Guardian columnist Emma Beddington struck a nerve with her scathing critique of Samsung's AI advertisement, and the overwhelming public response suggests she's tapped into something much deeper than mere advertising annoyance. Her piece, "The worst thing about AI? That stupid Samsung ad where the guy adds 'way too much sugar' to his pasta sauce," has become a lightning rod for broader cultural anxieties about artificial intelligence—and her analysis reveals why this particular commercial has become such a perfect symbol of everything that feels wrong about AI in 2025.
Beddington's central argument is deceptively simple: the Samsung ad featuring a young man who adds too much sugar to his gochujang pasta sauce, then asks Google Gemini for help, represents everything absurd about our current AI moment. The AI's suggestion to turn the ruined sauce into cookies by adding butter and baking for 10 minutes is, in her words, "frankly inadequate." But her deeper critique goes to the heart of how AI marketing fails to understand human behavior and common sense.
The Anatomy of AI Absurdity
What makes Beddington's analysis particularly sharp is how she dissects the fundamental absurdity of the scenario. As she notes, any human would simply "scoop the sugar out like a normal human" rather than attempting to transform pasta sauce into baked goods. The commercial's basic premise—that turning a savory sauce into cookies is somehow a reasonable solution—reveals a profound disconnect between AI logic and human practicality.
The ad, which is part of Samsung's campaign showcasing Google Gemini's capabilities, perfectly encapsulates what Beddington sees as AI's fundamental flaw: its inability to apply common sense to real-world problems. The commercial shows a young man who, instead of taking the obvious corrective action, enthusiastically follows the AI's bizarre suggestion to create "gochujang cookies" by adding butter to his sauce mixture.
Beddington's husband's objection that "baking requires precision, and the hapless youth and his phone have no idea what 'way too much' is in grams" highlights another layer of the absurdity. The AI's suggestion isn't just impractical—it's technically impossible to execute properly without proper measurements and understanding of actual baking chemistry.
What Beddington captures brilliantly is how this single advertisement has become a cultural touchstone for AI skepticism. Her observation that people "Googled 'sauce advert stupid' and then made a Reddit profile just so I could find someone saying this and agree with them" speaks to the ad's remarkable ability to unite people in shared frustration. The fact that viewers are creating social media accounts specifically to complain about this commercial suggests it has struck a particularly raw nerve.
The author's analysis of the various objections to the ad—from the practical ("what is he having for tea then?") to the culinary ("pasta sauces typically contain onions and garlic; not ideal cookie flavours")—reveals how the commercial fails on multiple levels. It's not just that the AI's suggestion is bad; it's that every aspect of the scenario defies basic human logic and cooking knowledge.
Beddington's noting of the convenient placement of "eggs, flour, cubed butter and vanilla extract handily out on the worktop" during a pasta-making session exposes the ad's constructed artificiality. This detail suggests the commercial was designed backward from the desired outcome (showing AI's versatility) rather than forward from a realistic scenario.
What makes Beddington's critique particularly prescient is how it connects this single advertisement to broader concerns about AI's role in society. Her admission that she's "always avoided badmouthing AI" as "a simple commonsense survival tactic to keep the robots on side" reveals the careful balance many people feel compelled to maintain in discussions about artificial intelligence.
The commercial represents a perfect storm of AI marketing failures: it showcases technology that provides obviously poor advice, promotes it as helpful, and asks viewers to believe that following such advice represents progress. The fact that the young man in the ad responds with enthusiasm ("Sweet!") rather than skepticism makes the scenario even more grating to viewers who recognize the absurdity.
Beddington's analysis suggests that the ad's fundamental problem isn't just that it's unrealistic—it's that it represents AI as a replacement for human judgment in situations where human judgment is obviously superior. The commercial implies that consulting an AI assistant is preferable to applying basic common sense, a message that many viewers find deeply unsettling.
The author's focus on the culinary context is particularly important because cooking represents one of the most fundamentally human activities—a domain where experience, intuition, and sensory feedback matter more than algorithmic processing. The idea that AI would suggest transforming a savory sauce into cookies rather than recommending the obvious solution (removing excess sugar) feels like an assault on culinary logic.
Beddington's observation that the ad "starts disrespecting dinner and baked goods in this cavalier fashion" captures how the commercial manages to offend on multiple levels. It's not just that the AI gives bad advice—it's that the advice demonstrates a fundamental misunderstanding of how cooking actually works. The suggestion treats ingredients as infinitely malleable variables rather than components with specific properties and purposes.
The author's noting that "anyone who has ever cooked anything is shouting: 'Just scoop the sugar out like a normal human!'" reveals how the commercial alienates precisely the audience most likely to recognize its absurdity. The ad appears to be designed for people who don't cook, which makes its cooking-focused scenario even more baffling.
While Beddington doesn't explicitly address this, her analysis hints at generational tensions around AI adoption. The commercial features a young man who seems perfectly comfortable consulting AI for basic problem-solving, while the criticism comes largely from people who recognize the obvious analog solution. This suggests a cultural divide about when and how AI consultation is appropriate.
The author's recognition that this ad has "brought us together" in shared frustration reveals how certain AI applications can create unexpected cultural unity. In an era of intense polarization, the Samsung ad has managed to unite people across demographic lines in collective eye-rolling—a remarkable achievement in its own right.
Beddington's critique exposes how the Samsung ad represents a broader failure in AI marketing: the tendency to showcase AI capabilities in scenarios where they're obviously inappropriate or inferior to human judgment. The commercial appears designed to demonstrate Gemini's versatility and creativity, but instead highlights its inability to apply common sense to simple problems.
The author's decision to "start a gochujang-flavoured fightback" against AI overreach, despite her previous reluctance to criticize artificial intelligence, suggests that this particular commercial has crossed a line from helpful technology demonstration to offensive absurdity. The fact that a typically AI-neutral observer has been driven to criticism reveals how poorly the ad achieves its intended goals.
What makes Beddington's analysis particularly insightful is how it identifies the Samsung ad as a symbol of broader cultural anxieties about AI replacing human judgment in inappropriate contexts. The commercial doesn't just fail as advertising—it fails as a vision of how AI should integrate into human life.
The author's critique suggests that successful AI applications should enhance human capabilities rather than replace obvious human solutions with complicated technological alternatives. The pasta sauce scenario represents the inverse of this approach: using AI to solve a problem that doesn't require solving, while ignoring the simple solution that any human would recognize.
Beddington's analysis reveals how the Samsung ad has become a cultural symbol of AI applications that prioritize technological demonstration over practical value. Her critique suggests that the future of AI marketing depends on understanding when human judgment is superior to algorithmic processing—a lesson that Samsung's commercial spectacularly fails to grasp.
The fact that this single advertisement has generated such widespread criticism and cultural commentary suggests that public attitudes toward AI are more sophisticated than many marketers assume. Beddington's analysis shows that audiences can distinguish between useful AI applications and technological showboating—and they're increasingly willing to call out the latter when they see it.
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