Tubi's Super Bowl Prank Ad Aimed to Position the Free Streamer as a 'Troublemaker' — Did You Fall for It?

Matt Webb Mitovich
·2 min read

“No, you didn’t sit on the remote. But on Super Bowl Sunday, we fooled audiences into thinking they did.”

With that caption on the YouTube version of their “Interface Interruption” Super Bowl Sunday commercial (above), Tubi took a small victory lap after many viewers of the Big Game were led to believe that someone/something had called up their TV’s navigation menu and switched over from Fox Sports announcers Kevin Burkhardt and Greg Olsen to the free, ad-supported streaming (FAST)/AVOD service.

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And if you, upon falling for the on-screen prank, muttered under your breath, “Tubi, you little stinker!,” that was the plan all along, according to Mischief @ No Fixed Address, the creative agency that worked with Tubi on the spot.

“[Tubi CMO] Nicole [Parlapiano] and the Tubi team came to us with a unique brief for the streaming sector: Reveal Tubi to the world, personality-first. Not title-first,” says Mischief co-founder and CCO Greg Hahn. “These spots reveal a personality we’ve had fun creating over the past few months: Quirky, playful and a bit unexpected. Tubi is poised to be the troublemaker of the streaming world.”

 

Tubi is a free, ad-supported streaming (FAST)/AVOD service that offers over 48,000 movies and TV shows, including a growing library of Tubi Originals, plus 200-plus local and live news and sports channels. Tubi made headlines recently by closing a co-exclusive deal (along with Roku) to stream for free all seasons of Westworld, The Nevers, Raised by Wolves, The Time Traveler’s Wife and other Warner Bros. Discovery series that abruptly disappeared from HBO Max late last year.

Did you 100-percent fall for the Tubi fake-out? Oo did you, as I did, notice that the Super Bowl’s live broadcast’s video quality had changed, and thus sensed that something pre-taped was at play?

Launch Gallery: <I>The Nevers</i>: Get Release Dates for All 12 Episodes on Tubi, Including 6 New Ones — Plus, Scoop on What's Ahead!

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