessly get a good gufaw out of deep-throated announcers in comedy sketches (ie: The ass stamp from "Conan O'Brien".)

I do recall that in an episode of "I Love Lucy", where she climbs into an empty TV set to trick Ricky that she was on a show, and she advetised some brand of cigarette inside the set. I belive it was Lucky Strike, but I'd have to check again. I think they're also one of the sponsors of "I Love Lucy" so I don't think it's anything new. I suppose the best response to this is to make as much fun of the product you're advetising without biting the hand that feeds you. Sometimes a couple nips at the fingers might come in handy. Case in point, a classic TV Funhouse bit on SNL that made fun of NBC's parent company, GE, for its weapons contracts. You can find it on the SNL DVD "The Best of Saturday TV Funhouse", but it's a special feature that isn't part of the main feature just to sneak around NBC Universal's parent company. Plus, it's pretty funny too.

[Manx]

In general, the Superbow ads were violence oriented with smashing glass, an office workers being hurled through a plate glass window, a heavy object thrown at a man's crotch (with the force that could make him a soprano) skiers running into stationary objects (that could be fatal in reality) and Koala bears being punched in the face. Funny as a train wreck. Obviously, Madison Avenue has been taken over by a Animal House frats and sadistic juveniles. There was no creativity.

[BannedFromCommenting]

I think it was funny! I first thought spoof, but by 3rd I thought oh Pepsi sponsored it.. but I didnt think a great idea. But I then saw it on Superbowl Sunday, THEN I realized the SNL bits were like "previews" or early views of the commercials... Which THEN I didnt mind, as lots of commercials use tv characters or actors.

MACGRUBER!­!!!!!!!!!!

[CFAmick]

The MacGruber skits with Shia LeBoeuf were hilarious.

[bugsbonzai]

"Are we heading back to the early days of TV comedy, when Milton Berle was emcee of The Texaco Star Theater?"

Quick answer: yes. Absolutely. 100%. Tivo and DVR's guarantee a change in advertising so the products are in places and times during the broadcast that people might actually see them. It's common sense. Technology has forced it, and it'll only get more prevalent in years to come!