Dear Captain Company:
I am writing to demand a refund in full for my purchases of your Astronaut Space Suit, Super Watch and Movie Fighting Snake. These items are total crap, and your deceptive ads in Screen Thrills Illustrated lured me in.
This is 1964, and I’d expect more from a company of your stature.
Let’s go item-by-item:
Astronaut Space Suit
The fun pictures in the ad made me think that, if I donned this suit, I could fly. After three failed jump attempts off my roof (and a couple of casts and dozens of stitches), I found this to be a complete falsehood.
You have eight zippers. Great. I bet a guy at a bar that I could unzip all eight in ten seconds. Guess what? I lost $100 and had to eat a bowlful of motorcycle oil.
The suit’s just plastic and zippers. Sure, it’s got a slight bit of padding, but I had my friend Wayne kick me in the nuts, and it still hurt like hell. And your “air hoses” and “air-lock valves” are just a series of taped-up poorly-placed bendy straws. A flimsy plastic semi-inflatable outfit is not worth $7.95.
Your ad says “originally $180.” That must’ve been before the government scraped the 14k gold plating off.
Super Watch
Yeah, really goddamned super. The cheapo thing bust apart after 10 minutes of swimming in the community pool. The Swiss are stupid people who put too many knobs on things.
I did get to wear it one day before it disintegrated. My friends were not impressed that I could tell time accurately, and nobody knew what a tachometer or telemeter was. They took it off me and whipped me with the genuine leather strap.
Movie Fighting Snake
This is the worst of all. The “snake” in the ad looks pretty scary, and the guy who looks like Walt Disney seems genuinely frightened because he’s struggling with a mighty beast.
But the reality is that this nine-and-a-half-foot (I measured, you liars) piece of rubber looks more like a hastily-painted radiator hose than a fearsome reptile. It doesn’t scare anybody. In fact, everybody just laughs at it. My friend’s kid actually used it in an impromptu skit called “Harry the Happy Hose.”
You say I can use it to star in my own home movie. I say anyone who uses this “snake” in a movie is stupider than a Swiss person.
As you can see, these items are incredibly unsatisfactory. Thus, I am demanding…no – insisting…no – COMMANDING you to refund my money. If I do not receive payment in full in one week, you will be hearing from my lawyer, who does not take kindly to misleading advertising geared toward honest, upstanding folks. Oh yeah, he also hates anyone who calls himself “Captain.”
Hating and awaiting,
Mr. Webel, Esq.
i’m still upset about sea monkeys. You are not alone my friend.