I remember so clearly how we NEVER saw television commercials for prescription medicine. Unheard of!
Then, in the late 1980's, direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising became completely legal — but in only New Zealand and the United States — nowhere else on Earth.
Now Big Pharma spends more on marketing than they do on research, mainly because most of the basic research has already been funded by federal grants — i.e., taxpayers (you and me).
So next time you see a prescription drug commercial on TV, remember that YOU are paying (through our taxes) for the ad's creation and airing.
Then, on top of that, we are personally shelling out ridiculous bankruptcy-causing dollars for the medicine itself — many, many times the cost of the actual drugs — to pay for their commercials.
I don't think any TV-show-as-toy-commercial production is ever going to top the fact that there was a live-action series that was literally just an advertisement for the Dodge Viper – yes, the sports car – that managed to run for four seasons and 78 episodes in the mid 1990s.
I just found this fun little artifact from the early days of Keroro, specifically summer 2001, about 2 years after the manga started, and about 3 years before the anime.
After years of hearing Keroro being voiced by Kumiko Watanabe, it's a little surreal to hear somebody else voicing him, ut if anyone recognises this voice actress, let me know (^.^)