Wow, there's a sentence I never thought I'd say.

I'm talking about that commercial for Pepto-Bismol, the one where the advertising icons come to life and start attacking the city. They're crushing buildings with their feet and generally causing havoc everywhere. And then they get upset stomach and diarrhea. Maybe from all of the people they've been eating or something. Now, this seems like great news for the world. The giants will get sick and stop attacking the world, maybe even die, never hurting the world again. It would at least give the city some time to figure out what to do with the giants, blow them up or drug them or tie them up or something.

So why do they send in a helicopter with a giant bottle of Pepto? Why do they want to help the giants, make them feel better? The giants take the medicine, and the commercial ends with the monsters continuing to attack the city.

???

I guess the prospect of giants having diarrhea all over the city was worse than him stepping on people and crushing buildings.

This is a really old Rocky and Bullwinkle opening clip complete with a General Mills product placement. I love how products were made a part of these old shows rather than today's method of sneaking in product placements. Hell, we know you can't have a show without advertisements, you might as well make it blatant. I'd love to turn on the TV and watch Colgate presents: Lost. Or something like that. Both Rocky and Bullwinkle also appeared in television and print ads for General Mills cereals, including Cheerios.

Oh yeah, and I love the theme song. Check it out:

What is it with cereals and free movie offers? Every time I see a box of cereal that says you can get a free movie, the movies are usually really...how can I put this...lame?

Take the new offer on boxes of Product 19 (a cereal I haven't had in years but decided to eat again). The movies you can get are Dunston Checks In, Cocoon, Lucas, Cheaper By The Dozen (the remake), Nine Months, Thumbelina, The Pick-Up Artist, and Breaking Away. OK, so a few of those movies are actually pretty good, but I'm talking more about the offer itself. Aren't these movies you can probably get in the discount bin at Best Buy for $9.99 or less anyway? How did they come up with these titles?

I mean, seriously: Dunston Checks In??

I was just watching a commercial for Colgate Total, and the woman in the ad is going on and on about how much she likes it, that her doctor recommended that she use it, etc, etc, and then she uses this line:

"It's the only toothpaste I use."

Well, so what? I'm sure the product is fine, but who switches toothpastes regularly? I think most people find a toothpaste that they like and they stick with it forever. They might switch to a different flavor or something, but I would be that very few people completely switch their toothpaste.

Not that they couldn't, of course, because there are approximately 3000 different types of toothpastes now. It takes me about 10 minutes just to find the one that I always use (Crest gel) because it's lost in all the other flavors and styles. Gah. Sometimes I think choice is a really bad thing.

• Microsoft is on the cusp of launching a $500 million campaign for the debut of its Vista operating system. That buys a lot of TV spots and banner ads but, ironically, only about a dozen copies of the software itself.
• With all the stories that have been printed lately about how Crispin Porter & Bogusky and how its work hasn't actually helped its clients, it's not that surprising to see a story like this that reminds us how wonderful and creative they are.
  
• Marketers are questioning just who the glamorous productions that are the upfront presentations are actually meant for. Networks could start to rein in how extravagant their shows are in the future under pressure that these are more shows than they are business meetings.

I was attracted to these Mentos ads because I loved the artwork on them. I'm a total sucker for anything artistic, especially in advertising. I think you have to go back a few decades to find ads that can truly stand as works of art in their own right.

Anyway, I was so enamored by the images it didn't even register that not only are the geniuses depicted in these ads eating a mint that didn't even exist yet, but that the ads are also suggesting that somehow the chalky mints give people ideas. Actually, it was LittleJohn at Advertising for Peanuts who pointed it out. Regardless, I still think they're great, and I'd love to see more ads with that kind of artistic detail. It really is a throwback to the print ads of the '50s and '60s.

The newest ad from Cisco jumps on the viral video craze, but I wonder if it confuses as many viewers who it attracts.

It's the one that shows the kid in the kitchen dancing, and he's filmed via cell phone camera by his dad. The video is put online and it becomes a sensation, a la that Star Wars kid on the "Lazy Sunday" video. Kids are watching it, the entire population of China is watching it, it's even broadcast on the big screen in Times Square.

First of all, I don't think any viral video has gotten that kind of attention. Second, the video seems to be perfect and flawless, on every screen it is shown on. And the way the ad is edited it seems like it's going over the web live, straight from cell phone to the web.

Will most people even know what Cisco is and why they are advertising?

You've seen the commercials: a guy puts on some Axe body spray and/or body wash and he goes from being a nebbish to being mobbed in a way somewhere between the way that the Beatles were mobbed by women in the 60s and a Caligula-era orgy. I was wondering: does this really work? Is there some ingredient in Axe that makes the ladies go crazy?

Short answer: no. Long answer: no.

I used the stuff last week for three days in a row. I used the body wash and also sprayed the stuff on, and in three different situations I was completely ignored by females. Unless you count the clerk at the supermarket asking me "Do you have your Shaw's card?" as foreplay. Same thing at Border's Books and Bed, Bath, and Beyond.

Of course, I'm not saying the stuff doesn't work. Maybe I'm using it wrong?

I always get a little bummed out after the holidays. I really love Thanksgiving and Christmas and New Year's, and it's always sort of a letdown when Jan 2 comes around and we're back to the same old grind and same old "feeling" to the year. I don't mind if there are holiday specials after January 2 or if people have their lights up after New Year's Day.

But I think that January 22 and beyond is a little too much.

There's a new commercial for Special K cereal that shows a mom dressed in red and white, next to her family's Christmas tree, and her daughter calls her "Santa!" She then realizes she's too fat and needs to lose weight so she goes to the cupboard to eat Special K (is that how dieting works, you're overweight so you go to the kitchen to get something to eat?). "Joy to the World" plays in the background, the family is under the tree, and the dad helps the kid with her toys.

Merry Christmas, it's almost Valentine's Day.

The truth can finally be told: McDonald's is inserting single-frame subliminal ads into Food Network's programming. If you don't believe me, just watch the video below. Soon we'll all be kneeling at the foot of a bronze Grimace statue while confusedly scratching at the horseshoe-shaped sutures on our shaved heads. Take heed!

Then again, maybe it was just a glitch, and maybe, just maybe, it was proved half a century ago that subliminal advertising doesn't work. However, the obvious answer is rarely as entertaining, so I like to imagine that somewhere in an underground bunker Ronald McDonald is ranting and raving like Dr. Strangelove and demanding more images of McDonald's be planted on television so he can build an army of mind slaves and take over the world. I shall lay down my life for my new bichrome overlord.

Continue reading Cinema Shilling Shenanigans: 1/19/07

I like those Staples commercials that have the big red button. You can even buy the button in stores, though I keep forgetting to pick one up. Might be a cool thing to keep on my desk.

Now I've noticed that Office Depot has a new campaign, though I'd have to say it's a bit creepier than a button. In the new ads, the ones that feature the song "Whooooooa, Office Depot, Whoooooa!", employees and customers use a hand that pops out of a box to direct them to products around the store. Sort of like Thing from The Addams Family.

My question is, does every store get their own hand? Whose hands are they? Can the hands think and feel and dream about a life outside of the box?

I'll stick with the button. I don't want to think about severed limbs when I shop for pens.

Yes, I'm one of those people, the ones who watch the Super Bowl for the commercials. I have no interest in football whatsoever.*

I'm a tennis and baseball fan (my brief affair with basketball stopped when the Celtics stopped being good, too long ago to remember), but I never miss the Super Bowl even though on most days I'd rather watch a Sex and the City marathon than watch football. I get involved in the pre-game hype of the commercials, what the ads cost, who is going to advertise when, how many ads a particular company has during the show, and even the post-game analysis the next day, usually in USA Today, where they have people watch the ads with meters and pick their favorites and least favorites (Budweiser wins many years, and I've never understood that). So I'm looking forward to the game in a few weeks, and we'll have full coverage of the ads here at Adjab.

*Of course, if the Patriots make it, this could all change.

I was watching Demetri Martin's new special on Comedy Central last night (funny, as usual). Can someone tell me what the hell was going on with those Microsoft Vista ads that ran throughout the hour? I know that Martin is a spokesman for the product, and he even starred in some of the spots, but they were very confusing and offputting, especially if you tuned into the special halfway through and didn't hear anything about Microsoft Vista.

Actually, the whole idea behind the ads makes me think someone at the ad agency or Microsoft is a Lost fan. The old guy in charge of an odd secret organizations (The Institute For Advanced Personhood), telling you to go to a site that will help you get rid of your clutter, the retro look of the spots, the use of old footage and computers. Very Hanso-ish, very viral. But I wonder if they're too odd to be successful?

I always thought that AAA's commercials were rather clever. Especially the tag line, which was "Sooner or later, you'll break down and join AAA." I thought it was a great play on words and simply told what AAA does and why it's important to be a member. And that's not easy to do in one slogan.

So I'm a little confused as to why they seem to have changed their slogan. Actually, the new line is so mundane that I swear I've completely forgotten what it is, even though I just heard it about 10 minutes ago. That's never a good sign when you're trying to get the consumer's attention.

First there was Cocaine the energy drink. Now there's Meth coffee. The new coffee shop in San Francisco offers high-caffeine coffee that includes yerba mate, a natural stimulant used by shamans in the Amazon for increased energy and more of a philosophical buzz.. I'm not sure I buy all that, but I don't drink coffee, either.

"Meth Coffee" was created by an anarchist and conspiracy theorist who goes by the name "The Roaster." Seems somewhat silly to me, but I guess we'll see where the concept takes him.

I grew up in the '80s, and like anyone who was a child during that decade, it is my god-given right to cram every bit of pop culture from that era down your throat. For example, do you remember the Honey Comb Hideout from the Honey Comb Cereal commercials? If not, that's okay, I'll be sending people to your house to tie you to your chair and force you to watch this until that damn Honey Comb song is stuck in your brain just like it's been stuck in mine since I was seven years old.

One of these ads features Andre the Giant, which is pretty cool. The other teaches kids how to deal with the problem of grown ups who know kung fu and want to steal your cereal. That may not seem like a real problem, but trust me, Steven Segal has tried to steal my cereal on nine consecutive occasions. It gets really annoying after awhile.