Dove Parody Assures Women They Don't Look Like Gorillas

Although Dove's "Real Beauty" and "True Beauty" campaigns have helped the brand become one of the best-known names in the industry over the last few years, some people think that their most recent ad — for a "beauty patch" that ended up being a self-esteem test — went a little bit too far.

And a few of those people – comedians Lauren Adams, Emily Altman, Langan Kingsley, and Livia Scott  – have created a parody of Dove's latest commercial. The video was produced by the online comedy network Above Average, which Altman – who wrote the spot – used to work for. Above Average tweeted the video out to their nearly 14,000 Twitter followers this morning and have already watched the video go viral.

If you saw the beauty patch video, this parody will look very familiar. It features a woman in a white lab coat asking regular women how they feel about the way they look. The 'doctor' then leaves, and the women are left alone in an empty room with a mirror to look into. When they look into the mirror, though — they see a gorilla. Or a person in a gorilla suit, most likely.

And that's where the parody takes a major left turn from the original Dove ad it's making fun of. Immediately, all three women realize that the gorilla isn't their own reflection – a contrast from the actual Dove video, where women didn't catch on to the real purpose of the beauty patch and had to wait for a big reveal at the end. "I would never believe that this is me!" one comedian exclaims in the parody. "I don't think that I look like a zoo animal!" another shouts in frustration.

The clip has already been winning praise online. Erin Gloria Ryan of the feminist website Jezebel.com called the parody "spot-on," adding, "After years of being manipulated by their cloying ads presented as real social experiments, many women have finally had enough of Dove's mawkish #TrueBeauty push."

And the commenters seem to agree that Dove was ripe for a humorous takedown. "I thought this parody shows how even though Dove is trying to promote that everyone is beautiful, they are still like every other cosmetic brand," one wrote. Other commenters mentioned brands like Veet and Pantene, who also came under fire recently for using for their ad campaigns, although for very different reasons: Veet criticized women who didn't shave their body hair as manly and unnatural, while Pantene co-opted feminist ideas to sell their hair products.

Still, there are some who argue that Dove being parodied is a major compliment. The company's commercials have become so iconic that it was immediately easy to recognize the elements in Above Average's video, and that means that Dove has succeeded at their branding. After all, it's like finding yourself parodied in a Saturday Night Live sketch: even if they make fun of you, it still means they're talking about you. And this means that Dove just got a whole wave of new publicity without having to pay a cent.