A commercial detection apparatus includes a frame grab thread which acquires frames from an input data stream to be analyzed by a cut detector thread and a filter thread. A commercial detection thread determines whether a commercial has occurred from data created by the cut detector thread and the filter thread stored in a memory. A factor used by the commercial detection thread is whether a black frame has occurred. The input data stream is divided into a plurality of regions and then a maximum and minimum value for a section of these regions is determined and compared to one another. If the maximum and minimum values are close enough, and the maximum value is below a threshold, then the frame is deemed to be black. The commercial detection thread also looks at the average cut frame distance, cut rate, changes in the average cut frame distance, the absence of a logo, a commercial signature detection, brand name detection, a series of black frames preceding a high cut rate, similar frames located within a specified period of time before a frame being analyzed and character detection. During playback, the detected commercials are either skipped or substituted with alternate content.