They Fired the King

I’ve been home with the flu for over a week. It’s been a rough one and, despite my annual flu shot, the strain I find myself struggling to get over must be one of those vaccine-resistant ones that people across the country have been plagued with this year.

Home sick, I’m watching way more TV than I normally do. Now, to be fair, I watch a lot of TV on a regular basis. I refuse to be one of those people who pretend that they don’t in an attempt to sound more disciplined, holier, smarter, or busier than others. I grew up in a church culture that very strangely valued people who pretended they didn’t have—or didn’t watch—TV, and it never sat well with me. My family wasn’t like that, but it was common among our peers. So, in an effort to live honestly and get away from the double-life culture that used to be so prevalent in our group, I fully claim my love of the boob tube.

Anyway, on my couch today, still hacking up a storm and trying to quell a headache that felt like my left eye was popping out of my head every time I coughed (which was quite frequent), my right eye was tuned into the brand new very first episode of Saturday Night Live (SNL) UK that just dropped on Peacock. It was, of course, delightful, but in the midst of it a commercial for Burger King came on. And it was a real commercial too, not an SNL parody, as they’re known to do.

The Burger King president narrated the commercial. He talked about how poor things had gotten with the brand and some very poor marketing choices that they had made in the past. The commercial even showed a clip of them kicking out that terrible caricature of a king that they had for a few years whose commercials were horribly toxic—to the point that I personally boycotted Burger King for quite a while because I couldn’t support a brand that promoted and encouraged such disgusting views of manhood. They said in the commercial, “We fired the king.”

My heart skipped a beat! I clapped out loud. I cheered, then immediately regretted cheering because it made my left eye hurt. But, seriously, what redemption! What a way to claim a misstep, acknowledge it, call it out, and then rectify it! I Go Burger King! And, believe me, the not-so-subtle political message behind “We fired the king” wasn’t lost on me, which was another reason for my applause. Maybe that’s one more step toward manifestation…

I’ve always loved Burger King. I sometimes try to act fancy, but in reality I’m a very basic beast. In addition to being a TV junkie, I’m also a fast-food junkie. And Burger King’s fries are my favorite; the Whopper is unbeatable in my book. So, my self-imposed boycott because of their horrible, misguided marketing for so long wasn’t very easy. And, to be fair, I did cheat on that boycott from time to time…out of necessity.

You see, Burger King was my only fast-food option on my way home from work when I was commuting an hour each way, six days a week, from about 2011-2018ish. Midway through that seven years, I got my first Apple Watch and GPS was starting to get smart. I knew I had a problem because one day, leaving work, my watch automatically gave me directions to Burger King, simply because that had become my habit and not because I had asked it to. I knew then I may have a problem. But I digress…

I’m so happy now to officially feel free to get back on the Burger King train. I won’t say they’re fully redeemed, but they’re making a big first step toward amends. And I support that. Now, if they would just take a play from Dunkin’ and KFC’s playbooks and simply rebrand to “BK,” dropping the whole incredibly dated “King” thing altogether, they’d really be cookin’…