First, let’s just get this out of the way. I know this is a cliché. Like you, I’ve seen all the videos of supercuts of infomercials of people not being able to hold a bowl of popcorn and a thought at the same time, or attempting to open a jar of olives with their nostrils, or not understanding how socks work or whatever. I know it’s a cliché, I know it’s hack, I know I should have risen above it decades ago. I know all this. It’s possible I’ve embroidered this very thought on a throw pillow. And still, somehow, when this incessant online infomercial for some sort of car cupholder has been appearing in my various social media feeds approximately eleventeen snacktillion times every day, I’m right back there, an old man screaming at a big furniture-looking CRT television about how everyone is so stupid, they’re all a pack of idiots, and wondering what the hell do they take me for?
I can’t believe I let this happen to me. And yet I did. Because every time I see this fucking ad for some fucking cupholder that I am in no fucking way going to fucking link to on my own fucking website, I get incensed at the stupidity of it all.
What am I so incensed at? It’s how the ad starts. It’s this:
Look, I know this is just archetypal brain-dead-human-in-infomercial behavior. I know. I know it shouldn’t bother me. But the gall, the fucking gall it takes to try and convince me of the value of cupholders – something I’m pretty sure most people have been well-acquainted with for a solid three or four decades at least – by having some hapless actor portray a human being so dazzlingly unfamiliar with liquids, cups, surfaces, friction, physics. gravity, pretty much every basic tenet of existing as a human in physical space so that I’ll think, garsh, I sure wish there was some way to prevent this tragic loss of, uh, milk?
I hate it. This is not a problem. Nobody puts a full, lidless cup on the angled part of their dashboard, a full arm’s reach away, and expects any outcome other than the one shown here. It doesn’t happen. And yet this company that makes –what, I don’t even know what, some kind of cupholder that goes in your cupholder?– this fucking company expects me to see this and then decide to give them money for something?
Fuck you, cupholder company that I will not name or link to.
Does this actually work? Is it done for comic effect? Maybe? Maybe it is. Maybe I’m getting worked up over nothing. I mean, nothing else in the ad is played for laughs, but maybe at this point in civilization it doesn’t need to be. Maybe they’re in on the joke?
Maybe. But it’s a tired fucking joke, and I’m still not convinced they mean it tongue-in-cheek.
I think this ad was filmed in China, because those quilted full floor mats are very popular there. I really like those, actually, and ordered some for the old minivan I have. They’re classy as hell. They deserve better than to be caught up and debased in such a grotesque manner for something like this.
I know some of you will say something like “yeah, but you’re talking about it,” to which I’d ask am I? Am I really? I’ve given no names, no links, nothing like that, and every time I see this on my timelines, which is, again, about once every picosecond, I scroll right past, annoyed. I couldn’t tell you the name of the product because I’ve never stayed long enough to see it.
I’m sorry to drag you into all this. I’m sorry to hold you down and scream profanity at you over something so inane. But I just felt that if I saw this one more time and didn’t get it out of my system, I’d explode. And I don’t want to do that.
I feel a little better now. Thank you. And don’t but whatever the fuck these clowns are selling, I don’t care if it’s a cupholder that fellates/cunnilingizes you while you drive.
Folks, I’m with Mr. Ibert. I still drive an entertaining sports car with a manual transmission that I eat and drink outside of. I also run 25 miles a week without carrying a water bottle with me. I hydrate before and after runs and before and after drives. I do admit I occasionally use at least one cupholder to transport a drink from the coffee shop to my home, but even that has backfired on me when I’ve been forced to perform an emergency stop when some idiot does something stupid like drinking or texting while driving. We’re all buying into the idea that we have to constantly eat and/or drink.
Wait till you get where you’re going or make a stop during long drives. You’ll survive, I promise.
Well, since it hasn’t been very long since everyone in China rode bicycles, and no one except party officials had cars, then the whole fluids in open containers in vehicles thing might still be unknown territory for some of them.
I think you meant “again” Jason,you don’t want to explode again. And no,please don’t.
All I can think of when I see ads like this is “Does your cat make TOO MUCH NOISE?” You need Kitten Mittens!
Dang, Kitten Mittens are a great idea. Cats are much louder than you’d expect. When my cat gets going he sounds like a heard of elephants running around upstairs.
One size fits all!
“Nobody puts a full, lidless cup on the angled part of their dashboard, a full arm’s reach away…” -Jason Torchinsky
A friend of mine thinks every cup is a go-cup and his cupholders are always full of junk that isn’t a cup. A ceramic coffee mug? Sure, that’ll sit right there on the dash just fine. A soda from lunch? Gets the free refill before leaving, but hates straws, so lidless and put wherever he finds convenient.
“…and expects any outcome other than the one shown here.” -Torchinsky
You’re probably right. I’m sure he’s just used to the spills.
In my day you just dropped a magnet into the bottom of your Coke and stuck it most anywhere on the car.
Well, back in my day if you dropped a magnet into a can of coke it would stick to the can.
But recently it was revealed by a *very stable genius* that magnets do not work once they get wet.
Oh, oh, homey. Speak for yo-self. I’m totally buying that auto-fellater
That car looks way too modern to not have a cupholder. I’ve never seen this ad in the wild but the short clip you pulled, the cameraman is quite careful to avoid showing the area behind the shifter. How convenient.