You are now entering Ad Space, a realm of commercials, brought before us so we might examine how they work, and discuss why we both love and hate them so. So it is written …

The Product:
Just some frickin’ pens and wristwatches!

The Promotion:

The Pitch:
Some frickin’ badass pens and wristwatches!

What can I even say about this ad?

If all it did was have the opening where Sylvester Stallone waxes philosophic about duality, before revealing that was just a sales pitch for pens: that alone would be so ridiculous in its faux profundity, it’d earn itself a place of dishonor here at Ad Space.

But this ad keeps going and gets so, so, so much more ridiculous – I don’t even know what to focus on.

The psuedo-origin story of the pen, that looks like someone tried to recreate a Heavy Metal story using PS1 graphics?

The attempt to sell the pen as “imposing” (which is not something I’ve ever seen associated with pens before)?

The “rare metals and precious stones”, trying desperately to appeal to consumerist vanity?

The ending which clearly indicates this ad was done as part of a cross-promotion with The Expendables movies?

Or just the frickin’ design of these things, so obviously the result of someone going “More skulls! More swords! More serpents!” with no regard for what actually using a pen like that must feel like? I mean, it’s like Klaus from American Dad! designing a new fishbowl, except done without a shred of visible irony.

We’ve covered some bizarre, over-the-top, and rampantly narcissistic commercials here before, but never anything quite like this! And if you’re as delighted with the sheer ridiculousness of this ad as I am, then I have a treat for you: there’s more where that came from!