US Super Bowl ads: do even Canadians care anymore?

There was a time when Canadians felt all left out because we couldn’t watch the US Super Bowl ads.

A former Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission chief even ordered the Canadian NFL rights holder, Bell Media, to provide a window to the originating US feed for the game in Canada just so ads for beer and cars and web platforms could play north of the border. This move cost the rights holder millions.

That decision was flipped a couple of years ago. Now, nobody cares.

Why? For one, nobody wants to watch commercials anymore, ever, on either side of the border, no matter how clever. Also, some of the same commercials play on the Canadian channels, CTV and TSN, anyway, including the Wayne’s World spots shown this year featuring Mike Myers and Dana Carvey.

Third, you can stream all of the ads, anytime you want, from Canada. You can do it now, right here, by following this link to a handy, one-stop-see-all site set up by our friends at The Programming Insider. The site is even called The Commercials You Saw During the Super Bowl.

So knock yourselves out, Canada. See the spots featuring Will Ferrell, Tracey Morgan, Jason Alexander, Meghan Trainor, Snoop Dog, Big Bird, Nick Jonas, Bruce Springsteen, Anthony Anderson, Dolly Parton, Stephen Colbert and others. There’s even one with Drake, and he’s actually funny:

Just think: advertisers spent $5.5 million this year to place these ads in front of an estimated 100 million viewers. Now you can watch them all for free.

Thank The Programming Insider. You’re welcome, Canada.

One last link to a 90 second ad from a beer company. There were a few of these Sunday that spoke more to the times we’re in rather than directly about a product. This one hit home for me and made me actually want to watch a commercial again: