But first, the video of the day. Description: No, no, no, no. Don't do that. Don't lean out.

CAP'N CRUNCH UNMASKEDThis is actually in Foreign Policy:

Sure, that's just how he talks. It's almost as if the controversy is being inflated to make you pay attention . . . to this.

That's one long commercial. It follows the time-honored script of cereal ads: someone is attempting to gain access to the cereal, against the wishes of its possessor or against some arbitrary rule set down by unnamed forces. In this case, the pirate Jean LaFoote is after the Crunch, and to sneak on board the ship his crew is dressed like a boy band.

Interesting choice of hats:

Of course, that's supposed to remind us of this guy:

Dirk Dastardly from the Penelope Pitstop cartoon, right? The guy with the snickering dog, which was funny for about 14 seconds? Hanna-Barbera junk from the 60s/70s now prized by boomers for qualities it never had, and ironically admired by post-Millennials for its irony-free banalities? Something like that.

Here's an original Crunch ad. The very first.

The voice was the great Daws Butler, of course. The Twitter name for the Captain, by the way, is "RealCapnCrunch." Because other people beat them to the name.