Game represents pop culture
Rawly Bransom
editor-in-chief

The Super Bowl is over, and now I have months of trying to find other distractions to keep my interest.
The Super Bowl, however, is not just the championship for my favorite professional sport.
Nor is it simply an American holiday that makes people who do not watch one down of football all year stay glued to every second of the game.
It has become a worldwide spectacle that makes even the game itself a second-tier event.
Any football fan can tell you his favorite all-time Super Bowl or play. For some, it may be a single kick that won or lost the game. Mine was when my Cowboys defeated the Buffalo Bills, starting their early ’90s domination.
For the average person worldwide, the Super Bowl is simply a pop-culture event to talk about for weeks.
While my football fanatic friends and I talk about the New England Patriots, others in the office will be talking about the halftime show, which I have never cared about. To me, it is always “the latest trendy artist of the moment,” and I have never been one to care about that kind of thing. This year’s halftime entertainment took on a controversial twist when Justin Timberlake exposed one of Janet Jackson’s breasts.
Of course, we cannot forget the commercials. No commentary about the big game is complete without discussing the donkey who wanted to be a Clydesdale or even children being punished with bars of soap in their mouths.
Super Bowl commercials are the most expensive commercials of the year. This year commercials cost $2.25 million for a 30-second ad. That is a 7 percent increase over last year’s ad rate, and only the final episode of Friends comes even close, with average of $2 million for a 30 second ad spot.
Still, companies willingly pay top money not only for viewers but for their most creative advertising of the year.
Super Bowl ads are seen months after the game because people just love them. We all remember the cat herders or the Budweiser frogs.
I understand my game is more than just a game. It is a few hours a year when the world sits down and watches the same show at the same time.
Still, I wish more people were interested in the game, which has more drama and intrigue than all the commercials and halftime shows put together.