sjbooher: Whaaaaaaat? Bud can actually come up with a semi-original/creative joke and dip down to the lowest common denominator? Amazing. C+
jtherkal: A house made of beer cans. I like that idea, but it falls apart from there, literally. Bud Light in a fridge made of Bud Light saves this one from falling lower than it did. B-.
sjbooher: I wish more people read this so I could find someone that could tell me the word for the emotion that commercials like this one make me feel. Honestly people, help a vocabulary-challenged brother out. The music… the sweet little boy… it’s supposed to make you feel all good inside, then you chuckle at the wind blowing out the candle… then you smile at the end. When I see it, I cringe, and I think “rip my eyeballs out, please.” I guess it’s an interesting way to talk about Wind Energy, though. B-
jtherkal: Wow, rip my eyeballs out, then a B-? That type of feeling is usually warrants an F. Maybe the word you’re looking for is cynical? Or repugnance? This was pretty weak, but in no way did it make me want to rip my eyeballs out. B.
sjbooher: Well, repugnance is what I do feel, but I’m looking for the description of the feeling that causes the repugnance. I literally do not even know how to explain what I am talking about, but I have this feeling often.
sjbooher: Booorrrrrrrr-ing. Boring and not funny. Mob themes are so overused at this point that it is extremely difficult to come up with something with originality. On top of that, this spot pales in comparison to the other Denny’s one, which was one of the best ads of the night. Nanerpus! The lone redeeming quality is the announcement of the free Grand Slam, which is an amazing promotion. D.
jtherkal: Boring? Nah. I can’t argue with mob themes being played out, but when that waitress draws the whipped cream face on the pancakes–it’s comedy! I love it! (begin Brian Fellows voice) That face is silly. (/Brian Fellows voice) Unfortunately, this should have been an ad for whipped cream, how it can make every situation fun or whatever. Instead, they roundabout you with some Denny’s stuff about having a serious breakfast. I don’t really think of Denny’s as serious anything. Not with Moons Over My Hammy. B-.
sjbooher: Try the Denny’s just off the 5 in the hidden California oil country. DEFINITELY serious breakfast.
sjbooher: I’ve never had the problem of ordering flowers and them being delivered in a box. Does that even happen? Also, the girl is not even unattractive. If you are going to be cruel and mean, be cruel and mean. They could have gone so many different and better ways with the “what the box says” concept, that I am disappointed in the result. D+.
jtherkal: Maybe we don’t send our girls enough flowers. I don’t know anything about flowers in boxes. But if your best claim is that you don’t put your flowers in a box, maybe you need to take another look at your business. The flowers are sort of funny, and I remembered this spot after the Super Bowl. B-.
sjbooher: So, yes, I may be an idiot. I was informed of an alternative interpretation of this ad. It could be the most beautiful woman in the world, but the fact that the flowers are in a box tells the women she’s not hot… even if she is. I get it now. Slight upgrade. C-
jtherkal: Royal Tenenbaums/Rushmore wannabe. Wonder if Wes Anderson directed this one. Probably not, don’t think it’s quite good enough. I guess if I can get past the fact that this seems like a total ripoff (and doesn’t everything nowadays?), I sort of like this. It clearly delivers the message, even if you’re good at stuff, buying a car can be intimidating. And the fact that the pie chart said “roughhousing” counts for something in my book. Originality, F. Overall, B-.
sjbooher: Not my type of comedy, and too long for the pay off. C-.
jtherkal: If only monkeys weren’t passe, this would be great. In fact, it’s amazing that we haven’t already seen a “grease monkey” ad during the monkey bonanza we’ve experienced over the last four or five years. They did up the ante by going with the man-monkey kiss at the end, which I didn’t expect. I just can’t give this a bad grade, even though I really do think monkey commercials have seen their day. B-.
sjbooher: Boring. Nothing to see here, moving along. C-.
jtherkal: Hmmmm…they did everything right here. Some action, some comedy, a celebrity. So why am I not impressed. I guess this doesn’t seem like Audi’s personality. At least the first 30-seconds, which take jabs at other luxury car makers (Lexus is for old people!), seems a bit low-brow for Audi. And I spend the first half of the ad thinking about BMW and Mercedes. B-.
sjbooher: Lexus for old people? What? Somebody missed the entire 90s when a Lexus was one of the hottest and most desirable cars on the streets. Anyway, as entertainment, this is good. As an Audi ad, horrible, especially during the Super Bowl when people are at parties and you’re lucky if they watch 5 seconds of your joint, much less a full minute or whatever before you show your product. F.
sjbooher: In the final presidential debate, after Obama pretty much blamed the country’s current position on the failure of the Bush administration, McCain struck back, saying something like “I am not President Bush. If you wanted to run against him, you should have run 4 years ago.” It was one of the few times in the debates that McCain seemed to win with a slick comment. This ad comes on the heels of that, strikes right back, and makes McCain look foolish. This is probably classified as a “negative” ad, but it’s the kind of “negative” ad that I think is ok. It’s not a character attack or mud-slinging. It focuses on policy tendencies of the candidate. This is well done, especially given the less than 24-hour turnaround. After seeing those clips of McCain making those ridiculous faces, it is hard to think of him as “presidential”. A.
jtherkal: I have mixed feelings about that whole situation. The question about negative ads in the debate made me feel very uncomfortable. It’s been fairly clear to me that Obama’s “negative” ads have been critical of McCain’s policies, not about his personality. This seems to stray a little from that, and seems like a reaction to Obama’s failure to lambaste McCain when he made that “clever” comment about not being Bush. Many viewed that moment as a victory for McCain, like he really told Obama. So while the ad is okay, it’s a reaction to Obama missing an opportunity to throw those same points in McCain’s face when he was trying to be snarky. Telling me about McCain’s tendencies doesn’t tell me about Obama’s plans, or about the faults in McCain’s actual plans. B-.
sjbooher: For all intents in purposes, despite being a Hip-Hop pioneer and an all-time great when the first half or so of his career is considered, LL has been on cruise control for around a decade or so. That being said, he is — and has been — mainstream enough, that he’s one of the few Hip-Hop representatives that I have found myself often encountering when around mixed (the Hip-Hop ignorant and the non-ignorant) company over years. As a result, I’ve been in the weird spot of having to defend someone whom I would trash if discussing with a different set of people. This dates back to watching some award show in college when some Michigan girl made an ignorant comment about LL’s outfit, which I found equally ridiculous but for much different reasons. I had to defend him. With this ad, at least I legitimately like it, regardless of audience. Funny, and I even now own Old Spice Swagger! Yes, ladies and germs (word to Garfield), Ads That Work. A.
jtherkal: Joke in a can alert! Someone cool used to be a nerd? This is mildly funny and not quite up to the standard of advertising that Old Spice has set for itself over the last year or so. I do like, “Now look at me. Nice.” After Deep Blue Sea, I can’t really take anything LL does seriously. I mean, genetically enhanced, super smart sharks? Wait, I should love that, right? I don’t love this, but I certainly don’t hate it. B-. Swagger is a pretty good name, though.
And for the record, I ALWAYS thought is was “for all intensive purposes.” And I now believe it to be “for all intents and purposes,” not “in purposes.”
sjbooher: Yes, I know it is “intents and purposes”… typo. The most likely reason jtherkal and I fight one day — his incessant grammar correction, WHEN HE AS NO SPELLING ABILITY especially when it comes to people’s names (which I think is sacred). And he legitimately thinks I do not know the correct answer, not considering the possibility of typos.
jtherkal: I’m not sure if this ever aired on television, even in a shortened form. But it’s another example of how YouTube advertising can be effective in driving traffic to a website. I wasn’t sure exactly what this was for, but I love the stop motion version of human “snakes.” It made me curious enough to visit get-out-and-play.com. They have a pretty cool version of the breakout game there, using real people as the paddle, ball and targets. The problem is, even after seeing the video multiple times and visiting the site, I still wasn’t sure what it was for. I just went back to find out. My initial thought was that it’s some sort of public service announcement encouraging kids to get out and play. If that was so, it seemed counter-intuitive to put a video game on the site. Well, it’s not a PSA. It’s for Nokia N-Gage, whatever that is. Some sort of gaming thing you have to download for your Nokia phone, which I don’t have. So ultimately, it’s a cool video that doesn’t really learn me. Plus, typing in that website name with the dashes is really annoying. Someone should have tested that. B-.
sjbooher: Despite his high grade, jtherkal’s argument proves my reason for a low grade. I’m interested for about 15 aseconds, then it becomes AEM that advertises nothing since no one’s paying attention by the end. And then, apparently, you can go to the website and STILL not know what the hell’s going on. F.