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Drama and Fries: Burger King Bungles Mary J. Blige's Crispy Chicken Ad

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Burger King is going public, all right -- just not quite according to plan.

On the brink of a menu overhaul and a return to the New York Stock Exchange, the fast food giant let slip a magisterially bozo commercial featuring Mary J. Blige singing an ode to their crispy chicken wrap.

Famous for celebrating the absence of personal drama with song, Blige's appearance unleashed a torrent of outrage, with many accusing Burger King of trafficking in disparaging stereotypes about African-Americans and fried chicken.

After a swift walkback from BK and an apology from Blige, the ad was ritually pulled from YouTube -- whereupon it went viral, got remixed, and got the kind of backhanded compliment from Dlisted, the influential, profanity-laced celeb site, that's worth its weight in gold.

What looks like a debacle might not be so terrible after all.

Watch the ad, and then one guy's remix, and judge for yourself:

My take? The view appropriate to the time we're living in is that this whole situation is hilarious, much like the ad itself -- even if it isn't a finished product. Yes, Burger King says the fully licensed and approved version will soon be released. My guess is the final cut will still involve Mary J. Blige, singing, and BK's crispy chicken wrap.

As well it should. Celebrity isn't what it used to be, and neither is advertising. Some might get hung up on whether Burger King created this controversy deliberately, thereby luring hapless writers on the internet to collude in their crafty campaign to amp up publicity in time for their big relaunch. Those hapless writers have the better of the ordeal, however: they get to point out that it doesn't really matter if BK meant to do it, because this is the new face of advertising either way. There's no better way to create a stir than to aim for an ambitious mark -- even if it's ambitiously dumb -- and miss. Today, it's hard to think about marketing ambition without thinking about things like easy laughs, self-deprecating confidence, and delightfully absurd vignettes.

Too many ads currently miss these marks in boring ways, injecting an excess of dark and deadpan anti-humor into otherwise realistic scenes. There are way too many way too lengthy awkward pauses on TV commercials right now. However closely the Blige ad brushes the danger zone of stereotypes, if you can't see how the burst of good-natured, interactive ridicule surrounding the ad separates it from the tired trope of the fake hipster with the non-punchline, or the fat redheaded guy dancing shirtless in the office, you might just hate fun. Worse, you'll be in for a miserable life. It's going to be a long time before consumers start wanting everyday brands -- or the famous faces they hire -- to take themselves more seriously in advertisements. Over to you, Dlisted:

Who doesn't want to sing about crispy chicken?! The thing that offended me most is Mary's bangs looking like it was scalped off of Benji. Call PETA, not the NAACP!