Cavalcade of Awesome

(Via SA_Steve)

Well, it’s ri-donk-ulous how popular my last McDonald’s commercial article became.  It’s now constantly at the top of my blog traffic. So, I thought, why not write a sequel?  I still search YouTube for old McD’s commercials, so it shouldn’t be hard to find some worthy of a look back.  And, I was right, there are many that I can still talk about.

McDonald’s has always had really, really good commercials.  Especially during the whole McDonaldLand era.  All of those characters were awesome and almost every single one of the characters had their own commercial.  So today, I thought I’d look at my favorite character and a few of his commercials.

I love the Hamburglar. He was always my favorite character. He had an awesomely kick ass name and he was a bit of a rebel. Also, check out the striped suit, the dude obviously did some time in prison. How cool is that? A children’s fast food mascot that did hard time. Awesome, indeed. So, in honor of our felon friend, here are a bunch of commercials that feature the Hamburglar.  Click the title of the commercial or the image to see the commercial on YouTube.

The Hamburglar Touch – This was back in the ’80s/’90s when the McD commercials had title cards like a Looney Tunes cartoon. This commercial featured the Hamburglar dreaming about what it would be like to have everything he touched turn into a juicy hamburger.  You can see the Hamburglar in this commercial looks different than the big picture above.  The Hamburglar used to look more like a goblin, but they softened him up in the late ’80s to look more like a Cabbage Patch Kid.  It’s tough to find commercials with the goblin face.

How Hamburglar Got His Stripes – I’m a little confused by this commercial. I mean, Hamburglar was a thief. He actively sought out and stole hamburgers. It’s even in his name (burglar). As I mentioned earlier, I assumed that Hamburglar wore stripes because the dude did time in prison. Am I right? Well, apparently not according to this commercial.  As you watch this commercial imagine all my childhood preconceptions getting gang raped in the Riker’s Island showers.

Hamburger University – Another odd commercial. Ronald teaching a class full of talking hamburgers? Creepy. What’s he teaching them, how to be eaten? Actually, he’s teaching them to stay away from the Hamburglar. “Don’t be eaten by the Hamburglar, guys, you have to save yourself to be eaten by regular kids.”  Like I said, kinda weird. Doubly weird because McDonald’s does, in fact, have a Hamburger University on the grounds of their corporate headquarters in Illinois.  But I don’t believe you’ll find a class full of talking hamburgers at that University.  But, again, I’ve never been there.  But it would be really cool if they were there.

Cheeseburgers To Go – This entire commercial is a riff on a Scooby-Doo episode. Watch Ronald chase the Hamburglar through a series of doors. Why are there so many doors in this room? Is it a hotel? It seems like a ridiculous amount of doors for the amount of room.  Anyway, this is the only McD’s commercial I can think of that actually got a sequel…Cheeseburgers To Go…Again. In the sequel, Ronald chases the Hamburglar through a hallway of doors instead of just a room. See what they did there? Yeah, Hollywood should take notes from McD’s on how to properly make an original sequel.

The next group of commercials are another type of commercial format McDonald’s used:  the music video.  In the ’80s, as a counter point to the “bedtime/fairy tale” based commercials like the ones above, McDonald’s used these music commercials to appeal to slightly older kids. I always loved these type of commercials because the tunes were always catchy and upbeat.  Here are a few of those.  Click the image or commercial title to see the video on YouTube.

First Day – I mentioned this in my first McDonald’s commercial article and it’s still one of my all-time favorites. The drinking fountain gag gets me every time.

Dancin’ – I remember this commercial very well as a kid.  The music is fun and upbeat and I like all the dancing. I think, for me, the most memorable part are the three graduates dancing before getting their picture taken or the two kids moonwalking in front of the Big Mac.

Homework – Another cool one I remember that was geared toward kids a little older. And it takes place in a school like so many of the others. Teachers give ever increasingly ridiculous homework assignments to the kids. A 500 word essay on “who was Moby Dick?” He’s a f%^$in’ WHALE, dude. Come on. And memorize the Preamble to the Constitution? No problem, I already know it thanks to Schoolhouse Rock. Valiant effort on the kids in the commercial to try to turn it into a rap song though.  Is it just me, or does the little boy in the end look and sound like Corey Feldman?

Okay, that’s enough for today, kiddies.  I hope to have another article up this week.  I thought last week’s Star Wars Celebration 10 year anniversary article looked a little lonely all by itself.  We’ll see if I can get another one up.  It may or may not happen,  mostly because Saturday is my birthday and I may not have a chance to work on it whilst I am in preparation for the festivities.  To celebrate my bday on Saturday I’ll be running a 5K and then hopefully going to see the new Star Trek movie and going to eat at one of my favorite places of all time, Maggiano’s Little Italy.  See you later.

This entry was posted on May 4, 2009 at 3:31 pm and is filed under advertising, fast food, food, McDonald's, nostalgia, pop culture with tags Hamburglar, McDonald's, nostalgia, pop culture, TV commercials. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.