Cereal Vice Reward: Difference between revisions

{{trope}}

 

{{quote|''For a long time it gave me nightmares, having to witness an injustice like that. It shows you just how cruel this world can be. I can still hear them taunting him... "Silly Rabbit, Trix are for kids." ''Why couldn't they just give him some cereal?!'' ''|'''Carlton''', ''[[The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air]]''}}

 

For all the struggles over making sure normal television shows have "[[Moral Guardians|positive influences]]", [[Double Standard|commercials seem exempt from this]].

Nowhere is this more obvious than in children's breakfast cereal commercials. Children [[Family-Unfriendly Aesop|are rewarded for being brats, for discrimination, for theft, and a number of other deadly sins]]. Often times they even torture cartoon characters who only want a bowl of cereal, why? [[For the Evulz|For their own amusement.]] It's only a matter of time before they get rewarded for being [[Incredibly Lame Pun|cereal killers]].

 

 

The Aesop gets even more Family Unfriendly in that the cereals are usually portrayed as so addictive to the mascots and/or kids as to earn them a top spot on the Controlled Substance list. Hard drugs: <s> part of</s> [[Adjacent to This Complete Breakfast|photographed next to this balanced breakfast!]]

 

{{examples}}

* "Apple Jacks" and "Cinnamon Toast Crunch" repeatedly has children mocking adults such as scientists, parents, life guards, etc. for being clueless and not understanding what the appeal of their cereals are. There was one Cinnamon Toast Crunch commercial where the adult guessed why kids loved it on the first guess, but the kids promptly ignored him. [[Family-Unfriendly Aesop|The moral seems to be: kids]], [[Adults Are Useless|your parents]] [[Biting the Hand Humor|are stupid]].

** A [[Bait and Switch]] commercial had the Trix Rabbit buy a box of the cereal from a convenience store, and then go into his kitchen late at night, removing the disguise, and pointing out that all the kids are asleep and he can finally get a bowl of delicious Trix! Cue him pouring the milk, which has only a single drop. Rabbit does a wild take, then a black screen: ''Got Milk?''

* The kids in "Lucky Charms" are constantly robbing a leprechaun blind of his possessions. He seems to be enjoying this. It helps that Lucky has magic powers to fly away or rescue his cereal if he doesn't want it taken, though he'll often bungle these spells resulting in the kids getting his cereal anyway. He's sometimes shown making new Lucky Charms marshmallows for the kids' enjoyment.

* Honeycomb cereal apparently transforms the child into a small, feral, hairy dog-like creature with stubby limbs and wide, manic eyes (and of course an insatiable craving for Honeycombs). He's called "The Craver", or something like that, and he comes out when the kid ''wants'' Honeycomb (complete with [[Catch Phrase]]...wait for it..."ME WANT HONEYCOMB!"). So it's not desirable...it's inevitable.

** Honeycomb commercials from [[The Eighties]] featured large people (including some famous professional wrestlers) breaking-and-entering into the Honeycomb Hideout, demanding a big cereal to match their stature. They were rewarded, not with an arrest warrant for trespassing or a frightened hideout-owner shooting the intruder, but with a song assuring them that Honeycomb is not small, no no no.

* An episode of ''[[Codename: Kids Next Door]]'' featured Those Delightful Children From Down The Lane frequently capturing children in order and torturing them by having a birthday cake in front of them - and not sharing. The main characters frequently stop the Delightful Children from eating the cake, thus invoking the trope ''themselves''...but with a reasonable justification and the goal of sharing the cake with the captives.

** A straighter example was Op. MUNCHIES. The kids and their villains spend the episode at the supermarket fighting over the last box of Rainbow Munchies cereal.

* Those freaking [[Toon Town]] commercials. Kids will be running talent shows, baseball games, martial arts contests, etc. Cogs will attempt to join the fun and do not seem to be doing anything particularly underhanded. Joining the talent show results in death by anvil, joining the baseball game means pies are thrown to humiliate the poor Cog, and the kids cheat using a hose in the martial arts contest. The Cogs' only crime seems to be... ugliness. Well, the Cogs are actual villains in the game. They're trying to make [[Toon Town]] all grey and corporate. Those bastards!

* The new Dolmio for kids adverts are like this, with the father and oldest son (or whatever their relationship is) try to take some while the mother and the children manage to stop them. It's slightly justified, since they are specifically trying to get the children's Dolmio rather than just eating the normal stuff.

* One of the more recent Reese's Peanut Butter Cup ads literally calls sharing stupid.

* The kids in the "Leggo my Eggo!" commercials go to unbelievable and often insanely complex lengths to keep their parents from ever having even one bite of Eggo waffles, even when the kids have already eaten their own.

* There is a Starburst commercial which has a guy eating some Starburst when he sees his friends in the park. The candy tells him they'll want him to share... but what if they weren't his friends? It then tells him to throw his friend's ice cream, dump their things onto the grass, and rip their clothes.

* [[Inverted]] in a series of ads for a line of jello marketed to adults. The parents come up with various ways to punish their children for stealing their snacks, such as terrorizing them with a 'Chocobeast' or a thinly-veiled threat presented as a tale of a little princess whose favorite things disappear forever. One commercial is simply an [[Imagine Spot]] where the boy pictures being turned out onto the street over stealing the dessert.

* A macaroni commercial has the ''adults'' behaving badly and being rewarded, such as sending their kids to bed without dinner so they can enjoy extra mac-and-cheese.

* This entry's more of a "hamburger vice reward", but this Steak & Shake commercial otherwise fits quite well. It shows a weird-looking man surrounded by his wife's (frankly pretty creepy) collection of penguin memorabilia. He accidentally breaks one such statuette, and gets shocked looks from his two [[Uncanny Valley|even weirder-looking]] younger kids, as well as the older daughter, who seems to be smiling cleverly like she ''wants'' him to get in trouble (must be getting a head start on the "moody ungrateful teenager" phase). Then it cuts to the family of weirdos sitting at Steak & Shake, and this tagline comes up: "Broken Penguin + 4 Meals Under $4 = What Broken Penguin?" Thank God for TIVO.

 

== Parody or referential examples ==

* The [http://breakfastofthegods.com/ webcomic] ''[[Breakfast of the Gods]]'' revels in this trope. Sonny is a pathetic, psychotic junkie and the Trix Rabbit and Sugar Bear have both kicked their habits and are desperately trying to stay clean and sober. Count Chocula and Franken Berry are leading the forces of darkness, and Tony The Tiger and Cap'n Crunch are the pillars of good.

** In ''[[Drawn Together]]'' they were sort of half-cult, half-mafia instead. Lead by Frankenberry once again.

* ''[[Family Guy]]'' had a parody Asian Trix commercial, where after the kids say the line, the rabbit angrily responds "You share!", kills them and runs off with the Trix. So satisfying to watch...

** In the episode "Let's Go To The Hop," about a drug craze running through the kids' school, in what is also a parody of [[The Breakfast Club]], a group of cereal mascots with real addictions was used, such as Tony the Tiger:

{{reflist}}

[[Category:Advertising Tropes]]