Retro TV Commercials

Get set for another batch of Classic Creepy Commercials, featuring everything from horror movies to space aliens to bugs made out of Play-Doh. We’re gonna have a time! The Official Boglins Hotline! (1988) Yep, this was a real thing that really happened. An official Boglins hotline! As I�

The return of the Halloween Countdown means that I get to dust off one of my favorite recurring Dino Drac features: Classic Creepy Commercials! Since I’ve now covered well over 100 spooky commercials, the pickings are slim and I’ll need to get creative. So like, my apologies to those

Get set for another edition of Five Retro TV Commercials, because I know you’re dying to see Charlie Brown sell life insurance. You’re so ironic. Nickelodeon Sweepstakes Promo! (1986) Here we had Nickelodeon bragging about its many on-air giveaways. If you shipped out 6000 skateboards

In this edition of Five Retro TV Commercials, you’ll see everything from old pizza to old action figures to old cough drops. That’s my pitch. Pizza Hut’s “Great White” Pizza! (1993) I’m low-key obsessed with Pizza Hut’s discontinued specialty pies. By “low-key�

Here’s another edition of Five Retro TV Commercials, featuring everything from Bartman to steamed hams: McDonald’s Cheddar Melt! (1989) I have a sick fascination with discontinued McDonald’s foods, revering them more as I would extinct species of birds than old sandwiches. Three

I’ve been absent for a week, which is exactly how long it would take for someone to steal me and leave an android in my place. Food for thought. Below: The latest edition of Five Retro TV Commercials. These ads aired during DuckTales back in ‘88, so imagine them bookending quips from M

Welcome to a special edition of Five Retro TV Commercials. Special to me, at least. Every commercial in this batch aired during The Death of the Incredible Hulk, an NBC television movie that premiered on February 18th, 1990. The Death of the Incredible Hulk got the plush Sunday Night at th

I wasn’t planning to go back to this well so soon, but I found a *really great* Gremlins 2 commercial, and that shit just can’t wait. Every ad featured in this edition of Five Retro TV Commercials premiered in 1990. Most of ’em aired during the same blocks of weekday afternoon s

It’s been months since the last edition of Five Retro TV Commercials, but have no fear: Thanks to some generous donations, I’m now armed with enough old commercials to write about nothing but old commercials from now through 2021. Let’s get this party started, and yes this is how I p

Let’s forget our troubles with grainy videos of cheesy ‘80s commercials. Here’s the latest edition of Five Retro TV Commercials, featuring everything from robots to Skeletor to space aliens. (Times were good!) He-Man & Quik Sweepstakes! (1980s) Back in ’84, Nestle teamed up

He-Man & She-Ra: A Christmas Special premiered in December of ‘85, and I was one of the presumed millions who watched it with their jaws to the floor. He-Man, in prime time?! That was huge! The special featured just about every character from both He-Man and She-Ra’s cartoons, eve

Scary truth: Christmas is less than a month away, and if you so much as blink, the season will be over. Gobble it up while you still can! Look at pretty lights and listen to cheesy music. Watch Scrooged, and nod along with Frank’s meaning-of-Christmas speech. Suck the end of a candy cane

Happy Halloween, everyone! Course, by the time most of you read this, it’ll be November. Hell, it might technically be November even by the time this gets posted. Oh well. I like November, too. Stove Top and Sunday circulars. I hope you had a tremendous season, and I hope Dino Drac playe

Guess it’s lame to do another Classic Creepy Commercials post so soon, but I have a lot of great ads to get to this year. I’m worried there won’t be time for them all! (God knows your Halloween season won’t be complete until you watch a promo for a 1994 TV movie about Roseanne.) De

Oof, there is some serious nostalgia in this edition of Classic Creepy Commercials. Get ready for the feels. Big thanks to Matt B. and Aaron G. for so graciously donating the ads featured below! You guys are the coolest curators. Pumpkin Kutter! (1980s) Still in production today, the Pump

My buddy Matt let me borrow some tapes that his family recorded back in the mid ‘80s, which is seriously the best thing anyone could let me borrow. Like holy shit. I need three external hard drives and cake. I’ve only begun to sort through the goodies, but I already found one of my un

Welcome to the latest edition of Five Retro TV Commercials, starring me, my cat and a broken Mer-Man character bust. Us three. Sunkist Fun Fruits! (1980s) I was partial to Fruit Wrinkles, but there’s no denying that Sunkist’s Fun Fruits were THE fruit snacks of the ‘80s. Originally s

Welcome to the tenth edition of Five Retro TV Commercials. Since I’m just now noticing that milestone, I can’t say that I have anything special planned. Just more old commercials. Crest Toothpaste! (1980s) As crazy as this one is, every kid-targeted toothpaste commercial was just as bo

Just like last time, everything in this edition of Five Retro TV Commercials comes from that tape full of 1991 Ninja Turtles cartoons. (I’ll be putting that cassette to rest after this article, by the way. There are other commercials on it, but nothing you can’t live without seeing aga

Welcome to a special edition of Five Retro TV Commercials. Special to me, at least. A tape donated by my pal MZ was simply labeled “Turtles,” and I correctly guessed that it’d be stuffed with old TMNT episodes. What a freakin’ goldmine! Everything on the videocassette was recorded

Just like last time, everything in this edition of Five Retro TV Commercials came from that insanely great Real Ghostbusters tape. Thanks again to “MZ” for so diligently recording all of Slimer’s antics back in ‘88 — there’s still enough left on that one cassette for me to

A reader/pal who we’ll call “MZ” sent me a huuuuuge pile of old taped-off-television videocassettes, loaded with commercials from the ‘80s and ‘90s. What a score. I’m now armed with enough material to keep the Five Retro TV Commercials series going until 2050. One of those tape

Today: Another batch of retro TV commercials! Like the five featured last time, these were all pulled from Batman: The Animated Series episodes that aired back in ‘93. For maximum effect, picture eight minutes’ worth of oddly touching Clayface moments between each one. Terminator 2

While digging through my barrel of tapes for the ongoing Five Retro TV Commercials series, I came across a real doozy: Several hours’ worth of Batman: The Animated Series episodes, all taped off of Fox back in 1993. Fox Action Theater Intro! (1993) I haven’t written much about Batman:

For wrestling fans in the ‘80s, it didn’t get any better than Saturday Night’s Main Event. Run as late night specials on NBC with no set schedule, the WWF famously took over Saturday Night Live’s time slot, which both legitimized the product and gave kids the excuse to treat midni