Usually if the Super Bowl is disappointing, at least the commercials are a highlight. This year, it felt like a failure all around with only a handful of ads leaving even a remote impression on us, while some of them were just awful. And it probably didn't help matters that the majority of the spots were released a few days early, taking the anticipation factor out altogether. Instead, the only real highlight of the night (unless you were a Seahawks fan, in which case, congrats!) was Bruno Mars (with the Red Hot Chili Peppers) and the calming ticking of the 24 teasers that made us excited for that show's return. Here's what you missed if you (wisely) opted to watch Downton/Sherlock instead of the big game.

Obviously, the best part of this game wasn't the commercials, or even the halftime show, or hell, even the game. In this case, it was all about the blackout, or the partial power outage at the stadium that caused reporters' heads to explode and players to lie on the ground "stretching" but looking like they were dying. That's good entertainment for us non-sportsy types, even if it made this game end even later than normal. But before we get to the commercial spots, can we just give a shout-out to the lovely Jennifer Hudson who looked fantastic and sounded even better while belting out "God Bless America"? And can we ask again if Alicia Keys has a codependent relationship with her piano? Because, honestly, her "Star-Spangled Banner" was average, and the piano was a major distraction. And while we appreciated the Destiny's Child reunion, it was a little sad that Kelly and Michelle only got to do snippets of their songs before having to sing one of Beyonce's solo numbers and then be shooed off stage. We kept expecting something more. Like maybe Beyonce to actually hit her mark in the opening so the body-forming lights would have gone around her. But whatever, on to the commercials.

Before we get to the commercials, we have to give credit to Madonna for putting on a well-executed half-time show -- much to our surprise. She's got quite a bit of energy for her age (or, our age) and manages to lip-sync successfully. Bonus kudos to the tech guys who made the Vogue covers dance on the ground. And the performance was filled with an eclectic group of guests from Nicki Minaj (in a somewhat toned down cheerleader outfit), Cee Lo (dressed like a giant sparkly monk) and LMFAO (as their normal dirty selves). If only MIA hadn't been so... MIA, what with flipping the bird at a cameraman and all, it would have been a smoothly run eight minutes that was memorable for the right reasons. Wish we could say the same about all of the commercials.

It would have been 10, but the Super Bowl ads were generally unimpressive this year as a whole (blame the economy or something!), but there were some exceptions. The one thing that was a little different this year, at least to me, was the insane barrage of NBC promotion. Of course the network that has the Super Bowl is going to promote its own content and everything, but is it always that much self-promotion? It felt like every other ad was a Heroes, Chuck, MacGruber or that people-whose-asses-fell-off-watching-30 Rock thing. Anyway, the list below is the best of the non-movie trailer-y/NBC content as we saw it. (See Moviefile for the best trailers, and we're ignoring the NBC stuff completely.) Enjoy having to watch a commercial before watching a commercial! Yay capitalism!

I get it. The Super Bowl is a blown-out-of-proportion commercial consumergasm, and we should all be better than that. All of that is justified, but as a football fan and die-hard Super Bowl apologist (yes, even this year), I was tasked with coming up with 10 good reasons to sit through the lengthy shillfest. And believe me, there are 10 reasons to watch it. I swear! Read on and I promise to share my hot wings with you.

This season, Supernatural's hell-raising, demon-blooded and/or soul-torturing Brothers Winchester have been given a holy quest by the angel Castiel. (Yeah, I know, it seems kinda weird to us, too.) That quest? To stop the demon Lilith (Dean's killer) from opening the 66 seals binding the fallen angel Lucifer. (There are actually 600, but only 66 need to get popped.) While we've seen two of them -- the Rise of the Witnesses and the Summoning of Samhain -- apparently at least 34 have been opened off-screen, leading us to wonder what the heck they were and where the Winchesters were when it happened. Well, it turns out they actually tried to stop a bunch of them between episodes, with mixed results. We made some calls around the Hunter hotline and found out what went down recently with six of the seals.

I wanted to believe that the post-Super Bowl, Prince-guest starring episode of New Girl would be good. After all, the show has been on a little bit of a hot streak after a very dismal start to Season 3 and because Prince is Prince so everything he touches is magic. Unfortunately, not even the magic touch of Prince (which was, by far, the highlight of the episode) could save this from feeling like a forced and overwhelmingly unfunny episode. (That said, Jake Johnson's high-pitched scream after Prince allowed him to freak out, was a thing of comedy beauty.)

Poor Super Bowl XLVII. It's only the third most-watched program in TV history.

Unlike Grandpa Munster, NBC has quit playing games with Bryan Fuller's heart.

Here are two great reasons to watch this year's Golden Globes ceremony.