Subliminal: no, just in your face, or head

Slate.com has some of the better contemporary social critics than I seem to be able to find elsewhere, or at least on a regular basis elsewhere. If you've sat in front of the television for any amount of time, there's a chance you've seen this commercial. It's a real mind fuck, but still effective:

Excerpt: As for this ad campaign, it is utter genius. With this one 10-second spot, the makers of HeadOn have torn down all the pretenses that have gummed up the advertising industry for years. Production values? Persuasion? Emotion? Humor (of the intentional kind)? These are stalwarts of the old, outmoded advertising paradigm. The new, head-on (or HeadOn) approach holds that advertising is about blunt force.

The spot Mr. Stevenson is referring to goes something like this:

Excerpt: The Spot: A woman rubs what appears to be a glue stick across her forehead. The voice-over repeats one sentence in triplicate: "HeadOn: Apply directly to the forehead. HeadOn: Apply directly to the forehead. HeadOn: Apply directly to the forehead." We cut to an image of the product in its packaging, while the voice-over tells us that "HeadOn is available without a prescription at retailers nationwide."