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Slashing Advertising - Episode #1

Archived in Television, Reviews, Advertising | No Comments

Brainstorm? Whatever. I had an idea for another feature column. And this is the FIRST episode. I’m calling it Slashing Advertising and how it works is this: we all watch television. When we see an advertisement that is trying to be clever, but failing miserably, then I slash it to bits, giving my readers a recap of the plot and three reasons why I think it fails.

Episode #1: Those Honey-Flavored Bran Bars (They taste great!)

Exhibit A: [The Product] Those Honey-Flavored Bran Bars — which, in my opinion, are actually pretty scrumptious — that everyone assumes taste like honey-coated cardboard.

Exhibit B: [The Ad] You’ve surely seen this one. A guy is on his way to work, riding the elevator and eating [The Product]. He says something like “These [The Product] sure tastes great.” The immediate response to this is that the woman riding in the elevator with him, drinking a glass of water, laughs or gasps or chokes in disbelief (call it what you will) and showers him with a spray of beverage from her mouth.

The scenario is repeated over a couple times until we reach the final act: Same guy sitting in a board room with a stereotypical meeting about to commence. The woman at the head of the table is (again) drinking a glass of water, and the fool of a protagonist about to repeat his catch phrase — “These [The Product] sure tastes great.” Instead, he pauses, waits for her to swallow the water, and — beat — says it. From behind comes the shower of water from some other woman.

Ba-Dum! Dum…. Tish!

The Case:

1) Spitting in disbelief: roughly defined refers to the act of spraying a medium pressure jet of fluid from one’s mouth in response to some kind of audible cue, specifically an unbelievable statement overheard from — in this case — a friend, or person nearby. I thought most of us learned to control this type of social faux pas back in kindergarten. Where did the population of this office go to school?

2) Let me just ask this: What kind of normal, well adjusted, middle-aged man wanders around the office eating bran bars and starting conversation with his colleagues by chanting some line about the flavor of his snack? Is this guy some kind of social retard? Are we expected to emulate him? Look up to him? Is he single? He must be.

3) In the course of a morning, our protagonist has eaten — let’s say — four bran-based, fiber bars. Perhaps his colleagues are all spitting in disbelief because the office shares a co-ed washroom? “Another one, Frank! Dude, we all have to WORK here! Your office already smells like a rendering plant.” This guy must sit there all day clenching his sphincter muscles, he’s so darn regular.

The Verdict: [The Ad] hocking [The Product] wants us to be like (let’s keep calling him) Frank. But Frank works with an odd group of spitting women, and Frank unfortunately suffers from some kind of severe social ailment which seems to be amplified by another unexplained bowel disorder. I personally eat [The Product] — occasionally, and in moderation — and [The Ad] almost makes me want to run away screaming.

This one gets a big ‘F’ — for Flatulence.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Read more posts by Andrew S (About the Author)

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Television Showdown - Episode #6

Archived in Television, Reviews | 1 Comment

This is Episode Six of my feature column, the Television Showdown on Haddow Drive where I pit two similar shows against each other on a variety of standard criteria. The criteria are always the same, and the winner of each criterion gets one point, for a maximum of five points. Winner takes all.

Episode #6
Battlestar Galactica (Remake) versus Battlestar Galactica (Original)

In this installment of the Television Showdown on Haddow Drive I ward off the cylon attacks between the old and new versions of Battlestar Galactica.

Criterion 1: Glad-I’m-Not-Them Factor
On one side of the coin we’ve got ourselves a good old fashioned disco party spaceship right of the nineteen-seventies. On the other side of the coin there is the apocalyptic human filth of the remade series. Perhaps I simply yearn for simpler times, with simpler, shinier enemies. Remake (+1)

Criterion 2: Use of Revenue Generating Product Placement
I fail to see how, say, Captain Odama drinking a Pepsi on the command deck would fit into the believability of the story. But then again, one of the main characters (in both series) is named ‘Starbuck.’ The difference, of course, is the latter is now somewhat (though completely unofficially) linked by sheer mechanics of word-DESIGN and the English language to a famous coffee company. Remake (+1)

Criterion 3: Inclusion of Primates in Cast
To the credit of the producers I have not seen a single monkey on board the remade Galactica. While I can’t say I’ve seen any on the original series, either, it’s exactly the type of (banana-flavored) cheese that would have scooped ratings in the 70s. And wasn’t Lorne Greene the host of that nature show? Original (+1)

Criterion 4: Clear and Present Reference to Adult Situations
Yes, the basis of all modern television is the logarithmic approach towards adult situations. As always, the newer the show the higher the bar. Back to the idea of a swingin’, sexy spaceship, the original could have been subtitled “pimp my viper” and had boom-chicka-boom playing in the background. Original (+1)

Criterion 5: Gratuitous Use of Four Letter Explicatives
Lacking any real gratuity on this front, we’re left to rule with the remake who has out and out contributed to geek vocabulary with their very own explicative: frak. It’s so frakking cool we gotta ignore the original in this case. Remake (+1)

OVERALL
Ignoring actual production quality, and looking solely to our own criteria, it seems it’s a narrow edge for the remade Battlestar scoring a close 3 to 2 over the original series.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Read more posts by Andrew S (About the Author)

del.icio.us Digg it Earthlink Furl iFeedReaders ma.gnolia Maple.nu Netvouz Netscape RawSugar reddit Scuttle Shadows Simpy Spurl StumbleUpon Wink Yahoo MyWeb

Posts that might have similar content:

Television Showdown Index >> Television Showdown on Haddow Drive I’m all into the feature columns so I’ve been fiddling with some ideas around a “television showdown” where I pit two similar shows against each other on a variety of standard criteria. The criteria are always the

Television Showdown - Episode #1 >> This is Episode One of my feature column, the Television Showdown on Haddow Drive where I pit two similar shows against each other on a variety of standard criteria. The criteria are always the same, and the winner of each criterion

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