Most horrible TV commercial

Rod Sprague · Post by **Rod Sprague** » Wed Oct 04, 2006 1:25 pm

In advertising, that is known as an “If you touch my beer, I will kill you!” add. I believe it was Schlitz, but a brand of beer went from one of the national dominant brands to second rate as far as sales, due to a particular add campaign. A man was shown to be a real outdoorsman and he would leave his beer in a cold stream, guarded by his pet cougar. He would say something to the effect of “Don’t touch my beer!” and his cougar in the foreground would snarl and rake its paw toward the camera.

PhilO · Post by **PhilO** » Wed Oct 04, 2006 6:52 pm

Miwokhill wrote:The 'what's in your wallet' commercials by a credit card company backfires, at least to me. It comes across so threatening and trecherous that I think of it as a reflection on the company itself.

The other that also ends up kicking itself to me is the bank who are advertising their identity theft program with the perpetrators of the i.d. thefts having their voices overdubbed onto to hapless victims. As with the other commercial it's well done but to the extent of creating a nightmarish vision that I end up somehow associating with the company itself.

I actually called them, after some really bad service issues, and suggested perhaps they put some of their bucks into service and support instead of cutesy advertising; they said they were working on it. Actually, they're not bad, but a lot of companies expand their advertising beyond a point that they can adequately support (can you say "Dell").

Philo

Whistlin'Dixie · Post by **Whistlin'Dixie** » Wed Oct 04, 2006 7:23 pm

What's the one where they have the adult athlete's heads on the kids' bodies?
Totally gross.....

And I REALLY hate that AFLAK duck

M

rebl_rn · Post by **rebl_rn** » Wed Oct 04, 2006 9:30 pm

Awwww, I like the AFLAC duck!

I saw a really obnoxious commercial for the first time today. It was for Yahoo!, I believe. It showed a woman about to spray something on her flowers in her yard, and her neighbor asked, "What are you doing?" and she replies something like, "Oh, just spraying on this fertilizer I saw a commercial for on TV." She sprays the fertilizer on and everything dies. Like everything, including the house. Then it goes back and this time when the neighbor asks "What are you doing?" the woman replies, "Oh, just spraying on this fertilizer I heard about on Yahoo!". She sprays it on and everything grows hugely, then a hole opens up in the ground and a dog jumps out! The little girl on the swing says "Scruffy! You're alive!!!" I don't know if it's nightmares about undead dogs or fantasies about reviving lost pets that might damage kids more....

Denny · Post by **Denny** » Wed Oct 04, 2006 9:43 pm

Ew!

Stephen King writing Yahoo commercials???

Flyingcursor · Post by **Flyingcursor** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 4:27 am

Poor taste at it's best.

I saw one that made me laugh. It's for some kind of remote computer access service. A group of people are touring a museum and the tour guide shows this miserable zombielike guy in a cubicle drearily pecking at his keyboard. She explains that it's an example of when people had to go to an office to do their work. One of the tourists states "I've heard of this before", then this little girl looks up and says, "Mommy, I'm scared!"

I laughed heartily.

amar · Post by **amar** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 5:24 am

http://www.awfulcommercials.com/latest.php

enjoy.

or don't.

fearfaoin · Post by **fearfaoin** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 7:41 am

amar wrote:http://www.awfulcommercials.com/latest.php

Yikes. The site owner must be from Wilmington, NC, since all the local
ads are from around there. Now I see why my Mother-in-law never
turns on her TV.

missy · Post by **missy** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 8:39 am

aw - I like the "what's in your wallet" ones with the Vikings. Especially the Christmas one where one of them shoots a plastic reindeer with an arrow (ok, maybe you have to know my ex to see the humor in that one....).
I liked the AFLAC one with Yogi Bera.

We watch "Pirates of the Caribbean" (first one) on I think it was USA a couple of weeks ago. It was 3 hours long. Without the commercials, I think it wouldn't have been an hour and a half. Totally stupid.

djm · Post by **djm** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 8:48 am

We deliberately show up late for films in theatres, now. It is guaranteed that there will be at least 15-25 minutes of advertising before the feature film comes on. Gee, its almost as good as staying home and watching TV!

djm

PhilO · Post by **PhilO** » Thu Oct 05, 2006 9:18 am

Whistlin'Dixie wrote:What's the one where they have the adult athlete's heads on the kids' bodies?
Totally gross.....

And I REALLY hate that AFLAK duck

M

I hate that first one too; when I said at a family gathering "uh oh, here's that disgusting big head ad" my life-long sports debating sparring partner said "hey I love that commercial, and the heads are not big, the bodies are just small." Go figure. Oh yeah, another Derek Jeter winner.

Have to admit though, I did like the Aflak commercials, esp the ones with Yogi, but only the first 100,000 times I saw it.

Philo

Rod Sprague · Post by **Rod Sprague** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 1:52 am

I remember that these commercials came across as if you were dealing with either an alien hive mind or some sort of succubus that was trying to take over the food industry; http://www.culturefreak.com/beatrice.html

Flyingcursor · Post by **Flyingcursor** » Thu Nov 30, 2006 6:27 am

Rod Sprague wrote:I remember that these commercials came across as if you were dealing with either an alien hive mind or some sort of succubus that was trying to take over the food industry; http://www.culturefreak.com/beatrice.html

That's amazing. I remember that well and like the author on that site I began to imagine Beatrice was some kind of Illuminati.

I'd forgotten the horror until now.