In case you've been away from your TV in the last month (and on behalf of American TV networks, let me just say, what are you? Some sort of freak? Have you been reading or something?) and aren't familiar with the Arch Deluxe, McDonald's has been running this new ad campaign to show off how mature they're becoming. It shows Ronald McDonald doing all sorts of mature things, like playing golf, going to dance clubs, playing pool, and habitually forgetting important facts. (No, wait... that was Ronald Reagan.) And so we're all awaiting this new breakthrough at McDonalds -- this great new, totally amazing (here comes the hip 90's buzzword...) paradigm, and what is it? What's their great new innovation?
Does anybody else remember this? It was, like, 1979 or 1980, and they had this ad campaign consisting of a young couple in love, enjoying a Big Mac with candles and tableclothes and everything. What better way to say, "I love you... but only enough to spend 5 bucks on dinner."?
Of course, as is always the case in McDonald's, real life was nothing like the commercials. I went to a candlelight dinner with my family, and they did have the candles and a tablecloth, but let's face it -- it's hard to have a romantic candlelight dinner when you've got some kid in the background yelling, "Fries are ready!" and you're busy trying to open up those stupid plastic ketchup packets without the ketchup spilling all over the tuxedo you rented for this special dinner. (You know, I have this theory that if they constructed a tank out of the same material they use for those ketchup packets and the cellophane they use to wrap CDs, it would be virtually indestructable. How about it, U.S. Army?)
This kind of makes me ask myself a few questions:
Actually, did anyone else notice that Grimace just hasn't been around much anymore? This seems to support my theory that he was rapidly evolving these past 10 years and turned into Barney. Kind of makes sense, doesn't it? All I have to say is if a big purple fuzzy Neanderthal Man shows up a decade from now, don't say I didn't warn you. But I digress...
Of course, all the McDonaldland characters were much better than those freaky Burger King ones. You had The Burger King who, naturally, had magical powers, and his fast-food-arch-nemesis, the Duke of Doubt, who went around doubting Burger King's abilities. To be honest, I never really understood why the Duke was supposed to be the bad guy here. If some guy in a crown came up to me and told me a) He was the king of all burgers, and b) He could use his magic powers to make a school bus float, I'd be a little skeptical myself. (I mean, c'mon -- we all know burgers live in a Democratic society.)
Come to think of it, this blind faith message is really kind of disturbing. I'm actually suspecting there's some sort of hidden Biblical message in here and we never got to see that one commercial where Burger King magically turns strawberry shakes into wine or feeds a village with just 2 sesame-seed buns and 2 Whalers. ("Burger King -- because if you eat anywhere else, you're going to hell.")
But I think I had a point before going off on this Burger King / Jesus Christ analogy (man, if I had a nickel every time that happened...), which was that I'm a little disappointed with McDonald's attempts at being mature. I think they could have come up with some better ideas if they had tried a little harder.
Like maybe Adolescent Mood Swing Coffee (sometimes it's really sweet, sometimes incredibly bitter -- you never know what you're going to get!) or the Mid-Life Crisis Meal (every meal comes with a little red sports car and a ditsy 20-year-old bleach-blonde model) or possibly the Biological Clock McNuggets (for a limited time... not available to those over the age of 45.)
Actually, this is strikingly similar to an item I once saw in The Sharper Image (As far as I can tell, nobody actually buys anything at The Sharper Image -- they all just go there because they secretly want to use the massage chairs.) which is an ordinary alarm clock, except for one special feature that tells you, down to the second, exactly how much time is remaining in your expected life span. I find this incredibly morbid. although I am kind of intrigued by the idea because I figure if I can hit the snooze button often enough, I might achieve immortality.
Although I'm not sure I'm quite ready for that -- it would messing around in God's domain, and really don't think that's for people like me.
That's more for guys like The Burger King.