Random Thoughts

OK, heres what I got from a 30 second commercial for the movie RED 2. Old people blowing shit up and Helen Mirren karate chopping younger men in the throat. Apparently RED stands for Retired Extremely Dangerous and there’s already been one hence the number two attached to this one. Yippee. Helicopters cartwheeling into the camera, old bald guys looking totally insane and Mary Louise Parker from Fried Green Tomatoes and Weeds, appears to be their...what? Handler? Adult diaper changer? Bruce Willis (age 58) is the youngster in the crew that includes John Malkovitch, Helen Mirren and Hannibal Lechter aka Sir Anthony Hopkins. What fucking demographic is this film aimed at exactly? Presumably someone like me, but I wouldn't watch it for free. I mean if I'm going to endure some mindless moronic explosion - car flipping bullshit I at least want to see some young eye candy. Certainly not old ass John Malkovitch in a ridiculous Bruno Mars fedora. Or Helen Mirren mincing around like we're supposed to buy into the premise that its OK because she looks awesome for an old broad. The operative word here is OLD. Because she's still fucking OLD. And what's Anthony Hopkins doing here? He's a "Sir" for Christ sake. Shouldn't he be sporting outrageously opulent costumery and quoting Shakespeare on a stage somewhere? Catherine Zeta Jones, looking like she raided the wig stash from Chicago, appears to be Bruce's sultry love interest. Nobody's going to fucking believe that; he's way too young for her demonstrated taste in men.

Loreal has officially run out of product names with the emergence of something called Miracle Blur. Honestly, Loreal...Miracle Blur? It doesn't even sound like a cosmetic. It sounds like some household cleaning agent: SENSATIONAL NEW MIRACLE BLUR WILL GET RID OF ANY TOUGH STAIN YOUR FAMILY CAN THINK OF! WITH OUR AMAZING NEW BLUR TECHNOLOGY STAINS APPEAR TO DISAPPEAR RIGHT BEFORE YOUR EYES! Cue to woman gazing with adoring wonder as MIRACLE BLUR in a convenient spray bottle causes her kids' muddy hand prints to disappear. So yeah, I'm thinking, does any woman, of any age, want her makeup to blur her face? And miraculously, no less. Wouldnt it be better if the product blurred the view of those LOOKING at your face? Back to the Loreal Name-O-Changer, guys.

Tina Fey is shilling hair dye. WTF? Tina, babe, your comedic/feminist/all round kick-ass broad cred is in serious jeopardy. Garnier Nutrisse. Again with the Loreal. You know who did this before you? Sarah Jessica Parker. Now from her we expect this kind of shallow, trifling money-grab-at-all-costs-to-my-image. Because, let's face it, HER image, built on Carrie Bradshaw, likely THE most insufferable, narcissistic, annoying bitch ever broadcast into peoples homes, was already fucked. But you, Tina? Liz Lemon? The everywoman heroine to every single lady who had to wear a bathing suit as underwear because she had no clean ones left? For Liz Lemon to resort to this kind of wholesale rejection of the natural aging process...a shanda! Now I'm not so stupid as to be unable to disentangle Tina Fey from Liz Lemon (even though by your own admission she was built largely on YOU), but this girly, hair dye-shilling person doesn't appear in your best selling book, either, and presumably that IS you. And surely its not for the money; you're financially set into the grandchildren generation. So what, Tina? Are you telling us that all of your second gen feminist grrrrl power crap is just that, crap? Well this disappointed fan has one thing to say to that: BLERG!

A new commercial for peanut butter Pop tarts is disturbing on multiple levels. First of all, food that is alive is ALWAYS fucked up and in this commercial a live Pop Tart is trapped in what appears to be quicksand, but there is some kind of makeshift sign posted next to the body of...whatever...labeled "Spa". So clearly the Pop Tart was lured to this sticky death trap through craven false pretense. It struggles mightily, its creepy anthropomorphic "face" twisted in terror. Suddenly a random breeze dislodges the "Spa" sign to reveal another sign beneath that reads: "Peanut Butter". The Tart realizes that it is actually trapped in a pool of peanut butter. Whew! The Tart eats its way out in three huge gulps, happy to be free and full of gooey, delicious peanut butter. Unfortunately just outside of the frame a freakish stick figure "human" is reclining on a pool-side chaise lounge tying a bib around its stick neck and eyeing the now peanut butter-filled Pop Tart hungrily. Oddly, the predator is less well defined artistically than its soon-to-be prey. When the Tart catches sight of the fork and knife wielding "human" his "face" collapses into utter despair as he realizes his life is about to end in slow, gory fashion. We also simultaneously realize that this monstrous human-ish thing is the one who has created the fake "Spa" to lure the unsuspecting Pop Tart to it's ultimate demise-through-being eaten. Reminds me of Shelob from The Lord of the Rings. Absolutely chilling. Human as ultimate predator of breakfast pastry with a particularly sadistic twist. So, let's see what we've learned here:

1. A formerly trapped and terrified item of living toaster pastry with a human face, has managed to cheat death by asphyxiation only to be confronted almost immediately by its imminent death by being eaten alive.

2. The salivating, "Spa" poolside stick figure "human" is about to eat the body of a living entity BECAUSE its digestive system is filled with peanut butter that has already begun to decompose as consumed food is wont to do.

There you have it! Who fucking writes this ghoulish shit, Stephen King? Nietzsche through a Ouija board? I mean maybe at 3:00 AM this is the kind of surreal weirdness that makes stoned college kids trek out to the nearest 7/11 in the hunt for a must-have peanut butter Pop Tart. But its airing in July. On a Saturday afternoon. Hell, the story alone in this macabre 15 seconds - that hope is fleeting and struggle leads ultimately to dire destruction - makes me wonder for our species because this dark message is, after all, selling something as innocent as a breakfast/snack food. What's next? Talking cows? Oh wait! They already did that in a series of talking Valley Girl cow commercials shilling dairy products. In one she's trash talking while in the shower wearing a pink shower cap. At least her human TV "family" doesnt ultimately carve her into steaks for the freezer. Also, not to be counted out: the commercial for Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal wherein the little cereal pieces actually EAT EACH OTHER WHILE FLOATING IN A BOWL OF MILK! Again, with faces...cereal with faces eating each other as proof to us of how irresistable they are. "Look gullible human food consumers! We are so desirable and tasty that even WE can't resist eating our fellow cereal comrades in the fight-to-the-death pool of milk that is your morning breakfast cereal!" I don't know about you, but I'm gonna think twice before I bite into another fucking Pop Tart.