gross commercials

               I recently saw a commercial that was so gross that I questioned in queasy disbelief what I had actually seen. It depicts a man who is pregnant with a shit baby. His wife rubs his belly in expectation, he eats ice cream late at night, has mood swings and then gives "birth" in a public rest room all to the soundtrack of a song about childbirth, "I Just Cant Wait To Meet You" by Michael Bolton. (which features the lyric "the greatest part of me, my babe....will be living on in you") The commercial is for Fiber One Chewy Bars (made even grosser by the fact that the bars shown at the end are the Oats and Chocolate variety which feature chocolate drizzle all over the top). I'm posting it below, but really don't watch it if you are eating or have a sensitive gag reflex.

                                                                            Barf.

         This idea of selling things to consumers by grossing them out is of course nothing new. Perhaps I'm sensitive to this more than other people, but I feel like I'm often grossed out by commercials. For instance, I think those Charmin bears are always nauseating, but even more so when discussing the "bits" of toilet paper left behind on your ass. To begin with, frankly I didn't know this was a problem. But apparently it is because there are many commercials with the promise of eradicating this horrible affliction. This first one shows the child bear bent over ready to snap a football to an adult male bear who is hopefully his father (although he is wearing a whistle around his neck so he may be the coach. creepsville.). And of course while looking down at the child bear's ass he notices the aforementioned "bits". The most disturbing bit is the shot of the child bent over, looking back in horror over the discovery of the "bits" with the football between his legs. Who at the ad agency Ok'd this? Even describing this commercial I feel as if I'm doing something wrong.

     Another one shows the Mother bear taking care of the "bits" with dustpan and broom.

     Then there's the sub-genre of gross medicine commercials. The first one I thought of is one that I will actually turn my head away from my television screen if it comes on. There is so much gross in this commercial. It is for Lamisil Toe fungus treatment and features a horrible little monster named Digger the Dermatophyte. Now i know toe fungus is inherently gross, but this takes it to unacceptable levels of gross, not least of which is how Digger lifts the toenail up to crawl under, a sight so visceral that upon first viewing I audibly gasped.

                   Woof, that's gross. Also, I think Digger looks like he might be related to Sy Snootles.

  There is another toe fungus ad that is much less gross, but still worth mentioning because of the anthropomorphized toe with fungus all over his head and the way the foot runs independantly of any body. It is for Jublia.

      Also in this category is any of those commercials where a family of mucus moves into some person's chest. The ads are for Mucinex.

                                    I think I just don't like hearing the word mucus that much.

     The other category of gross commercials are those of a sexual nature. I am not a prude by any means, but sometimes the advertising industry ramps up the ick factor when they try to be sexy or are so tone deaf that it becomes mind boggling as to what they are trying to say. Or, as in my first example they use sex to sell something that really does not warrant it. First up is the double feature barf-o-rama of Liquid Plumr commercials. Because what is sexier than a gross, hairy clogged drain? The premise is that this woman see the words "Double Impact" on a bottle of Liquid Plumr and immediately thinks of getting her "drain" snaked by 2 sexy plumbers. Oof. Actually the second plumber says he's going to flush her pipe. Sexy.

   The second one is Liquid Plumr for "when you need it now. This woman tells the plumber she only has 10 minutes, and he says, "I only need 7". It ends with him drilling a hole in wood (get it? drilling), laying a piece of pipe (get it? laying pipe) and pulling the cord on a ceiling fan (get it? pulling.....wait, huh?)

                                           Again, clogged drains are gross.

Next up is the commercial for the Fiat 500x. The setup here is that this woman wants to have sex with this old man so he goes to fetch his Viagra. Right away you're confronted by this image. So I guess Fiat was like, "You know what gets people in a luxury car buying mood? Thinking about old man boners!" The pills falls out of the window and into the gas tank of the smaller, more flaccid old Fiat. The car then gets a boner and becomes "bigger, more powerful and ready for action". Then all the women walking by automatically get turned on by the car. Yoinks.

And you know what, if I'm being honest, I don't really need to hear what rear ends turbo charge this old ladies engine.