“Can you hear me now?..Good!” (some cell phone service)
Young teen couple at a party, she excuses herself to go to the bathroom. He goes on and on to another couple about how smart she is, how talented, how creative…
Meanwhile, she is upstairs, puts her tampon on THE GODDAMN WINDOWSILL, it falls off into the bushes, she searches under the sink and finds generic tampons and maxi pads, and makes this FUCKING KNOTTED TAMPON DAISY CHAIN WITH THE STICKY SIDE OF THE MAXI PAD AT THE END, just to retrieve her precious “namebrand tampon” from the bushes…(which is shown going by the window her boyfriend is standing by)
OOOOOH, OOOOOOH, (now you’ve done it, you got me thinking!)
The OTHER TAMPON COMERCIAL where a gal and her boyfriend are arguing at an outside cafe, about whether or not she brought whatever mindless thing he wants in her purse.
She dumps out her purse, and this YELLOW PORTABLE TAMPON PACKAGE slips out…Idiot boyfriend picks it up and starts shaking it, and miss “I’m so smart, he is so dumb” says " Uh, I thought you said you were going to cut down on sugar"
And mr “I’m too dumb for my clothes” says " Oh, yeah, right" and drops the tampon…
Gee, fellow dopers with a penis: How often do you grab a packet of sugar that is yellow and shaped like a bullet???
Y’know, I always thought the one about the sugary tampons was because he thought it was a twinky or something like that.
Not that that would make the ad not-stupid, of course.
Oh, and I’d just like to throw in prescription drug ads in general. There are two kinds of these: either you have no idea what the thing is supposed to cure (but apparently it has something to do with skiing, earthquakes, or meadows), or you get a list of side effects (most often rattled through at a speed that John Moschitta (the old Fed-Ex speed-talking pitchman) would be hard put to equal) that will turn your hair white and your bowels to water just listening to. Do I really want an allergy medicine that will cause stomach bleeding, diarrhea, abdominal cramps, kidney dysfunction, and cirrhosis of the liver? I think I can live with the sniffles, thank you.
There’s one that I’m not quite sure of yet. It’s a Colgate commercial, I believe, with a man and woman hiking, when they see something glimering in the distance. They pull out their binoculars, search, and find:
"Mr. Beaver!"
It’s absolutely horrible, the acting makes me want to claw someone’s eyes out with a fork, and the whole thing just stinks. But that’s where I’m torn, because there’s no way in HELL it couldn’t be that way deliberately, and therefore, I find it enjoyable.
I just don’t know…
Also, I hate those godsdamned Orbit gum commercials that do that stupid retro seventies’ look and feel with that annoying woman throwing mud and crap on people, but then they smile all happy to show the gum works. Ugh…just…downright…horrible.
I also hate the new Arby’s commercial, though not necessarily because of the oven mitt character. The one I hate is where the manager announces to the entire crew that they’re introducing the new pot roast sandwich. Everyone cheers with enthusiasm and they start high-fiving each other (while one of them is wearing the oven mitt). I know from experience that no fast food employee would ever get excited about the introduction of a new sandwich. Most couldn’t care less and some would even groan at the thought of having yet more items to keep track of. On top of this, the employees shouldn’t even be standing around (“You got time to lean, you got time to clean!”). I hate most commercials where the employees are shown to be unrealistically enthusiastic and devoted to their jobs (Wal-Mart commercials tend to do this, most WM employees say it’s hell to work there). Most of these people are making minimum wage and would gladly vacate their jobs as soon as something better came along.
That’s the “Colgate Herbal” toothpaste, isn’t it? The first time I saw that one was in Britain, so I thought it was just a British variety of Colgate. And then, not long ago, I started seeing it here on American TV. It looks like the same exact ad, except for the accents.
I remember the British ad quite clearly because it introduced me to the British way of pronouncing the “h” in “herbal,” which sounded strange to my American ears. I imagine, though, that the American Mr. Beaver would sound odd to Brits, with his “affected” way of saying " 'erbal."
Anyway, whichever one came first, it’s still a stupid, stupid commercial. The British Mr. Beaver was especially disappointing, since I otherwise find British commercials far more creative and enjoyable to watch than American ones.
What that ad tells me is that a Lexus doesn’t tolerate getting wet. Not a quality I look for in a car; part of the car’s job is to keep ME dry. Too many ads are written by people who aren’t looking at what negatives could be inferred from the ad.
In our area there is a Toyota ad (New England only?) where you see grainy home movies of a Toyota Tacoma pickup truck splashing throught mud bogs, etc., while the voice over screams about “Look out world! Here cimes Tocoma Man! And I look great!”, etc., etc. A moment later, the film flickers to a stop, and this nerdy looking guy looks over at the Sports Illustrated swimsuit cover, which is propped up on the other chair next to the projector and says “So. Waddya think?”
So Toyota means to say that the target market for Tacoma trucks are losers with the people skills of a wet rock, whose social life consists entirely of their right hands? Sheesh…
That commercial for Yo-J, a combination yogurt and orange juice that comes in a carton. The tune’s actually kinda catchy, but I can’t understand why the mascot is a cow. It’s juice, not milk!
The one with the cartoon Mr. Peanut sitting in an easy chair, flipping channels. Grover Washington Jr./Bill Withers’ soul hit “Just the Two of Us” plays in the background (why?).
Toward the end of the commercial, Mr. Peanut almost falls out of the chair, then regains his balance with a weird Macy’s-parade-balloon smile on his face.
Movie preview cliche`s. The announcer describing the SAME MOVIE could do the Low Raspy Growl (horror movie) or the High Indescibable Happy Voice (comedy or family movie). The movies ALL SOUND ALIKE! Not just similar, but alike.
Commercials where new SUVs have to pass the inspection of children, as though a parent is going to buy a car based on what their child thinks about it.
Any commercials where precocious children attempt to shame the viewer into desiring something because, apparently, the children are far smarter and more knowledgeable than an adult.
Any commercial that uses a song with a meaning that contradicts the feeling or purpose of the commercial product. Example: the car commercial that uses Alphaville’s “Forever Young” during “Prom Town” or wherever they are supposed to be. “Forever Young” is a song about nuclear war. I guess the producers never got past the first stanza of the song to figure that out.
Or “Lust For Life” advertising a cruise line! Truly bizarre, unless they are trying to attract a far more “interesting” clientele than I associate with ocean cruises.
I have to switch over every time i see the coke advert with Courtney Cox and her husband. It’s not that it’s a bad one as such, but I’ve seen it far too many times and it’s really starting to get on my nerves.
I’ll second the zoom zoom adverts, they were dreadful.
Any candy commercial in which the heads of the children consuming the product are grotesquely modified as soon as the product is in their mouths. Examples–“baby bottle pop,” featuring the infant heads, and “gushers,” featuring the bloated fruit-shaped heads.
The Mitsubishi commercial with the spaz girl.
There’s a commercial running on the Animal Planet channel right now for PetMeds.com (I think) that features a woman complaining to her friend about what a hassle it is to take her dog, a beautiful golden retriever, to the vet’s office. I really want to strangle that woman.
An ad run by Lexus a few years ago attacking the Jeep Cherokee. It didn’t make any sense–not only because the Cherokee was never anywhere near the price range of a Lexus, but because the Lexus SUV featured in the commercial is incapable of doing anything but looking good.
“Jumbone” dog treat commercials. I don’t know what company makes this product, but I wouldn’t be surprised if they came close to going out of business because of this commercial. It simply featured a dog sitting in the middle of the screen while a woman with a shrill mid-western accent sang something about the dog playing a trombone over the telephone. Ick.
This one is more general: commercials for upcoming newscasts of the local news. They’re always loud and often very misleading. “This new product is flying off the store shelves. But will it KILL YOUR CHILDREN? News at 11.”
