Well, Here We Go

I've been thinking about doing this blog for a long time. I should've started a long time ago, back when I used to watch TV regularly with my friends. However, I wasn't as avid about writing back then as I am now. Well, maybe I was, but I didn't want to waste my time talking about commercials, which are often the bane of the entertainment industry. But, it's either now or never and I'm looking for something to write.

I'm not sure how I will conduct this. I don't know why anyone would want to read reviews on commercials. But, I have a complex history with them. You see, I have a history of noticing commercials that most often watch and forget. They remember them, because maybe someone will bring them up in a conversation and the other person will say, "oh yeah, I saw that one." Typically, the conversation will end because while advertising execs desperately want to entertain you for that 15 to 30 seconds so that you'll remember to buy their product, they more than often desparately fail. It's just too hard a task. An English teacher once told me that a good short story is often harder to write than a long one because you only have so much time (pages) to get the characters and story across.

I notice commercials and I actually let them influence my shopping power. I have a long standing boycott on Carl's Jr. because I abhorred their ad campaign of "if it doesn't get all over the place, it doesn't belong in your face." I found it disgusting and actually turned me off from eating from there. I have eaten there only once since those ads started their run in 2000 or whenever.

Advertising agencies have a task and that is to embed the image of their client's product so that when you think gasoline, you think "Shell," or whatever. They want to embed ideas of quality, happiness, reliability and savings when you remember their product, even when you can't remember why. When you think of beer, you think it's Miller time. It's not that it always works. I like a lot of beer ads and some make me laugh, but I would never drink most of those products. But, that's the idea the ad agencies want to push.

I'll sometimes hate a commercial, let's say Carl's Jr, and someone will have to say, "well, they did their job: you remembered the name of their product." I think this philosophy is bogus. Yeah, I get it, the commercial is so stupid that I remembered the product. But, so is Rebecca Black's "Friday" song and you don't see me trying to download her shit from iTunes! The whole point of advertising is to showcase the product, make the consumer aware of it, and that's it. Somewhere down the road, advertising has deemed it okay to advertise something poorly just so that people will remember it, good or bad. At least it seems that way.

Well, I don't stand for it. As I mentioned, I have a running boycott on Carl's Jr based on their advertising campaign. Someone say that it's a harsh move. But, I stand by my principles. If something is advertised poorly, then I won't buy it because it's basically saying that I'm an idiot and we just need to have the image stuck in our heads the next time we need that type of product.

For the purpose of this blog, I can't focus on every commercial in the world. I am going to be completely biased and review the ones local to me. I also can't review every single one of those, so I will definitely blog about the ones that really catch my eye, good or bad. Obviously, the more funny ones to talk about are the bad ones, but I will also try and showcase ones that I think are well done.

I also won't be reviewing radio ads. I don't listen to regular radio any more and, frankly, ALL radio ads are lame.

Feel free to write me with links for commercials from your neck of the woods and I will review them. Thanks for reading and I hope for your return.