There's always fun-thing different at your Dairy Queen restaurant!—The Lips, singing in his first appearance ever
The Dairy Queen Lips (or DQ Lips for short) is the mascot character used by the fast-food chain company Dairy Queen, first appearing in 1978, retired, and then reused in 2006 until 2011.
Appearance[]
The Dairy Queen lips, appear to be a set of CGI disembodied human lips with red lipstick that levitate in the air. While not possessing features such as eyes, ears, or even an inner mouth, he is shown to interact within the environment of the commercials as if he did. They appear to parody the lips which were also seen at the beginning and end of the 1975 film The Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Personality[]
Despite the lips in question appearing to be womanly in appearance, DQ Lips speaks in a male American voice, often acting very patronizing to the viewer with a smug smile.
For most of the time DQ Lips is on screen, he usually acts down to Earth throwing in bits of humor when promoting a food item or deal, under pressure however, he can act highly unpredictable as shown in one advert where he attacked a girl scout during the outtakes of a commercial, and broke the screen, attacking everyone in the studio.
History[]
The Lips’ first ever appearance was in 1978, in a commercial advertising the Super Brazier burger. They appeared at the end of the commercial, singing in multiple voices the quote marked above.[1] The Lips later shifted into the Dairy Queen logo, for similar appearances to both.
The mascot was quickly retired from the market, and 28 years later, in 2006 or 2007, the mascot was rebooted and reintroduced. It’s unknown which ad the Lips first starred in, but it’s believed to be an ad for the Caramel Chip Cheesecake Blizzard.
Many more ads would feature the lips mascot, using CGI lips, as an end tag. Not more than a decade later, John Behlmann's ads led to the Lips mascot's retirement in 2011, and after that, the "So Good it's RiDicUlous" slogan was adopted.
Criticism and Reviews[]
The Lips appeared in a 2011 Time article listing the ten creepiest product mascots. The article listed them as the creepiest mascot from the list, and claimed that “nothing about a man's voice booming from a floating feminine pout makes us want to seek out the nearest Dairy Queen”. The article also asked for a return of Dennis the Menace, a comic character who previously served as Dairy Queen’s mascot from 1971 to 2002, leaving a gap to see the lips 4 years later.[2]
Gallery[]
Trivia[]
- In late 2020/early 2021, some DQ Lip commercials, including the Phil Commercial and the Thin Mints commercial, were turned into a meme, and many re-edits of the commercials were posted onto YouTube and various other platforms.[3]