Quick question to the businesses out there: What are you trying to do to us?! (Besides sell things.)
Every holiday season we're afraid to turn on our televisions or watch the commercials before our YouTube videos load, because, at any moment, our mascara may start running from seeing a super-sad ad.
Seasonal marketing campaigns are emotionally devastating, and our hearts can't take it. And we're looking at you, too, international companies.
The Internet has given us wider access to the UK tearjeakers and more. We can just hear the soft swells of music and see snowflakes falling, without even understanding the language in some commercials, and still... we're a wreck.
These are the videos doing a number on us this year...
1. This plot twist insanity from the German supermarket company Edeka stars a grandpa who totally mindf--ks his family when he fakes his own death to get them home for the holidays. This might be why they don't visit more, Grandpa. But also, we are crying—because lonely old men at long, empty dining room tables make us sad.
2. This heartwarming Spanish lotto ad looks like a Pixar movie, and thus, reduces us to tears. It's like the movie Up, but it wants you to buy lottery tickets. A thoughtful night-time security guard at a mannequin factory gets a surprise from his coworkers. He cries. We cry. It's a lot to handle.
3. The annual John Lewis Christmas ad always gets us, and this year's is no exception. A little girl sends something special to man on the moon so he knows he's not all alone. That sentence alone just made us lie down in fetal position for a minute.
4. Mog's Christmas Calamity, the seasonal ad from Sainsbury's, makes it seem all cute and wacky like "oh look, this cat just can't do anything right, huh?" Well, this family pet burned his owners' house to the ground (accidentally, of course, but still.) Sure, the neighborhood comes together to help out in the end (also a tearful moment.) But it's pretty damn depressing to see the parents and kids walk through their gutted old home. It's at least a happy ending, because no one accuses Mog of arson.
5. The Ballymena Bear ad follows one stuffed bear's quest to find the little girl he was meant for. And they're so happy to see each other. Those smiles. Arghhhh! (Please note: That's a bittersweet "arghhhh!")
6. TK Maxx wants you to buy more s--t, specifically, for the people in close proximity to you. "They may not be your dearest, but they're your nearest." Still, watching neighbors smile while they surprise each other, as Otis Redding's cover of "White Christmas" plays? We're done.
7. This is basically an ad for Apple Music, right? Stevie Wonder and Andra Day perform a rendition of "Someday At Christmas," and it's perfect and moving and beautiful.
8. Again, little kids and the elderly. In this Toys"R"Us commercial, a little girl surprises the old man across the street by decorating his front lawn for the holidays. He returns the favor by putting toys under the tree for her and her friends.
If you need us we'll be over here, dealing with this for the rest of the day.