I have a confession to make: I love infomercials.

I don’t really know why I love them. For some, it’s the unintentional comedy brought about by a combination of bad acting, terrible writing, and ludicrous incompetence, and I enjoy them in the same way that I enjoy incredibly bad movies like The Room or Birdemic. Of course, there are reasonably well-made infomercials, but I enjoy those as well. Maybe it’s simply the enjoyment I get from watching washed-up actors desperately trying to convince you over a 21-minute window that your life will be immensely improved if you buy their product. Maybe it’s the soulless dead eyes of the host or the slightly confused reactions of the studio audience druggishly responding to interns waving cue cards. Either way, if I’m flipping through channels and happen across an infomercial, I have to watch it.

Many years ago, I made the mistake of telling some friends that I loved infomercials (with the caveat that I simply liked watching them, rather than lusting after the products). Because my friends are assholes, they promptly began buying me stuff from infomercials. In short order, I’d received a Snuggie – a product that bills itself to people too stupid to navigate a blanket – and a ShakeWeight, easily the most sexually charged exercise tool since the Sybian.

However, I was actually pretty excited when I unexpectedly received a Magic Bullet. First, the Magic Bullet is easily one of my favorite infomercials; second, I didn’t own a blender, and third, it actually looked like it might be a semi-useful product. After all, how hard can it be to fuck up a blender? I couldn’t wait to open up the box. I set the ShakeWeight down, stripped off the Snuggie, and used some Kleenex brand facial tissue to wipe the remnants of the ShakeWeight workout from my forehead. I’m talking about the sweat.

Upon tearing into the package I was momentarily impressed and subsequently horrified at how much shit was inside the box. One of the Bullet’s main selling points is that it’s tiny – it only takes up about as much space as a comically oversized coffee mug on your countertop. What they fail to mention is that it comes with approximately 250 accessories which will fill up most of a kitchen cabinet despite the fact that you will never use any of them.

The other main selling point of the Bullet is that you can use it for practically anything in the kitchen – like chopping onions and garlic – thus negating the need to pull out cutting boards and knives. Unfortunately, essentially everything has to be cut up before it will fit inside the Bullet, so you’re using a knife anyway. The Bullet compensates for this by doing an extraordinarily shitty job at chopping the onions, instead choosing to mash them into a watery paste.

To give credit where it’s due, the Bullet does a fine job at, say, beating eggs for an omelet. Of course, taking the time to assemble the base and blend it doesn’t actually save me any time vs. beating them with a fork.

But blenders really should be used for things like blending – mixing up a delicious smoothie, for example, or maybe churning up some batter for a muffin. Here, the Bullet proves its worth by failing on every part called out in the infomercial. It doesn’t blend anything in seconds and stuff gets stuck at the top of the cup so you repeatedly have to shake it to move the contents around, then blend, then shake, then blend, then shake, over and over and over again until the motor overheats, which happens after 60 seconds. Which gives me an idea: The Shake-Bullet! The Versatile Personal Exercise Countertop Magician! Have a delightfully phallic workout while making yourself a delightfully nutritious smoothie!

Finally, I decided to perform the ultimate test. During a climactic scene within the infomercial, Mick decides to whip up some nachos with the following steps:

1. Added cubed cheddar cheese and some diced jalapeno to the Bullet.
2. Blend for 2 seconds
3. Pop in the microwave
4. Instant perfectly crafted nacho cheese.

Observe:

Seems too good to be true, right? It was. Needless to say, it didn’t shred the cheese in 2 seconds or even in 20. After a few minutes of blending, removing, shaking, and repeating, along with a steady stream of profanity, I eventually got it appropriately shredded and proceeded to the microwave. After microwaving, the final result was a disgustingly mucousy paste. You know how when you’re at a funeral and you’re standing next to the grave as the priest does his thing and suddenly, involuntarily you cough but you try to suppress it so a wad of grainy phlegm hits the back of your teeth and you can’t just spit it out because you’d hit Grandma’s coffin and you don’t have a handkerchief so you work the phlegm to the back of your mouth and choke it back down? That’s what eating this cheese dip was like.

Overall, I give the Magic Bullet an F+. It can’t do half what a real blender can, it consistently performs shittier than a real blender on what it can, and it’s built on a foundation of deceit and lies.