How to recover when kids start eating your washing tablets? Get the dude from ‘Stranger Things’ in your ads

And, get this, he didn't even ingest laundry detergent!

If any brand needed a quick PR win going into last night’s Super Bowl, it was Tide. The cleaning product manufacturer has been making headlines recently thanks to a viral Internet meme called The Tide Pod Challenge. It’s an online fad whereby stupid people on the Internet upload videos of themselves eating Tide Pods – those detergent capsules you stick in the washing machine to wash your clothes. See below for an example of this web-based idiocy which can literally kill you.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bd9tzjihoJ9/?utm_source=ig_embed

Now, nobody is blaming Tide for the emergence of this potentially lethal competition. In fact, they’ve been very sensible and attempted to discourage people from doing it.

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But they really are in need of something equally WTF to change the conversation around their brand. That’s where the Super Bowl comes in.

It’s well known that TV ads during the NFL Championship game are viewed by a gazillion people, so naturally they’re in very high demand. And cost a lot more than the pitiful contents of your piggy bank.

Amazingly, Tide bought five of them. Like, do they even have that much money? How much can a laundry detergent company even make in a year?

READ MORE: Justin Timberlake’s Prince-starring Super Bowl halftime show felt underwhelming and opportunistic

On top of that, they booked one of pop culture’s biggest stars to act in them – Stranger ThingsDavid Harbour. His faux-suave style was perfect for the concept, which parodied all other Super Bowl ads in history. Soothing luxury car promo? Check. Bubbly in-bar beer commercial? Check. Ultra-coiffed perfume puff-piece? You betcha. Watch them all below.

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=doP7xKdGOKs&list=PLpZMjEEM864TdclLnlVUvPR8xUtRA5uTE

Predictably, the Internet went into overdrive. Eagles vs Patriots? More like Tide Ad vs Tide Ad. Here are some of the best and most over-the-top reactions (including one from Sheriff Hopper himself):

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