Wednesday, July 04, 2007

I Hate the Oreo Commercials... a Rant on TV

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I've been watching much more television than I should be watching. What I have seen lately has proven to be disappointing. And the ads talking about what will be coming on TV this summer, well, I'm sorely disappointed. I also wonder who are the idiots doing the scheduling this summer until the much better programs come back in the fall.
Maybe my tastes aren't exactly what the Madison Avenue suits think is the ideal viewer. Then again, I'm not the typical person. At least when it comes to TV habits or TV tastes. After all, I find PBS entertaining. I think that people would be smarter and much more well-informed about the world if they watched PBS and read some more books and newspapers. It's depressing when people know all the details about Lindsey Lohan's drunk driving/drug use/party behavior yet know little about Iraq. Or when Paris Hilton's time in jail trumps the war in Iraq that's nor really a war as major combat has been declared officially over 3 years ago. I digress. You can see my personal views on American society aren't that popular.
If everyone had my tastes in television, TV might consist of cooking programs (nothing too saccharine-like, commercial-grade fluff like Rachel Ray. How I miss Julia Child), science shows like NOVA, British mysteries, sports like football and basketball, and lots of comedy (Monty Python, Red Green, In Living Color, stand-up, etc. SNL's quality is nothing like what it used to be. Think of the glory days in the 80's and early 90's), and certain types of movies. To accurately describe the movies I like would take a while. It's an odd and ecclectic mix of the stereotypically high-brow and the stereotypically common and average. Nothing that would make much money if it actually became a TV channel.

I hate the Oreo commercials they are broadcasting right now. I absolutely hate them. Despise them. Loathe them with great contempt. I think they are one of the most annoying commecials I have ever seen, as well as the biggest waste of perfectly good money and time ever.
I remember when the Oreo commercials were good. Sure, they were kind of kitschy and cloyingly Norman Rockwell in their nature. And they pulled on the emotions a lot. There were the three ballerinas who poured their milk into one glass to dunk Oreos. And there was the little boy who had a sippy cup. And there were the numerous father-son, mother-daughter, grandparent-grandkid commercials when everyone got together and ate Oreos with a glass of milk. Those were simple, well-made commercials that, I believe, appealed to everyone. Who hasn't had an Oreo with a glass of milk?
And now, the commercials make me want to smash a television. Seriously.
There were the series of commercials that had two people competing against each other on who could eat their Oreo the fastest. The one where they showed people licking the creme filling. That was disgusting in my opinion and it turned me off. Couldn't look at a package of Oreos without imagining tongues licking them and coating them in saliva before dunking them in milk.
Currently, the commericals have taken the levels of annoying and sheer stupidity to a place I never thought was possible. The first commerical is the "Cat and Girls Singing" commerical. In this commercial (made to look homemade with the camcorder and shaky video quality), some girls are singing the Oreo jingle while their cat is playing with a dish. The commercial is already annoying as the girls can't sing worth a damn and I want to smack them to shut them up. If that wasn't bad enough, when the plate of Oreos fall into the cat's dish of milk, the girls start screaming like it was the coolest thing ever. No. It's not. And the screams are annoying as well. It makes me want to reconsider having children. If this is how they're going to end up being like, well, I sure as hell ain't having them.
In addition, I also hate the "Chin Face" commercial. For some reason, the makers of Oreos want to torture people watching TV by choosing the most annoying and least entertaining ways of selling their products. They've got the multicultural kids/adults, which isn't a bad thing. But they all stink at singing. Seriously stink at singing. It's like they studied and graduated magna cum laude from the William Hung Acadamy of Vocal Arts. If this was done in a cute/entertaining way like the Oscar Mayer commercial, I would forgive them. But they don't do it in a cute way. Oh no. The Oreo people have to do the fucking chin face.
For those that do not remember the Chin Face, it's when you stick little eyes on your chin, cover the rest of your face with cloth, and pretend your chin is your forehead. It's the amazingly unfunny shit that thousands of people/sheep/dumbass morons did during the late 80's and early 90's so they could win $10,000 on America's Funniest People or America's Funniest Home Videos. That period in time when Bob Saget and Dave Coullier were the hosts of the shows. The embarassingly stupid and pointless cultural phenomenon that I thought was dead and buried under ten feet of concrete like Jimmy Hoffa. I didn't find it entertaining back then and I sure as hell don't find it that fucking hilarious right now. Whenever I see a chin face video, I wish I could beat the person and ask them "What are you thinking? It's not funny!" I want to do that to the Oreo people as well.

I also think that the network executives are fucking crazy. Whoever came up with the new show ideas were retards. And whoever approved those ideas are even bigger retards. And whoever thinks these shows are amusing, well, you guess.
ABC has a show that's supposed to be similar to Candid Camera or something like that. I've seen the ads promoting the show and I don't think it's that amusing. Or that funny. Or even worth watching. Whoever made that commercial was a sadist. I don't think it's funny when someone pretends to stab themself in the hand with a sharp butcher knife. Or it's even remotely funny when a person thinks a guy in a wheelchair is coasting down a hill and it looks like they might get hit by speeding traffic. A normal person would be shocked at that. That's the normal reaction to an event like that.
Think about it. If someone actually stabbed themself in the hand with a knife by accident, would you laugh at that and find it hilarious? If a person in a wheelchair lost control while going up a hill and was about to get hit by a car, would you find that funny? A normal person who saw those events happening and didn't realize it was fake, would be scared, shocked, etc. You don't laugh at them. If it was for real, then what? Would you laugh at them for acting that way?
Anyone who thinks that is amusing is sick. It's not funny. It's tasteless. And I'm a person that is pretty open to lots of things.


That's all for now.