The shark, she is jumped

I apologize for the quality of this next commercial. Also, the person recording it shot their TV, so the video doesn't look that great.



I suppose something like this was inevitable; the Simpsons were doing commercial tie-ins within a year or two of their launch, and Family Guy has now been on the air for five or six seasons (inexplicably). But what is going on at Subway? You've got a new enormous sandwich, which I assume is probably not the best thing on your menu (although I rather conveniently can't find the nutrition facts on the Subway website). And who do you select to pitch this sandwich? A fat, lazy cartoon character - virtually the opposite of your target demographic. Hey, is it too late to get Jabba the Hutt to do a spot? "Peesha ya chee konah Subway Restaurants... ha ha ha..."

But wait! There's also a tie-in game! And a list of character bios! Including the favorite Subway sandwiches of all the major cast members! Because nothing makes me hungry for the Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki like knowing it's the favorite sandwich of a wise-cracking talking dog. I also enjoy that they included the Herbert character in the cast bio section; naturally, no mention is made of the fact that the entire joke of that character is that he's a pedophile. Pedophiles love the roast beef sandwich! You'd think someone at Subway would actually have watched the show before approving the ad campaign.

I suppose with Family Guy prominently involved we could have done a lot worse. For example, it's amazing that the commercial didn't feature (a) Stewie shouting something about victory; (b) Lois saying "Pete-ahhh" in that nasally voice of hers; (c) Quagmire saying "Giggidy giggidy" and bobbing his head; (d) Peter fighting a chicken; or (e) a reference to Star Trek, Star Wars, Diff'rent Strokes, Knight Rider, and/or the Kool-Aid Man. In fact, this post contains more references to Star Wars than that ad did. Touché, Family Guy.

Kia van Winkle

Did everyone at Kia's ad agency just come out of a 20-year coma?



I realize that Flashdance is still reasonably well-known, but it came out in 1983. That's nearly 25 years ago. Way to be relevant there, Kia. Also, is it me or is this really just kind of creepy? Would you buy a car from a frantically dancing salesperson who was pouring sweat? The whole "selling like he's never sold before" lyric is a little strange as well. Here's the thing, Kia: if I'm interested in buying a car from you, I don't really care how well your sales guy is doing at meeting his monthly quota. I'm interested in, you know, the car. Maybe you could have told me something about them besides their names? That might have been useful. Instead of the exotic dance moves from a quarter-century ago and the mailed-in song parody.

Maybe the problem is just that Kia has no idea what year it is. Check out this ad for Kia Fest '06:



Kia. Seriously. It is not 1984. I don't want to see Kia Fest '08 videos featuring breakdancing or some salesperson re-enacting the warehouse scene from Footloose, okay? It's the 21st century. Get with the program.