Did Ya’ Ever…

Disclaimer: I do most of my network TV watching during football season, so I mostly see commercials that run during the games.

When watching TV…

…did ya’ ever notice that whenever there’s a commercial for a car, that car is usually shown speeding along an empty highway? Or around a city whose streets are otherwise deserted? Or, if it’s stuck in traffic, the driver is either ecstatically happy to just sit in the damn thing, enjoying the music and luxuriating in its plush interior or, if they are in a hurry to get home to dinner, does some dangerous illegal maneuver to escape the traffic?

Did ya’ ever notice that when there’s a family in the car the kids are all getting along and the whole family are more than likely bopping to a catchy tune, including the driver who should be holding on to the wheel and paying attention to the road? Oh, I forgot. There are no other cars on the road.

Have ya’ noticed that cars go mach speed through mountainous curvy roads lacking guardrails, or zip through snow and do weird maneuvers on it that no sane driver should do even on a dry road?

Sometimes a whole fleet comes barreling up the highway, spread out over both sides. No problem. There are no cars coming from the other direction. Ever.

What about the ones where an off road vehicle demonstrates its ability to take you on a shortcut through the wilderness if you encounter a traffic back up? It climbs up to the top of a mountain and sits on the summit, the driver the king of the world. Or worse, when they back those suckers up to the edge of a cliff trusting completely in some automatic safety feature. Seriously? Would you actually try this? Would you ever even go near that cliff in anything other than a parachute?

The psychology behind car ads is that we are supposed to feel that in a car we are truly free, masters of our own little universes. The rest of the world be damned. Which fits well with the spirit of our times.

While we’re on the subject of cars, how about the way drivers in movies always get a free parking space right in front of the building? When they drive they usually have their eyes, or other body parts, on their passenger as they gab away. Does that make you cringe, wondering if this will be one of those films where a crash serves as a convenient means to getting rid of a character or two? I had a friend who did that a lot, and sometimes I had to warn him about an oncoming hazard. I think he was annoyed that I didn’t look back at him. Hey, one of us had to drive.

Do these scenes and commercials influence the way people drive? Do bears sit in the woods?

While we’re on the subject of cars that are likely to crash, what about all those insurance commercials that present some cutesy vignette that has nothing to do with insurance? During football season at least, they often feature, ad nauseam, a small handful of players who would gladly endorse cyanide for a price. I understand. Their hundred million dollar contract can’t be enough to squeak by on. What about that cute little lizard with a British accent and an uncanny resemblance to Michael Kaine? How about Progressive Insurance’s cute, quirky “Flo” character? The quacky AFLACK duck? The baby whose first word is “Liberty?” What does any of this have to do with insurance? I read that the companies that spend the most money on these kinds of ads are actually not very good. No surprise there. They apparently have no idea what the purpose of their product is, and after paying for all that advertising, I suspect there’s no money left for paying claims.

If you watch football, you have no doubt noticed that the most frequent commercials during games besides car ads and the dumb insurance ads are for junk food. Most often they feature Black actors whom the fast food industry targets. Just the kind of food they need, right? It’s bad enough they are all stuffing burgers, fries and pizza down their throats, but the company goes out of its way to emphasize that the amount of cheese on one slice of pizza is greater than the entire annual production of cheese in Wisconsin. Let’s not even think about the saturated fat in the burgers or the required addition of bacon to everything.

And in almost every commercial now, the characters, in a state of ecstasy induced by whatever the ad is selling, are always dancin’, dancin’, dancin’. Lately many commercials are like mini Broadway musicals. When was the last time you saw people out in the street break into song and dance? Well at least that would be a way to burn off some of that cheese.

I always marvel at the fact that for many who watch the Super Bowl, it’s the commercials they enjoy most. These ads tend to be so weird, that frankly, most to the time, I don’t even know what the heck is being advertised.

Do you ever wonder why in a crime drama, the the bad guy, without hesitation, blows away other members of the law enforcement team, but when confronted with our hero, he just points the gun at him or her, and proceeds to give a lengthy dissertation on how brilliant the crime was? This gives the protagonist just enough time to do something sneaky and bring the bad guy down or for someone to come to the rescue. Seriously? I want to yell at the villain, “Why didn’t you just blow him away when you had the chance?” .

How about when two strangers meet, initially hate each other, then wind up in the next scene scarcely getting into the room before they start pulling each other’s clothes off? Not that I’m complaining, and, by the way, if that’s ever happened to you my hat’s off to you.

Then there’s the direct to consumer drug ads that depict previously deathly ill people dancin’, dancin’, dancin’ while the announcer recites at twenty times normal speech tempo a liturgy of potentially deadly side effects. God forbid the drug companies should skip the ads and save the millions spent on them for research or lowering prices.

Did ya’ ever notice this stuff? Did ya’ ever wonder why it works so well? If so, please enlighten me.