The new Mercedes-Benz CLA Super Bowl spot

It takes a certain kind of chutzpah for a German company that supplied the Nazi war machine to use a track that features the line, “I rode a tank / Held a general's rank / When the Blitzkrieg raged / And the bodies stank.”

Apparently, Mercedes-Benz has exactly that sort of chutzpah. The premise, of course, is that you don't have to sell your soul to afford the company's stylish new CLA. That for under 30 grand, you too can dance with Usher, be pulled into red-carpet photographs with Kate Upton, and compete in Formula 1 races.

That all your Walter Mitty dreams are a quick loan away. It's fluff. It's fantasy fodder, all set whimsically to "Sympathy for the Devil," Mick Jagger's 1968 meditation on evil throughout the centuries.

Which is fine. It's the Super Bowl, a bunch of dudes playing football. It's winter-Sunday escapism, a time for epic bro-downs, adult beverages and celebration. Who wants anything too heavy?

Who wants to be reminded of the icky, icky past and the odious nature of the military-industrial complex, especially one so closely entwined with the attempted eradication of an entire people?

To throw this up during the biggest day for televised advertising in the country comes off as pretty cynical and, er, soulless.

But hey man, Willem Dafoe as Satan! We like Willem Dafoe. Willem Dafoe, what're you doing in this advertisement?

By Davey G. Johnson