Sometimes things happen and I remember that I'm a feminist and that apparently, I'm the only feminist around here. So it's up to me to get excited about things which are sexist and offensive, if only because some of the people I know think it's just adorable.
Anyway. I watch a lot of Comedy Central, and right now they have some Domino's Pizza ads in heavy rotation. The first one is of a perky Domino's delivery girl driving through Gotham city, being chased by baddies before finally makin' that delivery (one presumes, in under 30 minutes), and telling the scary clowns who answer the door that "the Joker owes me a car." Okay, fine. Apart from feeling a pang of "but...but the Joker's dead! Wahhh!" everytime I see this commercial, mostly it only brings out feelings of immense irritation. Like I said, heavy rotation.
The second commercial is similar, only this time they're promoting a Domino's sweepstake where some lucky schmuck will get ten thousand dollars delivered to them along with their pizza. Another perky Domino's girl (not the same one as in the first commercial, but definitely in the same mold) is explaining the terms of the contest while a gruff-looking dude stands next to her, holding a metal briefcase with $10,000 in it.
Let me just pause here and say, for the record, that if I ever won ten thousand dollars, I would take it in stacks of new ten dollar bills, and then I would spread them around on my nice new bed and roll around on them for awhile. Yeah.
Anyway, so the Domino's girl finishes explaining and she turns to Mr. Tuff Guy and says "Ready?" and he says "Ready, cupcake."
And...Nicki spits out her brownie in a blur of indignation.
Really? Really Dominos?! For starters--you have your perky delivery girls braving the back alleyways of Gotham in your commercials, I'm sure they're more than qualified to take an unassuming briefcase along with them. Why bother to introduce a random gruff dude? Surely that negates the whole "ooooh, Gotham is so tough and scary, but we are Domino's--our people can deliver anywhere, even our cute perky girls!" shtick. Secondly--cupcake?! How degrading can you get? Cupcake is used on little girls, not on grown women who are working hard and who are suddenly forced to tolerate the intrusion of some condescending jerk with his muscles.
The commercials don't make sense--I don't like using this Batman to shill for pizza anyway--and they are really frustrating. I know, I know--Peter--that "it's just a commercial" and I'm reading too much into it, but everytime the second one comes on, I am filled with an uncontrollable rage. Luckily that's only happened twice, but honestly--haven't we moved past "cupcake?" Surely if you're paying an advertising company billions of dollars to sell your pizza, they can come up with something a little less offensive.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Having worked in TV for a gazillion years, I can tell you absolutely that the pizza ads you mentioned are aimed at those people who DO call cute girls cupcake and think they will get away with it. (And on the surface, maybe they do.) These people eat a lot of pizza because there's nobody around to cook for them. Hmmm. Wonder why?
*pat, pat*
Post a Comment