There's a bunch of crap for that

I cannot stand commercials that simply refuse to make a lick of goddamn sense.



This means nothing. This is nothing. Why do the reindeer need "maps"? The maps are supposed to show Verizon's 3G coverage in the United States. (Santa Claus, if real, is not located in the United States.) The reindeer somehow need 3G coverage? And it somehow matters that all eight (nine?) of them have Verizon's network? Good luck getting a reindeer to work a phone, by the way. Shouldn't Santa just have a phone? The reindeer are all pulling the same sleigh - even if their 3G coverage was in any way relevant, I'm pretty sure seven out of eight would be sufficient.

Hey, here's a thought. Maybe instead of completely wasting the first ten seconds of the commercial on nothing at all, you could have spent some of that time doing anything to explain why Blitzen's "map" is a problem, other than having the smarmy-ass reindeer next to him just go "Uh, your map?" No, you'll stick with that? Okay.

The jabs in this war between AT&T and Verizon are really getting increasingly ridiculous. See, for particular example, this AT&T ad:



"Hey, you see this thing that has no connection to reality whatsoever? AT&T totally does it faster than Verizon!" Most of the AT&T commercials in response to Verizon's "there's a map for that" ads have really been oddly evasive (presumably out of necessity). Verizon's talking about our coverage? Better talk about download speeds! But be sure to make it really opaque by not giving any real examples and instead discussing how long it would take to download a complete human being. What? Or how about this one:



Really, you have to love the way both of them are pretending that the other's network is a total piece of shit when, if we take all the claims in these ads at more or less face value, there are perfectly legitimate reasons for each to be preferred by certain people. If you live somewhere where both have coverage, maybe you'd prefer AT&T and its better download speeds. But if you live in one of the many, many places that apparently don't get AT&T, maybe you'd prefer Verizon. Over nothing.

Ultimately, though, I think Verizon comes out on top, mostly because AT&T's biggest initial response was a classic example of selective omission:



You notice what he's not saying in there, of course - 3G. Verizon's ads talk about how their 3G coverage is better, so AT&T responds by saying, "Verizon's talking about coverage. Well, here's who AT&T covers!" Not who AT&T covers with 3G... just people who can use AT&T wireless phone service at all. Yeah, that's not deceptive. You'll notice that they don't mention the 97% of Americans thing in any of their ads talking about 3G speed and such. Also, in this ad they only mention ten cities, most of which are very large. Wow, you have coverage in major US cities, AT&T? No way! (Not the first time AT&T has felt it necessary to brag about having coverage in large American cities as though that were uncommon, it should be noted.)

For being somewhat less deceptive and not using a Luke Wilson in full smug as their spokesman, I give this round to Verizon. On the other hand, if this ad means that we've finally gotten rid of that awful family and their one-note joke about wanting to use new minutes, AT&T wins by default.

This is our parody

If you're anything like me - or just about anyone else who doesn't work for Chevrolet - you probably hate those John Mellencamp "This is Our Country" ads. Turns out the folks at Fruit of the Loom don't much care for them either.



Everyone recognizes those Chevy ads as annoying and incredibly full of themselves, so they were a pretty ripe target for parody - although it's a little odd to see Fruit of the Loom doing it, rather than another automaker. I guess one brand war at a time is enough.

A gold star for Fruit of the Loom, although I must say they run the risk of distracting people from the actual product message by virtue of the parody; when I first saw the ad, I spent most of the 30 seconds thinking, "Is this song a parody of those Chevy ads?" and almost none noticing the visual image of all the people wearing tagless t-shirts and sweatpants in lieu of "standard" clothing. Most people still probably associate the name "Fruit of the Loom" with underwear, so making sure to get the message across that Fruit of the Loom makes many other products was fairly important. It's not that they didn't do it, but they did it in such a way that you'd have to see the commercial at least a couple times for it to really sink in, and that can be a risky proposition. Still, I'd say this is one of the better ads I've seen recently.

Car fight!

I've always considered Lexus' ads to be, if not super pretentious, at least totally unrealistic. For example, every year they run some holiday ad where people walk outside their houses to find a Lexus with a huge bow on it sitting in the driveway, because a car that costs more than the average American makes in a year is a perfectly sensible Christmas gift.

This ad, however, is definitely pretentious:


What was even the point? If the Lexus is too classy for moves pulled directly from The Fast and the Furious, why are you advertising it that way? It's almost... gosh, it's almost as if you're reacting to something...


Well, well.

The Audi ad is kind of catty - it's a shot at Lexus' self-parking car - but it at least exhibits a sense of humor distinctly missing from the Lexus response ad, which prefers to stick to Lexus' well-hewn "haughty arrogance" niche rather than be particularly witty or clever. I suppose there's no real need for Lexus to do anything "cool" with their campaign - Lexuses (Lexi?) have a certain target demographic and it's not one necessarily known for its irreverent sense of humor.

Nevertheless, the straightforward response to Audi's ad is both obnoxious - with the arrogant voice-over and opera music - and kind of misses Audi's point. Audi used the "sweet spot" parking job as an eye-catching tool, simply as a device to point out that most people shouldn't need help parallel parking (there was probably also some implied comment about the size of the average Lexus in there, although I imagine most Lexus buyers like that aspect of the cars). Lexus' response suggests that they focused more on the showmanship of the parking job itself, as though what Audi was really claiming was that you couldn't do donuts in a Lexus. "This'll show those fuckers!" Lexus cried, deciding to start their ad with the very same donuts that Audi didn't show in their ad. (For good measure, Lexus spells it "doughnuts," just to make sure you know they're better than you are.)

I'm all for ad battles - usually any company taking potshots is aiming so far above its station that there's no need for the other company to respond - but it would be nice if they weren't so one-sided. Lexus' seemingly non-existent sense of humor just leaves them looking like they brought a knife to a gunfight.