Hungry Man’s Bryan Buckley directed this BBDO New York which from the remove of later years is like looking into a time capsule. That's true of course of most Super Bowl spots the further back you go, but bringing Ozzie Osbourne's family into this ad really summons a moment long locked in amber.
Just two months before this spot would air in Super Bowl XXXVII, MTV’s season-two premiere of “The Osbournes” delivered a staggering 6.6 million viewers, a record turnout for the network.
Here Pepsi makes the most of the popularity of the ravaged former Black Sabbath front man and his children Jack and Kelly (and a certain pair of saccharine-sweet, so-clean-they-squeak sibling performers from the 1970s) to try and raise the profile of its new-ish lemon-accented cola.
Buckley also directed Super Bowl XXXVII’s popular FedEx spot ("Desert Island"), and while the Osbournes sendup was similarly well received, Pepsi Twist already may have been past its sell-by date. The company quietly shuttered the brand in 2005, then briefly resurrecting it three years later before the start of the fall NFL season.
Ozzy Osbourne would be back in the Super Bowl, however, in another celebrity mashup for 2011: Best Buy's "Ozzy vs. Bieber."
BRAND: Pepsi Twist
YEAR: 2003
AGENCY: BBDO
SUPERBOWL: XXXVII
QUARTER AIRED: Q1