Remember when life was Tacless?

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https://youtu.be/bjGWWVLlkt8

Every time I turn around, there's another cheap piece of crap with the word "tac" tacked on to it (hey, that works...)  Tac lights, Tac Sunglasses, Tac portable chargers....and now "Tac Shavers."  As a very intelligent YouTube commentator (now that's a rarity) noted, we seem to be living in an era where just adding the letters "tac" to the As Seen on TV product is supposed to turn it from junk to Must-Have.

Because you never know when you'll be submerged in a swimming pool and suddenly feel the overwhelming urge to shave.

Because you can't be asked to find time to shave while you're actually at home, so you need this thing sitting in your glove compartment so you can run it over your face while stuck in traffic or sitting in the parking lot of a box store or wherever.

Because your last ounce of awareness that you're living in a society died a long time ago (around the time you had that $5000 earthquake-causing Suburbs-Shattering sound system installed in your car because everyone within 20 miles should know the kind of music you like listening to at 2 AM) and you just don't give a flying damn what anyone thinks of you anymore.  It's why you don't care if the people in the next lane see you shaving with one hand and staring at your cell phone with the other while you're supposed to be paying attention to the road (last week, a guy on the beltway was cruising along in the center lane at 30 MPH while propping a tablet against the steering wheel.  Because FU world, I guess.)  

Because you think "made with the needs of the military in mind" is a great argument to buy anything.  The customers of this product AREN'T in the military.  They don't need to be able to shave while standing in the pouring rain- I doubt they ever even need to shave while submerged in water.  I mean, what soldier is going to find himself in that situation and think "I need a shave?" anyway?  

Set your alarm 5 minutes earlier and shave your fricking face in your fricking house with a regular, house-bound razor, you morons.  

Another really awkward AT&T ad

 https://youtu.be/jL8aIJJhnVI

Watching this commercial for the first time, I really thought that one of two things was going to happen:

A.  The extremely uncomfortable-looking groom would admit that he desperately needed to urinate and excuse himself.   Seriously, the guy looks like he's going to explode and that the act of simply standing there is downright painful.  

B.  The bride, having taken a good, long look at her intended (perhaps for the first time?) realizes that he looks like a dyspeptic mannequin who looks about as enthusiastic about this whole thing as a miner entering the shaft elevator at 5 AM and maybe the MRS degree isn't worth what she thought it was. 

Either way, when the sassy black woman delivers the punchline, we are supposed to think it's HI-larious.  That part I know for SURE.  

Acura's in love with it's own commercial concepts

 https://youtu.be/Pzq2gbPFLlc

(This is the kind of ad that makes me almost look forward to the Lexus December to Remember season that is about to descend on us....hard.  Almost.)

At this point it should no longer surprise me that this insufferable wall of noise, blurred images and self-congratulatory garbage is followed by drooling morons posting "I love this ad" in the comments.  It's just par for the course these days:  put together an expensive minute or so of flashy, shiny junk, give it a soundtrack, slap it on tv and pay the bleating sheep a nickel a post to tell you how awesome it is and especially how much they adore and need need need the song that's attached to it. 

Meanwhile, this steaming pile of manipulative crud is topped off with what looks for all the world like a guy racing his blue Acura to run down a woman tied to the train tracks before the train can finish the job.  I seriously have no idea what his plan was once he got to the tracks- it's like he's playing a video game and running over the girl is worth 250 points and an additional life.  And don't even get me started on how the woman he "saves" ends up the driver....because I don't want to think about this noxious nonsense anymore.  Jesus Acura, just show the damn car sitting in a dealership somewhere.  We already know that if you push the gas pedal, it will go forward.  We already know that if you turn the steering wheel, it will make the car go in different directions.   I know that a couple of film art majors are super-proud of this commercial, but that doesn't mean I'm required to appreciate it.  It's an f--ing car ad for an f--ng overpriced luxury automobile, period.  Get the hell over yourself.  

The Talking Bucket is the most believable part of this KFC ad

 https://youtu.be/prFbaLDMG_A

I mean, if the bucket is going to include gigantic pieces of nothing that looks like KFC which also remains overflowing no matter how many pieces are removed from it, that bucket might as well start talking because the commercial is already off the rails when it comes to realism.  Not to mention the gigantic piles of potatoes and gravy and five-inch tall biscuits that are practically falling off the plate.  Not to mention the dad agreeing that the $50 or so worth of food we see on the table is "a lot better than microwave hot dogs," which may be true but it's not like those are the only two dinner choices available to anyone.  If you're going to include all that, a talking bucket is downright ordinary.  

(I do like how, in one scene, two people are excitedly talking in the background instead of daring to attack the enormous mountain of chicken which absolutely dominates the screen- it looks more like a barrel than a bucket in MOST of this ad.  And the beautifully choreographed scene where the kid is clearly waiting for his cue to reach for a piece of not-chicken.  Seriously, was that the best take you could get, KFC?)  

All this, and it still doesn't work in Vermont?

 https://youtu.be/a84UlLe6zDg

I actually managed to get through this ridiculous, overwrought, played-out-way-before-its-over self-congratulatory pile of steaming feces on the first try, even after realizing thirty seconds in it was going to just be another "we've got a budget and a minute and a half to fill, so let's spend that money and fill that time with insulting levels of dumb" commercial.

Woah....I just realized I said so much in the first run-on sentence paragraph, I really don't have any more to add.  Except that I lost count how many times this ad was about to end but then was padded out even more with unnecessary dialogue and repetitive WE GET IT button pushing and key-turning (how many times can you act like you're "ready" to do something and act like you are "doing" something which just leads to doing something else?  At least three, according to this ad.)  Oh, and that I'm even more appalled than usual with the comments.  What is WITH you people?

Yeah- no, Volvo. Just....No.

 https://youtu.be/XwZUZ42dYJo

The last thing I need from you is the portrayal of a greasy Eurotrash white suburban family which cruises around in a freaking Volvo compared to the people who worked from dawn to dusk in the mills.  Give us a fricking break.  

Oh, wait, maybe I'm being unfair.  Let's see- both this family and the mill family wake up before dawn.  Sure, one does that to make Espresso and get the children up, cleaned, clothed and off to school while the other ate last night's leftover scraps before trudging off for another 12-hour day surrounded by the incessant noise and cotton or coal dust of the mill, but that's just splitting hairs.  Sure, one family bundles into the Volvo while the other walks through the dark morning to the factory gates, but again- splitting hairs.  Sure, one will get two days out of every seven off for rest and relaxation from their office jobs while the other worked on average 6 and a half days per week at grindingly hard, dangerous work, but AGAIN I need to stop being so pedantic.   This really is an Apples to Apples comparison here, really.

So I'm going to stop being infuriated at the comparison of a wealthy family living in luxury in the American suburbs to the masses of half-starved, overworked, underpaid, oft-injured laborers who shook off sickness, weariness and a heavy sense of helplessness to get to the mill every morning to put food on the table.  After all, that first family owns a Volvo, not a Lexus or Audi.  Hard times in the mill, indeed.  

Is Alien Tape just punking us?

 https://youtu.be/IEu2PJn_6BM

I just have one question about this "amazing" tape/not tape product which allegedly can be used in place of wall-ruining tape and nails to do everything from hanging portraits to cementing bowls on to high chairs and fixing furniture in place:  Is it a "permanent solution," or is it not?

Watch this commercial very carefully.  Again and again, we're told how powerful this stuff is at holding things wherever you want to put them.  Several times the words THIS IS A PERMANANT SOLUTION shows up on the screen.  But at the same time, we're told that it's completely removable ("just twist and remove.")  That doesn't sound like much of a "permanent solution."  You can't have it both ways, Alien Tape!  Is this stuff that I can use to mount my 500-lb Rembrandt to the wall of my one-bedroom apartment, knowing that it will stay in place for ever and ever (that's what "permanent solution" means, right?)  Or am I at risk of knocking it off the wall if I bump into it, causing the material to "twist" slightly?  

It's really easy to miss that "this is a permanent solution" line, as it's never uttered, and meanwhile we keep being shown people making adjustments to the stuff that's been mounted with Alien Tape, including taking them completely down so we can see how the wall isn't damaged by the tape because "it's not an adhesive."  It's really easy to see people just buying this stuff, using it to mount something on their wall, seeing it's crooked- and not being able to budge it because THIS IS A PERMANENT SOLUTION, just like the small print in the commercial said but the narrator never did.  It's a lot easier to believe that this stuff doesn't actually work at all, and that expensive thing you mounted falls down and breaks in the middle of the night. Which is why I'm sticking to good old poster putty when I mount my Rembrandts.  But seriously, what the hell is going on here, Alien Tape?  Are you trying to get people to cement things to their walls, or get their priceless shower shelves broken, or what?