GoMedicare Benefits HelpRipYouOffCenter Ad.....

...which has absolutely NOTHING to do with Medicare except that the extremely popular government program is being used to create a veneer of respectability on to yet another scumbag insurance company seeking to prey on the elderly and the ill-informed.

Let's imagine that I'm the owner of one of these fly-by-night barrel-scraping plagues on humanity; how would I go about using the criminally under-regulated airwaves and the Rendered-Toothless-By-Forty-Years-Of-Reaganesque-Laissez-Faire Legislation Federal Trade Commission to pry money out of the people who have highest level of anxiety and lowest level of information among the populace?  Well, first I'll use the word "Medicare," because no matter how little the average Senior Citizen Daytime TV viewer knows about federal assistance they are ALL aware of Medicare and practically all of them derive benefit from it.  As I wrote in the first paragraph, the mere mention of Medicare creates an instant bond of trust between the company that purchased the commercial and the viewer:

"Oh, he said Medicare.  I know Medicare works.  I know it's totally legitimate.  And I can't read those little words that say 'not affiliated with any government program, so I'm going to just listen to the nice man with the earnest voice tell me something about Medicare and I'm very much inclined to accept what he's saying because he started off by saying Medicare."

(It's very important that I call my company something like "GoMedicare," or "MedicareAdvanced," or something official-sounding like that- I'm using the word "Medicare" so it must be legit, the government would totally NEVER let anyone use the word "Medicare" unless was some kind of official program- except of course for that disclaimer that the viewer couldn't read and also remember that toothless FTC thing.)

(While I'm at it, I'm going to put something that looks very much like an official Medicare card on the screen, because that's also very familiar to the viewer and will make him think this is totally legitimate.)

Then I'll remind the elderly viewer that Medicare is limited in what it will pay for- something most people on Medicare already know.  Medicare is awesome but it includes co-pays for prescriptions and doctor appointments and hospital visits.  So now I'll suggest that if they use my program they'll get BETTER Medicare- motorized scooters and wheelchairs, private hospital rooms, etc.- and it will just cost them a few extra dollars a month, so worth it to bring those Medicare benefits up to a Level They Deserve, right?

I will not EVER use the word "insurance" in my ad unless it's connected to the word "Medicare."  "Medicare Insurance" sounds ok, but I think I'd rather just call it "GoMedicare Benefits," because "GoMedicare" sounds just like "Medicare" and absolves me of any responsibility if the viewer failed to get the difference (which I am hoping happens a lot.)  Plus, seniors understand they are entitled to "Benefits" already- telling people who are already getting benefits that they are entitled to MORE benefits is totally plausible.

In the end, I'm selling junk insurance to the elderly by piggy-backing onto the popularity of Medicare.   "Call now and see if you qualify?"  If you already qualify for Medicare Benefits, why would you not qualify for GoMedicare Benefits?  Because you aren't calling to see if you qualify for Medicare Benefits, but if you qualify for a policy with an insurance company called GoHealth which never- not even once- tells you it's name in any of it's ads.  Or that it's website home page is devoted to "helping" people qualify for "ObamaCare"  (old people get shafted by tv commercials, younger people get conned online thank you very much.)  And in the end, I'm just trying to scoop as much money you can't afford into my own pocket because I'm just a soulless creep who had his empathy surgically removed with his wisdom teeth.

What the heck is going on in this Nissan Rogue Commercial??

So in this Nissan ad, we see that TrophyWife's job 24/7 is to protect her daughter from her mentally deficient Child-Husband and his determination to remain a giggling preteen when playing with their offspring.  TrophyWife has resigned herself to respond again and again with exasperated shrugs and occassional "WTF?" looks in response to Boy-Man's dangerously clueless attitude toward safety when it comes to his daughter.

(Though, seriously- I think TrophyWife might be a bit anal when it comes to her daughter's safety.  What exactly did she think would be the horrifying consequence if Daughter had crashed into the kitchen trash can?)

BTW, why doesn't TrophyWife just do the driving if her husband has proven again and again that he's a dangerously useless moron when it comes to...well, just about everything?  Is it because Women Don't Drive When Hubby Is Also In The Car Because Reasons?  Oh no wait, I know the real answer:  It's because Hubby can't screw up and give Mommy another reason to grimace, roll her eyes, or otherwise express her bemused disappointment at his inability to do ANYTHING right if Mommy is doing the driving.

One more thing:  Seriously, what is it with this guy?  From one angle, I see a guy who seems to be suffering from some weird mental problem which prevents him from doing anything but grinning and laughing, like he's a very small boy trapped in the body of an adult.  From another, I see a Father enjoying the time he's spending with his daughter who he recognizes as being made of actual flesh and bone and not crystal and therefore refuses to share his Insane Harpy Wife's constant fear that daughter will suffer injury if not kept perfectly still and wrapped in cellophane.   So What the Serious F--k, Nissan?

USAA Bank: Unafraid to follow the New Predictable

Wait a minute, I'm confused!  Which is to say, I can't quite believe what I'm seeing here!

As near as I can tell (and again, I'm sure I must be mistaken,) this commercial features a young couple making a friendly bet on a game of mini-golf.  That part I actually have no problem believing.  I'm sure this happens.  But what happens next is totally bizarre- the GUY LOSES THE BET TO THE GIRL.

I mean, seriously, really?  A girl besting a guy in an American TV commercial in the year 2019?  If that's what really happened here, what's next?  Snow in January?  Fireworks in July?  I dare not guess!

More Questions for Aaron Rodgers and State Farm

1.  Who the hell has a "favorite State Farm Agent?"  Who has a "favorite" insurance agent at all?

2.  What kind of horrifying crapshow is the life of Aaron Rodgers if he "takes his favorite State Farm agent wherever he goes?"  Man, if you have to bring your insurance agent along with you everywhere, you probably should be locked up as a chronic danger to society.

3.  Rodgers is also constantly checking his policy on his State Farm App in these commercials- another huge red flag.  Good lord man, what the hell are you doing that requires you to constantly check on the status of your freaking insurance?

4.  When are Packers fans going to get sick of every season featuring endless Aaron Rodgers Insurance Ads but no Aaron Rodgers in the Superbowl?  Seriously, guys- priorities.  Is Rodgers insured against consistent failure in the playoffs?  I'm sure he doesn't know offhand.  Time to check that App for the 300th time today!

5.  There's a "Subscribe" button for State Farm Insurance Commercials.  Who the hell would subscribe to be notified whenever another one of these steaming piles of dumb is released on youtube?  As if being beaten over the head with them all weekend during every football game isn't enough?

Another Awful Indeed Ad

Hmmm...just a thought:  Maybe if this kid with stupid greasy hair wasn't just sitting or laying around his parents' house with a stupid blank zombie look on his face, his parents wouldn't have jumped to the perfectly reasonable conclusion that he was being an unmotivated sponge.  Maybe they wouldn't have been so frustrated if he had been oh, I don't know, doing his own laundry or vacuuming or just TALKING TO THE PARENTS WHO WERE PROVIDING HIM WITH A PLACE TO STAY, MEALS, AND LAUNDRY SERVICE instead of acting as if moving back into your bedroom meant that you also got to revert to being a helpless child who needed caring for again.

Based on the way this commercial ends, I guess the parents are supposed to feel super-guilty for ever doubting that their stupid little spawn was actively looking for work by staring at his phone.  Like they owe him an apology for being irritated that their adult son was being totally uncommunicative about his job-hunting strategy.  Like they should have just ASSUMED that he was working really, really hard to land that position that would allow him to go back to being a functioning adult. 

But when you really think about it, um, No.  This creep is being an ungrateful little ass toward his parents.  He spends the entire commercial behaving like a guy who thinks his parents should be able to read his f--ng mind and somehow just KNOW he's working really hard to get the hell out of there (and ignore the silence, that stupid blank look frozen to his face, and that awful greasy hair.)  Also, he doesn't get a job at the end- just invites to attend interviews.  I know from experience that interviews don't pay the bills.  Hold off on that apology, parents.  And for chrissakes, stop doing this jagoff's laundry for him. 

AT&T joins in the never-ending Celebrity Spokeschoad Parade

Every once in a while, I'm reminded of how lucky I am to have been born at a certain time in the past century, watch very little television, listen to very little contemporary music, and am therefore more or less immune to these "wow, look at this Currently Popular Celebrity Doing Very Mundane Things Right Out Here In the Open" commercials.

Whoever Gordon Ramsay is, I wouldn't bat an eye if he handed me a free food sample at the Giant up the road from my house, just like I wouldn't bat an eye if Taylor Swift handed me my coffee at Starbucks because seriously, who the f--k are either of these people?  Well, of course, they are Celebrities who are supposed to Know Stuff by virtue of being Famous for doing things that have nothing to do with what they are currently trying to sell me on the TV.

And while we're at it, I'd love to tell Samuel L Jackson where he can stick that Capital One Card.  If he ever shows up around my Credit Union, I'll be sure to do it- assuming I recognize him.

Tide + NFL = Another Celebration of Dumb

Remember back in February when this was just a cute re-occurring concept for a series of Superbowl ads, and not something that you were being battered with every few minutes, hour after hour, for committing the crime of wanting to watch football?

Anyone remember the last time an ad agency came up with a clever concept and just viewers kind of enjoy it as a nice, inventive little surprise instead of responding with a knee-jerk "oh, you liked that? Well here it is again, 400 times over, until you want to blow your brains out whenever you see it pop up on your screen" series of Here We Go Again commercials?  I seriously can't.  In my lifetime, clever concepts on tv get beaten to death, then the bones get beaten, then the dust gets beaten, and then the dust gets buried for a year or two....and then the horse is resurrected to get beaten all over again for Nostalgia's Sake. 

Given the history, I suspect we'll be seeing this "What Night is Laundry Night" bit go on for quite some time.  Peyton Manning will keep showing up to bleat nonsense about Official NFL Declarations concerning when I'm supposed to do my laundry (think Peyton Manning has ever done laundry in his entire life?  Think he knows where the washing machine is in any of his houses? Me neither) and the drooling YouTube monkeys will gulp it down and claim to want more when they aren't begging to know where they can download the background music.  Other NFL "legends" will join in, until this Tide Ad campaign has had more official spokeschoads than KFC has had fake Colonels.  Eventually it will dissolve into a wall of white noise for even the OMG I LOVE THIS AD glue-sniffers and disappear from the airwaves, though I imagine that'll be 2024 at the earliest.  Then it will rise from the dead like Paul from Sprint to remind us the Good Old Days when we thought we liked this noxious, steaming little cowpie of an ad campaign.

Oh, and Peyton?  You showed up in every other commercial while you were still an active player.  Nobody misses you, because nobody's been given a chance to miss you.  I'd like that chance, please.

Questions, Indeed!

1.  So this woman was actively searching for another position while employed by her current company....maybe if she had been a little more focused on her job instead of searching for a better one, she would have been considered valuable enough to earn a promotion?

2.  This looks like a pretty serious company- this woman better hope she doesn't have some kind of non-competition agreement which prevents her from going to work for that place that wants to arrange an interview?

3.  This woman sure looks confident that she's going to get a job that she's just now learned about.  Was she just as confident when she joined this firm that she'd be getting regular advancement in exchange for hard work (I'm assuming that when she isn't looking for opportunities to quit, she works hard?)  If she does get the job over the six-foot-two white guy also being interviewed, is she going to keep floating her resume out there every time someone else gets promoted over her?

As long as they don't miss their appointment with the National Razor, I'm fine with this

I bet you let yourself get fixated on the fact that two people who are supposed to be in "FRANCE 1780" are interrupted in their discussion of carriage prices by a guy with a Circa 2019 SUV.  And yes, that's really really stupid.  But it's not the brain-dead insulting part of this ad.

That comes closer to the end, when the SUV-owning jackass yells across the square that he got a GREAT PRICE and, when challenged for evidence, waves his phone and yells "IT LITERALLY SAYS, GREAT PRICE!"  Ah, ok, why didn't you say so?  The App on your phone says Great Price, MUST be a great price otherwise how could the ad get away with saying so?

And the two people who overpaid on their...um carriages- quickly concede the "point."  Because as I mentioned earlier, they've been given Absolute Proof the other guy got a great price 'cause it Says Right There on his Phone.

Ok, done.  Bring on Robespierre and start the clean-up job on these twits please.  Because the Revolution can't succeed as long as France is burdened by this level of mouth-breathing gullibility, can it?

More Awesome Parenting from Kraft!

Got a little brat in your ridiculous palatial suburban mansion who won't eat her veggies?  Don't model healthy eating, that's too hard.  Don't make her eat her vegetables- that just creates disharmony in the household (and, as I learned in a song featured in the film Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, there's nothing more important than peace and quiet in the household.)

Here's a better idea- just give the kid something she'll eat with a big smile on her face, because Big Smiles and Contentment is what it's all about.  If that means tossing the veggies into the garbage and letting her eat macaroni saturated with fatty orange goo, well, fine.  Eventually she'll like that fatty orange goo so much you might even get away with pouring it on her veggies and getting your Little Angel to eat them, too!

Then you all can sit in your ridiculous glowing-clean dining room and give each other huge satisfied grins, as if anyone but that awful picky brat actually accomplished something of value. The little girl here certainly DID learn a valuable lesson- throw a fit, raise mommy's stress level- and she'll fold faster than Superman on laundry day.*  Dad?  Well, dad just wants a quiet house.  He couldn't give a damn what his daughter eats or how his wife deals with daughter's little tantrums, as long as it's all done by the time he walks into his Castle expecting a decent dinner.  He's not particularly thrilled that TrophyWife is serving him Kraft Crap In A Box as well, but we often get less than what we pay for.

*Seinfeld reference

I still don't hate these people as much as Lexus owners, sorry Buick!*

I'd like all these spoiled brats to go die in fires, preferably after being in horrible accidents in their cars- oh, excuse me, I mean in their Buicks.  Can they do that?

At the very least, I wish the guy who forgot to lock his car (I'm not playing this game) already had it stolen or vandalized, as it's clearly been hours since he left it (seriously, he's somewhere off the coast, and his car (f--k you, Buick) is parked ostentatiously on the top level of some parking garage at an airport?  Maybe not even in the same country?  WTF?)

And the woman who tells Alexa to start the car- umm, may I ask why?  It doesn't look like it's cold outside.  Or warm.  So what's the point of starting it before you get out there?  Afraid your carbon footprint isn't large enough, lady?  Or is it just another case of "I'm doing this because I can and I want you to know I can?"

Either way, I'd refer you back to my first request.

*We are approximately six weeks away from December to Remember Lexus ads.  Sorry.

Taco Bell's latest offering to America's Insatiable Stupid Food Hole

In the sick, perverted fantasy world of Taco Bell, thousands of people stand in line like lemmings who've been told that their destination is a store selling the newest iPhone to buy whatever greasy piece of faux-Mexican food trash they deign to serve up this week.

As if this commercial wasn't dumb enough on it's face- and it is (I mean, seriously- how many hours are these people standing in line to purchase a taco dusted with cheese?  It's CHEESE, people- not gold.  Not the newest iPhones!  CHEESE!  And pretty much exactly the same kind of cheese you wipe on your pants after eating a bag of Doritos!  Seriously, people!)  we have the spectacle of a woman commenting on what she just waited on line for, purchased, and is now eating as she walks out the door (I actually find this rather believable.  Anyone dumb enough waste a day they'll never get back to buy a handful of greasy meat wrapped in a giant Dorito is certainly dumb enough to express amazement over the concept seconds after the purchase.)



Here's what I don't get, though:  Why is the product featured in this SNL ad from six years ago not on the menu at Taco Bell yet?  I mean, Taco Bell is owned by Kentucky Fried Chicken, the people who brought us the Sandwich with deep-fried chicken in the place of bread.  Surely they can figure out the physics of a taco-pizza-crepe-pancake combo.  I'd stand in line for that!*

*not really

Questions for the fans of Buffalo Wild Wings, etc.

1.  If you can't deprive yourself of football for one day a year to attend a friend's wedding, send the invite back with the "NO" box checked and send a gift.  Don't show up, eat the food, and sit at a table staring at your phone during the festivities like the self-absorbed douchenozzle you know you are.  Just stay home with your football game.  Everyone else will have a great time without you.  Hell, they'll have a BETTER time without you.

2.  If you go to Buffalo Wild Wings, please don't act like the guys in this commercial who act as if they are afraid that if they actually eat the wings instead of attacking them, the taste might catch up and they'll realize they aren't eating actual Buffalo Wings like the kind you can get at actual sports bars from Buffalo to Pittsburgh but rather bland, mass-produced chicken that's just fine if you want lots of finger food during a football game but nowhere near good enough if you've experienced the real thing.

3.  If you work for the ad agency that makes these commercials, please ask yourself why you think that potential customers need to be yelled at in every. Single. Buffalo Wild Wings Ad.  Because we don't.  People who enjoy the prospect of sitting in the Olive Garden of Sports Bars for three hours watching The Game (any game) on a big screen tv while eating barely-seasoned chicken and guzzling down pitchers of equally bland brand-name beer don't require this level of angry hype, and people who have taste won't respond to it anyway, so why not just skip it already?

Wow, I can't imagine why comments are blocked for this iPhone 11 commercial

I mean, you'd think that Apple and Sprint would WANT to soak in the adulation from the viewers who just love the idea of trading in their old iPhones (iPhone 7 or younger, in ANY condition and we mean ANY condition, ANY!) and also love the excitement just oozing like gangrene pus from these two chipper young people!*

Or maybe Apple and Sprint are well aware that they put together a complete Hot Mess of an ad which would inspire the average viewer to dive for the mute button much more than hunting up their old iPhone and heading off to the nearest Apple store to sign another economically ruinous contract in exchange for a marginally nicer and newer phone than the one you crippled your bank account to purchase six months ago.

*I'm being generous by calling Paul a "young" person- he's 48- but it might be more descriptive to just call him an easily-purchased whore for whichever company is willing to hand him a check, a description many would consider harsh but I don't think anyone could argue is inaccurate.

Postmates demonstrates a trend I really want to see end like right now please

Some time in the very recent past a whole lot of advertising agencies got the idea that being as disgusting as humanly possible was the best strategy for selling a product.  Don't offer information about your product, don't tell the viewer why your product was superior- hell, don't even tell him what your product IS.  Just be as stupid and gross as you think you can get away with (and that's a line that's getting harder to hurdle every moment,) slap that crud on tv, and there you go, you've got yourself a commercial that will get attention.

Negative attention, but attention.

This clip includes two commercials for something called "Postmates," which I'm going to guess is just another food delivery service.  I'm not at all sure why Postmates decided that the best way to sell their food service was to

1.  Hire a tax cheat as a spokeschoad.  I mean, come on, really?  Martha Stewart?  Why do I care what Martha Stewart is pimping?  She's a crook.  I associate her with ripping people off.  Why would I buy anything she rents her name to?  And

2.  Take away any semblance of an appetite I may have had before either ad hit the air.  The first one is dumb and gross.  The second makes the first almost passable by comparison.  Almost.

BTW, check out the second guy's apartment.  I don't care about him in the slightest.  I hope he went for the penthouse, because that just means it's all that much farther to the pavement   However, I'm really kind of stunned we don't see any blood.  Given the classiness displayed in both ads, I'd expect to see LOTS of blood- like, spraying everywhere, including all over that laptop screen.   Wouldn't that have been even MORE funny, Postmates?

Taylor Swift is Just Regular Folks. This has something to do with Capital One, I guess.

See, everyone?  Taylor Swift is just like you and me, performing  low-paying jobs badly and having a good time doing it, because if she gets fired well like I said she's just like you and me and she'll be doing her best to make ends meet while she seeks out another low-paying job.

Yep, it's just so adorable to see multi-millionaires slumming it to the delight of their fans, doesn't it?  Maybe Taylor can show up at my school and teach a class or two, failing adorably at that, too.  It would make her even more gosh-darned relateable, if that's even possible.  Meanwhile, there's seriously nothing more delightful than watching someone who makes more money in an hour than the people who actually work at the jobs she's cosplaying at make in a year pretending to be Just Another Struggling Laborer, don't you think?