Anybody got any comedy standards or advertising techniques that have either worn out their welcome or are hopelessly out of date? I don’t mean offensive racist or sexist jokes, I just mean stuff that is old. I have a couple:
Comedy that needs to die: Any and all jokes about programming the VCR are tired, and have been for years. These jokes were based on VCRs being a new, unfamiliar technology, and were funny because almost everybody could relate to the problem. Nowadays, a VCR is almost a standard home appliance and almost everybody knows how to work one. We have had simple, onscreen menus for programming for some time now. How is a joke about somebody who can’t program the VCR funny anymore?
Advertising technique that needs to die: Commercials for household items in which the husband is an idiot who couldn’t find his way to the back of the refrigerator without help from his genius homemaker wife. I realize that these ads are not aimed at male consumers, but do these even appeal to women? Does Madison Avenue understand that the standard of a boy whose mother handles all the housework getting married right out of high school to a wife who now handles all the housework is about 20 years out of date? Have they not noticed that more and more people are waiting until their late-20s - early-30s to get married? Don’t they realize that when a man has lived away from his mother for a few years, he usually figures out what brand of laundry detergent or dish soap he likes, or where to buy groceries, or how the washer and dryer work?
One more thing - because so many more men are “living single” and doing their own housework, why don’t we see any of these ads specifically aimed at men? As it stands, advertisers are still targeting the old stereotype of stay-at-home housewives with these ads. There are now car and hardware store ads that try to target women - why not household appliance/supplies ads aimed at men?
I’ve seen at least one aimed at men, but I don’t remember what product it was for. It was a standard role reversal, with the men watching some game on TV but being concerned about using coasters and such.
What really needs to die is the every-four-years election-themed ads. The ones with two beer bottles debating, or a talkng head yammering on about his “opponent” or what have you. It might have been amusing back in the first election after TV was widespread but it’s hackneyed and unbelievably played now.
Car ads where someone goes into ecstatic rapture at the mere sight of that particular car. These are not ads for Ferraris or Corvettes – the ads are for Toyotas or Mitsubishis, which all pretty much look the same IMHO.
Comedy that needs to die: “Tastes like chicken.” Always followed by a hearty guffaw, as though there were something funny about it.
Advertising technique that needs to die: I agree about commercials featuring husbands who are dweebs, and the all-knowing wives who take care of them. Especially annoying: husband has a cold, and is sick and helpless and acting like a five-year-old; “doctor mom” gives him some cough syrup and makes him better. This gives the husband/wife relationship an unhealthy maternal vibe that does not appeal to me.
Also: this isn’t an old cliche like the “doctor mom,” but I’m really hating a series of commercials for some sort of Viagra-type sexual aid for men. These commercials feature a guy who looks rather like William H. Macy, but whose face is stretched in a Joker-like grin at all times. Creeps me out. Yuck.
I swear that geek who says, “can you hear me now?” should fall into a fissure and be swallowed up. Don’t think we could hear him from the bowels of the earth.
15-second ads on Japanese TV with worthless “talents”; loud music, screeching voices, and inane sound effects; and an ultra-jokey, surrealist style that conveys no real humor or aesthetic sense.
Oh wait–that’s 90% of all ads in Japan.
Another staple of TV beer ads around the world: the middle-aged man having an orgasm after his first gulp of beer on a hot day. Gimme a f*ckin’ break. I mean, some of them just reach this creepy level of absurdity, like the dude’s getting a blow while he drinks.
I my experience, people still don’t know how to program their VCR’s - almost every VCR I see still has a flashing 12:00 on it, and almost everyone I know has no idea of how to program one to tape a show at a certain time.
I’ve never seen that…I’d actually rather like to, for the sake of my lurid curiosity. Clutch Cargo was after my time, but I’ve been wishing I could see that type of animation once–and only once–ever since I read about it in the first SD book long ago.
Size of penis jokes. Once you get past high school, time to stop kidding each other about the wang.
Beer commercials that make you think that if you drink their suds, all these gorgeous women will throw themselves at you. Come on, they aren’t all that different. Plus I’ve never met a woman that was really a serious beer drinker, most prefer mixed drinks.
I’m sick of all the “priceless” ads. beach chair: $20. sunscreen: $8. spending the day at the beach: priceless. It’s not priceless. There’s parking, gas, beach permit (in some cases), food, etc.
I even hear the damn things on the radio. radio: $50. tuning in to KRAP: free. listening to a 90 minute block of commercial-free songs: priceless. Please, it’s been beaten into the ground past the water table. Give it a rest.
I just bought a new VCR a couple months ago. It has on-screen programming. When you are done setting the channel, time etc. the button you push on the remote to save and exit is labeled ‘clear’.
After all these years it seems VCR manufacturers still have no frigging clue how to design a sensible user interface, so it’s no wonder so many people don’t know how to use them.
Ad gimmick that needs to go: animals hitting on or being hit on by human women. Exemplified at the moment by the Molson bear, who seems to score with a hot human female every time he goes anywhere and orders the right beer. Because bestiality is a constant source of amusement!
That should be the Labatt’s bear, of course. Molson gets a free ad pass for a long time to come because of their “I am Canadian” commercial, which implied nothing about other species having sexual congress with human women.
