Outrageous TV Commercials

[hausdok]

Sometimes I see commercials on the television and think to myself, how would a consumer from the mid-50's react if it were possible to transport him or her through time and plunk 'em down in front of the television today? I think that person would probably go into real shock.

Just saw the new Echo outdoor power equipment commercial. There's a guy bent over an exam table with a doctor putting on his latex glove. The doctor announces that his students will observe and then proceeds to do the exam while the patient tells how he has to "put up with a lot of stuff but he won't put up with unreliable outdoor equipment. Then, with the doctor feeling around in the back door he pulls an Echo brand weed wacker out from under the table. He gives his pitch and then the scene changes to a female intern who's very actively doing something 'back there' as he's talking.

I was sipping a drink at the time the commercial came on. I'm currently wiping down both monitors and cleaning up my desk.

ONE TEAM - ONE FIGHT!!!

Mike

[Tom Raymond]

Our commercials are pretty tame compared to the rest of Western civilization. Just look at the Aussie stuff Kibble posted the other day. There's a full page teen-e-bop in bikini every week in the Toronto Sun Times, and the Brits regularly feature nudity in their ads. We used to make TV shows about foreign commercials, before reality TV ruined everything.

I think the most shocking are the Jello Temptations commercials, where Mom and Dad use brutal scare tactics to keep the kids from eating their Jello snacks. Child abuse isn't funny.

[Brian G]

Yeah, a lot of those are funny as hell (if you don't have a 1,000-question-a-day kid in the room).

My pet peeve concerns advertising for fast food places. They show you these sandwiches exploding with meat and toppings, but when you buy one it's flat nothing with 1/2 the stuff they showed in it. Blatent false advertisement we've come to accept without a word...sad.

That, and the ones who ask you "Medium, or large?" when you order a combo, as if "small" doesn't even exist. Flat-out unethical.

Brian G.

I May Be Crazy, But I Ain't Blind [:-boggled[:-blindfo