Let’s face it, commercials are annoying. I used to have Direct TV and could record shows and view them later in order to skip over the network’s attempts to pay for the programming that I was enjoying. Unfortunately, due someone moving in with an already existing two year contract, we switched to Comcast. We do not have a DVR and I am frequently forced to find alternate channels during commercial breaks. I am the king of this move, but more often than not all the networks seem to take their commercial breaks at the same time. Irresponsible. The channels that I watch should anticipate my needs and stagger their break times. Come on man, get it together. Anyway, after a few months of having to watch crap commercials, I have a new found appreciation for the great commercials of our time. I’m not talking about stand alone commercials, that would be too easy. Actually too hard. I don’t want to have to go have to think about this post all that much. I’ll do three of my favorites.
Terry Tate-Reebok
It's mindgames.
The concept here is simple. An office drafts a linebacker to enforce a variety of rules and codes. Every commercial comes equipped with Terry tackling various violators and spewing fantastic catch phrases and speeches. Some of the funnier ones:
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-”Well he in for a surprise. A RUDE, PAINFUL SURPRISE!”
-”And do I enjoy what I do? Heh heh heh heh heh, hell yeah.”
-”You know Triple T gonna condense the nonsense.”
-”You can’t be tippy-toin’ up in here! WOOOO!”
-”That’s my game, that’s Terry’s game. And when it’s game time, it’s pain time! WOOOO!”
-”You can’t come in my kitchen, kick my dog and steal a box full of ballpoints! Your ass must be crazy!”
-”Ain’t nobody downsizin’ this. I’m done when I say I’m done.”
-”You got mail baby!”
-”I’m gonna give you a slice of Terry’s special pain cake! And you won’t, want seconds of that!”
-”You can’t hurt this! I’m a machine Gene! I was built for this!”
-”You can’t walk away from a K-22 paper jam! You must be out of your mind son! This is my world Donny, you just work here!”
When you’re feeling loud and obnoxious it’s fun to yell some of these at the top of your lungs and see what happens. There are a great many of these that can be found on YouTube. If you haven’t seen them, I suggest you do now. If you have, look again. They’re still funny as hell:
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Terry Tate: Office Linebacker
Terry Tate: Vacation
Terry Tate: Draft Day
Terry Tate: OSPN
Terry Tate: Sensitivity Training
High Life Delivery Guy-Miller High Life
What a jovial fellow.
Another simple concept. This guy goes into swanky places and takes High Life away from goobers who don’t understand what beer should be. He then usually goes and hangs out with the common man and passes out High Life. I don’t even really like and Miller products but I would buy Miller High Life if he asked me to. The guy is absolutely hysterical. Just the idea of a delivery man going into a place and taking beer back is very enjoyable to me. He also has some pretty funny quotes, but they’re kind of context based and won’t make much sense if I just write them. Watch the provided YouTube links and hear them yourself.
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High Life: Skybox
High Life: Club
High Life: Track
High Life: VIP
High Life: Limo
High Life: Hamburger
High Life: Light
This is SportsCenter-ESPN
Follow me to freedom!
This is an obvious choice. There are tons of them with varying degrees of hilarity, but all are worth watching. I even liked the Michael Phelps commercial and everyone knows my seething hatred for Michael Phelps. There are hundreds, literally hundreds, but I’m going to include only a few of my favs.
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Rollins and SVP
Western Kentucky Mascot
International Edition
New Kid
Lance
Y2K
Star Wars
Chad Johnson (Ochocinco)
SVP Performance Enhancers
Stuart Scott and Federer
Stuart Scott and Sharapova
Wrong Number
Catch Phrases
SVP and Carmelo
I just spent about three hours going through all of the SportsCenter commercials. Best research EVER. Obviously I’m partial to Scott Van Pelt. He’s funny AND a UMD grad. I actually talked to him once when he called into my old roommates Maryland radio show. Marcus and the Mann. I was the phone bitch. It was a good year.
It would be bereft of me not to mention the commercial campaigns that have pissed me off so much that I want to destroy things. These are the commercials that are played over and over again ad-nauseum, even though they make everyone viewing want to go into a murderous rage. Again, three examples.
Geico
What does this even mean?
Pretty much everything they have done up to this point is garbage. The Cavemen, the Gecko, the singing money. All terrible. We get it, you spend no money on advertising.
Free Credit Report Band
YOU ARE AWFUL.
Alright, so the first commercial was okay. At least until the played it eleventy billion times and caused me to wish that credit reports never existed. Then they went on to do about ten other commercials with equally crappy and annoying songs. Congrats, you’ve inspired me to hate whatever it is you’re advertising.
Weird Progressive Insurance Chick
What a freak.
This woman’s chipperness causes me consternation. No one is that happy about work. Unless you’re somehow involved in porn, you cannot be that satisfied with your job. It’s strictly IMPOSSIBLE. Also, she is a straight up annoying human being. Why are we rewarding this type of behavior?
Perhaps channels should give a five second preview of the commercials that they will be showing so that we can tell if its worth leaving the channel on for the commercials. That way, if they’re going to play something good, I’ll keep watching and they can jack up their prices. It’s win win.
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Listen: Cake, “Nugget”
Quote: SVP: “Is that bad?”
J-Roll: “It’s not good.”
Pete
Clint