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2012 Celebrity Crash the Super Bowl entries

Posted by Beardy on November 28th, 2011

Doritos: Larger Than Life

It’s been about a week now since the submission period for the 2012 Crash the Super Bowl contest closed and in total it looks like Doritos recived 4,829 entries.  That’s an all time record.  Sure, some of those submissions are duplicates but not many.  This year the Doritos team did a great job of keeping the repeat submissions out of the contest gallery.  In fact, I’d estimate that only 1% of this year’s ads are duplicates.   If we ignore the fact that a few of the entries are repeats, a little math tells us that your odds of making the Top Five are 1 in 965.  That makes this year’s Crash the Super Bowl the most difficult video contest to win, EVER.  So if you entered this year and if you have friends that are really psyched about your chances, you might want to mention the “1 in 965″ odds to them so they won’t be too crushed if you don’t make the finals.

As I explained in my previous post, this year I’m trying to watch (at least a few seconds of) every, single CTSB entry.  My goal is to compile a list of all the best submissions.  (If you made an awesome entry and want to be considered for the list, leave your link in a comment to my last post.)  While scrolling through the contest gallery, every once in a while I’ll come across a commercial that has a recognizable face or two in it.  Over the years, a few “celebrities” have appeared in Crash the Super Bowl entries but using known actors seems to be a big trend this year.

But personally, I think using celebrities in a CTSB entry is a really awful idea for everyone involved.  Before I get into “why” it’s a bad idea, take a minute and check out this Crash the SuperBowl entry featuring Jenny McCarthy.  I can’t embed CTSB videos so you’ll have to click on the image to view it on the contest site:

click to view.

That was seriously a pretty good entry.  The production values where top notch, the premise was funny, the women all looked very nice and it ended with a strong punchline.  I actually think it would be a major contender if it did NOT feature a celebrity.  As it is, there’s just something off-putting about this submission.  It causes the viewer to wonder, “Why the hell is Jenny McCarthy in a Crash the Super Bowl entry?”  And that question leads to more questions like “Is she broke?”  “Does she really need the $25,000 finalist prize that badly?  “Or does she just want the attention of being in a Super Bowl ad?”  But here’s the most relevant question; if Jenny McCarthy wants to do commercials, why doesn’t she just do some?  Is she un-castable or something these days? (NOTE: The answers to all these questions have been answered by one of the directors of this spot! Scroll down for the full story.)

So you see, if you’re a recognizable actor, doing a Crash the Super Bowl entry is is a huge gamble.  Like I said, there’s only a 1 in 965 chance of making the finals.  But there’s a 100% chance that people will wonder why the heck you would stoop to entering a video contest. Ok…maybe some celebrities enter the contest just for the fun of it.  But if a famous person wanted to make a goofy video for fun, they could just do a FunnyorDie sketch for free.  So most of them enter for the obvious reason; the prizes for winning are money and exposure.  But looking desperate for either of those things is not good for an actor’s image.

And I also think it’s a mistake for filmmakers to feature major or minor celebrities in their Doritos ads.  In a way, it goes against the entire point and premise of the Crash the Super Bowl contest.  Doritos runs The Crash every year because they want to find something they can’t get from Hollywood or from a big, Madison Avenue ad firm.  They want quirky, crazy, outside-of-the-box ideas.   In short, they want “User Generated Content.”

The description for Jenny McCarthy’s ad lists two directors.  I googled them and it turns out one of them is her ex-husband.  And he’s also an known actor.  He’s done a lot of TV directing too.  So this entry is the exact OPPOSITE of user-generated content.  Actually, it’s hollywood’s take on user-generated content.  And that is the thing that bothers me most about these “celebrity” entries.  They have an air of hubris to them.  It’s like an NBA player walking onto a basketball court in a big city, public park thinking he’s going to blow everyone’s minds just because he’s a pro.  But no one likes it when a pro chooses to compete against amateurs simply because they’ll be easier to beat. Before I make another weird analogy, check out this other CTSB entry that features boy-banders Lance Bass and AJ Mclean:

Again, click to view.

Now that ad wasn’t so great.  The only thing it has going for it is that it has two famous people in it.  But right now, the people that produced this ad are probably patting themselves on the back for being smart enough/rich enough/well connected enough to cast Lance Bass and AJ Mclean. They didn’t have to waste time writing a stronger script because two celebrities trump great writing any day…right?

Let’s be honest; the vast majority of Crash the Super Bowl entries are awful.  It’s very hard for an “average joe” to make a tight, professional looking 30 second commercial for no money.  And that’s why I think celebrities agree to be in CTSB ads.  Some friend or nephew or ex-husband finds the contest and thinks, “wow, these commercials all suck! If I spent a few grand and hired a real crew and got my pal, insert-celebrity’s name here to be in my video I would win easy!”  But these folks don’t “get” the contest.  Presumably they think that their celebrity entry will be much more desirable than the thousands of entries that just feature regular jerk-offs from Nowheresville, USA.  If Doritos has to choose between a commercial that features Jenny McCarthy and a commercial that features a bunch of nobodies, Doritos will obviously pick the Jenny McCarthy ad…right?

Wrong.  Because if Doritos wanted to air a commercial featuring Jenny McCarthy in a bikini, they would just hire Jenny McCarthy and stick he in a bikini.  They wouldn’t bother to run a 10 million dollar “consumer generated” commercial contest if they wanted a  typical, “hollywood” ad.  So I don’t think we’ll ever see a “celebrity” entry make the CTSB finals.  If we did, it would probably mark the end of the entire contest.  Because if Doritos tells us that to win, an entry should have a celebrity in it, why would us regular jerk-offs from Nowheresville even bother to compete?

The entries that have recognizable actors in them are pretty interesting though.  Some of them are pretty good and some of them are a little lame.  Some where clearly made by pros with deep pockets who were able to hire known actors, while other entries seem like maybe they were made by the celebrity’s nephew and the actor is appearing as a favor.  Here are the 2011 celebrity ads I’ve been able to find so far.  If you see any other ones, leave a link in the comments.

The Eric Roberts Show: Featuring Eric Roberts:

I always liked Eric Roberts. And he's actually pretty funny in this.

Tasty as Charged: Featuring Jerry Adler:

You might not recognize the name but this guy has been in a billion TV shows and movies

Eyes Teeth: Featuring Sam Lloyd:

It's Ted from Scrubs! And he's in a weirdly hilarious CTSB entry!

Party Time:  Featuring Blake Clark and Peter Dante:

Wait a second...both of these guys have been in a ton of Adam Sandler movies. I wonder who made this spot.

Despite my bitching, some of those were pretty good.  But nothing can top the epicness of this celebrity Pepsi Max entry from Last year’s Crash the Super Bowl contest:

Pretty damn crazy, right?  But that spot did not make the finals last year.  So If an entry that features a rampaging Ernest Borgnine couldn’t win this contest, I don’t think this year’s crop of celebrity entries stand much chance either.

11/29/2011 UPDATE: The mystery of the Jenny McCarthy ad has been solved! One of the directors actually found this article and he was good enough to explain how the ad came to be. Here’s his full comment:

Hey Beardy

Jenny McCarthy is doing this in the hopes to help http://www.generationrescue.org/. When we got the news from your site ( “The Lonely Island guys are kind of IN the Crash the Super Bowl contest. By that I mean that they will be competing for the 1st place spot on the ad meter and if they get it, they will win the million dollar bonus!” ) We thought we would give it a shot too. Fair is fair..

Thanks for checking out the spot!

John A.

p.s. your site rocks!

Well now, do I feel like an asshole or what??  Not only did Jenny McCarthy and her team shoot an entry as a way to raise money to combat autism, they found out about the details of the Doritos contest from this website!  Though to be fair, the lonely Island guys were hired by doritos to shoot a super bowl ad this year.  They’re not actually competing against the little guys for a slot in the finals.  Their commercial is guaranteed to air.  But still, it’s nice to hear that this was for a not for profit endeavor.  So, good for them!

 

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We want to see your Crash the Super Bowl entries!

Posted by Beardy on November 21st, 2011

Time's up!

Well D (for Doritos) is finally here.  Right now it’s 4PM on November 21st which means you only have eight hours left to submit your 2011 Crash the Super Bowl entries.   And then tomorrow the wait begins!  I get a lot of e-mails this time of year and usually people want to know when Doritos will contact the finalists.  The official rules state that Doritos will notify the finalists within 6 weeks.  But 6 weeks from today happens to be Monday, January 2nd.  During the last installment of The Crash, the finalists were announced on January 3rd.  I’ve talked to a number of past finalists and it seems like Doritos usually calls the winners (yes, they’ll actually call you if you make the top 5) just before Christmas.  But the contest did start a little later than usual this year so what the heck do I know.

Right now, there are already more than 1,500 submissions posted in CTSB gallery.  But when the orange dust settles I bet there will be close to 2,800 entries.  That’s a lot less than in year’s past but the lower number is probably because this year, the contest moderators have been doing a great job of keeping people from uploading multiple entries.  In past installments, it seemed like every 10th video was a repeat.  I guess people uploaded the same videos over and over because they weren’t sure if their submissions went though.

But 2,800 submissions is still a crazy amount.   And guess what?  This year I have made it my mission to watch every, single CTSB entry!  If you watched 2,800 thirty-second commercials in a row, it would take you 23.33 hours to get through them all.  But to be honest, I’m not watching every entry from start to finish.  In fact, I usually click the “next” button on most entries after about 10 seconds.  You see, my goal is to find all the submissions that have a good chance of making it to the Top 5.  So if an entry has major technical problems that I suspect will keep it out of the running, I skip it.  And after like 15 seconds if I’m not hooked I usually move on to the next video.

This method saves me a lot of time but it isn’t exactly thorough.  Sometimes I get in the zone and I skip past videos before I really give them a chance.  So readers, I need your help.  If you see a really awesome Crash the Super Bowl entry, let me know!  And yes, you can send me your own submission if you think it’s especially great.  In about two weeks I will post a list of all my favorite 2011 CTSB submissions.  How long will the list be?  I have no idea!  Instead of doing like a “Top 50″ I’m just going to link to every ad that I think is good enough to win….and maybe I’ll throw a few personal favorites in there as well.

So if you have a great entry you want to show me, click the comment button and post the link.  Or you can e-mail me at .  As always, I’m happy to do a mini-review of every ad you guys send me.  I’ll try and be gentle but I’ll also be honest.  Just a couple rules; please, don’t ask me to critique an entry that you didn’t help create.  Also, I can only do public critiques.  So if you want me to give you notes on your submission, post it in the comments section rather than e-mailing it to me.  And finally, Full Disclosure: I did shoot a CTSB entry of my own but I will try and be objective and fair….even though my entry is easily the best this year!

Good luck everybody.  If you get a call from Doritos saying that you made the finals, be sure to let me know!  Yea sure, that would probably get you disqualified but I totally promise to keep your secret…

 

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Watch the 2007, 2009, 2010 and 2011 Crash the Super Bowl finalists

Posted by Beardy on November 15th, 2011

Getting ready to shoot a Dortios commercial for the 2012 Crash the Super Bowl contest? Well the first thing you need to do is a bit of research. So here is every, single video that has every made the Crash the Super Bowl finals. Enjoy!

2007 CTSB Finalists:

“Winner,” aired during the 2007 Super Bowl:

Bonus Winner: This finalist also aired during the 2007 Super Bowl:

No CTSB commercial contest for the 2008 Super Bowl but….

2007 CTSB finalist that Doritos chose to air during the 2008 Super Bowl:

2009 CTSB Finalists:

Aired During the Superbowl and won a million bucks for getting #1 on the ad meter:

Also aired during the 2009 Superbowl:

2010 CTSB finalists. This ad is the only finalist that didn’t air during the game!

Aired during the 2010 Superbowl and won $600,000 for getting #2 on the ad meter:

These three ads also aired during the 2010 Super Bowl:

2011 Doritos CTSB finalists:

Aired During the Superbowl and won a million bucks for getting #1 on the ad meter:

Also aired During the Superbowl and won $400,000 for getting #3 on the ad meter:

Also aired during the Super Bowl:

2011 Pepsi Max finalists:

These three Pepsi Max ads aired during the Super Bowl but none of them won bonus prizes:

 

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The five most over-done Crash the Super Bowl ideas

Posted by Beardy on November 9th, 2011

Never use the Crash the Super Bowl contest as a chance to see your buddy's girlfriend topless

Man, time really files when you’re trying to come up with a great idea for a Doritos commercial!  There’s now less than two weeks left until the deadline for the Crash the Super Bowl contest.  So it’s Crunch Time, folks! (pun intended).  But before you rush out and start filming, the first step in making a great Doritos commercial is research.  Obviously, you should watch all the entries that won the previous installments of the Crash.  But you should also try and figure out which concepts have already been done to death.  While running this site, I’ve had the opportunity to watch literally thousands of Crash the SuperBowl entries.  And there are a few common, played-out gimmicks that I see used over and over and over again.  So I am going to do you a gigantic favor and list the Top 5 most over-used Crash the Super Bowl ideas!  Every year, Dortios gets tons of videos that have almost identical plots and gags.  The ideas might be new to the person who wrote the script but to the judges they are tired and totally unoriginal.  So if you want to stand out from the crowd, here are the five concepts that you need to avoid.  For each concept I’ll include an example and I’ll try to only post high-quality entries so you can see that even good production values won’t make these ideas seem fresh:
 
1.  Doritos as “paper” footballs
 

 
Hey, have you ever noticed that a Dorito kind of looks like a paper football?  If so, you’re not alone because apparently a lot of people have noticed that!  Over the last five years, I bet fritolay has received hundreds of CTSB entries that featured Doritos being used as “paper footballs.”  I’m guessing this idea is so popular because a paper football is about the only small, triangular object most people can think of.  What’s crazy about this particular idea is that pretty much every Paper Football entry has the same plot.  There is a tense and dramatic stand off between two competitors.  The chip is “kicked” in slow motion but at the last second, there’s a twist!  Someone jumps into frame and blocks the kick by catching the chip in their mouth.

I’ve been watching the new batch of submissions and already I have seen more than one version of this idea.  But this concept is just too obvious.  If a Paper Football-themed ad did make the finals, you’d have a hundred people coming forward claiming that the winners stole their idea!
 
2.  Dressing up in a giant Doritos costume
 

 
This weekend, dozens of filmmakers across the country will go into their garages and apply the finishing touches to their homemade, giant Doritos costumes.  Some of them will just be a single, orange sheet of poster board.  Others will be meticulous, high quality suits that are made of foam and finished with an air-brushing of realistic orange and brown paint.  But if Frito-lay hasn’t picked a CTSB finalist that featured a guy dressed as a Dorito by now, they are never going to.  That’s because no matter how much work a person puts into their Dorito costume, the gag is just too easy.  Think of it like this; if Bud Light made a Super Bowl commercial where the joke was that the characters were in homemade Bud Light suits, how do you think that commercial would do on the USA Today ad meter?
 
3.  Zombies!
 

 
This idea has been totally done to death.  (Pun intended again!)  If you head to the Crash the Super Bowl gallery and watch 50 videos in a row, I bet you’d see at least one zombie-themed entry.  In fact, I just searched the gallery for the word “zombie” and there are already five submissions with the word zombie in the title!

It’s easy to understand why Dortios gets so many zombie videos though.  Zombies are super popular and the costumes are really easy to make.  But it’s fascinating how similar all these zombie ads are.  I’ll break down a typical story for you; a group of friends are running from hungry zombies.  The friends get trapped and the zombies attack.  But they don’t eat the people.  It turns out one of them has Doritos and that’s what the zombies were after the whole time!  Oh but once the Doritos run out, the zombies then turn on the people.  The whole plot is so popular among video contest filmmakers that I did an entire blog post about the “Zombie Fake Out” trope.  So even though zombie make up is probably 90% off right now at Walmart, resist the temptation to shoot a chip commercial about the undead.
 
4.  Doritos as Mousetrap bait
 

 
Doritos are cheesy. So what do people do with cheese? Pretty much just two things; they either eat it or they catch mice with it. (seriously, try and think of something else you can do with cheese) A lot of CTSB filmmakers have made this connection over the years. In fact, one of them even made it to the super bowl thanks to this concept. Way back in 2006, Fritolay picked an ad named “” as one of the finalists in the very first installment of the Crash the Super Bowl contest.  I’m sure you remember the commercial because it was so good that five years later, Doritos is still airing the spot on TV!  In the ad, a man in a suit puts a piece of a dorito on a mousetrap.  He then gets pummeled by a very angry guy in a mouse suit.  The ad is so ubiquitous that it’s hard to believe that CTSB contestants keep doing gags about Doritos as mouse trap bait.  Sometimes the mouse traps are and sometimes the mousetraps are .  Sometimes the mouse traps are meant for mice but usually they are meant for people.  But no matter what kind of spin a filmmaker puts on this idea, it simply has already been done perfectly by a previous Crash the Super Bowl winner.  For example, the moustrap video I posted above is actually pretty awesome. It even won a prize in Poptent’s video contest “Second Chance” assignment.  The way the giant robots lumber slowly in the distance is just perfect. If it hadn’t been for the previous “Mousetrap” ad I think this robot entry could have made the finals last year. But the Crash is all about getting new, off the wall ideas so Doritos isn’t going to pick a finalist that features a “device” that’s already been used.
 
5.  A “Sexy” Doritos Seduction
 

 
Let’s end on an over-done idea that I don’t mind so much; the Sexy Doritos seduction.  These entries always play out the same way.  A husband gets home after a hard day at work to find a trail of Doritos on the floor.  He follows the trail and it leads to the bedroom.  He opens the door to find his wife laying naked in bed…with only Doritos covering up her girly bits!  Of course, sometimes the concept is flipped around and it’s a laying in a bed full of Doritos. Either way, this gag is extremely common. Shoot an entry like this and all you’ll get for your troubles is a set of orange sheets.
 
If you’ve ever shot a Crash the Super Bowl entry about any of the ideas I just listed, I’m sorry if I offended you!  I understand what it’s like to work hard on a video contest entry only to later realize that it was kind of unoriginal.  But hopefully this post will help a few filmmakers avoid common, over-done ideas that simply don’t have much chance of winning.

 

---- Posted by Beardy. Follow us on Twitter @ ----

 
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