"Last year, the Super Bowl emanated from the eye of the vibe shift. Donald Trump had just scored his first popular-vote victory, remaking American consensus, and brands far and wide scrambled to meet the tastes of a newly MAGAfied polity. In practice, that mostly resulted in a revival of obnoxious early 2000s machismo-girls in bikinis, Shane Gillis, dewy-eyed tributes to the heartland, and so on. It was a bleak enterprise."
"Well, it turns out, the conservative cultural paramountcy was hilariously short-lived. Trump's approval rating bottomed out in the months after the inauguration, and currently it's hovering in the mid-30s. Amid the rebuke, brands have recoiled back within the antiseptic neutrality where they're most comfortable: irrelevant celebrity cameos, cheap millennial nostalgia, unmoored wistfulness for simpler days. Given that it is 2026, those efforts were put forth in service of A.I. and bloodless tech platforms. Didn't we used to make things in this country?"
Last year the Super Bowl reflected a vibe shift after Donald Trump's popular-vote victory, prompting brands to adopt overtly conservative, macho, and heartland-themed advertising. That wave proved brief as Trump's approval fell into the mid-30s and cultural conservatism waned. Brands retreated to antiseptic neutrality characterized by irrelevant celebrity cameos, cheap millennial nostalgia, and wistful simplicity. By 2026 many ads emphasized A.I. and sterile tech platforms rather than manufacturing or craft. The Squarespace spot featuring Emma Stone and Yorgos Lanthimos indicates that web-hosting companies have accrued surprising cultural cachet and marketing influence.
Read at Slate Magazine
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