• Forbes, Thursday, January 26, 2012 9:38 AM

Jim Henry pulls no punches in his critique of "the silly season of Super Bowl advertising." His take on Kia’s 60-second Super Bowl meant to be a Gen X couple’s wildest dreams, and including Victoria’s Secret model Adriana Lima, Mötley Crüe and MMA icon Chuck Liddell, among other things: "Let's see, forgetting anything? Oh, yeah, a car," he writes. The ad also features the 2012 Kia Optima Limited, which is meant to represent one of those dream items.

"That’s a valid point for the Kia brand to make. Kia is still living down its history of making cheap cars built cheaply, which people bought out of economic necessity, instead of a used car. The company defends the ad in terms of household reach. Kia needs to raise awareness of the brand, and to nudge the brand image upscale," he writes.

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