So to start off with the Ad Hominem project, I figured I would discuss one of the absolute worst commercials of all time. The following is a YouTube video. Please click and watch at your own risk. Once I find a way to not post YouTube links anymore, I will.
I don’t really know why I even bothered embedding it. It’s not like you haven’t seen this abomination 34,000 times. It’s not like that smug, stupid way in which they say “That’s so you!” isn’t permanently burned into your subconscious.
So let’s do the grading real quick, and then we’ll have a bit of explanation which will turn into frothing at the mouth:
Grading
- Length: How long does it take to sell me on this?………………..F
- Although the embedded video is a 30 second spot, the one on TV seems eons longer.
- Audio/Visual: How well is this presentation put together?………………..C
- You see the vehicles. They show off really unimpressive and unimportant features. But they do show them. They only seem interested in selling comfort features, but they do show the features.
- Points taken away for hamfisted diversity that feels like some asshole was standing there with a clipboard and a quota.
- Explanation of Product: Do I know what is being sold?………………..D
- Crappy cars to suburbanites who value wireless charging and not having to parallel park (like they have that issue in the burbs) over originality, or any sort of real vehicular improvement.
- They actually do not sell these cars beyond these superfluous extras at all. I don’t know what kind of warranty, motor, transmission, mileage, safety, or even what colors are available.
- Inducement of Sale: Why should I buy your product?………………..F
- Not a single compelling reason is given. Not one. You expect people to take on that level of debt for wireless charging?
- Procurement of Product: Where/how can I buy this?………………..C
- I gave this a C because, well, a car dealership.
- Overall?………………..(0+2+1+0+2)/5=1………………..D
- I am amazed and disgusted that I couldn’t make the rating worse. This just goes to show the value (or lack thereof) of systemic rating, but alas, I show my work.
- I must give credit that some part of the product is legitimately being sold, even if they are nonsensical in their prioritization.
- I think I expected worse because of the revulsion that comes from the “So you” bit. Goes to show how something small can really create an emotional reaction.
Frothing at the Mouth
You know what this commercial is? Imagine you have a skin irritation either on the top of your ass crack, your armpit, or between your toes. ONLY one of those three places will do. It’s a skin infection, the skin is cracked, almost to the point of bleeding. It’s very sore. You want to keep the area clean and dry and allow it to heal. You don’t even want to move as long as it is there, because the sting is such a nuisance. But it’s August in the deep American South and there’s nowhere to run. You know you are about to have to go outside for hours in 100 degree, 100 per cent humidity and that that skin irritation is going to get VERY wet, VERY dirty, and VERY irritated. There’s nothing left to do but bristle at the unfairness of the universe in meting you out this doom.
That’s what this commercial is every time it comes on.
From the very start with that stupid brass section hook, you know this is as unavoidable as death. All it takes is that damned horn section, and immediately the brain serves up a memory more vivid than that of my wife’s face of the “So You” moments. How is that possible? By what right does Buick get to rape my memory?
All of their commercials are hot garbage. Look at the comments section on that YouTube video. WHY IS THIS STILL PLAYING? WHO DID YOU TEST THIS COMMERCIAL ON? Maybe this is meant as a means of protecting humanity. If a subject does not hate and feel absolutely irrationally furious by this ad, then they are A.I. or Reptilian. I bet Mitt Romney fucking loves this commercial.
I bet Jennifer Garner does too. She’s a vampire. She hasn’t aged at all in 30 years. Clearly, the only rational explanation is that Capitol One has been keeping her stocked up on human blood that they extract from their customers. What’s in your wallet indeed. Their commercials suck too, but that’s for a different installment.
The point is that Buick makes an unappealing product that has to be hocked to us by horrible commercials that make minimal effort. The lack of effort as a brand and as salesmen just seems basically disrespectful. Buick is a subsidiary of General Motors. That same General Motors that in 2009 declared bankruptcy because of the predatory lending and poor products they made.
Seriously. Be a car company or a bank. Don’t be both. It’s also hilarious how much Ally doesn’t want people to be aware of the fact that they are the same company GMAC, that was fucking over your parents on that minivan 25 years ago.
Either way. They crapped the bed in 2009 so the government, as in the tax payers, bailed them out. To the tune of $49.5 BILLION. In 2013, when the treasury sold off their shares, they recovered $39 Billion. WE GOT ASSFUCKED OUT OF 10.5 BILLION DOLLARS TO RECEIVE THE PLEASURE OF HAVING OUR EAR-HOLES RAMRODDED INTO SUBMISSION WITH THIS LAZY, INCOHERENT CRAP FOR AN UNAPPEALING AND UNORIGINAL CRAP-WAGON.
That’s so you.