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[Kern]

From today's Daily Mirror (27/07/07, page 19):

(headshot of Megatron)


FURY OVER 'VIOLENT' ROBOT GIFT FOR KIDS


By Louise Barnett

BURGER King was yesterday slammed for encouraging kids as young as three to watch the violent Tranformers movie

The fast food chain is giving away free toys, based on the film's characters, to kids of three and over despite it being classified a 12A. [i](UK rating)[/i}

The National Consumer Council chief executive Ed Mayo said "This is a great summer for films and we wish Transformers well, but it has a level of violence that gives it a rating of 12 and over.

"So why are we seeing marketing to children over the age of three?

"The promotion with Burger King looks and feels like it's designed to pester and undermine."

The NCC insists the toys, given away free with kids' meals will lead to the very young using pester power to urge parents to let them see the film.

It wants new advertising rules for similar promotions to be tightened.

The summer blockbuster, which launches today, is classified 12A because of its moderate violence. This means under twelves can only see it in a cinema if they are accompanied by an adult.

A Burger King spokesman said: "We are pleased to be able to make these popular toys available in our restaurant so that children who are perhaps too young to see the film can still enjoy the magic of Transformers.

"Burger King enters global film promotional partnerships at least a year in advance of the cinema release, at which time the film classification is undecided."

The Committee of Advertising Practice, which draws up advertising guidelines, refused to comment until it officially receives the NCC complaint.

[Prowl_83]

Oh for f*cks sake...

[Kern]

Ayup.

'specially as the promotion has but a week to go.

[Ramrider]

Absolutely ridickerless, and a good answer from Burger King.

[Geekee1]

I hate stupid people!

[Supercollider]

Hmm,
Would the same have happened if they had Harry Potter toys, Order of the Phoenix is 12A as well?
I think not.

[Dead Metal]

So not only American parents react in a stupid way to toys.....

[Supercollider]

Just read the mirror's 'review' of the film here: http://www.mirror.co.uk/showbiz/enterta ... -19518514/

Laughed out loud at this

"... with the shelves of Toys R Us positively creaking under the weight of die-cast models of those robots in disguise..."

Die-Cast!?!?!?

[Burn]

So even though it's a parents responsibility as to whether or not they accept the toy on behalf of their own child ... it's still someone elses fault.

[nintendofreakgcn]

Frankly, while I believe there are arguably some good reasons not to let kids see the new movie, the violence isn't one of them. I don't see how that aspect is much worse than plenty of kids cartoons nowadays.

No, if there was something from the movie I'd be afraid of kids imitating, it would be the lubricating. That would just be disturbing. It's arguably best to keep really young kids away from the various bits of innuendo in the movie, as well.

Still, people involved in that article don't seem to realise that they're talking about a movie based (when you go right back, at least) off a line of children's toys. Of course there are going to be kids toys released in conjunction with it! I'd be disappointed if there weren't (heck, I wouldn't be collecting Transformers now if the movie hadn't had a toy line).

Also, it's not like people who get the toys will see the movie. I was just talking to a friend today, and he was discussing how he had loads of Transformers toys when he was a kid, but didn't see any of the cartoon.

In short, there's a technical term to describe the people who sparked this controversy: twits.