Bad Ads 2
When I was a kid, I and my idiot friends would while away hours by constructing hysterically funny commercial parodies, like the following:
IDIOT FRIEND: M&M's... Melts in your hand, not in your mouth!
PAUL: (laughs for 25 minutes)
We thought it would be hilarious if companies said stuff that would hurt, not help, their companies. Really sophisticated stuff. But my point is not to horrify you with my obviously low-quality childhood; my point is that at some point, ad companies obviously got the same idea themselves. The following are a few pieces of evidence, which I will collectively call for the record "Exhibit Suck":
Got raisin bran?
 Laura's been complaining about this commercial forever. In this one, a hip young gen-Xer (one of a house full of 3 hip young gen-Xers who unaccountably live on a farm) finds he has no milk for his raisin bran. Taking his bowl, he goes outside to try to milk a convenient cow. Says one of housemates to another, "Are you going to tell him that that's a boy cow?"
I doubt that there's a living being in America who, upon seeing this commercial, didn't vault to his or her boot-clad feet, spurs jingling, sputtering indignantly, "There's no such thing as a boy cow!" Cows are female cows. Bulls are bulls. But semantics aside, the cow in the commercial is clearly a female cow (or "cow"). And if it was a bull, his roommates deserve no credit for letting him go try to tug on a bull's privates without trying to intervene in any way. Their laid-back laissez faire attitude spells his DOOM!!!!
and while we're on the subject,
Got chocolate milk?
 A guy is standing on a street corner with a bottle of milk and a bottle of chocolate syrup. The guy pours both in his mouth and gargles. The commercial asks, "Got chocolate milk?"
What is the totalitarian regime running the "Got Milk?" campaign trying to put over on us? They seem to be implying that mixing chocolate and milk is an unorthodox way to make chocolate milk. I maintain that the protagonist of the ad does indeed have chocolate milk. We all know the basic building blocks of chocolate milk, and he has 'em. If there's a question at all, it would be, "Got spoon?" or "Got the 20 seconds it requires to mix chocolate milk?" or the simple, AOL-like statement, "You have chocolate milk."
Chevrolet:
In an obvious attempt to curry favor with the man on the street, Chevrolet's commercial spins a yarn about Joe Sixpack's favorite sport: fox hunting. In the commercial, a fox, trying to escape a pack of dogs, climbs in an abandoned Chevrolet. Presumably he closes the door somehow, although this is not fully explained. Perhaps "nicely equipped" is ad-speak for "special door handles operable by foxes." Anyway, the dogs run by, and the fox is safe.
The secret subtext, in case you missed it, is "CHEVROLET: KEEPS SMELLS IN".
You know what? Not a desirable an attribute for a car.
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