11 of the Best Super Bowl Ads and One of the Worst

Super Bowl Sunday is about more than just the game, the halftime show, and the inevitable controversial call that will be debated for days: It's also about, of course, the commercials. The Athletic and the New York Post are among the many outlets running down the best and worst ads of the night, a dozen of which you can watch in our gallery. Both sites panned the Squarespace ad featuring Adam Driver, and agreed that the "backstage" footage from the commercial was a lot better and funnier than the ad itself (watch that here).

The Athletic's Jake Ciely was largely impressed by this year's crop of ads, saying 2023 might be the best year yet for Super Bowl commercials. A 30-second spot during the big game cost as much as $7 million. Among the ads for specific products there were also big movie trailers, Indiana Jones among them (watch that here)—and then there were two commercials about Jesus. CNN does a deep dive into the "He Gets Us" ad campaign for ... Christianity, which has invested $100 million in a vast media campaign including the Super Bowl ads. It's not clear exactly what donors are behind the campaign, but among them is the controversial co-founder of Hobby Lobby, who's known for supporting anti-LGBTQ+ legislation. (More Super Bowl stories.)