Okay, so the new Burger King commercial? Hovering somewhere between “awesome” and “WTF.”
Burger King, which has been running with its mega-creepy plastic- head “living king” spots for the past few years, has now added the following to its weird roster: Placing said king, SpongeBob SquarePants, and… Sir Mix-a-Lot in the same spot.
Mr. Lot, still benefiting from the 1992 one- hit wonder “Baby Got Back” (which, yes, won a Grammy), doesn’t appear until the end of the ad, but that’s his rap single Burger King is parodying. (“I like square butts and I cannot lie!”) However, it’s not Whopper’s he’s pushing; it’s… kid’s meals.
You read that right. The campaign is part of a new promotion which advertises a free SpongeBob SquarePants toy in a 99 cents kid’s meal. But here’s the catch: That’s only available with the purchase of an adult value meal.
“Booty is booty!” announces Sir Mix-a-Lot in a cameo at the end of the ad. Well, perhaps. Consider the history of “Baby Got Back”: There was a time, difficult as it is to believe in this How I Met Your Mother during-the-family-hour era, when Sir Mix-a-Lot was considered too hot for that current doyenne of taste, MTV. Back when the channel actually played music videos, the one accompanying “Baby Got Back” was relegated to evening hours due to its sexual references.
As for this version of the Ode to Giant Lady Butts, it instead glorifies “square butts” and featkkures a shot of Creepy King measuring a model’s hinder. The ad was run during NCAA Final Four coverage. As for the asses of Burger King and Nickelodeon, they’re attempting to cover them with statements emphasizing that the ads are adult-focused, run during adult-targeted programming.
