I don’t plan to watch "Super Bowl’s Greatest Commercials" on CBS Saturday night. I don’t even watch the commercials when they premiere during the game. (I prefer flipping through my universe of premium movie channels hoping to catch a glimpse of bare skin.) I will not listen to sports talk shows Monday when the big discussion is, "Which Super Bowl commercial did you like best?"
I acknowledge many people prefer watching the commercials than the actual game. Maybe I’m crazy, but the day we started believing advertisements are a superior form of entertainment, we passed beyond salvation in America. More people know Mean Joe Green from his Super Bowl commercial from years ago rather than for his football skills. The big corporate conglomerates can trot out all the cute, wise-cracking lizards they want. They can give us little heartwarming skits of wide-eyed kids or gruff, good-natured athletes or soda machines that sing and dance, but when all is said and done, most of them are still essentially the purveyors of crap. Sloan Wilson wrote a book in the 1950s, "The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit," which conveyed the chilling effect of corporations on American life. Hell, in 2007 we’ve all become Men in Gray Flannel Suits.
We are told a 30-second TV commercial during the Super Bowl costs $2.6 million and are duly impressed, as we always seem to be by obscene amounts of money. No matter how bad his hairstyle or how enormous his ego, Donald Trump’s money duly impresses us.
If you’re a football fan, the Super Bowl is not really for you. Surrounded by people at one of those beer-and-pizza parties, you hardly get to see half of the game. If City Council outlawed trans fat, could you have a Super Bowl party without breaking the law? Most people peek at the game now and then while gorging themselves, content to know only if they hit one of the numerous pools they’ve played. If you actually want to watch the game, you are in the minority. Most people at these parties wouldn’t know Peyton Manning from Peyton Place.
The Super Bowl halftime show would hold promise if Janet Jackson and Justin Timberlake made a command performance. You remember Janet don’t you? Or perhaps you recall her breast? The myth has already grown that Ms. Jackson’s breast was bared on national TV. But, although a good deal of it was uncovered, no more was exposed than on your average summer day at the Shore. Take it from me, like many so-called outraged Americans, I reran the tape over and over until it wore out. But then the FCC — which under the Republicans has become sort of a governmental Legion of Decency — levied a ridiculous fine against the network. And the rest, as they say, is history. Now you can’t turn the sound down on your TV during an Eagles game and listen to Merrill Reese do a synchronized play-by-play because of Janet’s partial nudity. It’s a matter of delaying the live transmission so the networks can censor any potential profanity or breast-baring to satisfy the FCC. So Merrill is always a few seconds ahead of the play being watched on TV.
You know a performer is no longer cool when he or she appears during Super Bowl halftime. Case in point: Since his appearance, Paul McCartney is now about as hip as those who go to Red Lobster for the lobster. Unfortunately, Prince will make the transition from cool to square when his skinny body appears on stage Sunday. There was a time when the electric musician would have been considered too dangerous for a halftime show, but rest easy out there in the heartland. Prince (who used to be too hip to be called "Prince") will no doubt be a PG version of himself during Sunday’s show. He will be about as edgy as John Mellencamp singing a Chevy commercial disguised as a patriotic anthem.
Somewhere during the Super Bowl the venerable announcers will weave the happenings on the field into the greater story of what is occurring to America itself. If football is as American as red-state politics, the Super Bowl has replaced the Alamo as our national myth. The announcers will pay tribute to the first two African-American coaches to get to the Super Bowl (isn’t this a great country where everybody has an equal chance? Enter John Mellencamp singing). No one will mention it took an edict from the commissioner, who was pressured by civil-rights groups, to force team owners to even interview qualified black candidates. The first question Tony Dungy or Lovie Smith will undoubtedly have to answer after winning the game (other than whether they are going to Disneyland) is, "How do you feel about being the first African-American coach to win the Super Bowl?"
Here’s a clue: If you really think this game is about football, try remembering who played last year and what the final score was. Now pass the pizza.
