Super Bowl Ads of Yore Revamped for ‘08 Election

Well over a year ago, the online video component of this election season kicked into high gear when an independent individual with some professional political advertising experience created a media frenzy with his “Hillary 1984″ ad, a repurposing of Apple’s Super Bowl commercial from the ’80s.

Now, with the election just a week away, we’ve come full circle with two more ads from Super Bowls past revamped for online political purposes. Office Linebacker “Terrible” Terry Tate has returned to put the hurt on fools who don’t vote, while the “Wassup” guys have suffered every great malady our nation has gone through over the last eight years.

Neither ad makes mention of their original product — Terry was doing his tackling in Reeboks while the “Wassup” boys swigged Budweiser — but both use their reference ad’s existing storyline to push a new, political agenda. Both ads bring back original cast members and riff on the same jokes they did years ago. But it’s no longer the go-go early aughts, and the ads have lost their carefree tone.

The message seems to be: Forget beer and sneakers, even the guys from those silly Superbowl ads are paying attention to this election. Are you?