John Lewis Christmas advert slammed over ‘ungrateful brats’ as Alex Armstrong fumes: ‘Horrendous!’

The three-minute ad, dubbed “Gloria and Pickles”, stars Dame Kristin Scott Thomas as a grandmother who struggles to find the perfect Christmas gift for her grandchildren.

When they visit, the two young children deny Gloria a hug and seem unimpressed as she shows them her treasured childhood toy dog, Pickles.

Despondent, Gloria slips cash into her grandchildren’s Christmas cards to avoid disappointing them.

Suddenly, Pickles, voiced by comedian Paul Whitehouse, springs to life and tells her: “You can do better than cash.”

The pair embark on a last-minute shopping trip, travelling through London by tuk-tuk before heading to John Lewis for inspiration.

On Christmas morning, Gloria surprises her grandchildren with a key to a specially transformed room in her house, dubbed the “Gran Cave”, a space filled with sparkling lights, disco balls and music where they can spend time together.

Not even Sam Fender’s cover of The Rolling Stones classic You Can’t Always Get What You Want could save the advert for Alex, who slammed John Lewis’s 20th annual festive offering.

“I’m going to be the Grinch, and I’m going to continue to be because I thought that advert was horrendous,” he said, adding: “I thought it was terrible!”

To bolster his argument, Alex reflected the thoughts of GB News viewers who had shared their reactions to the advert.

“There’s a strong sense here from our audience that this is a rubbish advert and that they’ve missed the mark,” Alex said.

He added that viewers were despairing about “spoilt children who won’t hug their grandmother until she gets them the right gifts”.

“I had miserable grandchildren like that; they wouldn’t get anything,” one watcher said.

“The little brats don’t deserve anything. Sums up kids today,” another said.

A third declared it was “another woke advert! The children need a good telling off for being rude and disrespectful.”

Alex quipped that the dog Pickle should have been renamed Gherkin, in reference to John Healey’s Budget, where the Chancellor promised measures to make items like the small cucumber affordable.

The host compared the reaction to the advert to Mr Healey’s financial statement, both of which some quarters deemed lacklustre.

GB News Entertainment Editor Alex Davies offered a more charitable analysis, suggesting the John Lewis advert was keying into something “parents and grandparents are used to”.

He suggested the meaning was: “It’s hard to transcend generations and understand what children want. And instead of material gifts, you can buy them a memory.”