The Walking Dead returns to AMC on Sunday, February 12th to finish up their second season. That also means Glenn is back with even more baseball caps! Steven Yeun was on Attack of the Show yesterday to promote the new episodes, as well as share what it’s like being a huge celebrity in South Korea. Also, he shares stories about his Korean parents who were initially disappointed in his career choice (surprise) now expect him to overachieve as an actor as well. We know how he feels.

It seems like the new Super Bowl tradition of late is airing commercials which are racist, offensive, or at least racially insensitive toward Asians. In 2008, it was a set of offensive SalesGenie.com ads (written by an Asian, no less). 2010 gave us the Doritos Samurai Guy (who didn’t know the ways of the Samurai). Last year, Timothy Hutton using the plight of Tibet as a punchline for Groupon’s deals on fish curry, not even a dish that Tibetans are known for.

So what fun anti-Asian ads aired during the 2012 Super Bowl? Seeing as it’s an election year, a political ad is making waves: Michigan Republican Pete Hoekstra aired an ad accusing the policies of incumbent Democratic Senator Debbie Stabenow (or Debbie “SpendItNow” as seen in the ad) as being helpful to China, to the detriment of the United States.

From 8Asians reader Peter L:

If you haven’t seen it already, this advertisement went up during the super bowl in place of a local ad spot. It accuses a political opponent of giving political power to Asian countries in a way that marginalizes Asians as a whole… I’m sort of wondering what that chick was thinking when she signed-up to be in this ad. Her way of speaking sounds like she’s a fluent American English speaker, but mid-way through her schtick it looks like she remembers she’s supposed to sound like a stereotypical fob with missing prepositions. Maybe she liked the size of the cheque.

Luckily, this spot did not air nationwide. But thanks to the power of social media, it is being widely shared and condemned– including by a coalition of black ministers, civil rights folks, and even GOP advisers.

Hoekstra’s campaign says that the ad is “satirical,” but I’d argue that there needs to be a bit of wit behind it if you call it satire.

I was watching MSNBC the other day and caught this commercial, which apparently has been around (at least on YouTube) for almost a year. The commercial has testimonials from a wide, diverse group of Tempur-Pedic adjustable bed owners, who express, in English, their love for the product until 0:36 seconds into this this 1:00 minute commercial, where an Asian man speaks in what I think is Cantonese with his wife standing by his side.

WTF is going on? I had to rewind my DVR to see if I thought what I saw was right. This just reinforces the perpetual foreigner concept, and reminded me of the KFC commercial I had blogged about a while ago. I mean, if Tempur-Pedic wanted to reach a wider audience, why didn’t they also have Spanish speaking bed owners in the commercial as well? There are a lot more Spanish speaking Americans than Chinese speaking ones for sure.

I have written before about the character of Ravi on the Disney Channel’s Jessie show and talked about how some wonder why this Indian American character has to have an accent.  The reason why is apparent in this clip which makes Ravi’s Indian culture the entire joke. Not surprisingly, the clip has raised a stir in blogs like this and garnered many dislikes (I can see why Disney turned off comments). Some people don’t think it is so bad, but then again, others react to lines like “I am a human samosa” (not in this clip but in other episodes).  What do you all think?  Is the portrayal racist, unfunny, both, or neither?

Number Two Son’s reactions to the clip was that it was “culturally ignorant.”  He no longer watches the Disney Channel.  My personal take is that it is both racist and unfunny.  Even Baljit’s portrayal on Phineas and Ferb is better than this, as it is funny most of the time and doesn’t drive all of its humor out of weird versions of Indian culture.  There is a chance that Jessie“can get better and more nuanced in how it treats Ravi, but I’m not holding my breath.

The Amazing Race has done an amazing job of having Asian Americans competing as well as often winning the race. This season is no different, with sisters Misa & Maiya Tanaka hailing from San Diego, California. Maiya , 25, is a professional golfer on the LPGA Symetra Futures Tour, and her older sister Misa, 27, is a car buyer.

I have to say, both sisters are kind of cute and come across as pretty sassy. As they say in their interview, the sisters are often underestimated. It’ll really be interesting to see how tough and competitive they are in the course of the race. However, unfortunately in the history of The Amazing Race, there has only ever been one all women’s team that has won. So best of luck to Misa & Maiya!

The latest Target commercial highlights the first interracial Asian American couple since I’ve been blogging about Target commercials. It’ll be interesting to see if Target highlights another couple with an Asian American Man (AM) with a White Female (WF) like McDonald’s recently did.

In this television ad, this couple has moved into their newly purchased home. And that home has a kitchen sink that doesn’t exactly work. There’s always Target where you can buy a Brita pitcher. Well, not exactly Target’s best commercial. I liked the last commercial I blogged about, Little Drummer Girl, a lot better. Overall, I’m not into these short Target commercial, but the older longer-form commercials with More To Luv by Minnutes as the background music.

I saw this commercial with Roger Fan (of Better Luck Tomorrow fame), though I guess it first aired last Fall. At first, I thought maybe the actor was Randell Park, with his hair styled a little differently – but the voice didn’t match. Then I thought, maybe that is Roger Fan? Fan blogs about this commercial and how doing commercials helps pay the bills while making a name for oneself in Hollywood. Fan says he’s done about on average over the years six commercials per year. However, I think this is the first commercial I’ve seen him in since blogging for 8Asians and my Asian American Commercial Watch series.

Fan plays a border patrol agent asking for a list of documents, one after another, normally not needed to cross the border.  With Quicken Loans, the company gives you a list of required documents needed ahead of time before applying for a loan or refinancing.