Coca-Cola kept one of its Super Bowl ads a surprise, and it ended up being a polarizing one.
In the spot — titled "It's Beautiful"— "America The Beautiful" starts off being sung in English but is also sung in languages like Hindi, Arabic, and Tagalog. It highlights the multicultural makeup of the U.S. and even features a gay couple.
Right now, it's looking like it will be the most-talked about ad in the game.
Twitter blew up with reaction from those who hated it and those who loved it. Some examples:
@runlong01: Super Bowl Coke ad - - I will never drink a Coke product again
@blairscott_AL: Coke sings American the Beautiful in foreign languages & now a Cosmos ad? Poor conservatards got it rough this Super Bowl.
@theangelwinks: #Coke ad #SuperBowl “@DRichardson94: Some terrorist were singing our song in that coke commercial” interesting reactions smh
Here is the ad:
The immediate reactions can almost be predicted word-for-word. Coke's Facebook page turned into a wall of conservative protest:
Liberals are tossing around words like "perfect" and "amazing" while conservatives are calling it "divisive" and "offensive." Everyone in between either thought it was sweet or worthy of an eye roll.
Some liberals pointed out that people who hated the ad mistakenly thought "America The Beautiful" was the national anthem. (The anthem is, of course, "The Star-Spangled Banner.")
BuzzFeed has a pretty good survey of not-so-well informed reaction to the ad.
The commercial, from Wieden + Kennedy, will definitely be talked about after the game.