Step Yo Game Up!

This one seems to have really taken a page out of Sega CD’s playbook. See “older posts,” for evidence.

Rating: 30 seconds of unoriginal ideas.

Sports Center

Wieden + Kennedy. This campaign has been running since the Fax-Machine Era. It’s still funny most of the time. Wally should have received an EMMY or a 30 Seconds of Hell Awardy Award for his acting here. Disappointed, dejected, heartbroken. We’ve been there, pal. And, fuck the Yankees and the Red Sox.

Rating: 30 Seconds of Heaven

More Comedy From Alabama Politics

Well, holy hell. If there’s one thing the teabagging masses love it’s people dressed in colonial garb. If there’s another thing, it’s furries dressed in colonial garb. Rick Barber is flirting with Tea Party perfection here, especially since he’s ignoring some rather notable historical facts. He almost seems like he’s doing it on purpose.

Take it away Dave Weigel

He appeals to Washington as the owner of a distillery who “knows how tough it is to run a small business without a tyrannical government on your back.” But President Washington presided over, and approved, the first tax levied by the federal government — the 1791 whiskey tax. When the tax met resistance, he approved the assembling of militias to enforce the law and mobilization of agents to collect the revenue. So the Barber daydream of Washington angrily ordering a “gathering of armies” to oppose a tax is… well, entertaining, I guess

Anyway, with Tim James and Dale Peterson inexplicably losing their primaries, this Rick Barber J-hole will be supplying more than his share of idiot theatrics for the rest of the cycle.

Rating: Thirty Seconds of Hell

Chrysler.

I’ve been giving Chrysler a lot of shit lately so I’ve been trying to find a new ad of theirs that I don’t dislike. Well here it is. I googled for about 20 seconds and couldn’t find the company that produced this spot. Whoever it is, it is obvious they’ve been keeping their eyes on A Continuous Lean

It is interesting however, that Chrysler waited until they were disowned by the Germans and adopted by the Italians to get all jingoistic.

Rating: Thirty Seconds of Heaven

Demon Sheep

What can we say about this “new classic” that hasn’t already been said? The weird thing is that it does actually give me the willies toward the end. Real, genuine goosebumps and not goosebumps in name only. (GINOs)

Rating:30 seconds minutes of hell.

Attention Grill Coddlers: there are three end results with your next grill purchase: ‘Have Fun With It’, Have Your Delusions Shattered, or just Pretend to Have Fun With It

Like, um, like, somebody call the dork police, and the fashion police, because this spot is so totally 30 seconds of dork-alert-5000.

This commercial is a recipe for a dork-disaster: 1) the commercial is driven by a kids’ bop rendition of the “Bly Gotta Feelin’ kick-start-party-song by the Black Eyed Peas. 2) the opening line of the song is, “Didn’t know, couldn’t see, what was around the corner for me. Let’s go!” 3) the kids bop vocalist is dressed in autotune, and this is a textbook example of a creative team shamelessly jumping on the ephemeral autotune bandwagon.

4) The commercial flagrantly targets caricatured demographics — only those who can afford a weber, of course — which, in this case, is the widowed, prim and proper, affluent grey panther; the wholesome African-American male who lives in the suburbs and is happy; the lonesome librarian who lives by herself and has fun by herself; and the jolly bearded gas station attendant (he’s the lil shocker). This blogger will omit the rest of the dorks, because I respect you, and because this dork-ball video-mash subsequently welters into an unsightly meatball — hot and ready to be charred on the ole’ web grill.

However, I do appreciate the female backing vocals, 0:26 in, when we hear a passionate, “Come on — yeah!”

Rating: 30 Seconds of hot-and-ready propane gasy hell

The Chrysler Taint as Applied to Wieden + Kennedy

Agency: Wieden+Kennedy (!?)

I can’t remember the last time I saw a Chrysler ad or product that wasn’t horrible. With this new spot from the venerable Wieden + Kennedy, they have reached a new low. It’s 2 minutes of just totally incomprehensible bullshit.

I really hope Fiat can turn this ship around and sell some Alfa Romeos in process.

Chrysler used to make this, now they specialize in making me want to vomit.

Rating: Thirty Seconds of Hell

A Candidate for Real Americans

So, your ol’ pal Comrade Teargaskov’s been away for a while. Yep, fightin’ in them culture wars has taken me away from the ‘puter for a spell, but I’m back.

One of our chief allies in this here war, and it is a war mind you, is Dale Peterson. He’s old school conservatism mixed with the quick cuts popularized by the Music Television in the 1980s. He has a gun and he has a plan for Alabama. Elect this fella. Facebook.

Thanks to Wonkette for tipping me off to this wonderful ad.

NOTE: THIS AD IS SO GOOD THAT IT MAY BE WIDER THAN OUR THEME ALLOWS IN SOME BROWSERS. DEAL WITH IT, HIPPIE.

Thirty Seconds of Heaven!

Binder and Binder: The Success of the Cowboy Power Hat (NOT!)

This commercial is darkness. Corporate mania.

Rating: 30 Seconds of Hell.

Live Television. This is fun, isn’t it?

We may be breaking our rules here; however, this is one dandy television infomercial. This guy is frivolous:

1. He wears a white buttoned all the way to the tippy-top!
2. His maniacal laugh.
3. 16 seconds in, we hear him fall off his car whilst off-screen. (Whilst, whilst, whilst, whilst).
4. “Insert finger here.” Later on, “Insert two fingers here.”

No one in their right mind would have such zest whilst selling clam earrings, earrings made from the same metal material as those crumby, made-in-China rings you buy from the gumball machine for 50¢.

Whilst talking to a guy off-screen, he begins his ventriloquist lip-syncing act. Riotous!

Oh, but how I love the lavender picture-in-picture that frames he whilst the close-up of the clam earrings hang on screen. This spring, oh have I longed, and whilst longing, I have looked for thee, and now I have found the ne plus ultra picture-in-picture infomercial where a frivolous guy deals clam shell earrings at DOOR BUSTER prices.

The ultimate highlight of this spot is when the riotous guy demonstrates a ‘how to: insert earrings into your ear.’ I love this guy … come to think, I wouldn’t mind being an infomercial dude who sells clam shell earrings. As a matter of fact, I would probably model myself after this guy. Wow, this guy is really great. I hope he reads this. I wonder how many earrings he sold that day. Thousands.

Rating: 30 Seconds of Whilst

Fuck this ad, Fuck Snickers and Fuck Betty White

First of all, Betty, I’m glad to see you’re still getting work.

This is a stupid ad, but the ease at which the “You’re not yourself when you’re hungry” theme can be replicated means we’ll only being seeing more uncreative garbage coming from whatever crap agency birthed this nightmare. I would have rather watched a 30 second career retrospective on Abe Vigoda and Betty White than this ad.

I’m no advocate of eating healthy, but are we really supposed to believe that a Snickers bar is a good thing to eat when you are so hungry that you are unable to perform?

However, score one for Snickers, as at least they weren’t accused of homophobia for this ad.

Rating: Thirty Seconds of Hell

Landespolizei

I like Audi. I don’t love them, but they’re okay by me. I think it was pretty brave for them to make fun of environmentalists, even though it was pretty tame. And the “Green Police” to Nazi connection isn’t as big of a deal as it’s being made out to be.

The ad is ok, but I have to think that at some point, the kitschy 1980s soundtrack thing will run out of steam.

While I’m handing out advice: Audi, the reason the A3 isn’t flying off showroom floors is because you can’t get a manual transmission and Quattro AWD in the same car. It’s ludicrous. This is your base model car, designed in part to attract the young and affluent to your brand. A brand that is built on Quattro All-Wheel Drive. Your DSG transmission is an amazing toy, but ultimately it’s bullshit. Automatic transmissions are for sorority girls and old people.

Build a stripper with a cool (hounds tooth?) cloth interior, a manual transmission and Quattro. Then, let them choose whether they want a TDI or that sweet 2.0TFSI mill. Price it under $30k. I don’t care if you lose money on every single one.

Then, follow Subaru’s example and stop making front-wheel-drive cars all together. Non of the other luxury/sport manufacturers even do it except for Acura, and fuck Acura.

Rating Thirty Seconds of Heaven?

The Megan Fox Super Bowl Ad

Well, I suppose that I am the only male in my age demographic who did not recognize this utterly tedious tattooed woman Megan Fox. This, Megan Fox who by the mere posting of semi-nude bathtub photos may slow the gears of our unemployed nation to a halt (from their current crawl.)
(A note to Megan Fox and women: Stop making that pursed-lip face when you pose for photos)
Anyway, a kid’s mom catches him in an act of onanism, and some guy falls off a ladder because of Jessica Rabbit or whatever.

Rating: Thirty Seconds of Hell

Fav Ruh

Damn. After all that talk about hating every ad last night, I found another one that I like. My idol, Henry Sun idolizes this guy, Favre. He has a DVD about him. I have to tell you that despite the sports media’s constant massaging of the ol’ pill popper, I like him too. This ad isn’t terribly funny, but it’s cogent, it makes sense. There’s a narrative that illustrates a point about Hyundai’s cars, which continue to improve.

Rating: Thirty Seconds of Vicodin Heaven

A Quest for Fun

I like National Lampoon’s Vacation even though I did not initially support the nationalization of the lampoon industry. I think ultimately, history showed that it was the wrong decision, but times were hard back then and everyone was on drugs or having orgies while on drugs. Drug orgies.

I’d also like to make a note about how fucking great Chevy Chase was when he was at the top of his game. Very funny, that guy. Anyway. The ad. It’s very good. It illustrates the value proposition for HomeAway and it’s a little pretty funny. THAT IS NOT ANTHONY MICHAEL HALL.

Thirty Seconds of Nostalgic Heaven

Little Kiss

This is a horrible piece of garbage. I don’t expect the members of Kiss to have any shame, and until Willow 2 work is going to be slow in coming for little people actors, so we’ll give them a break. But, as a creative director, how do you let this ad see the light of day?

The “Priceless” MasterCard ads have been running since I was a tiny child and they’re still ok. This “Trust Me, I’m a Doctor” Schtick is so god damned tired already.

Thirty Seconds of Hell

Super Bowl XLIV

Because we are the premiere TV commercial criticism blog on the whole internet, we will be reviewing every damned ad that littered the commercial breaks in this year’s Super Bowl. It would have almost been fair to post video of every ad and then type “Fuck you, advertiser” underneath it. There were some winners, though. Let’s start there.

Remember the Butterfinger ads featuring The Simpsons? Pretty inoffensive, but not great. This ad, Hard Times is just super. It’s heartwarming and Millhouse even makes it a little funny. One question though, Coke couldn’t get Kent Brockman? Who is this new reporter? Hard times indeed.

Thirty Seconds of Heaven