jtherkal: I hate KISS. And even though I can’t deny the “little kiss of cherry” in Dr. Pepper leading into a little person KISS band is marginally clever, if offensive, I still hate KISS. I hate little KISS just a little less. D-.
sjbooher: Sometimes I don’t “get” things. I didn’t “get” “little kiss of cherry”. When you couple that with my similar hatred? F-.
jtherkal: Advertising today is going in new and strange directions. Dr. Pepper certainly recognizes the role YouTube is going to play in it all. Until a few weeks ago, I had never heard of Tay Zonday, but a million other people had. Just a guy making a song. For some reason or another, mostly because it’s ridiculous, millions (over 20 million views!) of people watched his video. So what does Diet Cherry Cholocolate Dr. Pepper do? Give him some production dollars and put a video on youtube. Was it a waste of money? Over four million views say no. He moves away from the mic so he can breathe! The only bad thing I have to say about this is the ending. They didn’t need anything more than the bottle being splashed. That terrible cherry chocolate logo, which was apparently created by someone vomiting design elements into a blender, then blending it and pouring it into a “terrible logo” mold, was unnecessary. A-.
And need I mention the strange awfulness of “Diet Cherry Chocolate Dr. Pepper”? I can’t even begin to fathom what that tastes like.
sjbooher: Tay is awesome, “Chocolate Rain” is above and beyond awesome, and the idea of this video is absolutely brilliant. While I cannot say I think the end product is perfect — I would have wanted the product featured a little more prominently and told Mista Johnson he can be in “the next one” — it does not matter. Millions of views are getting the brand out there. B-.