Commercial Comedy
| Published 12/03/04

Graphic by: Allen Blickle

If you learn one thing while you're in the Media Studies major, it's that you've got to pay the bills to have the media. Without the money to produce papers, magazines, television and radio shows, they don't exist. If you didn't previously know that the 35 cents you spend on a newspaper barely pays for the ink on the first page, here is your moment of realization. It's the Bud light, Pizza Hut, Sears and Honda ads that are what make media possible.

So, being in the field, I've developed a bit of a love/hate relationship with advertising.  It doesn't bother me that it exists, just the way in which it works. Commercials are the kind of thing that - when they're good - they're great; when they're bad, you ask yourself why a loving and just god would allow such a thing to exist. I've always been a big fan of using wit and humor in advertising, and recently I've seen some amazing stuff. Most notably, I've discovered Terry Tate, office linebacker.

This Reebok ad, which debuted at the 2003 Super Bowl, answered the age old question: why not use football players as disciplinarians in an office environment? These commercials are absolutely hysterical and well worth however long it takes to download them. While Terry tackles workers for insubordinations such as not re-filling the coffee pot or playing computer games on the job, he finds time to spit out some of the most thought-provoking taunts I've ever heard, usually while standing over the victim's bruised body and ego. These include such lines as "You can't walk away from a K-22 paper jam", "You must be outta your mind, son," and "This is my world, Donnie, you just work here baby."

If the pure excitement of that wasn't enough for you then see how he deals with lazy workers who don't re-fill the coffee pot: (after tackling) "You can't bring that weak ass stuff up in this humpty bumpty. You kill the Jo, you make some Mo', you know this baby. Else you in for a long day, a looong day. Cause triple T's up in this, biiiitch."

Lastly, if you happen to be the unlucky soul that interrupts Terry's mime routine, expect to hear something along these lines: "You respect the arts, or the arts won't respect you. Your ass is trapped in my box now baby, Terry's pantomime box of pain, and there aint no escape from that, Waooo."

This series of commercials has not only rekindled my hope for a brighter future for the world of advertisements, they have also provided me with hours of non-stop laughter. In order to write all these quotations I had to watch the commercials over and over, which in my opinion was some of the best research I've ever done.

So don't just read it, go out and watch them for yourself. Because in the end it really doesn't matter if what they're selling falls apart, smells, costs too much or was made by small Malaysian child in a dark factory, as long as it makes you laugh you know you'll buy it anyway.

I'll leave you today with one last musing from our friend Mr. Tate, who has single-handedly made me a believer. The next time you try to bring the pain on fools who don't respect the serenity of the office environment, think of good old triple T. "The only pain I got time for is the pain I put on fools, who don't know what time it is."