Something set me off on a wild train of thought today. Would you believe it was an Egg McMuffin?

Scandal.

In question was a McDonald’s billboard that I witnessed on my way to work this morning. I don’t have a picture of the advertisement, so I’ll illustrate.

BILLBOARD: A lonely, non-scrambled egg sits silently bemoaning it’s existence. A glorious Egg McMuffin, encased inside a cloudy thought balloon, rests overhead.

CAPTION: “What every egg dreams of becoming.”

Modern marketing has always been one of those things that stops me from ever watching television. As a secular person and devout agnostic, I usually refrain from engaging in any form of what I would consider product or hero worship, with the exception of a young senator from Illinois. Having watched a good amount of television in the past, and being a living, breathing human being with eyes and ears, my exposure rate to advertisements probably ranks higher than any person born before the 1970s, and it is a daily-affirmed goal to try and avoid any typical noise about discount sales or the world’s number one golf ball provider.

But try as I might, this one slipped in there, and it’s been rattling around my brain all day long.

Not the mechanics of said advertisement, mind you. I certainly remember that fifth grade instructional video, shown to us in warning before lunch hour. I’m aware of the horse-shoe glue used to give the bacon that extra gooey glisten, and the mounds of hidden push pins that keep each layer of foodstuff in place for the two hour photo shoot.

What kept me thinking was the egg. It’s life and it’s aspirations.

“What every egg dreams of becoming.”

First I put myself in the mindset of the egg. Out of the many roads I might take in egg-life, what was so special about becoming an Egg McMuffin? Would I understand that I would not physically BE an Egg McMuffin, but would merely be the egg IN the Egg McMuffin? My egg matter would not be enough to account for that slab of ham or those flaky buns. Sort of how Blue Beetle is a pretty capable character, but he’s only really kicking ass when he’s joined up with the Justice League. And when he’s not dreaming about Herb Peterson.

Blue Beetle is the Egg to Justice League’s McMuffin. Did that register? Okay.

Second question is why does an egg aspire at all? The pathways in life for an egg are few. A: it becomes a chicken. B: it is processed, scrambled, boiled or battered as foodstuff for humans or small reptiles. C: young kids hurl it at peoples houses during Halloween.

But if choice B is preferable, if all an egg really wants to do is satiate other creatures, is this an egg that is aware of the consequences of that process? What are the range of emotions experienced by the egg inside an Egg McMuffin, as it is torn into and digested by morning commuters? Does it acquire sensory perception during this act ?

Is it pleasurable?

And how long is the egg aware of it’s own consuming? If the center of the egg’s self lies merely within a single consciousness, void of pain receptors and physical stimulation, then how long does that consciousness stay in a static location? Does it only exist in the part uneaten, or before it goes through the modes of preparation? Are sections that have been chewed off and swallowed now new material, something non-egg? Does this egg die?

So far I’ve fought an urge to call McDonald’s advertising division to ask some of these pressing questions, as I feel there may be an untapped narrative here.

Imagine a graphic designer, fully educated with a masters degree, given the menial task by some ad executive to create billboards for a breakfast sandwich that probably comes in a can and is heated up in the microwave. Hunched over a portfolio brimming with beautiful illustrations, this man or woman gnashes their teeth and beats their chest, aspirations fading of designing for some upstanding publication, like Kerrang! Magazine.

But they’ll show them, those corporate pigs who wouldn’t know a Buscema from a Davis. This ad will be different. This ad will be humanizing! This will be a story, a philosophical concept, plastered within fourteen by eighteen feet of unadulterated, American advertising.

Man, I’m hungry for some McDonalds.

-Tucker

Tucker Lucas feels that if Blue Beetle is the egg, then Booster Gold is the bun and Martian Manhunter is the bacon.