My name is Ian. And you can count on it.

Yes, people. This is a moment for all those that have foraged through the SomethingAwful forums. For those stuck in the greater Cleveland area, you also know what I mean. If you recognize the header for this entry, you know EXACTLY what's coming. If not...whoo, boy, you are in for quite a treat.

Before I show you one of the many wonders of this man you are about to meet, let me say that he has graced many-a-late night TV viewing with his black-clothed presence. 1 A.M. syndicated Scrubs is nothing without this god of sales keeping us hooked in between episode acts.

This is no mere man, ladies and gentlemen. This...is Marc Norton. He is the king of credit, the captain of variety, and the lord of all that is bad, yet alluring commercials. You cannot turn away when he pops up on your screen. You can try, but you will fail. Here is just one of his recent advertising endeavors.

Yes, ladies and germs, not even the late Charlie Chaplin is safe from this man's clutches. He'd be rolling in his grave were he not too busy sighing and slapping his forehead and having a Hitler stache.

This commercial came to be soon after the economy started throwing a world-class hissy fit. Is it not fitting that ol' Sir Charles Spencer Chaplin be resurrected, as he was still making films during the Great Depression? Nice touch, Marc! I feel this is going in a creative direction.

Oh. Wait. Hmm....

Yeah, nothing's funnier than someone down on his luck almost shooting himself. Sensitivity score DOWN.

But wait! Here he comes to save the daaaaay~! Marc shows up in the nick of time to spout off one of his...two raspy catchphrases! "If you can't get credit at" blah blah blah. Because someone about to off himself really wants a new chintz lounge. 

Now, don't get me wrong. This commercial showcases what it wants: even if you have bad credit, you can still get sub par furniture from a shady man, and he will even bring it to your house that same day! Maybe play some checkers, wine & dine a little, whattya say?

Oh...except they don't show furniture anymore. The old ads did, yeah, along with some of the creepiest shit you'll ever see on TV. And I don't mean just local access advertising. I mean on any of the surplus of channels, most of which we don't need. Well, unless you really enjoy the All Douche, All The Time channel. I know I've got it favorited. 

We then have some man love from Chuckie C. and they walk off, palling around, not connecting on a "humorous kick," into the sunset. Wait. Into the wall. The very obvious wall. Also, they found out Chaz's credit really WAS that bad...so he couldn't even get credit at Norton Furniture...which means he can't get credit anywhere. And then the oversized handgun, and then a lawsuit.

Shadows be damned, it's a sunset. I want to believe it all worked out!

No. I reeeeeally don't.

A short commercial, but not near short enough. You may enjoy listening to someone who apparently smokes 8 packs a day, but not me. I hate Neil Diamond's raspy voice, why would I like Marc's? 

I'm sure he's a cool guy in real life, likes to poke fun at himself, blah blah, but if you're going to make commercials bad, whether intentionally or not, I'm going to bring them here. 

Mind you, this commercial could've been better with one change: actually put in the old subtitle cards from before talkies were invented. We get rid of those grating vocals and it keeps the theme running. Also, no suicide. While I'm sure it has contexts where it can be funny, I don't think it goes with buying a loveseat. 

Then again, his name IS Mark, and he does say you can count on it, so who am I to disagree?

Well, I am me to disagree. And that's good enough to bitch about things I don't like, including that commercial.

Rating time! 

-Chaplin Dopplerganger: 1st prize for winning a Charlie Chaplin lookalike contest over the man himself (actually happen to the real Chaplin. Look it up.) but also 1273 insensitivity points for your gun pointed at your cranium, no matter how comically large both are.

-Marc: you haunt my dreams. You are the reason I want to have good credit, so I can go anywhere else to get a La-Z-Boy. You are the reason I don't wear all black anymore and I shed my ponytail. You are all that is wrong with Cleveland. Yes, even moreso than the Browns. 

But, though your commercials be eye-gouging and brain-wrenching, I'll give you 7 style points for seeming to know how awful your ads are. Now I suggest you take those points and buy some production value.

Don't worry, people. You'll be getting a dose of Marc Norton every little bit. He's too bad to pass up on a site dedicated to his kind of slop.

Wait. Maybe you should worry.

BK Diddy? Yes, he did. Get it?!

My previously mentioned Jewish buddy reminded me of how awful fast food ads can be, so today is BK Wednesday. It's not as tasty as you're hoping, but it will wreck your digestive system.

Ten years ago: Sean Puffy P. Daddy Vote Or Diddy Doodily Doo Combs Brushes Et Al So-On-And-So-Forth Jacob Jingleheimer Smith used to make music. Scratch that. He used to change his name more than Prince and is known best for covering a The Police song and actually murdering you if you didn't vote. He didn't care if you weren't old enough to vote, it was "Vote or Die," not "Vote if you're of legal age or nationality or Die." We lost many an innocent during that time.

Today: He sells hamburgers.

 

Alright, so this is a mercifully short ad without much dialogue. There are just a few things to note because of this.

Numero First: Creepy music. This soundtrack would work better with those King ads. The one where he wakes up next to you after a "Five Shots of Everclear" night. And he offers you coffee and a breakfast sandwich. 

Mind you, I love those commercials. I will buy anything from that creepy king as long as he leaves me alone. 

Not for this, though. Maybe there's a creepy Japanese kid from the unnecessarily abundant horror films lurking off camera (and there's enough of those fucking movies that it wouldn't be too farfetch'd [Get it? It's a Pokémon joke. Bah, don't judge my sophistication.]), but I doubt there's anything mildly frightening off stage outside a pink slip waiting to pounce on an unsuspecting advertising exec. OooooOOOoooOOOooooOOOH!

And then we have Didn'ty (I'm so clever). 

Six years ago: Making the Band

Today: Making the Whopper. HA!

Here he is, at the behest of Harvey Dent's less successful but hopefully soon-to-be scalded brother, trying to get people to realize Burker King now stays open late, despite the fact that Wendy's, McDonald's, and Taco Bell did this years back and pretty much made actual commercials showcasing their hours. Commercials that mattered. Well, as much as awful TV can matter. We'll get to those companies another day.

How does Didn'ty help? He doesn't suggest they put that on BK signs across the company.

Or that they hire a serial killer who eventually gets caught and all he says as he's being arrested is "BK IS OPEN LATE!" (Would've worked better, I'll bet.) 

Or that they make good commercials. Far be it from that!

Nope. Instead, he states, simply, "Vote or Die." 

Oh, we already did that joke? Okay, fine. He says "Tell 'em Diddy said BK's open late." Shades DOWN.

"That's it?" Fortunately and unfortunately, yes. Short, but nowhere near sweet. Short and pukey.

And, as if Didn'ty's word was magical and spread across the land, and with news teams already filming a BK (hopefully that suggested BK serial killer on camera), people find out BK's open late and celebrate by rioting. Rioting for cheeseburgers. "Eat a Whopper or Die." 

No one would care that much about BK opening late to destroy the restaurant itself unless they were poor college kids, and even so, we all know that Taco Bell is the place for late night beer/pot induced cravings. Think about it. You're craving some T-Bell right now, but you know as well as I do that you'll eat it, but you'll end up regretting so much the purchase you made 15 minutes after.

"I could've thought of that." But you didn't. And you shouldn't. You should think up GOOD things, like ths:

This is a much better BK commercial that has a lot of what's crappy in the other one. A washed-up musician (Hi, Hootie), other people (Hi, attractive extras), and sammiches (Hi, Chicken Bacon Cheddar Ranch). 

What's different, though? The washed-up musician sings, the other people are worth looking at and enjoying themselves, and...chicken instead of beef. Important plot point, people.

Sure, it's an unrealstic one (most commercials are, but I'll still bitch about it). It's a magical world where greasy foods grow on trees and you walk on a road of fatty cheese. And through all this, people are still fit and good looking. Yet, is this really more unrealistic than people listening to Sean Puffy Combs anymore?

But we're not here to enjoy BK commercials. We're here to rate them. And so we shall. We being me. Always me.

And so, we have SPPDVORDDCBEASOASFJJS (see original long name zinger up there) who gets 2 lowerings of the shades out of 10 and a -17 on the "Who Cares?"-o-meter. Harvey Dent's pathetic brother gets 1 normal side of a face out of two, and we get the shits from Burger King. Not classy, but nonetheless super accurate.

Until next time, remember: commercials may advertise expensive items, but they are the reason we can't have nice things.

MAKE THE FUNNY!! Hint: they didn't.

So here goes trying to do this commercial thing on a M-W-F schedule. Like a webcomic, but I can't draw and I have more than one reader. Ba-ZING! I kid--I've read and enjoyed over 100 series...yeah. That's my life.

Anywhichway, this one's another request from a fellow internerd. Not like any of you reading this aren't one, too. It's actually somewhat representative of the product instead of...y'know...99% of car commercials.

Alright, so ooVoo. It's like Skype except no one uses it. I'm willing to bet this ad is a strong reason why.

As a preface, I will try to avoid bashing the young girl, who probably has no idea what she's doing here and also try to stray from digging at the male lead's appearance.

Fuck that. He looks like a puppet. Seriously. Say his lines and try to move your mouth like he does, especially when he says "Hey, Pumpkin." Are you a ventriloquist? No? Then good luck to you, sir or madam.

Onto more..."classy" discussions. Let's start with the good again. Well...the name ooVoo is kind of fun to say? It goes Ooh-Voo. That's all there is to it.

Oh! And they mention the GS 4200, which, after googling, we find out it is a cash register made in China. High-end stuff, people.

That was hopeless. Let's get to the gritty shit.

Will someone please give the cameraman a machine that doesn't have a zoom or focus-change button? The shots in the first half of this WHY* go in and out so much, it's like camera sex, which I assume is unfulfilling. If it's not, let's get us some camera sex. Y'get me? Yeah, you get me. The superzoom on everyone's face also doesn't help. We only have so many attractive people in the world, and none of them are in this ad. Not a one. Ugly can sell...but not when you use your camerawork to explore the pores of these suckers. Dr. Kelso doesn't like uggos, why should I?

Speaking of something entirely different but still quite awful, we have the soundtrack. I'm sure we're all glad Lou Bega found some more work after Mambo No. 5. Actually, less "glad" and more "go away." Lots more.

Any more technical aspects? Yeah, if you look at the incoming call picture of his wife, you'll notice it changes from its initial incoming photo to when he rejects it. His wife takes on a much more...drunken quality there. Not blaming her. You may say this is nitpicking. I may say this is me bitching about a minute of TV. I work with what I've got.

Onto the acting portion. Or, because I can, the smackting portion. Because I'm going to smack the people who can't act in commercials. And you if you don't like "smackting." Like I said, the little girl's fine. You can only ask so much from child actors. They try to be cute (or creepy, thanks to Japan), and that's what we want. 

Then again, shitful writing doesn't help, but we'll touch on that as we traverse through the "plot" or, as I like to think of it as I watch, the "pleasegodwhyamIdoingthistomyself-ot." Plot for short, I suppose.

-Girl finds computer. 

-Girl calls Puppet Dad.

-PD forgets to close unimportant applications on his computer, like ooVoo, Weatherbug, and Porntube. 

-Girl ooVoo calls PD during meeting, interrupting piss-poor snoring sound effect. 

-PD rejects call and Girl's love. 

-Girl says "fuck you" and calls again. 

-PD is whipped (remember, he thinks it's Wife) and answers call, despite giving important presentation on cash registers. VERY IMPORTANT.

-PD and Girl exchange lines (that were written on the basis that terrible = $$) to the unbelievable (I mean "suspension of disbelief" does nothing) enjoyment of the rest of the coworkers.

-Girl drops the Lessthanthree on PD. PD regretfully says it back. Regretfully. That dick.

Seriously, watch the relationship between the girl and her dad. She's cute, she's just trying to show her dad she loves him, and he has exasperation in his voice each time he responds. I don't care if she interrupted your GS 4200 meeting. Cash registers be damned! Spend a second talking to your daughter who you've spurned for money storing opportunities!

And why the FUCK would he want to talk to his wife if he didn't want to be on the phone during a meeting? Fuck you, hypocrite! I don't care if you think he'll tell her to keep his daughter away from the computer. That's probably what he did, because he's a shitty shit person!

Moving on from that classy exploit, and onto the writing! There's not much said, to be honest, except for "Dad!" and "What?" that catches our attention (GS 4200! YES!!!). The one thing that is apparently HYSTERICAL beyond all belief? 

MAKE THE MONEY! That poor girl... The key to success? Have the rest of the employees laugh at this as if they'd never seen something so uproarious in their lives. This is gut-busting humor, people! Show us how you feel! Pretend you're watching Carlos Mencia!

Oh...Killing the mood. And I made an over-done, but nonetheless super truthful dig.

We get to end this charade on its tagline: simply amazing, amazingly simple. By the by, typed verbatim. These people don't use capital letters in their product or anything else. You've got to earn that shift key, ooVoo. It IS simple, though. We'll give them that. 

And what commercial with a kid in it wouldn't be complete without that kid creepily whispering something, in this case ooVoo. There! She earned her money's worth! Cute AND creepy. Wonderful!

Rating time: The product: 10 points taken straight from Skype's point cupboard. 

-The girl: 7 sympathy cards. 

-Puppet Dad: One Jeff Dunham to try to squeeze the humor out of you. 

-The camerman: 5 cases of Dramamine. It's for motion-sickness, people. Read up on some medicines.

-The rest of the employees: You're fired. Get the fuck OUT! Get the FUCK out! GET the fuck out! Can't figure out what to emphasize, but you get the message.

'Til next time. Watch some TV, and hope I never get a Tivo, so I can't flip through this shit.

*We Hate You (straight from advertising agencies into my warm heart)

A change already?

At the request of fellow internet explorer (See what I did there? Yeah, you did, and you sighed.) Mr. TK, this thing will be more than commercial critiquing. 

Sure, that'll be my main focus, as I love me some hatin' on bad advertising, but there will be more. "But why would I care?" Because it involves the INTERNET. 

Still, you could then ask "Yeah, but it's your opinion, not mine." That may be true, but you're reading this much, aren't you? Who can resist more interhighway revelations? Not you, my friend. Not you.

Oh, and if it IS you that can, then this is for you.

That's the proper amount of space needed to flick you off from here. Enjoy.

Berries and SHUT UP.

Okay, so this one's a few years old, but I'm sure you all know what's coming if you read the header.

Alright, so what we've got here is a big ol' pile of terrible. There are people who actually love/lurve/Lessthanthree this. There also people who love genocide. I'm lookin' at you, Adolf. What? Comparing an "innocent" ad to one of the most evil beings the world has ever know is a bit harsh? Are you telling me this thing hasn't mass murdered our happiness? 

Now, don't get me wrong. I love ridiculous things. One of my best friends is the goofiest person I know, as he is the Jewish funny guy to my Aryan rage. But then that just brings us back to the previous paragraph. Offended? Blame society for not allowing our sense of humor to flourish, despite it being god-forsaken.

But back to the ridiculousness that is this train wreck. We've got the two major players: Elfballs and Deadpanmotherfucker. We won't count Random Douchebag because he's got a whole zero lines in this thing, which means he probably didn't get paid near as much to live with this pile that can ruin even a good episode of The Office. Trendy.

Play the Zelda series? Elfballs is Tingle. There you go: video game reference. Don't play it? Well, you can see exactly what he is: a grown man dressed as a little elf boy, assumedly kicked out of Santa's workshop for giving the other elves lusty glares and forwarding them granny porn. Like I said: Tingle.

Then you have DPMF who is...a deadpan motherfucker. He has no human reaction to what is going on in front of him. A normal person would shoot first, ask questions never. Or run. Or at least change facial expressions. Awesome robot impersation, guy, but I like acting from actors. Act a bit, Acty McWaityoucantact.

That's my main beef. Sure, there's the awful jingle that, try as I might, I can't bash out of my head. The dance? Not helping. There's even an instructional video by Elfballs on how to do the dance you can find online. I'd link it, but I've already provided enough to ruin your vision and hearing tonight.

But...the worst part. The absolute WORST part of this is? They have a slightly tweaked version that I actually enjoy. 

There is no stupid pause in the middle of the "song," the DPMF actually has a better expression near the end to show he's SUPER AWKWARDED OUT, like the rest of us, and the little peekaboo move by Elfballs? Only topped by the high kick, which I assume came out of frustration from DPMF's lack of...anything good.

Yet I never saw this version air. Not once. I saw the previous one, and a shortened version of it, which wasn't even better due to the brevity, but rather much worse because it was more like a bee sting than a stab wound. Sure, the stab wound lasts longer and could kill you, but what if you're deathly allergic to bees? Think about THAT. Yeah, exactly. Don't wanna end up like Macauly Culkin.

To be fair, Starburst isn't going to lose me with a shitty ad. The candies are too delicious and rainbow'd. Well...four color'd, at least. Red, Pink, Yellow, and Orange, in order of tastiness, at least. 

Disagree with my approval of candy tastes, and disagree with my commercial tastes, but what will the public think of you then? That you value a castrato's ability to bring unsolicited suckitude by dressing straight out of Oliver Twist with a bowl cut.

Rating? 7.6 for the product, a full pooper scooper for Elfballs, a connecting kick to the face for DPMF, and a condolence card for that poor soul that got conned into just sitting there wishing he was doing something productive, like writing a commercial critique blog.

Next one will be a request, just felt like bringing something familiar this round.

Youtube.

You have added a search bar on embedded things, Youtube. 

I like it. But I hate it. It is jarring and efficient. You lovely jerkass, Youtube.

Next commercial up in the early AM assuming Nyquil says "Hey, don't take me or you pass out early! Don't mind your voice sounds like Louis Armstrong if he swallowed a cheese grater!"

Starting off with a request.

So apparently this is gonna happen...um...right now.

Not one hour after I posted my pre-thingshappening-rant, I got a request from a friend. Mind you, I would never have seen this commercial as I don't live in the Pittsburgh area, but being a Clevelandish guy, it's fun to laugh at terrible things from Pittsburgh.

Yes, I know we have the Browns. Fuck you. We've suffered enough.

Anyway:

Let's start off with the good points...er, point: I'm not sure if this is from the original airing or if this was implemented by whoever ripped it to youtube (internet lingo win or loss?), but this video gives us 9 seconds to prep ourselves. Even if we press the play button unsure of what failed advertising ploy is before us, we get that 9 glorious moment buffer where we can say "Hey, I might like this business and this commercial could ruin my view of them!" and hit pause.

If that's the case, then I suggest you watch anyway just to see what your favorite Greater Pittsburgh Area car dealership has done with your precious moneybucks. You owe yourself that, Pittsburghers...Pittsburgians? Who cares.

And now, onto the WHAT*: First off, I know nothing about pro hockey. As stated, I am a Clevelandish guy, and we don't have a team. The Lake Erie Monsters are not pro, and I doubt they play hockey. I have no proof they do. They say so, and their commercials agree, but isn't this whole thing here to rip apart ads? I thought so.

That being said, I have no clue who these "superSTARs" are were it not for a different Youtube host pointing it out (except HIS version won't let me embed it. Thanks.) This commercial is geared and only shown around Pittsburgh, so maybe those people know who these...fantastic...actors are, but not this guy, and that's all that matters here.

Speaking of, I've seen athletes act before. LeBron's commercials are solid, Peyton Manning and Michael Phelps did well on SNL. These Oscar candidates need a bit more...chutzpah. Or to not be in this commercial. Take your pick. Let's take a look at how the director ran over this:

Colby Coolguy (I assume his first name is Colby from this, didn't do research. Not invested enough YET.): I want you to look like Napoleon Dynamite and act like him...good, now suddenly you're cooler than Zack Morris! Good transition, I felt your characterization there.

Slicky McFumanchu: First off, I want you to put the emphasis wherever it's not supposed to be. Good, now...is Austin Powers still funny? No? Well, let's upgrade to McLovin, except I want you to sound like you're having an asthma attack.

Dolph Lundgren: I'm glad we could hire you while in such high demand from your Rocky IV role. I want you to take this English for Dummies book and skim the backcover's flavor text. That's all you'll need.

Jenna (really? A girl joke? So crass) Underbite: Because you're the only one who looks like an ass-beaten hockey player, your speaking role is cut. Can't have people enjoying you. Instead, catch the keys and look longingly...oh-so-longingly. 

Zoom in on an unoriginal license plate...give the people 5 whole seconds of breathing time afterwards to realize they need to car shop anywhere else...and that's a wrap! We'll see some of you (read: the good-looking but asthmatic one) for part two!

Oh, yes. There's a Part Two.

If I truly had to rate this...and I don't have to do anything...out of 10, I'd rate this as a "Funny where they didn't want it to be funny" ad with extra points for "Foreign 'Acting'" and "Random Hot Chick Who Probably Doesn't Work Here."

Yes, I heard this was on Jay Leno. No, I don't watch Leno. Nothing against the guy, but I'm just not okay with someone who's chin rivals my own.

It's a start, people, but just take note: I put more work in this entry than anyone did on that spot. Watch it again if you want. 

*What's Here Attributes Turds.