Iron-Free Shirts Insult our Intelligence

by The Imaginary Reviewer from the Imaginary Review

My most hated TV commercial goes as follows: A man emerges from what looks like a steamy hotel bathroom wearing a dressing gown. He sees smoke, and runs towards an ironing board in the hotel room. He picks up the steam iron, which has been left sitting on his shirt which, in true slapstick style, now has a big wedge-shaped hole in it from where the iron has burned through. As the foolish man looks despondently at his favourite shirt, the voiceover implores you to buy new Crapola* Brand Wrinkle-Free No-Iron shirts.

Usually by this point I am throwing the nearest potted plant at the television, such is my hatred of this advert.

My problem with this commercial stems from the fact that the agency seems to be implying that no-iron shirts are a good idea because ironing is such a mentally taxing activity. It’s not that ironing is one of the most boring, tedious, shittiest menial tasks there is, no: men need wrinkle-free shirts because they can’t be trusted with a spoon, let alone a steam iron.

“Hey men,” the ad’s makers seem to be saying, “look how difficult it is to iron a shirt! Look how stupid you are! You can’t even iron a shirt properly! You twat! You UTTER TWAT! You probably lack the basic attention span required to follow the complicated storyline of this ad! Why, I bet you stopped watching this ad after several seconds because you were distracted by the sound of an airplane in the sky outside your windows! You’re probably poking yourself in the eye with a pencil right now! Dur dur dur! Look at the stupid man!"

"Oh, and please, buy our shirts.”

Let me say this now: I have never stopped in the middle of ironing an item of clothing to do anything more time-consuming than scratch my balls. And even when I do, I remove the steam iron from the garment in question so as not to end up with a cotton/polyester fireball. Nobody, not even the most ignorant shit-for-brains mouth-breather, stops ironing mid-shirt in order to have a shower. This ad isn’t just unlikely, it’s insulting.

And so, I won’t be buying that particular brand of Wrinkle-Free Shirts for Brainless Room-Temperature-IQ Morons. But I will make a suggestion for their next commercial.

Everyone hates ironing because it’s crap, not because it’s hard. Men hate it because we’re lazy; women hate it because it gets in the way of complaining about how lazy men are. So the ads should reflect this. I say, begin the commercial with a normal, average bloke getting out of bed. He starts getting dressed, but pauses as a gorgeous Victoria’s Secret-style model sits up in the bed, and says seductively, “Frank? Do you have to go so soon?”

The man looks at the camera, smiles and shrugs, while the voice over says: “New Crapola* Brand Wrinkle-free Shirts. They save you ten minutes every morning. How you spend that ten minutes….is up to you”. Fade out to sounds of frantic groaning and frenzied bed-squeaking.

Seriously, the world lost a great advertising executive when I decided to take up reviewing things that don’t exist.

*This is possibly a gap in my memory.

Ad-Sense, Non-Sense

by Ask Alice from Alice in Average Land

I don't get the Verizon commercials. "Can you hear me now"? Basically they're saying that the reception is so crappy that this poor guy has to stand on top of fences in the Artic to get a signal. They really should have him saying: "Can you still hear me?" Then at least we know that he could hear them in the first place. Although if I had someone asking me every five minutes if I could still hear them I'd just say no and hang up.

Speaking of advertisements, there are a few slogans that really make no sense to me. If we took them literally we'd all be a bunch of lunatics. AT&T's - "Reach out and touch somebody"? Sorry but that's creepy. Especially when you consider the Yellow Pages ads that say "Let your fingers do the talking". Put the two of those together and we have a serial rapist on our hands.

Then there's: Like a good neighbor, State Farm is there - well it's rather unfortunate that my neighbor is a fat creepy dude who wears sweatpant shorts and no shirt while smoking (who knows what) in his garage year round. If my house burnt down in the middle of the night I'm not so sure I'd want him there while I run screaming out of my house in my little booty shorts and tank top.

Just saying.

How do they come up with this stuff anyway? There must be men in suits sitting around a table discussing their options:

Exec #1: "How can we possibly improve on what we have? I love: "It's what I eat and what I do" it really speaks to the people.
Exec #2: "Yes but how can you DO a burger? Wait, wait, I think I got it - by eating it. Yes I do see the logic there Stanley"
CEO: "Okay, how about: McDonalds, it's what I eat and what I do ALWAYS"
Exec #1: "Isn't that sort of like Coca-Cola's slogan?"
CEO: "Dammit"
Exec #2: "We have to appeal to the kids here fellas. We need some slang in there"
Exec #1: "McDonalds: it's what I eat and what I do - in the hizzle!"
CEO: "I'm loving that"
Exec #2: "I'm loving it!"*a look of inspiration crosses over their faces and thus a slogan is born*

Sometimes I think maybe they don't really put that much thought into these slogans either.

Toshiba's "Choose Freedom" slogan - what exactly does that mean? If we choose a Sony are we relegated to the first twelve channels forever? Where does this freedom come into play with a Toshiba that it doesn't with a Samsung? Oh and there's another gooder: "Digitally Yours". Now they're playing with our emotions and getting all Hallmark on our asses. You can certainly tell what market they're aiming for.

Good thing I don't believe everything I hear...

I'm richer then I think, am I, Scotiabank? Well I think I'll just go on a little shopping spree here and take care of that problem. Oh nevermind, I lost my American Express and I just don't feel right leaving home without it.