Like nearly all of you TV advertising often annoys me. I don’t like the guy from Country Wide, I despise the rash for prescription drug advertisements and the lady who informs us that “it costs as much to bury a woman as a man.” I hit the DVR fast forward button when NutriSystem and eHarmony do their thing. I absolutely hate the character in the male-enhancement product called “Living Large Bob.”

Once in a while an advertiser gets it right. I think Honda Accord hit the right note in using Electric Light Orchestra’s “Hold On Tight.”

Question:

What commercials do you hate, tolerate and like?

What commercials do you hate, tolerate and like?

I like the ones that have funny story lines like the caveman series that's become a television show. The ones I hate just beat you over the head or appeal to negative emotions like fear.

Used to have a TV in my work area for background diversion, but now nothing but a window to outside for gazing time. Then when not working, it's actual conversation with human beings and DVD if we want diversion. I've gone about six months now with no commercial TV and don't miss it.

Once in a while I'll search YouTube for funny commercials. That can be fun for a little side trip.

The ones that are between extremes that I tolerate are the get-rich-quick things with obvious actors saying things like, "I made A MILLION BUCKS last year and just BOUGHT MY THIRD VACATION HOUSE IN TAHITI! Next year I want to MAKE MORE MONEY THAN BILL GATES!"

Then I think about what unknown actors are paid for commercial gigs. I look deep into their eyes and see the pathos. A soul is down there directing the puppet to repeat the words, knowing that karma is churning, hoping that there's actually forgivness. It's a rich drama.

Agreed that the eHarmony commercials are probably worse than the drug companies'. Same deal, a couple of actors pretending to have an actual relationship. Here's where I forgive Bob living Large. That's a parody and it looks like the actors are having fun.

I especially like Bob's wife. She looks to be having *lots* of fun.

This is a great NYC promotion!

What commercials do you hate, tolerate and like?

This is a tricky one for me to contribute to, since most TV advertising in the UK is made specifically for the British market. Of those that aren't it's hard to tell which ones are used in the UK because someone somewhere seems to insist that perfectly understandable American English has to be badly dubbed into Brit accents.

One that I suspect is not is a current campaign for IBM BladeServer, where a fat IT guy is in the desert gaspsing "Hot! Hot! The servers are too hot! Somebody save me!" At which point a clean-cut geekboy turns up and says "I already did" thanks to the miracle of yadda yadda yadda. It's not a very good advert. (This side of the pond, they tend not to get called "commercials" but instead are known as "advertisements", shortened informally to "adverts".)

There is one I particularly like at the moment, mainly for it's non sequitur value. Cadbury's chocolate

The ones I hate most are in two categories.

1. Those that are for premium rate "adult chat" phone or SMS services. Taken individually, they do what they're supposed to, but it's more that the channels that show them put lots of them, bumper-to-bumper, usally in the same order in every ad break between midnight and 6 am. As if it is impossible that anyone watching might not be
   1. drunk, and/or
   2. desperate
2. Those that are for loans aimed at people with poor credit ratings. Again, each individual advert is tolerable, but they again seem to fill out every commercial break (funnily enough this is common parlance this side of the pond... creeping Americanisation, I reckon:P), in the same order, from 9am until about 5pm, as if everyone watching is
   1. a loser, and/or
   2. stupid, and/or
   3. desperate

The theme seems to be I hate any kind of advertising that assumes it's target audience is somehow defective. (Even fashion, beauty and cosmetic surgery advertising mostly assume people want to make the best of themselves, rather than starting out defective and - with product X - being able to become just like normal people.)

All other ads I just tolerate. I'm not really a fan of advertising, and thanks to living in the UK I can watch & listen to the ad-free BBC for pennies per day (about 37.1 pennies at current rates or about 76 cents). And, and thanks to HDD recorders, I can fast-forward through the ads when I do want to watch commercial TV.

So I don't have to do very much tolerating.

I live in Iowa, so aside from all of the ads you mention, I get bombarded (since spring this year) with political ads. Can those of you that are not in early primary states who are tired of political ads imagine what those of us in Iowa and New Hampshire are dealing with? What sucks even more is the election is still over a year away and it will only get worse! I would rather watch feminine itching commercials during dinner than to watch one more political ad.

I really like the California Dairy Association ads with the "happy cows". They have very clever commercials, but I'm not sure if they're run nationally or not. They used to have a series of ads about aliens coming here in search of the "magic nectar" (milk) that were hilarious. They found a cow that they named "Da Iry" and tried all kinds of ways to convince her to bestow upon them the magic nectar. They finally took her back to the home planet and then stopped running those ads.


Aquilla

The "happy cow" ads are running in Texas.

What commercials do you hate, tolerate and like?
I hate hate HATE all the stupid ED ads (how many people think sitting in adjoining bathtubs out in a field is somehow sexy?). I detest the eHarmony ads with the weirdly creepy dude touting umpteen levels of compatibility. And I absolutely LOATHE the NutriSystem ads; for some reason they creep me out, especially the one with the gals with the southern accents saying ridiculous things like “my husband can’t keep his hands off me”, or “my husband jokingly calls me his trophy wife” like it’s a friggin’ compliment! Blurgh!

A totally creepy ad that just came out is for some sort of injectable gel for wrinkles around the mouth. The woman’s face looks like the Joker from Batman. And she says “people won’t be able to tell”. Yah, right!

I really like Target’s ads; they are creative, witty, attractive and get their point across. I love their new one with Jack LaLanne (“long live living long and loving every minute of it!”). The guy must be in his 90’s, but he still looks better than most 50 year olds! Everything about their campaign is brilliant.

I love the California Dairy commercials with Janice and Diane (the cows). The first time I saw the one where Diane says “hit the snooze” and the rooster goes flying out of the barn, I fell out laughing.

The Fresh Step litter commercial with the party cats is cute, too – forming a line for the litter box, or the Persian saying “hey, that’s my sister!”

There are many commercials that have elements I like. I think it’s Audi that has the commercial of the car screeching around in a circle and parallel parking perfectly with the line “the luxury car for people who park themselves”, a not-so-subtle poke in the eye at Lexus, who has the assisted parallel parking feature.

Burger King surprised me with a good one that doesn’t include the creepy “King” with the kung-fu chicken. “Lit-tle kick” Hee!

I've tended to enjoy most of the Geico campaigns and car ads tend to be pretty well produced. But - I'm a guy, what can I say? - I always enjoy ads featuring fit young people in as few clothes as possible. I may not buy the product (or even remember what it is), but I won't mind watching the ad. The only exception here would be the "Girls Gone Wild" DVD ads, which are just too trashy for words.

Fortunately, all of the annoying ED ads have stopped using phrases like "If you have ED..." or "I have ED..." - which to me always sounded like "If you have VD" or, worse, "I have VD!" (For the younger readers here, VD is what STDs used to be called .) The ads are still annoying - and just as venereal - but at least they no longer conjure images of chancres.

I go through periods of loathing various commercial personalities. The freecreditreport.com guy ("Log on now!") has recently been ousted in my enmity by the Brit in the AT&T wireless internet card ad: "Found you!" "Would you like tea with that? Thank you!" Shut up, die, and go to hell. Though even he isn't quite as bad as the creepy Burger King or the guys wearing the Wendy's wigs. Those things gives me nightmares.

Sadly, I've never seen the "happy cow" ads.

May I interject a moment to rant about "Chuck"? Why oh why God does my bf like estrogen oozing crap like this? I feel like I'll never have to pop another pill watching this hair-pulling series! Just last week (or two weeks ago) the Asian spy girl was holding a gun to Chuck's head... with her finger pulling the trigger all the way back but Chuck's brains didn't spray the wall like so much strawberry jam and came back to annoy me next week! Arggggg.

/exhale

Anyway... some commercials I hate are the Visa/MC ones where calamity ensues when someone writes a check or fishes their pocket for change. Every time it comes on I give the TV the one finger salute.

Another is the Volvo ads where everyone's happy chatting in the car and B-A-M-M! cut to the accident scene. I wince every time I see a car ad in preparation for the inevitable accident.

ED ads still annoy me. It's like colon cleaning pills, only on the outside and we pay advertisers lots of money to banalize bodily functions to raise someone's stock.

Then there are the garden variety buy-this-product-and-beautiful-women-will-pop-out-of-thin-air-and-have-sex-with-you! ads.

Robert: Did you know that if men color out their gray they'll get laid?
Lesly: Wow, that's amazing.
Robert: Yeah.
Lesly: Are you gonna dye your hair?
Robert: I'm thinking about it.
Lesly: You should do it if you ever want to have sex!

I checked back on this Youtube link and it's well worth a look - watch the regular and first, then check out some ofthe parodies. Most amusing.

There is something incongruous about watching the network news about people blowing themselves up in Iraq followed by commercials depicting a scantily clad couple dancing on the beach in some drug-induced euphoria. Is it really "a better life through chemistry"?

Oh my God, yes! I despise this commercial, particularly because of the incongruence of the "list of side effects", and the next lines uttered by the actress: "Side effects may include injection site reactions such as swelling, redness, rash and bumps. -Smooth, natural, everyone will notice, but no one will know!"

They'll certainly know if you have swelling, redness, a rash or bumps!


The other thing that's starting to get to me lately are all of the more OBVIOUS product placement it tv shows these days. Ok, a guy pulls a Pepsi or a particular brand of beer out of the fridge. No biggie. But then there are the ones, like the car pulling into a parking space, and the angle is such that it looks like it's going to run through the parking spot, and crush you in your own living room, just so that they can get a shot of the grill emblem on screen.

The other one I hate, is on The Closer. Our heroine, Assistant Chief Brenda, has T-Mobile as her cell phone provider. How do we know? Because she uses their "audio logo" for her ring-tone, and someone calls her no less than four times per episode! And that's on top of the T-Mobile ads that run during the hour the show's on!