In what bizarro world does it make any sense whatsoever that the world-famous fast-casual purveyor of glazed riblet racks and Fiesta Lime Chicken salads would sell $45 tickets to an all-you-can-eat buffet in conjunction with Coney Island’s biggest, grandest neptunian celebration of everything strange? The juxtaposition may be jarring, Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York argues, but the brand-new neighborhood Applebee’s promotion of the Coney Island Mermaid Parade is just indicative of the neighborhood’s sanitized future. It’s the kind of place where chain restaurants open on every block, and sharks eat the little fish, literally.
The Mermaid Parade, of course, is a proprietary realm of cross-dressing lobsters and jumbo papier-mâché boobs and art and half-naked, body-painted people. It typically looks like this, and this, and this.
But not like this. In short, it’s not the kind of place you’d expect America’s Favorite Neighbor® — now a full-fledged Mermaid Parade sponsor — to show up clutching a flyer that still bears the watermark of the stock photo agency it ripped the picture from, which happens to depict a glitzy crowd who happens to “look nothing like the scrappy, freaky, iconoclastic artists that epitomize Coney’s mermaids and men,” the blog reports.
In other words, as some participants are out right now shopping for body glitter and nipple tassels, the restaurant is heavily promoting a day that’s “all about family.” In any event, to some, the spinach and artichoke dip is bound to taste a little off this Saturday.
Applebee’s & the Mermaid Parade [Jeremiah’s Vanishing New York]
Earlier: Post-Sandy Coney Island Chain-ifies With Applebee’s and Johnny Rockets
