Auto erotic

Do you love your car? I mean really love it. I mean, love it so much that you would like to have sex with it, metaphorically? Then you need to be driving a Cadillac.



Woman: "In today's luxury game, the question isn't whether or not your car has available features like a 40 gig hard drive."

A what? What? A 40 gig hard drive?? We're still talking about a car here, right?

Woman: "It isn't about sunroofs, or Sapele wood accents, pop-up nav screens or any of that."

I rather enjoy the supremely bored inflection she puts on "pop-up nav screens" as though (a) it was like saying the car came with seat belts and (b) the list she just read was 200 items long. Also, it's funny that you feel a need to mention all these things that it isn't about. Guess what? I think you think it's about that. Can't anyone just brag anymore with having to be all arch about it? Fucking post-modernism.

Woman: "No, the real question is... when you turn your car on, does it return the favor?"

Okay, seriously? Gross. I can't believe the unnecessary purring with which that line was delivered. And guess what doesn't appear in this commercial, which spent its first 15 seconds or so listing the features that it wasn't about? Any listing of features that qualify for "car turning you on" status. Do the features listed not play into that? Are we talking about horsepower, 0-to-60 acceleration... what the fuck are we talking about, here? Wait, I know - nothing. Is it nothing? It's nothing, isn't it? I'm just impressed they were able to work in a couple unobstructed shots of the gear shift, given that she seems to spend the rest of the commercial sitting on it.

Here's the thing: the 2008 CTS has gas mileage of 16 city / 25 highway with its standard features. That's not good even by SUV standards, let alone "upscale sedan" standards. (Note that all the 2007 CTS models finish rather low on this list. The 2008s supposedly perform better relative to the competition, to be fair, although with 16/25, I'm not sure how.) So the real question is, when you spend 35 to 40 grand on a car, and then you have to spend 50 bucks on gas every ten days, does it return the favor by buying you dinner on occasion?

Your mom thinks you're special.

Click here and view the commercial to the left of the screen.

What this commercial for the Buxton Over-the-Shoulder Organizer reminds me of is a grade school Invention Fair, where starry-eyed eight year olds show you two ketchup bottles and a salt shaker taped together, convinced that they've achieved the pinnacle of condiment engineering.

[ring ring]

Ohhhhhh nooooo! Can't find your phone in that cluttered handbag? Searching for those house keys again! Do you have to dig and dump to find what you're looking for?

Oh ho ho boy! This must be that over-the-shoulder expandable organizer I've heard so much about! It sounds so innovative! Will it be a hybrid wallet and vertical file system with color-coded tabs? And zippers! Zippers that you can label! I'm right, right?

Then you need the over-the-shoulder expandable organizer! From Buxton, makers of fine leather goods since 1898!

Okay, so what you're actually pushing here is a purse. A purse with pockets. Very nice, Billy. You get a gold star.

It's the biggest, little bag ever! [inappropriate comma placement theirs] That holds it all, and keeps it organized! [sentence fragment, also theirs] So you find what you need, in a flash! Crafted of supple, gen-you-WINE leather!

I like it when purses are hawked to me by carnival barkers.

The Buxton organizer has this outer pouch for your phone! You'll never miss a call again! Don't lug around a heavy tote! Watch!! As the Buxton organizer turns this jumbled mess into an organized success!

I don't think you need to have taken a chemistry class to understand that you're not making the bag any lighter than the "heavy tote," unless the argument is that a leather handbag is lighter than a canvas tote bag. All you're doing is rearranging your mess into a differently-shaped mess.

And it's expandable! Store two regular sized water bottles, AND an umbrella!

This'll be great for when I go on safari!

Amazing! With the Buxton organizer, you're hands-free, making travel a breeze and shopping a pleasure!

If there's anything that women hate, it's shopping. Thank god this purse came along to change all that. I mean, this over-the-shoulder expandable organizer.

Look! A regular handbag can get stolen! But, with Buxton organizer's adjustable shoulder strap, it's always secure!

Any bag can get stolen. The only difference here is that the woman is still wearing the handbag while she sits at the table (very comfortable) rather than hanging it on the back of her chair. This is a change in behavior, not a magic handbag. If she didn't leave her purse hanging behind her where she couldn't see it, like a dumbass, she wouldn't have had this problem in the first place.

There's a special wallet compartment for easy reach, and handy slots for your credit cards!

At this point, the commercial lists all of the things that you could put into pockets. Credit cards, business cards, parking stubs, appointment cards, coupons, driver's license, social security card. Why stop there? Three nickels! Five cigarettes! A pack of gum! Your dignity!

By the way, social security card in your everyday purse is a no-no. Take that piece of advice as a freebie from the AdWizards, Buxton.

You'll be so organized, you can even find what you need with a blindfold! You could pay over a hundred dollars for a similar designer bag! Get the Buxton organizer in gen-you-WINE leather for only $19.95!

Wow, lady, that cheap-ass purse sure goes great with your BUSINESS SUIT.

There's more! [promo for a digital voice recorder, which incidentally retails two for $9.99 at your neighborhood Walgreens]

My point is, if it's a great purse, by all means just tell us it's a great purse, which happens to have a bunch of pockets and an an adjustable strap that can be worn over the shoulder or cross-body. You haven't reinvented the wheel, so you damn sure didn't need to take four times as a long as a regular commercial to promote your product.

Advertising from 40,000 feet, Part the Whatever

I have a feeling SkyMall knows how easy it is to make fun of them. Other sites lampoon their products, too. So, I don't feel bad about these kind of posts. Without further ado....


Ohhh. Yes, please do. Let's take a look at some of these catalog items to see what we can use that thoughtful gift certificate on....

***

Do you crave the delicious taste of convenience store food without the inconvenient drive?

So glad this is finally available. I often cook 8 hot dogs at a time and think to myself, "Why can't there be a easier, goofier way to do this?"

1950s diner-style dogs roll in from the past!

So... this is some kind of culinary time machine, too? Or does it come with relic hot dogs from the 1950's?

***

Do you suffer from muscle tension? Try our patented Neckpro Traction Device, new from Kevorkian Home Solutions Enterprises....

"Noooo! Don't significantly reduce neck pain, Harold! You have so much to live for!"

***

SkyMall has delivered us from the indignity of getting hammered on luke-warm alcohol....

Nothing goes down smoother than an ice-cold shot of your favorite liquor.

Nothing. That shot's going down smoother than a Sig Ep's pickup line. Even mineral water is going to taste like hot tar compared to fifteen-degree SoCo, baby.

Features LED illumination for an eye-catching bottle display.

And you'll be too shit-faced to notice that the eye-catching bottle display is upside down.

Simply attach your bottle of choice and let the liquor drop to a temperature colder than ice

Gee, sounds even simpler than placing your bottle of choice into your freezer, which would have the same effect.

Does the name "Lil' Chill Shot" sounds a little too like a Polly Pocket toy for something that could dispense 190-proof Everclear at a frat party?

***

Reality check: This man is unironically wearing a neon electric guitar-emblazoned jump suit....

Day-omn. That dude is getting the lad-ies! I hope they have baby blue Smurf Jammerz in adult sizes, too.

***

For the high-street man-about-town with more than one, but fewer than six, designer timepieces....
Protect Your Expensive Watches...
.... by placing them in this easy-to-steal, convenient carrying case for the burglar with an eye for fine wrist-wear.

Looks great on dresser, too.

Sometimes even SkyMall simply runs out of things to say. "Looks great next to clarinet case in late afternoon sunlight on a windowsill of a Connecticut farm house."

***

So, still not sure what to do with that SkyMall gift certificate? When faced with the choice between worthless crap, and hilarious worthless crap, I think the only thing to do is: regift the gift certificate.

Vote or diet

One of the hoariest expressions in the English language is "The road to Hell is paved with good intentions." That's probably a little strong for this Pizza Hut ad, but no matter how nobly-intentioned it is, it's really just not any good.



"Say, did you hear about RECENT POLITICAL NEWS? Those fat cats should do what's best for the common, pizza-eating man! I may just vote on LUDICROUSLY OVER-GENERALIZED POLICY ISSUE!"

Perhaps it's because the spot doesn't actually sell their product, but Pizza Hut doesn't seem to have given this ad much of a budget. It looks like it was filmed with two theater majors on the first day of improv class; I refuse to insult Pizza Hut's marketing team by suggesting that any of the dialogue actually needed to be written down on paper.

Guy 1: "What's up?"
Guy 2: "Just eating some pizza. Check this out. Look at all these presidential candidates talking about change. They're gonna change this, change that... know what I'd like? A little extra change in my pocket."

Sir, I congratulate you. A play on words worthy of Shakespeare. Seriously, could that joke be any older? I think the first recorded use was in this vaudeville routine from 1896:

Archibald T. Blatherschmidt: "I say, Bartleby, that William Jennings Bryan is always talking about silver. Silver this, silver that... know what I'd like?"
Bartleby J. Straightman: "What is it that you would like, Archibald?"
Archibald T. Blatherschmidt: "A little extra silver in my pocket!"
[general merriment]

Guy 1: "I hear you. I may just sit this election out!"
Guy 2: "No, come on, man, you've got a voice! Go use it! You know, you can change history if you just vote."
Guy 1: "Yeah, you're right - I'm voting!"

I hope he isn't that easily swayed when it comes to policy issues. The youth vote has been notoriously hard to mobilize, but the idea of millions of college kids marching to the polls because Pizza Hut told them to is a little weird, isn't it? And what kind of twisted logic leads you to conclude that an unhappiness with the current state of political affairs - whatever that means in this excessively generic case - means that not voting is the best idea, even if you're only concluding that for two seconds until your roommate uses his powers of persuasion on you?

Guy 1: "How about sharing a slice of pizza for a change?"

Ooh, callback! Nice, dude. Very nice.

Guy 2: "Dude, I... two??"

Well, that fell apart in a hurry, didn't it? Archibald Blatherschmidt's Sideshow of Mirth always made much more graceful exits. They just don't make 'em like they used to.

I'm just confused. Did this win some student film contest of which we were not notified? Was this the only take shot with the lens cap off? There has to be some reason for why something so generally limp and shoddy made it to air, doesn't there? I appreciate the sentiment, Pizza Hut, but given the cynicism of the demographic you're targeting, I think you needed something just a little less shitty. Not every argument on the merits of voting can begin and end with, "No, dude, you totally should." And give Pizza Hut credit for not sticking a product shill into the ad - the Pizza Mia box gets placement, of course, but you kind of have to already know what it is to really recognize it as anything other than a generic Pizza Hut box - but it's kind of odd to see an ad that doesn't pitch a product, especially when the election is still more than nine months away. Think of all the kids rolling out of bed on November 5. "Hey, man, were we supposed to do something for Pizza Hut yesterday?" "Shit, dude, I don't know. You up for some Taco Bell?"

You've gotta put Mercury on your zzzzzz

Sometimes I wonder if certain companies even have ad agencies. Watch this Mercury ad and try to tell me it wasn't assembled in-house.



When Ford, which also has cars that run SYNC, made an ad showing off the feature, it made it a funny one. Not jaw-droppingly hilarious or anything like it probably wanted to be, but at least it went for a joke. So what does Mercury do when presented with the opportunity to sell the same feature?

Woman: "Can your car play every song you own? Play track 'Let It Roll.'"

Oh, that famous song "Let It Roll," by that famous band Common Sense. They're famous. What on earth was the budget for this ad? Remember, Ford owns Mercury; it seems telling that they went with relatively big-name artists Smashing Pumpkins and Korn for their own ads but foisted a "reggae/pop" band off on Mercury, apparently the red-headed stepchild of the Ford family. Although really, none of those bands has been popular since 1999 or so.

Woman: "And can it make phone calls, all at the sound of your voice? Call Amy."
Woman on phone: "Hi, this is Amy!"
Woman: "Be right there!"

What the hell? That's a conversation? First of all, you're both super boring. Second of all, why does Amy answer the phone like she's practicing her answering machine greeting?

Woman: "If it's the attention-getting Mercury Milan, it can."

When you have to throw in an editorial like that, it's pretty clear you're just making shit up. What is attention-getting about a pedestrian-looking mid-size car? Do they all come with "Featuring the awesome power of SYNC" stenciled on the hood in spray paint? Ooh, you could put some bad-ass flames around it - that would turn some heads. Wait, what's that? It's a totally boring, could-be-any-other-car model? Awesome. Of course, this isn't the first time Mercury has tried rather limply to make the Milan sound even remotely appealing.

My favorite parts of this ad are the several seconds of dead air right after the song starts playing - because we all needed the women to shut up so we could drink in the car's ability to drive in a straight line - and after the announcer gives the lease price, apparently so we have time to read the tiny, unreadable lease boilerplate without distraction. Are you sure you don't want to tell us anything else about the car you could have squeezed into those extra five seconds, guys? Just the one third-party feature? Okay.

Woman: "You've gotta put Mercury on your list."

I promise that if, at the end of this year, we do a "Most Stultifying Ads of 2008" post, I will put Mercury on my list. You have my word on that.

Subway: Eat bench.

When he signed his various endorsement deals, I'm guessing Brady Quinn thought he'd be getting a lot more playing time.



That is just unfortunate. Does standing around watching other people play football qualify as you being "busy"? Come on, Brady, that's a sweet sandwich delivery gig. You're going to need to keep your legs in shape in case you ever do get to start.

This is why no college football fan likes Notre Dame, for the record. Why is the backup quarterback for the Cleveland Browns getting endorsement deals? Oh, because he went to Notre Dame. Guess what? Big deal. Did he win the Heisman like fellow Subway pitchman Reggie Bush? No. Did he ever win a bowl game? No. Has he thrown more than eight passes in the pros? No. Couldn't we at least wait until he starts a game before we sign him up, advertisers?

Additional Scoops of Idiocy

Kellogg's ran an ad for Raisin Bran Crunch not too long ago that we here at Ad Wizards thought was an asinine, tortured, 30-second turd fest. Well, good news for turd fest aficionados: Kellogg's has apparently deemed that ad worthy of turning into a campaign:



In the spirit of cooperation, I'll assume this commercial is intended to be tongue-in-cheek, and I won't go into it line-by-line. But I would like to ask a few general questions:

1. Does something as vanilla as a bran cereal with dried fruit really attract "superfans"?
2. Is the idea of a bran cereal "superfan" supposed to be the basis for the "humorous" absurdity in these ads?
3. Does absurdity sell a lot of boxes of cereal?

Maybe Kellogg's knows the answers to those questions. Or maybe they have no idea, and they're just throwing shit against a wall and seeing what sticks. Either way, I guess they have a concept for an ad here. However, the "punchline" of the ad doesn't work. You have three Raisin Bran Crunch fans on a pilgrimage to the Raisin Bran Crunch plant. They are each eating cereal while driving in a vehicle emblazoned with the Raisin Bran Crunch logo and sporting a Sun mascot mirror dangler. All the while they're talking exclusively about Raisin Bran Crunch. Then, we have this:

Backseat Guy: You know what will really get us in the spirit? (singing) 99 boxes of Raisin Bran Crunch, if you're nice to me, I'll share some with you...

Passenger Seat Guy: ... (silence, turns head slowly, shocked expression)

Okay, no, dude. You are eating a bowl of Raisin Bran Crunch in a car with 2 other people doing the same while traveling to see where Raisin Bran Crunch is made. You are certified, batshit insane. You cannot believably express surprise at anyone else's actions. You cannot believably act shocked at anything!

I have an idea for the next installment of this campaign: our colorful trio of RBC boosters decide they want to meet their mascot-hero face-to-face. So they volunteer to pilot NASA's first, and only, manned mission to the Sun. As they near the center of our solar system, the cheerful chords of "99 Boxes of Raisin Bran Crunch" fade away softly as their space shuttle, decorated with bright red Kellogg's logos, is incinerated at 5,778 degrees Kelvin. Tagline: Kellogg's Raisin Bran Crunch: Remember, it's bran and dead grapes. Don't overdo it.

I want more, more, more of that reckless overstatement I've been looking for

Diet Dr. Pepper's ads have long been a little... odd. For a while, the jingle ran, "I want more, more, more, of that Dr. Pepper flavor I've been looking for." You know how you might get that? Regular Dr. Pepper. Then it was "Diet Dr. Pepper tastes more like regular Dr. Pepper!" More like it than what? You know what tastes most like it? Regular Dr. Pepper.



Um... what? There's another one in this series I couldn't find online where a six-pack of Diet Dr. Pepper actually walks across the grocery store to the "dessert aisle," because its taste is so "rich and decadent." What? Look, I realize that the comparison being made is mostly to other diet sodas, and yes, it's true that among diet sodas, Diet Dr. Pepper is near the top as far as closest facsimiles of the regular product. But let's not go fucking crazy here. Diet soda is not fooling anyone into thinking it's the same thing as eating a cupcake. It is not "decadent." No one is going to be all, "I'm cheating on my diet! This is so rich and sweet, it must be loaded with calories!" *turns can around* "Oh my God!!!!" Even regular Dr. Pepper is not "rich" or "decadent." It's pop, for crap's sake. It's not a five-dollar truffle or a slice of Black Forest cake. It's not a double-thick chocolate milkshake or two scoops of chocolate chip ice cream smothered in hot fudge. It's a goddamn can of pop. Calm the hell down.

From the makers of Dr. Frankenstein's Throat Lozenges....

Having trouble bringing the deceased back to life? Well, the answer's here: Theraflu.


Hey, it doesn't just clear your sinuses. Check out this info from the Theraflu Warming Relief bottle:

Uses
- temporarily relieves:
- minor aches and pains - headache - runny nose - loss of life - unending purgatory - ancient curse compelling you to walk the streets as a miserable specter for eternity - minor throat pain

Seriously, are we talking about a cold and flu symptom medication, or are we talking about some miracle drug that can raise the dead? And if you are in possession of such a product, do you really keep it in your kitchen cabinet, next to the plates?

It's a curious ad. And at first the image of the demon cat didn't make a lot of sense to me, then I read the bottle label more closely:

Directions
- do not use more than directed
- adults and children 12 years of age or older: take 2 tablespoons
- bring offerings forth to the sacred Red Cat God before ingesting dose
- do not take more than 6 doses in 24 hours (unless Red Cat God decrees it)

Theraflu. Good to be back.... from the fiery depths of Hell!

Classic nonsense.

Did you ever wonder what crazy smells like? You need go no further than the king of bizarre abstract ads, Calvin Klein.



Can you believe that these ads targeted people who wanted to be attractive to other people? I would have guessed cyborgs or zombies.