Burger King ads: offensive or brilliant?

[Honey]

It's been Burger King's Modus operandi the past five years to make commercials that are -- for lack of a better term -- weird. While this plan started off with a bang and one of the first viral videos of the Web, lately it's been leading to more and more forgettable commercials (and even a video game) featuring The King.

Now, though, Burger King may have veered from the weird into the just-plain-wrong with Whopper Virgins. The gist of Whopper Virgins is this: The only people who are unbiased enough to give a true opinion of whether the Whopper or Big Mac is better are people who've never tasted either -- specifically peasants from second- and third-world countries. So Burger King flew to places like Romania, Greenland and Thailand to get these people's opinions.

On paper it doesn't sound that bad though a little misguided (would you have people who've never drunk wine judge a wine competition? So why not pick burger experts to judge instead of novices?) and something out of the Hardee's handbook. The controversy concerns the way Burger King is portraying the peasants.

While Burger King isn't releasing the actual documentary until Monday, it seems the company isn't going to hold back when it comes to cultural stereotypes. That picture above is of a Romanian peasant, though it could be right of Hollywood casting. Peopole are already wondering just how real these taste-testers are.

The entire thing reeks of Burger King's advertising agency, Crispin Porter + Bogusky, trying to push the envelope to stir up attention. Like the desperate-for-attention kid in class, it's funny for a little while but now Burger King ads are just getting more and more annoying. CP + B has not made themselves many friends with the account either and if you get a few drinks into some people who work at local digital ad agency VML -- which held the digital business until March of this year -- they have a different story to tell about Subservient Chicken being all Crispin Porter's success. — Owen Morris

Kansas City - Fat City - Burger King ads: offensive or brilliant?

[mrs.v]

The King freaks me out.

[Penny Lane]

[twitchy2.0]

[Butterfly]

They are very disturbing commercials indeed. I don't know how any one can watch and then think, "hmmm, I need a Burger King burger".

[twitchy2.0]

This woman did:

[Butterfly]

That is advertisement enough to never eat that shit, ever.

[travelbug]

This woman did:

Yeah, over and over and OVER, apparently.

[cynic]

.....truly tasteless would be if McDonalds would use the in-store video tape of the guy smacking down the little girl....with a tagline going something like....."No One Gets Their Big Mac Before I Get Mine".....

...I should be in advertising....

[Sweetie]

^ Love it. You should be an ads salesman.

[Just Kill Me]

OMFG Cynic that's disturbingly hilairoius.

The burger king "king" scares the fuck out of me.

[tkdgirl]

OMFG Cynic that's disturbingly hilairoius.

The burger king "king" scares the fuck out of me.

I agree! 'King' is what I imagine the anti christ to look like.

[holly]

The King freaks me out.

Me too! It's the stuff nightmares are made of!

[AliceInWonderland]

great, now i wan a whopper

[Just Kill Me]

I agree! 'King' is what I imagine the anti christ to look like.

I almost feel dirty after seeing him on TV.