TVSquad

(NOTE: The following post talks about my favorite commercials of this past Super Bowl. There are absolutely no spoilers in this post. That is, unless you didn't watch the Super Bowl, recorded it for future viewing, and have decided to ignore every single other media outlet, as well as friends and family so no one tells you who won. If that's the case, don't blame us for your extremely poor time management skills.)

Well, it's all over except for the pack-up, the clean-up and the over-analyzing of the analyzing of the game that was actually played in Tampa. Super Bowl XLIII is now in the history books and so are its commercials. This year featured some returning companies, some new ones, plenty of NBC promos, and a koala puppet being punched in the face. In other words, a bit of everything. Out of all of them, here are some of my favorites.

(NOTE 2: The embedded videos come courtesy of Hulu. If you cannot view these videos I have linked the commercial titles to another site that you should be able to view.)

• TV Land has an Andy Griffith Show marathon all night.
• At 8, NBC has a new Crusoe, then Saturday Night Live Sports Extra.
• FOX has a new Cops at 8.
• CBS has Super Bowl's Greatest Commercials at 8.
• TCM has The Sweet Smell of Success at 8.
• At 9, FOX has a new America's Most Wanted.
• CNBC has a new Suze Orman Show at 9.
• Nickelodeon has a new H2O at 9.
• Also at 9: Hallmark has the movie The Note II: Taking a Chance on Love.
• At 9:30, Cartoon Network has a new Naruto.
• At 10, CBS has a new 48 Hours Mystery.
• At 11, FOX has a new Talk Show with Spike Feresten.
• At 11:30, NBC has a new Saturday Night LIve, with guests Steve Martin and Jason Mraz.

Super Bowl XLII is all done except for the cleanup and the hangovers. And, you are probably doing one of two things right now. Either you are joyously celebrating the win of the Wild Card New York Giants over the undefeated (until Sunday) New England Patriots, or your are cursing out that f@#&ing Tom Brady and coach Bill Belichick for screwing up a perfect season and, most likely, starting a new sports curse in New England.

Oh well, at least you have the commercials to take your mind off of it all if you were a Patriots fan. This year's crop was pretty diverse with a mix of serious and humorous ads. Plus, a little star power thrown in just for taste. Thanks to Jason Hughes, Jen Creer, JJ Hawkins, and yours truly, TV Squad has postings about every new commercial that aired, from the E-Trade baby to the guy who attached jumper cables to his nipples.

If you're scratching your head on what the hell I mean then jump over to the next page, where you'll see a list of links to all of our commercial reviews.

Gallery: Super Bowl XLII Commercials

• At 8, CBS has Super Bowl's Greatest Commercials 2008.
• FOX has a new Cops at 8.
• NBC has the U.S. Figure Skating Championships (Ladies) at 8.
• At 9, FOX has a new America's Most Wanted.
• There's a new Suze Orman Show on CNBC at 9.
• BBC America has a new Torchwood at 9, then a new Graham Norton Show.
• Josh Holloway stars in the horror movie Whisper, at 9 on TNT.
• ESPN has the Winter X Games at 9.
• Cartoon Network has two new episodes of Naruto at 9.
• Also at 9: Food Network has two new episodes of Rachael's Vacations.
• At 10, CBS has a new 48 Hours Mystery.
• At midnight, FOX has a new Talk Show with Spike Feresten.

Check your local TV listings for more.

Advertisers still spend a ton of money on the Super Bowl. They use it to launch new products, advertise new movies, and convince guys that only one special beer will make us irresistible to scantily clad models. We'll have full coverage of the Super Bowl ads again this year, but maybe we can go one step further. The New York Times reports that there's still one ad slot left for the game, and FOX is only asking for $2.7 million for the 30 second ad.

So how about we all pool all of our money and buy the spot for TV Squad?

I think all of these Bud ads are trying to push across one major point: if beer is involved, men don't make very good decisions.

I'm offended by this notion. Except when it comes to women, of course. We've all been there, right guys? But to say that a man driving along a spooky dark road with his girlfriend would pick up a scraggly hitch hiker carrying an axe just because he's also carrying a case of Bud Light...that's stretching it. Why is he carrying a case of Bud Light? Where did he get it? Did he take it when he killed a bunch of people at a party? And like I said earlier, this is Bud Light we're talking about.

You just know he's going to pick up the guy with the chainsaw at the end too, and then they'll be in trouble. Or maybe he'll fight the other hitch hiker, a la Freddy vs. Jason.

I've often had days like this, when everything seems to go wrong with the work I'm doing. But with me it's usually Engelbert Humperdinck that's causing all the problems.

This ad is surreal, and funny. You lack energy in the afternoon at your office, and that's when singer Robert Goulet comes in and messes things up: screws up your office, knocks things over, causes havoc. The only way to get rid of him is to eat a handful of Emerald Nuts and you'll get your energy back. Until tomorrow, when Goulet returns.

One of the better ads, I think. Emerald always does something off-kilter with their commercials and this one is no exception. I like when they use older celebs like this. Humperdinck's next.

That's Jessica Simpson? Yeah, she's still hot and all that, but do I imagine something or does something look off about her face? She doesn't look quite...real. Too much make-up, maybe? I don't know, maybe high-def isn't great for celebs.

So Cheesy Bites are back. I didn't even know they had gone away. But it looks like everyone is crazy for them, so there must be something to them, right? Jessica walks the red carpet and seems really happy that the Cheesy Bites are back at Pizza Hut.

Oh, by the way, welcome to hour Super Bowl ad coverage. Since everything in this game is sponsored, from the pre-game to the player intros to the kick-off, I'd like to announce that the typing I'm doing is brought to you by the Sam Adams Beer I'm drinking right now.

Well, not the game. I mean, really. But we'll be covering the new, expensive commercials that are going to debut tonight. Coverage begins around 6:30pm, right when the game is supposed to start, but there will be probably be an hour of player introductions, coin flipping, and steroid testing.

By the way, the pre-game coverage is taking place on CBS right now. It started a month ago.

• Lee Goldberg has the list for TV shows and movies nominated for Edgar Awards (mystery awards).
• Oscar is making a big marketing push to get you to watch the ABC telecast next month.
• Adjab is doing a great wrapup of all the news concerning the Super Bowl commercials.
• Jennifer Aniston has work done or her nose.
• TUAW has a video demo of the new Apple TV.
• A Top Chef contestant has just quit his job at a NYC restaurant. Does that mean...?
• TVGasm has a full list of all of the premieres, specials, and finales for the rest of the winter (constantly updated).