There are many ways to be a top Super Bowl ad: being the most talked about, being best loved, topping the Super Bowl ads lists, being funniest, being best received at the bar or party or being best loved by kids. One of the buzz-building aspects of the big game is the array of choices to pick from when determining your personal fave. Some years there is an undisputed winner, like 2011’s VW The Force, which has to date attracted over 56 million views on YouTube. The beloved spot was helmed by Park Pictures’ Lance Acord.

This year has a much broader range of buzzed-about spots, some loved, some widely disliked.

A-list stars in commercials are an annual Super Bowl tradition, carried on this year by  Samsung’s “The Next Big Thing”. The 1:20, featuring vfx by The Mission and performances by Paul Rudd and Seth Rogen — with a LeBron cameo thrown in — mirrored the closely fought game, offering up a close competition by the funnymen to star in Sansung’s vaunted Super Bowl spot. Hilariously withering comments are lobbed back and forth by the two, as they await the advertiser’s decision about who will headline the commercial about “the next big thing.” The Mission also completed vfx for the pre-game teaser, El Plato Supreme, featuring a similarly guffaw-worthy competition between the two comedians for the role. Both commercials are out of 72andSunny.

Another celebrity encounter was Tracy Morgan’s comedic turn for Mio Fit sports beverage, helmed by Moxie Pictures’  Martin Granger. Morgan, of 30 Rock fame, gives a typically loud-spoken riff on change, in a velour tracksuit standing in front of an American flag. After speaking his piece, Morgan launches into space.

Sports superstars are also known to weigh in to boost the traction of Super Bowl commercials. This year, Deion Sanders dons the character of Leon Sandcastle in this NFL spot directed by Moxie Pictures’ Frank Todaro. The champ feigns rookie-dom in order to garner some of the media attention showered on newcomers to the game, encountering Roger Godell who seems to catch on to his hilarious hoax. The NFL spots were out of Grey, NY.

The 34-minute blackout period was an unexpected factor for advertisers. During the tense period of time when half the lights were off at the Superdome in New Orleans, many heads were scratched as to what would happen. During the surge, some viewers fled, but when the lights came back on, the last half hour of the game was the highest rated of the night, landing 75 percent of all viewers watching television at the time.

In what the New York Times predicts was the most watched TV program ever, with the LA Times placing it at #3, one spot won the “most talked about” honor pretty much hands down (although reactions to it were drastically divided): GoDaddy’s “Perfect Match,” featuring a kissing duo that was anything but. The Cutting Room’s Chuck Willis edited and Sonic Union’s Stephen Rosen mixed for Deutch, NY.

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