What's Missing Here?

If you guessed "redeeming social value," you'd be right, but that's not what I'm looking for. Hey, it's my third post of the day, so I'm not going for "deep" here.

And it's not "a good reason to buy one of these phones," either, though you'd be right with that guess, too. Watching downloaded movies on a three-inch screen justifies a vanity purchase like this stupid little toy? Really? No. And if you don't "need" to have the option of watching television or movies every fucking second of every fucking day, I don't see what makes either of these phones superior to my FREE flip phone. (If you DO feel that you need access to electronic entertainment all the time, no matter where you are, please seek professional help and stop helping these companies wreck society, ok?)

It's not the price, because if you are in the market for one of these things, you don't care about the price. You just see the commercial, haul your sorry ass to the store, open up your wallet and tell the undereducated twenty-something at the register "yes, I'm back for my ninth upgrade this year. Just take whatever you need out of this leather thing."

No- what I'm looking for- but never really expecting to see- is nothing more complicated than a SET OF FRICKING HEADPHONES. Seriously, what the HELL is the matter with you, people? Go ahead and indulge in your obsession with your idiotic toys. Watch television and movies until your eyes fall out of their sockets for all I care. But with the last surviving part of your brain that is not dedicated to instant gratification and social withdrawal, try to remember that you are in a PUBLIC PLACE surrounded by people who DON'T SHARE YOUR SAD ADDICTION TO ELECTRONIC STIMULATION. Watch your wonderful movies with the exploding cars and everything going smashy-smashy. Feel free to be so engrossed that you step in front of buses and trains (I mean it, I hate all of you that much.) But for God's Sake, give me SOME sign that you are aware that there are OTHER PEOPLE ON THE PLANET and they would like to get from Point A to Point B without being assaulted with whatever you are trying to use to stop the awful echoes of nothingness bouncing around inside your skull, losers.

Come on, Cell phone companies. I know you hate us. But would it be so hard to show these people using ear buds? If it would help, I'd remind you that they don't really work very well.

"And she thinks Baked Kraft Mac'n Cheese is good for me!"

Ok, I don't want to be too critical of this ad because it's got a good, important message, and I don't need to be flamed by people accusing me of being pro-cancer or something.

I'll just point out that this little girl with the mom who is "kinda weird" has already appeared in Kraft Mac'n Cheese ads ("you BAKE it...in the OVEN...") and "MacSurance Covers you for lost Mac'n Cheese...,") which means that the woman in this ad is probably not her mom, but another actress. Know what that does to the message, GE? Makes it considerably less appealing and believable.

If you want to sell us on your efforts to fight cancer, how about going out and finding an actual cancer survivor and her actual daughter (I bet you anything they are out there) and spare yourself the trip to Central Casting to find the Cute Little Girl with Commercial Experience. Because maybe I'm alone here, but recognizing this kid totally detracted from the message. All I could think of was this Precious Little Moppet pining over the loss of "Cheesasaurus Rex- I LOVED that guy!" and pushing "MacSurance" against Loss Due To Disgusting Parents With Bad Manners. Not fighting cancer.

So while I don't wish this kid any specific ill will, and I frankly don't care if she goes on to have a decent career in Hollywood, I think her usefulness as a Cute Kid Talking About Her Mom expired the moment she signed with Kraft. Better luck next time, GE.

"...And I guess the guy who invented that cool toothpaste painted these..."

Ugh, where to start? Two filthy-rich white people buy a freaking palace suitable for entertaining their equally filthy-rich, equally white friends. They had no IDEA that those paintings in the attic were authentic Vermeers, nor do they really care- they just "both love the color yellow." The message we are supposed to get is "some people don't understand the value of beautiful works of art." This is supposed to segue into something truly nasty. But we'll get to that in a minute.

Clueless disgusting filthy-rich dickwads not only did not know that those paintings they fell ass-backwards into are valuable, they don't even know who Vermeer was ("funny name.") So they are uneducated as well as clueless. No problem- I guess it doesn't take all that much intelligence to have parents who believed in protecting their "generational wealth" (that post is coming, stay tuned) or got you a cushy job as a hedge funds manager. See how easy it is to be disgustingly rich, Occupiers? You don't even need two brain cells to rub together!

Anyway, this is all supposed to come together when the airheads who live in the palace don't even recognize that the Look How Incredibly Well-Off WE Are Castle on Wheels (starting price just under $80,000) parked on the street outside is ITSELF a work of art. At this point, did we expect any different from these philistines? After all, if they don't know who Vermeer is, and don't know Art when they see it, naturally they think this symbol of Conspicuous Consumption God I Hope They Use It To Transport You To The Guillotine automobile is just a "car" (starting price four years of college at a state university)." I mean, for all their Money and Appropriate Pigmentation and awesome art collection they really are just slobs- and that's the punchline.

We can imagine that on the drive home, the two guests clucked endlessly about how strange it was that Bob and Susan didn't seem to appreciate the awesomeness of our car (starting price the cost of feeding Nairobi through 2014,) and what a waste of time it was to have it detailed and waxed to a high gloss during dinner. I'd be thinking of where I could find some cheap Starving Artist paintings- in yellow- to trade for those Vermeers. Because I'm not interested in becoming disgustingly rich, but I wouldn't mind being a LITTLE better off.

Stick your A-Fib up your...well, I think you can guess the rest, Big Pharma

If the condition that Pradaxa treats is so damned serious, why is it "commonly" reduced to the term "A-Fib?" Jesus Christ, is it a disease or a shortstop prospect for the New York Yankees? I know that if my doctor told me I had this condition that required the use of the word "bleeding" half a dozen times to explain it properly, I wouldn't want him to shorten it to "A-Fib." I mean, I'm glad you are so freaking hip, American Medical Association- but this IS my life you are talking about.

What's next? "Mrs Smith, your son was just admitted into the emergency room, he has a broken leg, or what we call B-Leg." Or how about "your husband has suffered a brain aneurysm, or BISM." Because if you are going to be sick or hurt, that shouldn't prevent us from being Hip, should it?

Second, doesn't Pradaxa sound like more of a trap than a benefit? Don't stop taking Pradaxa without your doctor's permission, as stopping may cause internal bleeding. Taking Pradaxa, by the way, may cause internal bleeding. So if you take this drug, you risk bleeding to death internally. And if you stop, you run the same risk. Ain't it great to grow old in the 21st century?

Finally, I like how the makers of this drug seem to realize that the side effects of their Miracle Drug are too scary to be explained by just one doctor- no, we need an entire phalanx of Caring Professionals to explain to us in soothing terms why this drug is really beneficial despite all this scary stuff that can happen to you if you take it. Don't believe the female doctor? Here's a male doctor telling you the same thing. Oh, and here's a fat old guy who can barely walk, but take our word for it, he's MUCH HAPPIER because he's taking Pradaxa. Or at least, he will be, until it kills him.

The FDA is doing a great job, isn't it? Every time I see one of these drug ads, with it's one or two lines of benefits followed by four paragraphs of warnings, all I can think is how ridiculous it is that we live under a system which allows drugs to be rushed to market and peddled by paid spokesmen and actual doctors alike as long as the ads come with long lists of disclaimers. So the moment one branch of Big Pharma manages to produce a drug which SEEMS to have SOME effect on dealing with a disease (and we are talking everything from dementia to heartburn) it's on the shelf at your local pharmacy, and never mind that it may cause all kinds of bad things to happen to sad, desperate, and above all Trusting people who are only trying to do what their doctors told them too (more and more often, because they told the doctor they saw this ad and were convinced to badger him for this drug.)

Wouldn't it make a lot more sense for these drug companies to be told to keep working on these new products until the risk of these truly horrific side effects was at least greatly decreased? Oh, but that slows down the money machine, doesn't it? Can't have that. So I guess all we can do is quietly suggest that maybe doctors go back to acting like doctors and not drug peddling middle men for the Pharmaceutical industry. And stop treating us like children by trying to give serious diseases "cool" names.

Hey, at least it's not Tee Set

Guess what, morons? You don't look stupid getting the words to "Rocket Man" wrong. Don't be ashamed because there's a line in the song you've spent your whole life mishearing.

You should be too busy being ashamed that you are even attempting to sing Elton John's Major Tom ripoff. Or any Elton John song at all. I will, however, give you credit and a tip of the hat for not subjecting us to some mangled version of the worst song ever written which is not called MacArthur Park or "sung" by Paper Lace, Sir Elton's treacly "tribute" to Princess Diana. God what an ear-bleeder.

Wow, what WOULDN'T this guy do for a Klondike bar?

The Hate is strong with this one.

It's as if the good people at Klondike suddenly noticed that in Commercial Land, Males who really can't bear to be with their wives/girlfriends are a time-honored tradition that they somehow managed to overlook in thirty years of advertising. Eliminating all subtlety, the ad agency hired by Klondike, given it's marching orders to catch up with the rest of the world, threw together this horrid thirty seconds of Stupid.

Ugly, fat, unshaven slob Hubby absolutely, positively cannot BEAR to listen to anything the woman he once apparently wanted to spend the rest of his life with has to say. To him, the voice of the woman who's first "I Love You" resulted in a rapid heartbeat now makes fingernails across a chalkboard sound like the most beautiful music ever created. Listening to her prattle on for more than FIVE SECONDS is pure agony for this guy, who judging from his waistline and posture clearly married only to have someone to wash his clothes, incubate his babies, and refill his beer glass so he won't risk missing a play during Monday Night Football. What, she wants to TALK too? Ugh, I think you just found the thorn in the rose of your "relationship," buddy! It speaks!

This is another one of those commercials that steps beyond the realm of Inoffensively Dumb and reaches Cruel, Mean-spirited, and just plain Sad. It's bad enough that the jerkwad who wrote this nasty pile of dung is probably married with kids and has no idea how awful it is. It's worse to think that Klondike believes it's just following the crowd by portraying men as such insufferably self-absorbed, distant, cold-hearted dicks. "Hey look, America- we get the whole Men Are Insensitive Assholes bit, too! So buy our product!" Ugh.

Oh, and Klondike? Making that product look like a kitchen sponge drenched in chocolate syrup? Not the best idea, either.

You're going to be here all day. Just Accept It.

Never mind the "just accept it, banking monkey" patronizing BS that flows through this God-Awful commercial. It's every bit as bad as Southwest's "Our Crappy Airline is So Much Different than the others, THEY cheat you out of every penny" ads.

In fact, never mind ANY ad for Banking, Airlines, Insurance, Cars or Beer which suggest that somehow their identical service or product is measurably "better" than all the others. Because it's all a crock. There's about as much light between Ally Bank and Bank of America as there is between the Democrats and the Republicans- not enough to illuminate a grain of rice. So Ally, Southwest Air, State Farm, Miller Lite- cut the crap, ok?

Instead of dealing with that entirely predictable, utterly dishonest theme, let's just stick with something simple- who among us has not been behind this guy at the ATM machine? Of course, it's usually something like the stupid knothead having not the slightest idea how to use the freaking machine, or not realizing that you can't WITHDRAW the money if you don't actually HAVE the money. This time, Our All Too Familiar Jerkwad is content to stand there holding up the entire line because he can't decide whether to pay a freaking three dollar fee to get his money. I mean, I know I've seen this guy more than once in my life. In fact, I see him everywhere- at the ATM machine, he can't figure out the Amazingly Complicated Buttons. At the theater, he suddenly can't remember which film he wanted to see, or that he needed to take his money out to pay for the ticket. At Giant Food, he insists on using the Do It Yourself aisle but can't find the barcode on the items he wants to purchase to save his life, and of course is buying nothing but fresh produce so he has to God Help Us Both find the proper code on the screen and (horrors) weigh his freaking bunch of parsley TODAY IF IT WOULD BE CONVENIENT. He's the Guy With No Clue But All The Time In The World, and if you know what you are doing and/or are in a hurry, that's just tough.

Thanks for giving this guy a job, Ally. I'll congratulate him the next time he's in line in front of me.