Dwight McKenna's Monstrosity
Coroners might not have the most glamorous elected offices, but that doesn't mean their campaign ads have to be snoozers. Before Dwight McKenna lost his race to longtime New Orleans coroner Frank Minyard in February, he portrayed his opponent as a B-movie version of Dr. Frankenstein in what has to be one of the campiest TV spots of the season. This pièce de résistance features assertions that Minyard sold body parts, à la Burke and Hare; insinuations that Minyard was responsible for the grief that accompanies losing a loved one; fake internal organs that look like giant, uncooked chicken breasts; and a snaggletoothed, hunchbacked assistant named Igor who, by the looks of things, had wiped his bloody, disfigured hands all over the back of his boss's lab coat. As it turned out, gory commercials were no match for Minyard's experience in this stiff competition.