Still the Terminator: Arnold Schwarzenegger
Photo: Getty Images Entertainment, Carlos Alvarez. All rights reserved.
With golden letters and a sombre look, they look like posters for the next superhero. Blockbuster set in Greek mythology. In the forefront Arnold Schwarzenegger as Zeus with flowing mane and breastplate. As the goddess Hera, Salma Hayek gazes into distant worlds. The German Hollywood muscle man Ralph Moeller swings his trident as Poseidon. A final battle for Olympus?
But this time it’s not about a new Marvel competition, but about the commercial event of the year. The Super Bowl is the final of the National Football League (NFL) on Sunday. The match is considered the largest single sports company in the world, with a corresponding presence on TV and the web. In the commercial breaks between moves, big brands traditionally engage in a costly creative duel. Around five million dollars were recently spent for 30 seconds of airtime.
It is now also clear who is behind the spectacle of the gods. The car manufacturer BMW wants to draw massive attention to its new electro models with Arnie and Co. In the motoring press, the marketing return to the Super Bowl after seven years is seen as the start of an e-car offensive by the Munich company on Tesla’s home market.
The pompous look of the gods is ironically broken in the films that have already been released. In one of these clips, Zeus and Hera are retiring to the retirement paradise of Palm Springs. A mini version of the winged Myhos horse Pegasus replaces the poodle. And even as the god of lightning, Zeus has his problems with the microwave. In another teaser, the barista from the local coffee shop fails to pronounce his name correctly.
At the end there is a divine joyride with the electric BMX-SUV iX, in company jargon “the pioneer of a new age”. Here, too, the makers proved their flair for pop culture references. Instead of a thunderous Walhalla track, they accompanied the iX jaunt with the 1982 reggae-funk number “Electric Avenue” by the British Eddy Grant. Coincidentally, a line of text says: “GOOD GOD we gonna rock down to electric avenue…”