SUPER BOWL BLIPVERTS I

"Just as no rose is complete without thorns,
No television show is complete without the following commercials."
Alfred Hitchcock
'Alfred Hitchcock Presents'

With the choice of the Debit MasterCard/MacGyver crossover to kick it off, I'm finally going to write about the Super Bowl ads and their place in the TV Universe. Not ALL of them, of course - even I have limits!

We can skip the ones that aired in the past - used goods. These would include the Hummer 3 love battle between the monster (GojiroDaddy.com?) and the giant watcher robot. And forget about the movie previews and those commercials that were pretty much straight-forward messages like the Dove Campaign For Real Beauty and for the Cadillac Escalade. (Ugh. Was there a commercial more boring than that one during the Super Bowl?)

I can cover a good portion of the blipverts with the sweeping theme of "Everyday TV Life". Sticking the word "TV" in there is key, because even in the mundane details, life in Toobworld can vary greatly from that in the Trueniverse.

Some of these ads could have happened in the real everyday life - well, okay, maybe the guys listening to the game and having a cookout up on their roofs was a tad sitcommish, (as was the finally approved GoDaddy.com bit), but I'll bet there are lots of kids who have had the sort of conversations heard in the Toyota Camry Hybrid spot.

There was nothing with the dramatic pull of last year's popular "Salute To American Troops" by Anhueser Busch (which later in the year I was able to link to 'Over There' on the FX network.) But there was no dearth in the sitcom aspects regarding the lifestyles of the male animal.

The touch football game in the Michelob Amber blipvert followed in the tradition of 'Friends' and 'How I Met Your Mother' - a group of close friends enjoying good times and comedic situations; capping it all off with a beer... and without having to endure being tinted blue like in the old Zima ads.

The two security guards in the Sierra Mist spot populate everybody's nightmares about going to the airport, and they could easily be found causing hassles for the characters in any sitcom, even if the goal of stealing your refreshing beverage never came up.

And what separated 'The Wave' in the Budweiser blipvert from any similar feat attempted in the Real World? Its perfection.

Like I said, it's all in the details.......

Stay tuned. I'll be back with more, after the break.......

BCnU!
Tele-Toby