Quiznos’ Burning Man Parody Commercial is Brilliant, Possibly Illegal

This Quizno’s ad making fun of Burning Man is so spot-on hilarious that Burning Man might sue.

The parody commercial is a fake movie trailer for “The Burn Trials,” in which characters from “The Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials” attend Burning Man and discover it’s part of a sinister government plot to bring about our inevitable dystopian future. “They lied to us,” our hero Thomas says. “They said it was an anti-establishment society based on radical self-expression, but it’s just become a place for rich people to check off their bucket list!”

The commercial is so clever and self-aware that it almost makes me want to go buy a sandwich right now. “You kids won’t last a day out on the Playa without subtle exposure to corporate influence!” the villain says, as a Quiznos “$1 Off” ad appears in midair.

The people behind Burning Man aren’t so pleased with it, though. Spokesperson Jim Graham Burni says legal action is being considered because the video is theft of the event’s intellectual property. “We are pretty proactive about protecting our 10 principles, one of which is decommodification,” Graham said. “We get a quite a number of requests each year from companies wanting to gift participants with their product or to capture imagery or video of their products at the event, and we turn them all down.”