Why This Controversial Ad For Twix Candy Bars Was Banned In The UK

Absurdism is dead in 2025, apparently. At least, if modern industry regulators have anything to say about it. A recent Twix ad was banned in the U.K. for allegedly promoting reckless driving. 

The minute-long commercial for the popular candy bar – titled "Two Is More Than One" — opens onto a long-haired man cruising twisting desert roads in a brown retro-style car (via YouTube). Mountains unfold around him as Molchat Doma's "Cудно (Борис Рыжий)" plays. To avoid a car behind him, our driver speeds up, then suddenly pulls the emergency brake, sending the car off the side of a cliff. However, instead of crashing, the car magically lands upside-down and unscathed on top of (gasp) an identical car with an identical driver. Gripping a Twix bar, the second, right-side-up driver motors away with both brown cars stacked on top of each other. The setup looks like a Twix bar (although, in case there was any confusion, "Left Twix" and "Right Twix" are the same thing).

Parent company Mars-Wrigley received five complaints against the ad, accusing it of encouraging unsafe roadway exploits. Consequently, the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) officially banned the Twix commercial, ruling that it could no longer be shown without significant editing. Car-toppling scene aside, the ASA says (via BBC) that the driver also appears to be taking those mountainous turns at velocities exceeding the legal speed limit.

It could be easily argued that the motif here is more about magical realism than the actual promotion of reckless driving. Meta-surrealism isn't meant to be taken literally — a point seemingly punctuated by the fact that the ad ends with two identical cars and identical drivers (an extremely unlikely scenario). In response to the ban, Mars-Wrigley argued that the commercial was clearly set in a "world that was absurd, fantastical and removed from reality," according to the BBC. Non-government ad-approval agency Clearcast similarly echoed that the commercial was meant to sell Twix, not to imply that "safe driving was boring." Still, to some viewers, the ad was anything but jovial.

The ad's top YouTube comment (which has received more than 300 likes) teases, "I was planning to drive like this but now the ad is banned, I won't." Other commenters share greater outrage at what they perceive as egregious censorship. 'Well done to the 5 people who complained," writes one viewer. "I'm sure you've made the world a far better place and saved a lot of lives. The ASA have lost their minds." Whether you love Twix or hate them, this latest ASA ban marks a blow to creative advertising as a whole. If the Twix-nix is any indication, modern consumers can buckle their seatbelts (pun intended) to sit through some pretty mind-numbingly unimaginative, milquetoast commercials in the coming months.