Mahati Ganji
“Super Bowl Sunday”, this unofficial holiday is the most anticipated day in some sports fans’ year. Even after 50 years, it has not lost its viewership. It remains one of the most watched sports events in the world, on par with the UEFA champions league and El Clasico. It has enthralled most of America and a large portion of the rest of the globe. In 2015 the super bowl XLIX set the record for having the most viewers ever, making American sports history!
The tradition of the Super Bowl began with the merger of the NFL (National Football League) and their rival the AFL (American Football League) in 1967. Since then there have been 50 of these world championship games, held on the first Sunday in February each year. Due to its high viewership, companies have taken advantage of prime advertisement during scheduled commercial breaks, spending millions on a time slot and production of an ad campaign. As a result, Super Bowl commercials have evolved into something that people actually look forward to every year, each year being bigger and better than the last. Besides being the only time people look forward to seeing commercials, Super Bowl Sunday has also gained the title of second largest day for US food consumption after Thanksgiving. Like Thanksgiving, the Super Bowl brings a lot of people together, all to watch two teams pitted against each other, duking it out to see who is the national champion. All in all, it is a must watch experience, if not for the game, then for the extravagant halftime performance and the commercials.
As mentioned above, these advertisements represent millions to billions of dollars for the companies that make them. A thirty second ad alone costs over 5 million dollars. Advertisers use the Super Bowl as a means to generate hype for their product among a large audience. They come up with creative ideas to try to make the commercial go viral. In fact, many viewers watch just for the ads. With the increase in price every year, some of the companies are unable to recuperate their cost with the subsequent revenue. Due to their high quality, humor, and special effects, Super Bowl commercials have become iconic. Some of the best Super Bowl ads are from companies like Coca Cola, Budweiser, Volkswagen, GoDaddy and Doritos. While large companies have produced some of the best Super Bowl commercials, some of the featured commercials have created controversy due to their content and caused havoc online. Some of the companies whose commercials have caused controversy are General Motors, Ashley Madison, Man Crunch, Randall Terry, Coca Cola, Nationwide Insurance, and many more.
Another highly anticipated part of the Super Bowl is the halftime show. To increase its audience, the NFL started bringing popular singers to perform in the thirty minute time slot between halves of the game. Last year, at Super Bowl 50, there was a spectacular performance from Coldplay, Beyoncé, and Bruno Mars slaying alongside Lady Gaga, who also gave her best performance singing the national anthem. This year Lady Gaga opened the Super Bowl halftime show with a protest anthem reflecting the current political climate and naturally, sang some of her greatest hits. Performing at the Super Bowl was a childhood dream for Gaga, a dream that she was able fulfill on Sunday. Besides the surprising comeback for the Patriots and their ultimate win, Lady Gaga’s halftime performance was one of the highlights of the show and cost millions to pull off.All in all, we can say that Super Bowl 51 was a success for both Lady Gaga and the Patriots.
