jtherkal: At least this stood out. “I will watch your vampire TV shows with you!” Vampires are so hot right now. Be a man! Take a stand! Drive a car! Take that bitches. Vroooooom! A+.
sjbooher: To add on to my earlier rant… I ALSO LOVE VAMPIRE SHOWS, AND I’M STILL A MAN. I’ll let Manvertised handled this one: “Any way you look at it, though, it’s openly hostile toward and deeply resentful of women.”
To me, the thing that really makes this ad so moronic, is that many of the “I Wills…” are annoying things that both men AND women have to do. Walking a dog… shaving… early work… work meetings… etc. should be shared miseries! And is dividing your audience the answer? I’m pretty sure if everyone buys your product, that is better than half the people buying your product. F.
F.
sjbooher: Love. No, it’s not time for a serious breakfast! It’s time for NANERPUS!!!! So good. It’s Naaaaaaaaaaaaaa-nerpus! Best of the night. A+.
jtherkal: Great is right. At first I thought they messed up and used the wrong voice for Nanerpus–that it should sound more like a cartoon. But since this is so short, I’ve watched it about 60 times and now I love it. Banana, nana, nanar, nanerpus. A.
And if you can’t get enough Nanerpus, check this out:
sjbooher: I thought this one was good. Seems like the tech-savvy portion of the world probably already knew about Hulu, but it probably had not gone completely mainstream yet, so why not announce yourself — basically an online tv network of sorts — during one of the biggest TV events of the year? Perfect platform and well-executed ad. A+.
jtherkal: What he said. Plus, I love 30 Rock. I love Alex Baldwin. I love Hulu. It just pains me to know that now I can’t use Alec in anything I do. Hulu done it first. A.
sjbooher:Ha, I love it! “Hey, dummy!” is my favorite part, with koala punching a close second. Win. And Kanye co-signed, if that counts. A.
jtherkal: This was perhaps my favorite commercial of the Super Bowl. The repetition gets your attention and burns into your brain. And each of the bits are pretty funny. That lady on the dolphin? Where the hell did that come from? My favorite part is when the guy is drinking gold. “It’s gold.” You’re damned right it is. A+.
jtherkal: I can’t wait until Lost starts again. Sawyer is the hottest shit on the streets. Whatever he does, I want to do. It says don’t dive, but he dives! Then he does some sort of leaping butterfly stroke. No one actually swims like that! Except for Sawyer. He defies convention. If I ever wore cologne, I would wear this brand, simply because Sawyer wants me to. A.
sjbooher: This ad is absolutely brilliant. For years I’ve seen Cool Water ads in Sports Illustrated, forever imprinting their brand in my head. Blue. Beefcake. Cool. Sex. Water. When the bigwigs over at Davidoff first saw Sawyer in the water during some random Lost episode, they probably couldn’t get his agent on the phone quick enough. He IS Cool Water. Amazing. Few times in life do the stars align so perfectly. The best part for Josh Holloway is he probably did not even have to leave the Lost set. Hell, he may not have even done any special filming for this joint. They easily could have found some “lost” footage from the show, gave it the ol’ cut and splice, and BAM — done. A+.
jtherkal: In what will become a growing series as November nears, we’re going to tackle political ads. For years, political ads have been a stain on our society, littering the airwaves with slanderous accusations, boredom and just plain terribleness. You’d think that candidates would hire professionals to pump out some ads that don’t feel like your typical political BS. But to date, few have. We’ll start with this gem, which has been a bit of a lightning rod as of late.
It’s for John McCain, Republican candidate for president (for the super uninformed). My guess is he has hired some professionals, and those professionals talked him into this outstanding ad. The conversation probably went a little like this:
Ad Guy: So John, the difference between you and Obama is that you’re old and crusty. He’s young, beloved and hip. Trying to make you seem hip, or Obama seem crusty is a near impossible task. So our angle is this: play up your crustiness and make his popularity seem like a fault.
McCain: Interesting. Can’t we just say “McCain is white and will take over the fucking world with guns?”
Ad Guy: No, there’s been a bit of a backlash due to all this war crap.
McCain: Oh, continue.
Ad Guy: Well, we start with ominous music. Then we show people chanting “O BA MA! O BA MA!”
McCain: Wait, won’t that make him seem popular?
Ad Guy: That’s the point, you old bastard. Now shut it and wait for the punchline.
McCain: Sorry.
Ad Guy: So while people are chanting, we show images of celebrities that are idiots. Paris Hilton, Brittany Spears, etc. Then people will think “Obama is a celebrity, Paris is a celebrity, Obama is the same as Paris.”
McCain: I like your logic.
Ad Guy: Then we say some of the political bullshit you insist on cramming in my ads, followed by that image of you looking into the light while you say you approve this message.
McCain: Doesn’t that clip of me looking into the light make people think of me being old and dying?
Ad Guy: That’s the point! We want people to think about how old you are. You’re the anti-young. You have so much experience that you’re almost dead.
McCain: Brilliant.
Ad Guy: That’s why you hired me.
I guess if I have to rate this, I give it a F. The backlash on this has been nothing short of sensational. Paris has even responded with this:
sjbooher: That’s it, I’m voting for Paris. That is awesome. How does Paris Hilton have a better campaign ad than McCain? And it also sounds like she already has a better handle on her running mate (Rihanna, potentially) than either of the real candidates! Ha. McCain’s ad was lazy and scatterbrained at the same time. FOCUS, MAAAAAAAN. Not to mention he just saved Obama millions of dollars as the backlash is campaign advertising in and of itself. F to the McCain ad, A+ to the Paris ad.
jtherkal: SMASH! Everyone dreams of watching people in their office get crushed by a linebacker. Bringing the wondrous violence of football from the field to the office makes for gooood watching. When Terry throws that guy into the cube, smash! What are they selling? Who cares. I remember it’s Reebok and I still, to this day, go back and watch these every once in awhile. Say what you like, but in my book that’s effective advertising. Except that as an adult, I’ve never bought a pair of Reeboks. Mostly because they make ugly shoes. Advertising can’t fix that. A.
sjbooher: Agreed. Highly entertaining. One of my favorite sounds in the world is that of a good, solid tackle. They did a great job with the sound effects and dialogue on this one, making it a classic. “That ain’t new, baby!”. A+.
jtherkal: It’s love. It’s love. It’s la la la la love. I don’t really like this commercial, but I like the song. To me, it sounds sort of like the South Park guys singing it. Here’s where this ad fails: It’s about giving someone a beer. That’s what a waitress does. The only part of sharing beer I care about is GETTING one. Save your altruistic sharing message for something un-beer-related, like pumpkin pie or something. Ad: D. Song: A. Overall: C+
sjbooher: Guess I just landed myself in CrazyTown! Are you crazy, jtherkal? This ad is awesome. You can horde your beer in the corner of your studio apartment all day and all night and drink it alone. I’ll be with my friends and non-friends alike, sharing the love. My favorite part, other than the song, is the maniacal laughter into which some of the beer recipients break, especially the old guy in the snow cabin. A+
P.S. — Can someone please put the Heineken “liquid gold” mini-keg ad on YouTube?
Hip hop duo Atmosphere recently launched a website promoting their new album, When Life Gives You Lemons. The site, paintthatshitgold.com uses a simple, but very well executed idea to get at their target audience. The site lets you “tag” any website. You simply enter the address and paintthatshitgold.com goes and gets a screen grab of the page.
Then, using their simple tools, you can paint over the page. Choose spraypaint, markers, stencils, colors, thickness, etc. It’s easy to use and fun.
When you’re finished, you can upload your image into their gallery, which has some pretty impressive work in it.
jtherkal: Bullseye. This site is fun to use and I think people generally spend some time playing around with it, all the while listening to Atmosphere’s sample tracks, which aren’t bad. I’d never head of them before, but now I bet I’ve spent almost an hour listening to their music while I paint over other sites. The kids they’re trying to reach look at graffiti as a form of art and I’d wager it’s pretty damned popular. It’s a form of rebellion, a way to make a statement and just plain fun to do. Paintthatshitgold.com does exactly what it’s designed to: Gets you to listen to Atmosphere. The fact that you can paint a mustache on an image of Hillary Clinton from a CNN page, or paint crybaby tears streaming from Kobe Bryant’s eyes is just an added bonus. Tremendous effort. A+.
sjbooher: I love Atmosphere. So rather than ranting on-and-on with a biased opinion, I’ll just hand out an A+ and keep it moving. P.S — I also love painting crybaby tears on Kobe Cryant.
sjbooher: I first heard about this on Hip-Hop news site, nahright.com. I don’t know anything about Roy Black — apparently he is famous in Germany — and I don’t even know what this is advertising. Perhaps Snoop is singing about it in German? No matter — this is awesome. Snoop coming out of a fridge? Hot girls coming out of a dishwasher and dancing around? Fabulous. A+.
jtherkal: My associate seems to ignore his own rules whenever he sees fit. Perhaps it’s because he doesn’t understand German advertising and is giving them the benefit of the doubt. I don’t deny the greatness this 40 seconds of films brings to this world, but you need to tell me what it’s for. Maybe this is just some sort of incomplete YouTube clip. I can’t give this better than a C without knowing what it’s for.
sjbooher: You are sort of right… I was just making the assumption that if I knew German, I would know what the product was.
