A couple weeks ago the most amazing thing started to percolate around social media, but then it was apparently stopped by lawyers from Kellogg’s. The “amazing thing” I refer to is the ultra-elaborate trolling—allegedly orchestrated by the brilliant Finnish anti-capitalist artist Jani Leinonen—of Kellogg’s and their Tony the Tiger mascot.

For generations, kids the world over have grown up eating Kellogg’s sugary, nearly nutritionless breakfast cereal and getting positive reinforcement from Tony’s “It’s GRRRREAT!” catchphrase, but some of the child actors who were actually in these commercials have apparently had tragic difficulties later in their lives.

Each new video that appeared saw Tony addressing the problems—via the use of his simplistic catchphrase basically—of a prostitute, a brutal cop and a suicide bomber.

Here’s the first one, launched on October 7th:
 

 
What Leinonen (I’m pretty confident he’s the mastermind)—whose “School of Disobedience” show is currently on exhibit at the Finnish National Gallery Kiasma—has done is, well, as I said before, ultra-elaborate trolling. Culture jamming of the Banksy or Ron English school and of the highest order, not only in terms of the wit employed, but in how perfectly this prank was pulled off. What you are about to see aren’t some amateurish commercial parodies, they are as professionally realized as something that you might see on Saturday Night Live, or indeed, as any “real” TV commercial for Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes. I used to work at a commercial production studio in New York that specialized in mixing live action and animation, usually in the employ of selling sugar to children, natch, and lemme tell ya, back then this would have taken a small army to pull off. This guy is a maniac! I really admire his dedication and work ethic. He might want to destroy capitalism—but Jani Leinonen is anything but lazy. He must be the hardest working anti-capitalist around.

Exhibit #2, a very bad cop gets some help—and some Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes—from Tony…
 

 
In recent days, Kellogg’s have apparently been successful in getting the Twitter and Facebook accounts closed for the “Tony is Back” media hack, which is bullshit as parody of this sort is quite protected by law, but in lieu of this wonderfulness not being able to toot its own social media horn, won’t you please share these and keep this going? The website and the videos are still very much alive.

It’s worth mentioning that Jani Leinonen was also—briefly—a politician earlier this year, the 37-year-old activist artist stood in Finland’s parliamentary elections in April. Before that, he was perhaps best known for stealing and decapitating a Ronald McDonald statue to protest what the fast food giant was doing to the planet and its citizens.

As Aretha Franklin sang “R-E-S-P-E-C-T.”

Jani Leinonen, may I humbly suggest that you contact Bernie Sanders’ Presidential campaign and offer your talents? You + Bernie = history being made. That would be… GRRRREAT!

If you thought the other two were dark, see how Tony helps “Anna” with a complete breakfast…
 

 
Bonus… (I’d kill to own this piece, had to share…)
 

 
H/T Death and Taxes