Scary Queen Mary advert banned

Wed Jul 14, 1:14 pm ET

LONDON (Reuters) – An advert featuring a moving image of Tudor Queen Mary I turning into a flesh-eating zombie has been banned after complaints that it scared children.

The digital image of 'Bloody Mary', the Roman Catholic daughter of King Henry VIII, who burned over 300 heretics at the stake during her reign, appeared on the side of subway escalators to promote a London Dungeon exhibition.

It shows Mary passively seated and then turning to face the viewer, with wide eyes and a silent scream. Her face changes ghoulishly; gashes appear, her teeth rot and her eyes turn red. She then resumes her original passive position as her face returned to normal.

The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) received four complaints that the ad was inappropriate as the sudden change of expression was likely to frighten children.

The watchdog agreed, ruling that the poster should not be used again in its current form as it had "terrified" children and breached fear and distress guidelines.

Defending the ad, Merlin Entertainments said: "The object of the advertising was to show the dark side of her personality and portray her as a villain."


"Warning: Subject matter could be considered extremely frighting.
Watch at your own risk."

Spoiler:

Fear and distress giudelines? Some people are afraid of clowns so why not ban circus adverts? I bet more than 4 people would agree.

I caught this ad in the brief time it was up, didn't really pay it much attention.
This in the city where every phone box is plastered with obscene hooker's calling cards.
Priorities people.

Well I was able to find and image of it online. It didn't show her transform but the before and after. I think people are being too soft with their kids. Yes you want to let them keep their innocense as long as possible, but the world is a harsh place and they need to learn how to be ready for it. In todays day and age we have too many people going to see fancy doctors because daddy didn't hug me and mommy was an addict. This crap happens. I'm sure a lot of you know the grimms fairy tales. The original ones. The ones that told kids the trouth before disney made them all happy cotton candy farting sprinkles out of their a$$. All of those stories involved rape, murder, or killing.

Not to mention there are kids today at the age of 4 dropping their pants and telling people to suck their d**k. I would know because I had a kid do it to me. Younger kids are having babies and younger kids are watching porn or horror movies. We shouldn't protect them from a sign. We should protect them from losing their morals and education. We should protect them from not knowing right from wrong while seeing fact or fiction. That is the parents fault. Not advertisement companies.

And that's supposed to be scary? I grew up on Ren and Stimpy; what's their excuse?

My daughters would laugh at that. Mind you, we do have a face changing vampire Mona Lisa print in our hall so I guess they're pretty much used to the macabre

^^Have you ever seen the movie The girl with the dragon tattoo? The entire movie is based around sexually abusing women and killing them. You should be afraid of creepy old men stealing your money and beating you while getting sexual favors to give it to you. The entire movie was in swedish I think. Still reality is those things happen. This picture doesn't.

^^ Exactly. Predators, wolves in sheeps' clothing, and other liars with too much power in their hands -- *those* are the bad guys.

I haven't seen the movie, DCGG. It played here for a little while, but it's out of the theaters now. Was it good?

if parents are worried about thier kids getting scared by that then god bless those poor kids. They are going to be so sheltered.

and I agree Red. they need to watch out for that stuff, not a "scary" queen mary

I bet those parents tell Bible stories that are scarier than that picture. "Yes son, all children died in the flood."

anyone that has ever seen a screamer video has seen something scarier than that and I'm sure just about everyone has seen at least 1. Hell, anyone thats watched the news has seen something scarier

The way this World is going with the loss of manners and basic kindness and empathy towards others is waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay more scary than that.

Btw talking scary, Hellraiser still makes me cringe like a little feeble girl