This parody AI beer ad is nightmare fuel, so why do I love it so much?

Here's another little gem that's terrifying in the way only AI-generated art and video can be. A parody of beer commercials, it's an AI-generated horror show, and I can't stop watching. 

The ad (for a fake beer brand) has all the hallmarks we've come to expect from Ai-generated images and video: spaghetti hands (tick), Alien-mouths (tick), toothy grins (tick), floating objects (tick, tick, tick). AI still has a blank spot for creating lifelike humans or even realistic beer cans – these ones float and warp like gluey, buttery cylinders (see our pick of the best AI art tutorials to learn more about how the tech works).

This fake AI beer commercial is the work of mixed-media agency Private Island, who created it as a parody of both American beer commercials and AI art. They used Stable Diffusion, Control Net and Runway Gen 2.

It begins as a sleepy BBQ and ends in an explosive, fiery apocalypse like a scene from Terminator 2. "This is what hell looks like," wrote one Twitter user. "At least we know now." Another Twitter user joked, "Does the LSD come with the beer or is that BYO?"

In one shot a woman sups at the side of a beer can with gusto, two men draw on a floating glass beer bong, a severed hand floats in beer glass and no-one cares; a man sucks beer through thin air and an eleven-fingered hand offers a guest a cold brew. It is horrific, but this AI-generated nonsense is also scarily engaging.

The speedy cuts and chops and edits escalate the pace of the commercial to the point of a hedonistic surge of beer-fuelled chaos. Yes, it's terrifying but it's also incredibly engaging. There's a decadent, unrestrained AI eye behind this chaos and I think we may be stumbling into a new CG aesthetic.

We could be on the verge of a new trend with this weird unreal aesthetic. As a greater number of people create clips with this wild look, and the more viral these videos become, it's only a matter of time before this 'style' is aped by the agency of a major brand, if only to be subversive.

"We are creating a series of in-house experiments that help us figure out how these tools can be used in production – Synthetic Summer is our most recent," said Director and co-founder Chris Boyle in an article for Stash Media. He added: "If 2022 was the year generative image stills went mainstream, 2023 will for sure be the same with motion."

As AI becomes more freely available and trusted brands other ethical apps and uses, such as Adobe Firefly and Nvidia Picasso, it feels like we're on the verge of something new happening. I don't imagine this will be the demise of the need for real artists, in fact as more bizarre AI art is created the likelihood is art from actual humans, and physical art in particular, will become more sought after and prized. Now, excuse me, but I need to rewatch this silliness again.