What the Hawk?

I sympathize with makers of local commercials. You're tasked with standing out amid a sea of high-budget national ads that never fail to make your spots look even cheaper than they already would. With that in mind, I can see why a company might opt to borrow ideas from a national campaign for their local ad. However, the eTrade baby is not the one I would have gone with.



Baby: "I'm looking cool in this car! This thing is a stroller magnet! I should work on my pick-up lines."

First of all: no. You should not do that, because you are a baby. Also, note that the baby's body never moves, which is kind of disturbing and just makes him look like a tiny quadriplegic.

Baby: "Hey girl, you need a nap? 'Cause you been crawling through my mind all day."

As awful as the eTrade ads were with their implications of babies having sex with each other, I'm not sure this isn't more blatant than any of those. Baby pick-up lines? Someone really thought this was a good idea?

Baby: "Wow. I'm slaying it!"
[Mom in front seat rolls her eyes]

"Ha! Man. My infant son thinks he's, like, the hottest shit. And he's so not. I would never fuck him if he used that line on me."

Baby: "How about, dang, girl! That diaper's looking good on you."

How about not? How about I'm three seconds away from clawing my own eyes out and shoving them into my ears?

Baby: "What are you, a size 18 months? Yeah, I like my girls a little chubby."
Announcer: "You want some chubby?"

What? What the fuck are you talking about? If this is reliant on me having seen previous ads in whatever fucking series this is, or knowing Hawk Ford's shitty dealership slogan, that is a BAD idea, because I live in Chicago, watch a lot of TV, write about ads as a hobby, and yet can't recall ever seeing one of their ads before. If it's not reliant on that... WHAT?

Announcer: "Chubby discounts. Chubby savings."

WHAT. THE. FUCK. ARE. YOU. TALKING. ABOUT.

Does Hawk Ford know that "chubby" is also a slang term involving the penis? Were they going for that pun? When the baby says that he likes his girls "a little chubby," is that intended to be a play on words, in that he might also have a "little chubby?" Because if so, I want to drive down to Oak Lawn and light that entire dealership on fire.

And if they don't know that, and they weren't going for that pun... what in the hell were they going for?

By the way: "Chubby discounts, chubby savings" isn't even Hawk Ford's normal slogan, as evidenced by these other ads in this campaign. So... a baby calling another baby fat was just so hilarious we had to alter our whole ad to be built around it, in spite of the fact that it makes no goddamn sense? For fuck's sake, at least those other ads use the baby for semi-legit reasons. With this one it just seems like there was a bet in the office about how horrible a commercial they could make and still get it on the air.

Viagra for Your Beard

So you want to add some computer animation into your ad. Don't blame you -- it's the "in" thing to do. What you might want to avoid? Creepy, Lidsville-esque, CGIed hair that's trying to sell pre-shave lotion:

(Sorry for the poor quality, but I guess Lectric Shave commercials aren't popular enough for people to digitally record them onto their computers. Go figure.)

Announcer: Wake up your whiskers, with Lectric Shave!

Why do the whiskers have little faces on them that match the head they grow on? Does this seem crazy? What guy thinks of his beard like this? "Dude, maybe they're like tiny versions of me growing all over my face. And they get a little sleepy in the morning, so I have to wake them up!"

Whiskers: Lectric Shave!

Who doesn't enjoy seeing flaccid whiskers perk up at the sight of some pre-shave "lotion."

Announcer: Stands up whiskers for an up to 52% closer shave.

Okay, this is actually good. Thank you for putting a claim in this otherwise insane, dizzying commercial.

Decapitated whisker: Man, that was close.

I just don't know that they really thought this one through. This whisker seems awfully excited for someone who's floating into a pale blue chasm of death. He's just been sliced by an enormous spinning blade, and, with his last words, he utters a goofy pun. Just... odd.

Announcer: Blade Close... Lectric Smooth.

By the way, Williams, thank you for inventing the word "lectric." Humanity is indebted to you.

Lectric Shave, along with its sister shave-product, Aqua Velva, is about the most old man-ish, most fuddy duddy product you could market. So you're not helping yourself by spending money creating weird, nonsensical animation and hiring chubby male models who were brought to the present by a time machine sent from the '70's. Just show us your product, make your claims, and spare us the nightmares we're going to have where our beards become little people and start begging us to slice off their heads.