Tubi pulled a FAST one on Super Bowl viewers on Sunday night.
Tubi, the free, ad-supported streaming television (FAST) service, ran a clever trompe l’oeil ad that made it look as if viewers’ TVs were changing the channel right in the middle of the climactic end of the Eagles-Chiefs game.
The 15-second spot, which ran in the fourth quarter of Fox’s Super Bowl LVII telecast, starts by throwing back to the game’s announcing duo of Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen. (Tubi is owned by Fox Corp.)
As Burkhardt and Olsen banter in generalities about the game, an unseen hand pulls up a Tubi on-demand menu on the TV — and after a couple of audible blips, selects “Mr. & Mrs. Smith,” the 2005 movie starring Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt, before the Tubi logo flashes on the screen.
The jarring ad left many viewers confused — and angry.
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“Tubi should be SUED for that commercial,” Barstool Sports’ Rico Bosco groused on Twitter. Pro softball player Haley Cruse Mitchell commented, “That tubi commercial definitely made me start a fight with my husband.”
Tubi, which Fox Corp. acquired in 2020 for $440 million, mildly disturbed Super Bowl audiences earlier in the game with “Rabbit Hole,” a 60-second ad featuring gigantic, mute rabbits (gently) kidnapping people and throwing them into holes in the ground. The tagline: “Find rabbit holes you didn’t know you were looking for.” The Tubi ads were created by ad agency Mischief.
Watch the Tubi “Interface Interruption” ad: