“The real problem with this series (and the ad campaign it’s based
upon) is that it mocks liberalism.”
Yep.
That early commercial in which the GEICO pitch-man has to mollify
the offended cavemen with a sitdown at a swanky restaurant was classic.
The one caveman that turned down a meal was a masterpiece portrait
of the ever-offended passive-aggressive jerk that will NEVER be
satisfied, no matter how much people try to make things right.
I think the commercials are a joke on the notion that evolution represents progress; in the very first commercials the catchphrase that switching to GEICO was so simple that even a caveman could do it was based on the logical connection that everybody would recognize the meaning.
As the commercials aired, it became obvious to them that the phrase was catching on but the uptick in new business seemed to be tapering off, so some bright young fellow got it in his head to give the gecko a day off and “characturize” the cavemen now firmly fixed in the audience mind.
And then came the masterstroke, the sit-down-dinner, the apology, the shrug and disdain of these “cavemen” who, for all their hirsute primitive countenance still seemed quite prepossessing in their manner and bearing as though we modern humans had misjudged them all along and had been operating under the false notion that all our trappings and contrivances represented going forward when to our suddenly-manifest-now-contemporary forebears sitting across from us we seemed to be but sophomoric bores.
It will be very hard to beat that moment of first comeuppance.