You thought the "American Idol" cruelty on last night's TV show was nasty? You thought the troop surge was the most divisive issue of the day?

Forget it! It's popcorn. Turn a few marketing experts on each other and - dang -- the pop really hits the pan. The burning issue ticking off folks in the advertising biz lately appears to be the zombie popcorn sales.

It seems that the advertising agency Crispin, is trotting out videos of the late Orville Redenbacher in its new ad campaign. Some of the insiders are just ... incited...

Ken Sheaton of Ad Age writes his assessment : "Bring Out Your Dead: Crispin Resurrects Orville Redenbacher." The subhead is "How Not to Sell Popcorn 101."

"When Crispin first won the account, I joked privately that they'd dig Orville Redenbacher from the grave. Well, that seems to be exactly what the agency did, presenting an unsuspecting audience with an iPod-wearing, dead-eyed zombie. ... My emotions ranged from "this is amateurish-looking crap" to "holy jeebum crow, this scares the hell out of me" -- especially near the end, when the Orville zombie's shoulder start hitching and it looks as if he's about to hack up a hairball.

It's not just him. He also cites The Copyranter, writing at Gawker, weighing in with "the ad industry would 'reanimate dead Darfur babies if they could get away with, and it sold product.' And you thought Simon Cowell was brutal.