Every year, we say we aren't going to talk about this.
Every year, we do.
So, here we go again.
Did you see the commercials in this year's Super Bowl? No one really seems to care about the sports event itself, just the commercials.
In fact, businesses plunked down $3.8 million for every 30-seconds of visibility during Sunday's event. Everyone, it seemed, wanted a piece of the more than 100-million viewers for the football matchup.
In years past, fans have overwhelmingly leaned toward ads that made them laugh. These were still popular in 2013, but this year viewers seemed ready to have their heartstrings plucked.
Most viewers placed the 2013 Budweiser ad at the top of their list. The commercial showed the bonded relationship between a trainer and a young Clydesdale. The commercial follows horse and trainer through their early life together up until the horse leaves to join the Clydesdale team. Three years later, during a parade, the trainer recognizes the horse…the horse recognizes the trainer and a tearful reunion follows.
A Taco Bell ad walks the line – making you feel good about senior citizens as we watch them "tearin' it up' with a night on the town.
In fact, as usual, many of the ads were geared toward humor – some missed the spot, most hit it. Oreo cookies allowed a quiet library fight to end up trashing the library. When a cop car bursts through the wall, they still abide by library rules and law enforcement "whispers" into a megaphone.
Doritos, always funny, shows a dad willing to place dress up with his daughter if Doritos are involved.
Mercedes-Benz decided to play the sex card and shows Kate Upton using her looks to get guys to wash her car.
And perhaps the most "talked about," tweeted-about" and "reposted" ad from Sunday's event came from Go-Daddy. The ad connects sexy and intelligent with a close-up kiss between a super model and a nerd.
With issues like potential nuclear development in Iran, saber-rattling in north Korea and economic problems almost everywhere around the globe, Americans do seem to come across as superficial – spending so much time talking about a football game or, even more so, the commercials that air within it.
Still, it may be the very trying times within which we find ourselves that make such diversions appealing. Perhaps we need things like this in order to deal with the grim realities of day-to-day life.
Whatever the truth, one thing is certain. Come early February in 2014, we'll be doing something we vow we won't: we'll be talking about Super Bowl ads.
This article originally appeared on Santa Rosa Press Gazette: Our View – Super Bowl ads: a necessary distraction?