On the one hand, it’s just a funny commercial that uses humor to grab interest, though the humor has virtually nothing to do with the product. They could be selling diet soda, late-term abortions, hair care products or yellowcake uranium for all it matters.
But on the other hand… this is a cautionary tale of the importance of proper crew selection not just for Antarctic expeditions, but also for long-term spaceflight. And it’s a tale of cosmic horror, of humans struggling to survive and stay sane in a vast universe that cares nothing for them and which will exterminate them in the blink of an eye, without so much as a glance in their direction. This could be the followup to”The Thing” or “The Terror” or “At The Mountains of Madness.”
This is crew on the edge. Kevin is just the first, and he won’t be the last. Something will have to change and fast or otherwise their habitat will soon be surrounded by corpsicles. The inevitable US Air Force rescue crew will, some months later, approach the night-shrouded hab stealthily, guns drawn; the first thing they will see through their night vision goggles will be a few bodies standing naked in the snow, frozen solid with looks of mixed boredom, madness and relief on their faces. When they finally reach the hab itself, they will notice disturbing red stains painting the interior of the windows. Inside they will find a few more bodies, or at least portions of them; bits and viscera scattered around, lengths of intestine used as Christmas Tree garland. The last cryptic message will be scrawled in blood on the wall: “You made me play second base.”
The rescue team will of course be streaming video from helmet and gun mounted cameras, signals beamed to the C-130 orbiting above, then encrypted and bounced to a communications satellite, then to a facility in a nondescript office in the industrial outskirts of Denver. Grim-faced men will observe in real time and will note sadly that the rescue team themselves are already beginning to display anomalous behavior. An order is given; while the rescue team pokes around the interior of the hab, the C-130 drops a small package, no bigger than an office waste paper can, surprisingly heavy. The object will deploy a parafoil to control and slow descent; the C-130 will promptly go full throttle and head for the horizon. The package will drift downwards in a quick spiral. A few meters directly above the hab, explosive charges compress a hollow sphere of plutonium into a critical mass; the prompt X-rays will bounce off an internal shell of uranium, compressing a billet of lithium deuteride. A small second sun will bloom over the hab, vaporizing it, the rescue team and the frozen corpses… and, hopefully, the eldritch alien force lurking under the hab that those in Denver have seen in action before. Many fast calls will be made to government officials both in the US and in foreign lands; especially in Russia there will be expressions of outrage over the detonation of a hundred-plus kiloton thermonuclear device in the atmosphere. But with the uttering of a few key code words, those officials will blanche white, mutter in agreement, hang up, close their offices for the day and go home, there to either hug their confused and concerned wives and children or sit in the darkness and slowly get drunk, each to their own natural inclinations.
At least, that’s how *I* see this commercial…