Cool is elusive. We all know that. Pursuing cool is difficult because true cool is only achieved by fearlessness without purpose. Arnold Schwarzenegger action movies are not cool; they are loud and stupid and enjoyable at times, but not cool because they are designed to make Arnold look cooler, and as such fail. Chow Yun-Fat action movies, in comparison, are cool, because Chow Yun-Fat is utterly willing to do something that potentially can make him look like a horse’s ass in just about any movie he’s in – and because he does it, with elan and style, he becomes even cooler.
(Or, to put it another way: no way does Arnold Schwarzenegger let a baby piss on him to put out a fire on his leg in the climactic action scene of Hard Boiled.)
However, even people who are honest-to-god cool have their limits. There are activities which can be performed that, unfortunately, will remove coolness. It does not matter a whit how devil-may care or suave you may be: do these things, and you will lose cool points. There is no moral dimension to these sorts of activities, either. (If Ralph Fiennes could make participating in genocide compelling in Schindler’s List… well, you get the point.)
The foremost of these is, of course, drinking from a juicebox.
![](https://mightygodking.com/images/neo-juicebox.jpg)
Drinking from a juicebox has become cultural code for “young” and thus by extension also “callow” and “naive.” And that is the most generous interpretation one can manage. If you want a less generous interpretation, consider that on recent episodes of 30 Rock, we were introduced to Kathy Geiss, the presumably mentally challenged niece of hardass executive Don Geiss (played by Rip Torn, who defines hardass), by seeing her drinking from a juicebox.
Herein lies the problem with drinking from a juicebox: it doesn’t matter that tetrapaks are more ecologically friendly than bottles or cans, it doesn’t matter that juice is better for you than pop. Kids drink from juiceboxes. We consider the abandonment of the juicebox to be a rite of passage into adulthood, and resist the idea of it being suitable for non-youthful things.
![](https://mightygodking.com/images/meninblack-juicebox.jpg)
Indeed, one might argue that the youthful connotations associated with the juicebox have slowed the rate of acceptance of tetrapak technology into other areas of the beverage industry – tetrapaks are particularly appropriate for wine storage, but only recently have wineries even begun to adopt the technology, and if you don’t think it’s because the tetrapaks look like “oversized drinking boxes,” you’re fooling yourself.
But I’m getting away from my main point, which is that juiceboxes are really dorky in a way that’s just about completely unstoppable. You can’t redeem the juicebox by having a cool hardbitten character drink from a juicebox – your cool, hardbitten character will just become “quirky” (which is Hollywood for “gay but we’re not admitting it”). The juicebox is just about unstoppable as a character killer.
![](https://mightygodking.com/images/hansolo-juicebox.jpg)
“But Chris,” you say, “these cute Photoshops are funny and all, but action heroes aren’t going to drink from juiceboxes anyway, so what’s the big deal?” And you have a point there, so let me retaliate with the H-bomb of anti-juicebox arguments.
![](https://mightygodking.com/images/sayanything-juicebox.jpg)
How sexy is Lloyd Dobler now, eh? Eh?
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19 users responded in this post
You lost me at Chow Yun-Fat being cool.
Why does it seem utterly appropriate for Neo to drink from a juice box?
What about Jackie Chan? Surely Jackie Chan could drink for a juice box and still look cool. I mean, the man managed to make being a sloppy drunk look cool.
Drinking from a juicebox could become cool. The following stages of cool-ification would have to happen.
1. Adult dorks would continue to drink from them.
2. The self-proclaimed hipsters of the dork brigades would then proclaim juice-box drinking as “ironic,” “retro,” and a “quirky comment on consumer culture,” like collecting Pez dispensers or Yma Sumac LPs. Small independent movies will show adult characters drinking from juice boxes.
3. Juice-box drinking works its way up the hipster food chain until it reaches the fringes of the fashionable.
4. MTV and the like discover this and co-opt it as hard as it can. Everyone on “The Real World” starts drinking from juice boxes.
Critical mass would thereby be achieved, and juice boxes would go from childish to hip for years.
I don’t see it happening, but it could, yo. If “Speed Racer” can go from a stupid cartoon to quasi-hip to a big-budget stupid movie, nothing can be written off.
You could have John Cusack lain across an entire flat of juice boxes, and his sexy would remain undiminished.
I think the juicebox can be made to look cooler, and therefore ease the transition.
A) Abandon the primary color scheme for metallics.
B) Make them bigger.
C) Abandon the straw. Just rip the corner off and drink.
Also, how does this theory apply to those silver bags Capri-Sun comes in?
“B) Make them bigger.”
This is actually the main reason I stopped drinking from them, regardless of how “kiddie” they are. Once I hit my teens, I could slug one down in about a swallow or two. That’s just not going to cut it.
So, are you trying to say that you drink from juiceboxes? Because that’s where I thought this was going.
(That wasn’t meant as an insult. This just reminded me of a post you wrote a little while ago about Spaghettio’s or ketchup-flavored pasta or something.)
You know, if you had just shown Cusack with the juice box… I wouldn’t have thought it was photoshopped.
He probably has a fridge full of juice boxes at home. 🙂
John Cusack makes juice boxes hot by association. Sorry.
“A) Abandon the primary color scheme for metallics.
B) Make them bigger.
C) Abandon the straw. Just rip the corner off and drink.”
Man, whatever happened to Boku? I liked that stuff.
Lloyd is even sexier now, as his sexiness always relied upon being utterly, irredeemably and unapologetically un-cool.
I put it to you thusly – can you seriously argue to me that Lloyd standing outside whatserface’s window holding his boombox blasting “In Your Eyes” would look any more ridiculous were he also holding a box of Mott’s All-Natural? I submit that he would not.
I see you wussed out and failed to subject juice boxes to the ultimate test of putting one in the hands of Christian Bale.
Chicken.
Lloyd Dobler is NEVER not sexy. The minute I see a photo of Cusack from that movie my naughty bits quiver. It’s a force unlike any other (yes, including THAT one).
B) Make them bigger.
C) Abandon the straw. Just rip the corner off and drink.
I agree, basically this turns them into milk cartons.
No power on Earth or beyond can make Lloyd Dobler not sexy.
Your post title has me singing.
“It could be bunnies…”
(Though I must acknowledge my awareness that the lyrics are “I’ve got a theory”, not “I have a theory”. Thought association.)
I’m curious about what inspired this post.
Well this is the second weirdest hangup I’ve seen.
I know this is a minor tangent, but I think the argument that tetrapaks are more environmentally friendly than glass or plastic is a bit flawed. Yes, they are lighter, but they are damned near impossible to recycle.
The funny still stands, though. 🙂
I disagree. I drink from juiceboxes all the time, and I’m fucking awesome.
Ecto Cooler, man. Ecto Cooler.
Any liquid is better in box form.