Budweiser’s “A Hero’s Welcome”
After reviewing all the possible Super Bowl commercials along with the articles that take a certain position on them, there was one article that I thought took a particularly strong opinion. Don Gomez’s article responding to Budweiser’s “A Hero’s Welcome,” takes a very one-sided and firm opinion. The opinion presented is that the commercial was extremely exploitative and offensive, and while I am not left with the same feeling of anger that Don Gomez portrays in his article, I must say that overall, I agree with his observations.
The commercial in question is Budweiser’s “A Hero’s Welcome,” and it involves a scene in which an apparent Iraq war veteran is making his homecoming. The scene opens with him descending the esclator at the airport to his wife, and is shot somewhat shakily from afar to create the feeling that the cameraman is away from the scene. It then continues to film the couple as they depart in their car. Up to this point it appears to be a regular homecoming, and no advertisement for any product has taken place. However, as the two arrive there is a large gathering and it soon becomes obvious that some kind of welcome home event has been organized. They proceed to ride through a parade-like scene on a red Budweiser wagon, and the seemingly touching scene becomes a ploy by Budweiser to take a completely unrelated product like beer, and somehow associate it with supporting the troops and giving soldiers a “hero’s welcome.”
The article by Don Gomez calls the commercial exploitative and offensive. He goes as far as saying that the article angers him as he has seen similar exploitation recently, and had the same reaction. But this particular one is worse he claims, due mostly to the fact that when its all said and done, its all about advertising and making money. This quote from Gomez effectively summarizes his position. “I am not a fan of this ad. It makes me angry. I’ve written previously about the recent growth of exploitative, ‘homecoming’ images used as entertainment. This is worse, because it’s not entertainment. It’s an advertisement.”
While I am not quite as enraged as Gomez, I do agree with his position. I’m just not convinced that Budweiser would be so quick to create such a scene if they didn’t project it to ultimately benefit them financially in the way of advertising revenue. Obviously they are trying to show that they support the troops, but