An exercise bike company has been forced to defend itself after its frankly terrifying Christmas ad was widely mocked on social media.
There are many things wrong with the ad, which begins with an approximately 60kg woman being gifted a Peloton exercise bike by her husband for Christmas.
She then appears to embark on a painful year-long weight loss journey which she documents with weird selfie videos. Finally, she sits and watches a supercut of her exercise with her silent husband, who smiles smugly at the wellness journey he provided for his already-thin wife.
"A year ago, I didn't realise how much this would change me," she emotionally tells him, and presumedly the viewer adding, "Thank you."
I can't even really describe how terrible it is, you simply must watch it.
The BBC reports many viewers have dubbed the ad "sexist" and "dystopian" and compared it to a horror film. Peloton stocks have reportedly dropped 10 percent, and Vice called the ad the "scariest thing you'll see this year".
"Her grim motivation that pushes her to drag herself out of bed combined with exclaiming at the camera how blatantly, inexplicably nervous the Peloton makes her paint a bleak portrait of a woman in the thrall of a machine designed to erode her spirit as it sculpts her quads," wrote Katie Way for Vice.
Suffice to say, social media truly came into its own.
But Peloton, unsurprisingly, says the issue is us - saying that the criticism is just from viewers "misreading" the "inspiring" message.
Okay, sure.
"We constantly hear from our members how their lives have been meaningfully and positively impacted after purchasing or being gifted a Peloton Bike or Tread, often in ways that surprise them," a Peloton spokesperson said in a statement to CNN. "Our holiday spot was created to that fitness and wellness journey."
"While we're disappointed in how some have misinterpreted this commercial, we are encouraged by - and grateful for - the outpouring of support we've received from those who understand what we were trying to communicate."
We just hope it's all an elaborate advertising technique for the next season of Black Mirror.
