On Jan. 23, M&Ms forever altered the history of their company with a single tweet. In this tweet, Mars Inc. reported an “indefinite pause” on the spokescandies and announced they would be replaced with actress Maya Rudolph. It was not until the Super Bowl LVII that the public would know what this truly meant.

Whatever happened to lead M&Ms to this decision?

The M&Ms spokescandies have been the focus of unwarranted controversy since 2022. In January, it was due to the fact that Mars changed Green’s shoes, and in October it was the introduction of a new M&Ms spokescandy: Purple.

It would be wonderful if that was the end of the M&Ms drama, but unfortunately there is more.

In preparation for International Women’s Day on March 8, Mars released new packaging featuring all female M&Ms. On the package, the female M&Ms, Green, Brown and Purple, are upside down. Fittingly, the goal of this unusual orientation is to launch the #FlippingTheStatusQuo campaign.

Additionally, $1 of every package sold will be donated to women’s nonprofits She Is The Music and We Are Moving The Needle, both of which focus on helping women employed in creative industries.

This campaign, on top of the previous M&Ms controversies, was interpreted as M&Ms’ attempt to push a left-wing political agenda onto consumers and kids. This has led many to claim that there should be a full-on boycott of M&Ms. One of these people inflamed by the outwardly inoccuous campaign is conservative political commentator and author Nick Adams.

On Jan. 11, Nick Adams tweeted:

“M&M’s have gone WOKE!

Mars, the company behind M&M’s, launched a nuclear strike in the war on men by unveiling a package with ONLY the female M&M’s.

This is sexist and NOT inspirational AT ALL!

We must BOYCOTT M&M’s until the alpha male M&M’s get their own exclusive package.”

Unfortunately, this is not the only tweet Adams has made on M&Ms. In another tweet, Adams dramatically describes “inform[ing a mother] M&Ms had gone woke,” and getting her to buy Twix for her son instead, another candy owned by Mars.

Many speculate that Adams is a troll, but there has yet to be any strict evidence to support that premise.

M&Ms connoisseur and Linganore sophomore Nick Killaway said, “I think it’s possible [that Nick Adams is a troll]. It’s very hard [to know] because … if he’s actually written serious books on the topics that are on the covers, then he’s probably not a troll. But if [the books] are just jokes and they’re actually just some weird political fanfiction or something, then he probably is [a troll].”

It was the culmination of all of this controversy that led to M&Ms’ Jan. 23 tweet.

The tweet read: “America, let’s talk. In the last year, we’ve made some changes to our beloved spokescandies. We weren’t sure if anyone would even notice. And we definitely didn’t think it would break the internet. But now we get it — even a candy’s shoes can be polarizing. Which was the last thing M&M’s wanted since we’re all about bringing people together.

“Therefore, we have decided to take an indefinite pause from the spokescandies. In their place, we are proud to introduce a spokesperson America can agree on: the beloved Maya Rudolph. We are confident that Ms. Rudolph will champion the power of fun to create a world where everyone feels they belong.”

The responses to this tweet were deeply mixed. Many were angered and thought that Mars putting an “indefinite pause” on the spokescandies demonstrated weakness and conforming to the unjustified hatred they were receiving. 

Another response was a popular theory that would later be proven correct.

After the M&Ms tweet, many began to speculate that this was not an actual change but rather a dramatic setup for a superbowl ad.

A hint of this came shortly after M&Ms posted their tweet, when they completely rebranded their twitter account to fit their new spokesperson. They replaced their profile picture and banner with pictures of Maya Rudolph and even went so far as to rename their twitter account from M&Ms to Ma&Yas.

Then came the confirmation. Indeed, Mars did release a superbowl commercial featuring Maya Rudolph and the newly rebranded version of M&M’s: Ma&Yas.

In addition to the name-change, Ma&Yas were also rebranded as candy coated clam bites.

“[The rebranding] is a joke. It’s all to get publicity in the end. It’s funny that Mars is trying to play off of [the controversy]. I mean, yeah, I don’t see a problem with it,” said Killaway.

In the end though, as many predicted, the rebranding was just a stunt and not a permanent change. Shortly after the superbowl, the M&Ms twitter account changed their account name and banner back to normal and tweeted an official announcement of the spokescandies return, much to many’s pleasure.

Although he found the rebranding funny, Killaway said, “As a person who likes M&Ms, I like the [spokescandies] better, purely because they’re just really stupid. I don’t think a comedian can give the same absurdity that a CGI circle with some eyes can.”

There was also a general consensus that there was not nearly as much done with the M&Ms’ advertising stunt as there could have been. Many expected a dramatic commercial depicting the imprisoned spokescandies fighting to get their jobs back, rather than the meek “help us” sign Red held up at the end.

Linganore current events teacher Darren Hornbeck shared his thoughts surrounding the M&M’s controversy. 

“I’m more concerned over the rumor I heard where Taco Bell is attempting to buy the liberty bell and attempting to turn it into the taco liberty bell. That’s what we should be concerned about,” said Hornbeck.