Talking to your TV is so hot right now. Apple TV does it. Google TV does it. Android Fire TV does it. I get it, Dish, you wanted in on this action. I don't fault you for that.

But holy hell, how did you make a remote this ugly?

The Hopper 3 has been shipping since February, but the compatible $30 Voice Remote just started shipping. I was made aware of its horrors by a Tech Crunch article posted earlier today, complete with gruesome hands-on pictures.

It's not like I have high standards. I don't expect a lot. A TV remote has to have a lot of buttons on it, unless you cheat and rely on on-screen keyboards / keypads to do all the work. I get that it's hard to make a ton of buttons look pretty. We all wish we could be Apple sometimes, am I right?

But look at this eyesore "Smart 2 in 1 Qwerty" remote Samsung made. Offensive, yes, but at least Samsung knew not to use a font from the credits of a 1999 Syfy Channel original movie:

Here's one of those novelty jumbo remotes that was made as a *joke* and yet its creators still had the good taste not to use a strange progressive bevel down the front:

Oh and remember that time Logitech tried to reinvent the TV remote and it just made everyone sad and now the product is discontinued? Yeah, at least they knew to hire someone to design it who doesn't entirely hate eyes:

I'd say before today, Comcast was the king of ugly remotes, peddling this soulless object:

But Dish has usurped.

Dish, Hopper 3 sounds great. I'm glad you went all out on 4K, and I'm not even mad you included 16 tuners. That's exciting and extravagant. But this remote is wrong, and you should feel bad.