Thursday, May 7, 2009

Worst Product Placement Ever And Worst-Timed Name Drop Ever: Gary Unmarried

Quite an unfortunate episode of Gary Unmarried this evening. If you were bored enough to be tuned into the CBS series this evening you were treated to two unfortunate scenes. One was the absolute worst product placement I think I have ever seen and the other was the most unfortunate timing of a name drop of all time.


The first, the product placement fiasco begins with Gary and his friend (not even worth imdb'ing his name) walk in the living room, proudly carrying KFC buckets and bags, The Colonel's smiling face emblazoned in perfect line with camera. I thought that was pretty bad, like most product placements. I tend to ignore them, an easy thing to do, but wow, did the writers make sure you couldn't ignore this placement.

Friend: This is not KFC.
Gary: Uh, yes it is. It's the, uh, the, uh, new grilled chicken. You'll like it.
Friend: But it's so tender (canned laughing). You can taste all the herbs and spices (lot's of canned laughing). You think it's like 5 herbs and 6 spices? (hahah)
Gary: I dunno, just eat it, ok.
Friend: What if it's like 10 herbs and 1 amazing spice (the laugh machine should be a break neck pace by now)
Gary: I hope this conversation never ends (laughing).
end unfortunate product placement scene.

Fresh off that amazing scene, after a few commercials, comes a scene in a hotel room where they repeatedly joke about having tickets to see Danny Gans. The joke consists of three characters and multiple lines taking up about 30 seconds. It's even mercilessly brought up again towards the end of the episode when someone mistakes Danny Gans for Sigfried & Roy. The two jokes themselves were pretty lame in the first place and crossed the line into unfortunate territory because Danny Gans died Tuesday the day before this episode aired. Ouch.



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2 comments:

  1. When the network says you have to do a product placment all you can do is make it funny. I thought they did a real good job of making it funny. The show was probably shot in Feb. The Danny Gans references were not jokes about him and they were good jokes. They put up a card honoring Gans after the show. Rob Riggle was extremly funny and perfect fit for the show. I don't know what you think is funny but this show is funny every week and millions are board enough to watch it. I think your review is short shighted and very limited. Your just being lazy not to mention anything else but the product placement and a freak of luck. The reason your board enough to watch is your probably boring as this unispired post. There is nothing insitful or witting or biting or interesting about it yet you dis the show writers? Really? Wow you have really done yourself proud here ouch! ooooo to much information. Don't go there. I eagarly await your next meaningless lifted paragragh from your cutting edge blog.

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  2. I'm guessing you are either a writer for the show or someone who knows one of them. I know that the writers have no control over product placement and I did not blame them for it - I simply said the writers made sure you couldn't ignore it. If I were going to blame someone for it I'd go for the network as I know that not even the producers have much say in the matter.

    I also did not say the jokes were about Danny Gans, I believe the quote was "jokes about having Danny Gans tickets", though the one comparing him to Sigfried & Roy, well, that was sort of about him. I'm sorry if calling the jokes lame angered you, though I kinda like to have my own opinions on my blog.

    As for what's funny about the show, it's good time filler and good for a few chuckles, I wouldn't DVR it if it wasn't, but let's face facts - this show isn't breaking any new ground.

    Sorry if this post offended you. It wasn't a review, by the way, or I would have talked about more than just two parts of the show. This was a post talking about product placement and unfortunate timing of Danny Gans' name.

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