What the Super Bowl’s AI Ads, I Hope, Got Wrong About the Future
The Super Bowl just gave us a master class in irony. At $8 million for a 30-second spot, brands had a golden opportunity to make us laugh, cry, or at least remember their names come Monday morning. And what did we get? A parade of AI commercials that somehow managed to make the future feel both miraculous and profoundly lonely.
Here's the thing that struck me most: we saw the full spectrum of what AI can be. On one end, poorly executed AI-generated content made brands look cheap and out of touch. On the other hand, slick commercials from Anthropic, Microsoft, and OpenAI tell us that what we really need in our lives are AI chatbots and assistants. The message was clear: AI is here, it's unavoidable, and you'd better get on board.
But somewhere between those two extremes, something crucial got lost.
Let's talk about why these companies even bothered with Super Bowl ads. The AI giants have money to burn, sure, but there's a strategic reason they're spending it here. Despite all the hype, most people still aren't paying customers for these AI services. The Super Bowl offers something that even the most sophisticated digital targeting can't match: a massive, captive audience all watching the same thing at the same time. If you want to convert the unconverted, this is your shot.
And yet, despite the massive investment and strategic importance, these commercials fell flat for me. Really flat.
Take OpenAI's Codex commercial. The concept was genuinely impressive, showcasing the remarkable technological progress we've made, the kind of stuff that would have seemed like pure science fiction just a few years ago. But watching it, I felt something unexpected: loneliness. The commercial highlighted AI's capabilities but left me with an empty feeling, like we were watching humanity's technological achievement from a distance rather than experiencing it as something that brings us together.
The Anthropic commercial had a similar problem, though it approached things differently. It was funny, I'll give it that. But it was also kind of scary, playing on our anxieties about AI-generated advertisements and how they might infiltrate our lives. The humor masked something unsettling underneath: a future where authentic human connection gets mediated and monetized by algorithms.
And can we talk about the execution? Some of these AI-themed commercials were peppered with special effects that looked, frankly, cheap. The Jurassic Park commercial was a perfect example—when you're spending millions on airtime, the least you can do is make sure the CGI doesn't look like it was rendered on a laptop from 2015. It's particularly ironic when you're trying to sell cutting-edge AI technology but can't be bothered to invest in cutting-edge production values.
But here's what really bothered me, the core of why these commercials missed the mark: they never made the final leap. They showcased impressive technology. They demonstrated capability. They even gestured toward world-changing applications. But they stopped short of showing us what all this means for humanity, together.
AI can help with little things: scheduling, writing emails, and answering questions. It can help with big things: medical research, climate modeling, and educational access. It can certainly change the world. All of that is true, and all of that is worth noting.
What they failed to show was the collective dimension. How does AI bring us together? How does it strengthen communities? How does it help us solve problems that require human collaboration, not just human-computer interaction? The ads positioned AI as something that happens to us or for us, not something we create and use together to build a better world.
This isn't just a missed marketing opportunity; it's a missed cultural moment. The best Super Bowl commercials have always been the ones that tap into our shared humanity, that make us feel connected to something larger than ourselves. They weren't just selling products; they were telling us stories about who we are and who we want to be.
The AI commercials could have done that. Imagine if, instead of showcasing a lone coder or an anxious person bombarded by AI ads, we saw a community using AI to solve a local problem. Or scientists from different countries collaborating through AI translation to cure a disease. Or kids from different backgrounds learning together with AI tutors that adapt to each of their needs. Show us the technology, yes, but show us the human connections it enables.
The irony is that the companies behind these commercials understand collaboration deeply; these AI systems were built by massive teams of researchers, engineers, and ethicists working together. But that collaborative spirit didn't make it into the ads.
As I watched commercial after commercial during breaks in the game, I kept waiting for one of them to get it right. To show me a future where AI amplifies our humanity rather than isolating it. To make me excited not just about what the technology can do, but about what we can do with it, together.
None of them did.
Maybe that's the real message we should take from this Super Bowl's AI commercial showcase. The technology is here, it's powerful, and it's not going anywhere. But the story we're telling about it-the vision we're selling-still feels incomplete. We've figured out how to make AI that can write, create, and analyze. Now we need to figure out how to talk about it in ways that bring us together rather than highlighting the loneliness of our digital age.
That would be worth $8 million. That would be worth watching.
