Sunday, February 05, 2006
Not-So-Super Sunday
Its that time of year again. Every single American television, from HD flat pannels to grainy 12" black and whites with tin foil bunny ears, will be turned to watch up to 6 hours of the real American pastime - football. It doesn't matter who the two teams are, of if you even caught a single regular season game featuring any team; for some reason everyone feels compelled to tune in.
As a kid this was a holiday that ranked up there almost as high as Christmas or my birthday. I got to stay up every year to watch the whole game, almost as late as New Years! My hometown team, the Washington Redskins, have played in a large handful of games in my lifetime, so mostly I would cheer for whomever my parents were not, just so I could do "in your face" dances for my dad when my team scored.
These days I watch mainly for the commercials, the Skins haven't played in a Super Bowl in an extremely long time (but we did get not only into the playoffs, but to the second round!) I used to be in advertising and remember very vividly that for two years (and back in the days before TiVo) I would be assigned by a professor to tape ONLY the commercials, no game, so we can study the good ones and the ugly ones the next day in class. What a pain. Especially when there really is no rhyme or reason to when commercial breaks cut into a game, could be 15 minutes, then it could happen in just 30 seconds ("OOOOOHHHH he just went down, we better go to a word from our sponsors.)
I used to watch for the performances, between the National Anthem and the Half Time Show. It seemed like ever since the year Michael Jackson performed about 10 years ago, they would up the entertainment factor. There were the three years that the half time show was produced by MTV geared specifically to the TRL generation (Britney! Justin! Aerosmith!?!). But we all know what happend in 2004.
One accidentally (I understand, an arguable point) exposed pierced nipple at the end of a 15 minute long mini-Super Concert with Puff Daddy, Kid Rock, Justin Timberlake (the guilty) and the owner of the nipple, Janet Jackson (the victim).
I'm not going to debate here or rehash what the most TiVo'd event ever caused bigger mass media hysteria than anything President Bush has drummed up. My point to make today is just how anti-Super these games have become.
Paul McCartney? The Rolling Stones? Obviously great artists, but low on a lot of people's entertainment meeters. You can't be edgy or even half-way interesting sitting behind a piano, or having a silent competition on stage between Mick Jagger and Keith Richards to see who can do the best Karen Carpenter impersonation. And I couldn't even tell you who's singing the national anthem tonight, nor will I be able to tell you tomorrow.
Yes, the TiVo will be recording the Super Bowl tonight, but I won't be in front of it. This is probably the one Sunday out of the year there won't be an obnoxious number of sold out movies at the cinema I go to. And when I get home, I'll pop some popcorn, and fast forward to the commercials. For all of you who will be watching the game, and the half time show, I pray you don't see Mick's nipples....or worse.
As a kid this was a holiday that ranked up there almost as high as Christmas or my birthday. I got to stay up every year to watch the whole game, almost as late as New Years! My hometown team, the Washington Redskins, have played in a large handful of games in my lifetime, so mostly I would cheer for whomever my parents were not, just so I could do "in your face" dances for my dad when my team scored.
These days I watch mainly for the commercials, the Skins haven't played in a Super Bowl in an extremely long time (but we did get not only into the playoffs, but to the second round!) I used to be in advertising and remember very vividly that for two years (and back in the days before TiVo) I would be assigned by a professor to tape ONLY the commercials, no game, so we can study the good ones and the ugly ones the next day in class. What a pain. Especially when there really is no rhyme or reason to when commercial breaks cut into a game, could be 15 minutes, then it could happen in just 30 seconds ("OOOOOHHHH he just went down, we better go to a word from our sponsors.)
I used to watch for the performances, between the National Anthem and the Half Time Show. It seemed like ever since the year Michael Jackson performed about 10 years ago, they would up the entertainment factor. There were the three years that the half time show was produced by MTV geared specifically to the TRL generation (Britney! Justin! Aerosmith!?!). But we all know what happend in 2004.
One accidentally (I understand, an arguable point) exposed pierced nipple at the end of a 15 minute long mini-Super Concert with Puff Daddy, Kid Rock, Justin Timberlake (the guilty) and the owner of the nipple, Janet Jackson (the victim).
I'm not going to debate here or rehash what the most TiVo'd event ever caused bigger mass media hysteria than anything President Bush has drummed up. My point to make today is just how anti-Super these games have become.
Paul McCartney? The Rolling Stones? Obviously great artists, but low on a lot of people's entertainment meeters. You can't be edgy or even half-way interesting sitting behind a piano, or having a silent competition on stage between Mick Jagger and Keith Richards to see who can do the best Karen Carpenter impersonation. And I couldn't even tell you who's singing the national anthem tonight, nor will I be able to tell you tomorrow.
Yes, the TiVo will be recording the Super Bowl tonight, but I won't be in front of it. This is probably the one Sunday out of the year there won't be an obnoxious number of sold out movies at the cinema I go to. And when I get home, I'll pop some popcorn, and fast forward to the commercials. For all of you who will be watching the game, and the half time show, I pray you don't see Mick's nipples....or worse.
// posted by ProudJock Matt @ 10:01 AM 
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