I know there are bigger fish to fry, but I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t draw your attention to this travesty of a commercial Verizon just released. It’s only 30 seconds long but may go down as one of the worst ads I’ve ever seen.

What’s
so offensive, you ask? Well, the carrier (and one-time parent company
of Engadget) wants to promote the fact that it will give AT&T and
T-Mobile customers a better deal on their wireless plan if they bring in
their monthly cellular bill. That’s all well and good, but we need to
talk about the cathode-ray tube TV that’s at the center of the
commercial.

The
ad opens with a woman walking into a Best Buy-coded store and handing
over a 27-inch CRT TV to a nearby sales associate. “Hi, I got this old
thing and the bill from the store where I got it,” she tells the young
salesperson while casually tossing the TV to him. “Figured you could
beat it with a better deal on one of these big boys,” she adds, pointing
to, let’s be honest, an objectively worse flat panel TV.

Now,
I need to know: did anyone who worked on this commercial try to lift a
CRT? Look, I know it’s 2025, and even the newest sets are now close to
two decades old, but even if you’ve never seen one in real-life, surely
you’ve heard how heavy they are? If I had to guess, the TV we see in the
commercial, which looks like an RCA 27R411T,
weighs close to 75 pounds. There’s a reason so many Facebook
Marketplace listings recommend you bring a friend with you when you come
pick up the CRT they’re selling; most people can’t lift even a
mid-sized set on their own.

I
hate to think how Verizon made this commercial. CRTs are a dead
technology. No company is making new consumer sets anymore, and any
working CRTs left out in the world are on borrowed time. If the company
gutted a working set to make this commercial, it means there’s one less
CRT in an ever-dwindling pool. Someone could have enjoyed that TV and
stopped it from entering a landfill.

But
as for the rest of the commercial, it’s equally as bad. No big box
retailer is accepting trade-ins for a CRT TV, and even if they were,
trying to get rid of one that way would be a rookie move. CRTs, both TVs
and monitors, are highly sought after by retro gamers. Even a
relatively unknown set like the 27R411T can catch a few hundred dollars,
especially if it’s in pristine condition. In fact, a quick eBay search returns a seller looking for $350 for their 27R411T unit.

But
you know what our dear Verizon booster does? She just walks away
without the CRT after the salesperson tells her the shop won’t give her a
better deal on a new TV. “Guess you’re not as cool as Verizon” she
says, uttering a thing no one in the history has ever said. Sorry,
joke’s on you, lady. Not only is that TV impossibly light, it’s way
cooler than anything Verizon has ever done.