History YMMV / SuperSizeMe

** While the film has been praised for tarnishing the public image of fast food chains, many have pointed how the backlash affects people working in the fast food industry, who are disproportionately minorities and/or from lower-income classes. Additionally, the film is very limited in its scope, focusing only on individual decision-making, and consequently doesn't even acknowledge the systemic issues that contribute to the rise of unhealthy diets -- such as the fact that eating healthy is often more expensive, the lack of time and/or proper kitchen facilities to prepare healthy meals, and the problem of "food deserts" that means that many people lack access to healthy food entirely -- let alone offer any sort of possible solution.

* HilariousInHindsight: One of the Happy Meal toys shown in the beginning is from ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible''. One of the episodes of the final season is "Grande Size Me", a parody of this film dealing with Ron vowing to eat nothing but junk food to disprove the guidelines set by his health class. At first he gains weight with no drawbacks, but this is due to accidental exposure to a mutagenic substance. After he is cured, he gives a parody Aesop of steering clear and being responsible around vats of mutagen.

* DontShootTheMessage: The general message about how major fast food companies do not have the best interest of customers at heart and target young kids as customers is not a bad one but it gets lost amid Spurlock's questionable tactics for proving his point and the fact that many of the interesting elements are ignored to focus more on the shock value of the experiment.

* CondemnedByHistory: When the movie was originally released in 2004, it was a massive hit and was widely praised for illustrating issues with the fast food industry and its connection to the obesity epidemic by showing the ill effects of Morgan Spurlock eating nothing but UsefulNotes/McDonalds for a month. Its publicity led to [=McDonald's=] removing the "Super Size" option from its menu and made it a staple of health classes in American schools. However, by the end of the decade, it began attracting increasingly vocal criticism for the veracity of its experiment, with people highlighting confounds like Spurlock both having a history of alcoholism and having been a vegan prior to filming. The response documentary ''Film/FatHead'' particularly brought the film's issues to the forefront by repeating Spurlock's experiment but failing to replicate its results. By the second half of TheNewTens, ''Super Size Me'' became better known for its methodological flaws, and the withdrawal of its [[Film/SuperSizeMe2HolyChicken sequel]] from the Sundance Film Festival and [=YouTube=] Red in the wake of Spurlock's admissions to sexual misconduct only drove more nails into the coffin. Nowadays, ''Super Size Me'' is typically mocked for both its CaptainObviousAesop and its veracity issues when it isn't [[OvershadowedByControversy overshadowed by Spurlock's scandal]].

** While the film has been praised for tarnishing the public image of fast food chains, many have pointed how the backlash affects people working in the fast food industry, who are disproportionately minorities and/or from lower-income classes. Additionally, the film doesn't even acknowledge the systemic issues that contribute to the rise of unhealthy diets -- such as the fact that eating healthy is often more expensive, the lack of time and/or proper kitchen facilities to prepare healthy meals, and the problem of "food deserts" that means that many people lack access to healthy food entirely -- let alone offer any sort of possible solution.

** While the film has been praised for tarnishing the public image of fast food chains, many have pointed how the backlash, however, affects people working in the fast food industry in that they are places where many minorities and lower-income classes seek work as well as the fact that eating healthy is actually rather expensive and few places offer eating choices (most supermarkets don't cater to those seeking a better diet). The film doesn't address this issue, nor does it bother to give a solution to an established system in some communities.

* {{Anvilicious}}: Even if you like the film, it's hard to argue against it being a little heavy-handed.

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: Back when this film came out, the very premise was the big draw of the film and brought the issue of healthy eating and fast food chains to mainstream news outlets; it was even commonly screened in American health classes. These days, however, it is a common fact that eating at fast food restaurants for long periods of time is unhealthy and people are less likely to have a problem with the film's intended message but actually have trouble with Spurlock's background history of sexual misconduct and the inclusion of Jared Fogle, who gained infamy after being outed as a pedophile a decade after the film's premiere.

* CaptainObviousAesop: Fast food is bad for your health. The film admits that everyone already knows that, but attempts to show that it's worse than you might think. The doctor at the beginning says that he expects Spurlock to gain some weight, but after a few weeks is begging him to stop the experiment for his own safety [[note]] However the documentary fails to mention the massive alcohol intake he partook in off camera or address the sudden shift from vegetarianism as potential causes for such an extreme decline in his health. [[/note]]. The experiment as a whole just glues together a larger message about making smart food choices.

* HilariousInHindsight: One of the Happy Meal toys shown in the beginning is from ''WesternAnimation/KimPossible''. One of the episodes of the final season is titled "Grande Size Me", dealing with Ron vowing to eat nothing but junk food to disprove the guidelines set by his health class. At first he gains weight with no drawbacks, but this is due to accidental exposure to a mutagenic substance. After he is cured, he gives a parody Aesop of steering clear and being responsible around vats of mutagen.

* SeinfeldIsUnfunny: Back when this film came out, the very premise was the big draw of the film and brought the issue of healthy eating and fast food chains to mainstream news outlets; it was even shown in some schools as part of the education. These days, however, it is a common fact that eating at fast food restaurants for long periods of time is unhealthy and people are less likely to have a problem with the film's intended message but actually have trouble with Spurlock's background history of sexual misconduct and the inclusion of Jared Fogle, who has become an infamous pedophile in the years after the film's premiere.

** The film briefly explores how the junk food peddlers' massive marketing budgets and utilization of popular celebrities as spokespersons allows them to dominate the public conscious in a way the government doesn't have a prayer of countering with healthy eating awareness efforts/[=PSAs=]. Spurlock then goes a step further and suggests that all the ways fast food chains market their products towards kids (ie giving away free toys, having playgrounds in their restaurants, hosting birthday parties) is cynically done with the intent of infecting their childhood memories during a key developmental stage, ensuring lifelong brand loyalty as they consume their product as an adult (and feed it to their own kids) purely for the sake of nostalgia. These are incredibly poignant points that deserve further discussion, but are instead completely glossed over as the audience instead focuses on Spurlock and his use of InsaneTrollLogic to drive home his CaptainObviousAesop.

** Discussion of the film will often feature debates over the veracity of the experiment, with factors such as Spurlock being vegan prior to the film's beginning making the results worse than they'd be for a normal fast food eater, or whether his decades-long struggle with alcoholism had anything to do with the liver problems he alleges the diet caused him. Not to mention that no one has been able to duplicate the results of Spurlock's experiment, perhaps the most popular example being Tom Naughton, who produced the documentary ''Film/FatHead''. In the film, Naughton follows the same rules of the experiment laid out in the film (and tries unsuccessfully to obtain a copy of Spurlock's food log so that he will literally be eating the same things), but combines it with not dropping his daily activity, the results being vastly different than Spurlock's.

** Discussion of the film will often feature debates over the veracity of the experiment, with factors such as Spurlock being vegan prior to the film's beginning making the results worse than they'd be for a normal fast food eater, or whether his decades-long struggle with alcoholism had anything to do with the liver problems he alleges the diet caused him. Not to mention that no one has been able to duplicate the results of Spurlock's experiment, perhaps the most popular example being Tom Naughton, who produced the documentary '''Fat Head'''. In the film, Naughton follows the same rules of the experiment laid out in the film (and tries unsuccessfully to obtain a copy of Spurlock's food log so that he will literally be eating the same things), but combines it with not dropping his daily activity, the results being vastly different than Spurlock's.

** UnintentionalPeriodPiece: In a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy, [=McDonald's=] and its competitors discontinued their "Super Size" options, diversified their menus with "healthier" and more artisan options and changed their general marketing approach in response to the film. As a result, ''Super Size Me'' dates itself by showcasing [=McDonald's=] before they implemented these permanent reforms to their business model.