The Viagra commercials might as well just say “If you don’t get an erection while watching this hot lady try to turn you on, you should ask your doctor for Viagra.”
I have 3 prepaid cards that incur $0 in fees and all offer direct deposit and mobile check deposit (free with a wait or low fee for immediate availability). I have never paid an ATM fee, as they all have various free networks and POS PIN withdrawals. They all offer free bill pay and 1 offers checks (but they are pre-authorized). I think one of them has a $1.99 monthly fee but I get it waived by meeting the modest deposit requirement.
I’m annoyed by the “fresh” Subway commercials.
No, not because I hate their food (I like it) but because in their so-called history of their franchise, they completely ignore the elephant in the room, the one thing that they wish people would forget ever happened.
I’m talking about the wedge cut. The wedge cut made Subway unique. Getting rid of it would be like…like Jeopardy going to questions and answers, rather than answers and questions.
You can’t ignore the past, Subway! The wedge is part of your history!
I liked the Geico commercial with the guy getting a phone call from his mother in the middle of an epic spy chase scene. That is, I liked it the first few times I saw it. Now I’m so sick of seeing it…
Say “catheter” again, Mother Fucker! Go on, Say it!
Stupid cross-eyed bitch looking like she’s in a daze, "$19.95, and throw in a free brush? That’s… amazing!"
I love the Geico Peter Pan commercial and most Geico ads.
Thought the Juicy Fruit commercial with the zipper speak was stupid as hell,but they outdid themselves with the armpit fart ad. Really, Juicy Fruit? You want your product associated with farts?
You know, Geico ads are a double edged sword.
For the most part Geico makes clever, funny and sometimes unique commercials. And I really enjoy the variety of ad campaigns that are unique to themselves. Here are a couple of them:
• Was Abe Lincoln honest?: (Cuts to an old-style black and white film of Mary Todd Lincoln asking “Does this dress make my backside look big?” After a lengthy pause and deliberation, Lincoln sheepishly responds, saying “Perhaps a …”, interrupted as she gets up and walks out perturbed.)
• Did The Waltons take way too long to say good night?: (Cuts to the Walton family saying “good night” to each other numerous times.)
• **Did the little piggy cry ‘wee wee wee’ all the way home?? **(Cuts to a pig named Maxwell riding in the back seat of an SUV holding pinwheels, yelling “wee wee wee” out the window, before being dropped off at his house by his friend’s exasperated mother.)
The problem is, and why Geico ads belong in the “Commercials Currently Annoying You” is because THEY PLAY THEM TO DEATH!!
The current Geico ad, with the secret agent being chased and fighting his enemies who gets a phone call from his mother complaining about the overrun of squirrels at their home is very funny, the first few times you see it. The problem is that Geico plays those ads SO often, over and over and over… that it turns from fun to** truly** annoying.
You’re right. That’s a fine line-- a commercial should be memorable, but the more memorable it is, the more likely it is to become annoying, no matter how good it was the first time you saw it.
I wonder something: do consumers transfer perceived cleverness of a commercial to some “cleverness” factor of the product or company? While clever commercials, like the Geico ads, are entertaining, and in the DVR age, just getting people to watch the commercials, is a big challenge now that didn’t exist before VHS came on the scene, so that’s one reason for all the cute commercial lately, but a commercial needs to hook the viewer on the product somehow by communicating *something *about the product, even if it’s just “Hey, it’s fun.” In addition to cuteness, Progressive is communicating that consumers have a lot of control over when and how much they pay, which is a big deal with insurance.
The main thing you take away from Geico ads is “Geico makes funny ads.” Is that meaningful? does it translate in people’s minds to “Geico is a clever company” –> “Smart people work there” –> “Smart people will help you more than dumb people,” or something?
I can’t believe anyone liked the Geico spy ad even the first time. It’s loud there…are you taking a ZUMBA CLASS? Really? That’s what she calls loud? The rest of the commercial is just being an annoying Mom that wants to talk. That line? Idiot.
I hate those Deal Dash commercials because of that woman. Why is she so mad hecause others purchased stuff for cheap? What a meanspirited biotch.
Most commercials on the science-y channels were written with stupid people in mind. But there is one for prepper food where the narrator says “Every American should have at least a month’s supply of food in your home.” I always wonder where I’d keep it all.
The spy is an idiot, too; his mom is calling on his spy phone! Who gave her that (likely classified) number?
Ancestry.com, whose ads essentially play up how irrelevant the information is. If you can go the first 50 years of your life thinking you’re German, then find out you’re Scottish - it doesn’t matter either way.
Right up there with Sonny not HANGING UP to deal with people who are actively trying to kill him.
I think they’re even worse than that-- if you spent your life going to beer gardens, dancing polkas, and wearing lederhosen, you are German. Or-- umm…maybe German is a bad choice for their example of birthright trumping all other considerations, if you get my drift.
I have no idea what type of Jew my father and his side of the family was-- Sephardic, Mizraic, Ashkenazic-- my father’s father’s side is a total mystery, and his mother’s goes back (my branch in the US) to a Sephardic-gentile (Irish) couple who adopted lots of Ashkenazic practices, because they found acceptance in an Ashkenazic community.
My mother’s family is Ashkenazic, but her grandparents on one side rejected a lot of Judaism. My mother and father practiced mostly Ashkenazic Judaism by the time I was born, mainly because they found a shul they liked that happened to be Ashkenazic. Then my father’s brother married into an immigrant family with strong Ashkenazic practices, and that’s where most of my personal practices come from, with one exception: when I became a vegetarian, I decided to follow Sephardic Passover dietary practices, so I could eat things like whole beans and rice.
I don’t know what a DNA test would show. It’s bound to show some Slavic gentile ancestry, but how much will be a surprise. I could find out that my Irish ancestry has a strong Welsh streak. I could find out that I have no Sephardic ancestry whatsoever. Who knows? I suppose I could even find out that I have very little actual Jewish ancestry, speaking strictly about DNA, but none of that would change the way I live my life, even that last one, because you are not more or less Jewish; you are either Jewish or you are not.
I’m not against Americans celebrating their heritages, or enjoying old country traditions that have been passed down, but it seems a little silly for me to go hunting for them. You know, to not be raised with a practice, and not even know whether your direct ancestors did it in the old country, but to start doing it here just because being ethnic is trendy, or something.
Daytime TV seems to have a lot of ads aimed at the elderly or people with special needs. Like in post #54, the knee brace ad. Why wouldn’t you just go to a doctor and let him tell you if a knee brace would help you or not? If people can get a knee brace for “little or no cost” to them, how does this commercial make money?
And the catheter commercials. Do so many people use catheters that there’s profit to be had in commercials for them?
But worst commercial of all, the “please help” commercials with the dogs and cats in the cages. 
It’s the squirrels in the background that make it funny. The mom is calm, cool, somewhat sedate and small scurrying squirrels, one at first then two, three, etc… appear almost as an afterthought. It’s that small touch that inject the humor.
The idea is that people might not ask their doctors about the knee braces unless prompted by the commercials. (And the companies paying for the commercial get their profits because once the doctor prescribes the brace, Medicare or Medicaid will pay for it. So just as with any product, the more they sell, the higher their profits–but in this case there’s a necessary middleman [the doctor].)
That Trident gum commercial with ther guy with the bulging eyeballs and shit-eating grin…he appears to be in a courtroom. Did the judge just inquire who farted in his court? If so, he might as well own up and boast about it:
“I did, your honor, and if you thought that one was rancid, check this next one out. Obviously I could not lie about it; I mean, look at my Trident grin! Would it make you believe me?”?’
"Holy sheeyit, that one was even worse! Bailiff! Shoot that gassy sumbitch!
That commercial with some dumb car being sold while you hear some kids sing songing the names of the presidents. Because it’s Presidents’ Day month… That one annoys the doodoo out of me. Can not reach for the remote fast enough.