Trident Strawberry Fusion

Flavor: From what I can tell, this is one of two flavors of the Fusion variety, which leads me to believe that this may have been a Trident experiment of sorts. From the get go, this gum is trying way too hard. "Fuse it Up! Chew the sweet pieces with the sour pieces and you've created a FUSION of FLAVOR that's all your own!" Have I missed something here? What's "all my own" about doing exactly what they tell me to do? The gimmick is that there are two gums in one pack-- one sweet, and one sour, and when combined, the result is a perfect (and somehow personalized) super-gum. What is really is, however, is half a pack of pretty good strawberry gum and half a pack of the same gum only really dull and crappy. When combined, the flavor is just the "sour" gum after you've chewed it a while. The packaging itself is even misleading, as the "sweet" and "sour" designations appear on either side of the pack, but are paired with arrows that point to the opposite side of the pack. How am I supposed to know that pink indicates sour and red indicates sweet? It's just not intuitive. I have to say the sour gum is pretty tasty, but this whole Fusion thing only means you get half a pack less of the good stuff for your money.

Texture: One piece is tough all the way through, and doesn't pack much crunch for a pellet shell. When you add a second piece, it doesn't blow your mind away with lightning bolt fusion power, it just... gets tougher. It's a big wad of tough, squeaky gum.

Overall: A swing and a miss Trident, I'm sorry. I think the real error here is the target audience-- Trident pellets are not traditionally appealing to kids, but this kind of gimmick is definitely targeted toward them. If it's an effort to drum up some younger interest, I give this outstanding sugar-free gum producer credit for that, but it's really just not working. Kids don't want anything to do with a gum that touts "Cleans teeth" alongside "FUSE IT UP!" And adults want a quality product, a real solid strawberry candy-tasting gum, not this weird game in which, invariably, all chewers wind up being losers.
Rating: oo two gumballs