Every so often, there’s a commercial that earns our collective wrath, and this year, (just like last year!) it happens to come from indoor cycling brand Peloton. Peloton’s new ad campaign, which went viral over the weekend thanks to its botched premise, is an incredible, Black Mirror-style descent into the absurd.
The ad opens on Christmas morning as a woman, trim and beautiful, leads an adorable child into the living room. Waiting for her is a brand new Peloton bike (!) courtesy of her indifferent husband, who couldn’t even be bothered to put a bow on the thing.
What follows can only be described as a descent into the pure hell of this poor woman’s life. Filming herself in selfie mode, the woman jumps onto the Peloton with a look of such uneasy trepidation that there clearly must be other issues bothering her, because no one in their right mind should be that nervous about taking an exercise class in their own home.
The woman’s terrified face is so disconcerting, her distress so obvious that it’s impossible to focus on anything else happening in the ad. She’s already trim and gorgeous, and yes, even though exercise should be about more than self-image, it’s clear this woman is trying to compensate for something. Is it her crumbling marriage? Her husband’s not-so-subtle suggestion she drop a few pounds?
The zeal with which she attacks the Peloton clearly speaks to some deep, unfulfilled need somewhere in her life. Her she is — young, beautiful, successful, with a child and financial security– and yet, something inside her is still so obviously and utterly broken that only an unhealthy fixation on indoor cycling can help mend it.
Look at her face as she continues her exercise journey. What is making her so terrified? Is it society’s increasingly unreasonable expectations for women? Her husband’s cruel and stony demeanor? The pressure of trying to maintain a marriage, a family and a banging body? A gaping void in her soul that even increased exposure to physical pain can’t totally numb?
As the ad progresses, the woman continues her pathological videos, documenting her exercise journey not for her social media followers, but for her own husband, who, ostensibly, lives with her and has seen her wasting away on that thing all year long.
She sits next to him (again, terrified) and makes him watch a years worth of selfie workout videos, as proof that she has indeed used the present he bought her last year.
“It changed my life,” she declares, though she looks pretty much the same and her anxiety levels still seem way too high.
Seriously, why is she gazing at him like this? Why is she so desperate for his approval? She’s the one who did all the work! It’s incomprehensible what’s happening in this relationship, or why this woman desperatly craves the validation that only Peloton can provide. Thankfully the internet has some theories.
Absolutely 100% chance that the husband in the Peloton ad is abusive
— Allahpundit (@allahpundit) December 2, 2019
i actually think that the real story of the ad is that she forgot to buy her husband a gift so she made a fake video compilation of all the times she allegedly used the peloton he got her last year
— Erin War on Christmas Ryan (@morninggloria) December 2, 2019
In the Peloton ad, she is the one working her a** off through a montage and at the end, she …thanks her husband, who sits there smirking. sometimes it's a bit too real. Real disturbing. Message received: Ladies, exercise harder/be thinner for your man and then thank him for it.
— Pepper (@PepperGii) December 2, 2019
I’m gonna marry the peloton wife and let her do whatever she wants and bake her garlic bread every night and give her scarves for Christmas
— Sophia Benoit (@1followernodad) December 2, 2019
a peloton ad where the thin and hot peloton gift recipient films the peloton accumulating clothes in the guest room throughout the year and ends the video by serving her husband divorce papers
— kilgore trout was in the loop (@KT_So_It_Goes) December 2, 2019
Truly, this Peloton ad is a prescient, 30-second look at our warped cultural pathology towards women, wellness culture and obsession with spiritual consumerism.
It’s clear this woman doesn’t need a Peloton. She needs a good therapist and a divorce lawyer.
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