FraudWasteAbuse

I’m big on nostalgia. Probably more than anyone else I know, especially my wife. I think it’s because she didn’t have cable television growing up. I’ll talk about all the cool shows I used to watch on Nickelodeon and she won’t have a clue as to what I’m talking about. So while I was watching shows like Danger Mouse, Mr. Wizard’s World, Today’s Special, and The Mysterious Cities of Gold, she was watching shows like. . .well I don’t really know what kinds of shows she was watching. There actually were a few good shows on the networks, but without Nickelodeon she was missing out on much of the experience.

While watching those totally awesome shows, we all inevitably sit through the commercials. There are a few commercials I remember vividly, but most are locked away in some deep crevice of my brain, only to come back again when I review a familiar 30 second clip. For those of us who grew up in that era, I’m sure you remember the Dig ‘Em Frog, the Kool-Aid Man, and the tons of gimmicky cereal ads.

I had commercial nostalgia years before the internet came on the scene. In my family we had a lot of movies on VHS that we had recorded over the years. I used to play them on the VCR and and fast-forward through the movies so I could watch any commercials I might have remembered. But today, thanks to YouTube, old commercials are at our fingertips. Below are several commercials that I remember fondly.

I’m sure that most of us who grew up with Nintendo remember the Power Glove. I never used one or even knew anyone who had one of these, but the commercial sure made it look cool. If any of you have seen The Wizard (aka the hour and a half long Nintendo commercial that people paid to see) there’s a memorable scene in which a kid is playing a racing game using the Power Glove. After he finishes the race he utters the classic line, “I love the Power Glove. It’s so bad.”

When I watched this commercial again for the first time in years, I could still remember exactly how the commercial went. I think commercials with jingles do that to you. Anyway, I suppose Colgate was sure that kids would be begging mom and dad to buy this totally rad new toothpaste after seeing this glam-rocking animated toothpaste tube. Not one of the best attempts at creating a mascot but it made for a memorable commercial.

This is a classic Pepsi commercial. At the time this commercial aired, I hadn’t seen Back to the Future yet, so I really had no idea who Michael J. Fox was. But that didn’t really matter in this case. As a kid I was easily impressed, and I thought it was so cool that Michael J. Fox could get a free Pepsi by making a copy of the can on a copy machine. How awesome would that be if we could do that in real life? After watching this commercial again today, the first thing I thought was that I’ve never been in a library with a soda machine.

Oh, Zack the Lego Maniac! How I hated you! I loved Legos as a kid. Unfortunately, I didn’t get many chances to expand my collection. Zack reminded me of this. Every time I saw this asshole parading around his room with his thousands of dollars worth of Legos and that smug look on his face, it really pissed me off. The only Lego set I really wanted (and never got) was this cool space monorail set. I mean, didn’t all kids have parents that could buy them a $100 Lego set every week?

I remember Bonkers candy and I also remember liking it. What I don’t remember is why this commercial compelled me to want to try it. I fail to see how some old lady and some rich people getting crushed by giant fruit would make kids want to eat this stuff. Apparently the popularity of the candy waned after the commercials stopped airing and it was discontinued.

Remember this douchebag? Okay, so this technically isn’t an 80s commercial, but it was too good to pass up. It seems that Encyclopædia Britannica found this ubernerd to do a series of commercials for them. I think this one was the second in that series. Back in those days, computers were mostly useless as evidenced by the nerd who never touches it throughout the entire commercial. Most of us usually went to the library to do research for a paper or project. I guess the commercial was supposed to make nerds and research look cool so you would ask your parents to shell out a few grand on a encyclopedia set. Unfortunately for them, this guy was loud and annoying and didn’t even get an A on his paper.