"Superstore" Ad Is A Wonderful Biting Commentary

I usually have little patience for TV promos, you know, those things networks play during commercial breaks telling you how wonderful the upcoming season of whatever show will be.

Right now, though, NBC is promoting a new season of "Superstore," a comedy I actually like quite a bit because of its somewhat cynical, but accurate and biting take on the service economy and large corporate retailers.

I actually think the promo is terrific. Yeah, on one level it's just telling you to watch the show. But it really hits at the daily humiliations many people in service jobs have to endure at the hands of soulless, cheap and abusive corporate offices. And the awful things these workers must wear on the job!

Not all corporations are like that, of course, but a fair number are. So I like how this promo skewers this piece of society and capitalism.

Watch:

NRA Is Really, Really Mad At You For Dissing Trump

The guy in this NRA ad is really, really mad that people
on TV make fun of Donald Trump 

The National Rifle Association - NRA - have become quite the media stars in addition to their advocacy to make sure each and every one of us owns a complete arsenal. Even if you're mentally off the rails.

Then again, the NRA ads are a bit off the rails, aren't they?

It's odd that the group with all the guns feels like the ones that are beseiged, but whaddaya going to do?

There was this ad from last year, in which Dana Loesch couldn't contain her bitter anger at people who had the gall to exercise their First Amendment rights to protest against Trump, and while they were at it, protest against racism, income inequality and other social ills.

In NRA world the Second Amendment trumps (ha!) the First Amendment. Go figure.

Anyway, critics said the Loesch ad was an open call to violence, and I do see that point.

Now we have a new ad from the NRA, and it's, um, something.

This new spot features another very, very, very angry person named Grant Stinchfield. Why is everybody with the NRA so angry? They get what they want from Congress. They have almost unfettered access to their guns. Trump loves 'em. They should be ecstatic.

They're not, though. In this ad, a seething Stinchfield stands next to a television, holding a sledgehammer. On the TV are quick clips of a variety of people and shows, including Saturday Night Live, John Oliver, CNN and others bashing Trump.

Stinchfield, finally having enough of this, smashes the TV with his sledgehammer. Then there's the logo, "NRA TV. Our Greatest Weapons Is Truth."

I wish the NRA would tell the truth about all these mass shootings we have and what we should do about them, but you can't expect much. Just this afternoon, I'm seeing reports of another school shooting, this time in Florida. Does the NRA look at tragedies like this as free advertising? Well, that's a debate for another post.

I don't know if that NRA claim to truth is, um, true or not, but as many people on social media have pointed out, it's awfully hard to watch NRA TV if you've smashed your television with a sledgehammer.

As the Huffington Post points out, Twitter, as usual, was unrelenting in its response to this NRA ad.

Some top Tweets on this:

"Anyone wonder why he didn't shoot the TV?"

"Do the NRA snowflakes need a safe space so big bad words won't hurt their little feelings?"

"I'll wear my little brother's t-shirt and smash my TV with a sledgehammer, with cowboy music playing, then I'll act all mad and tough....oh yeah, make sure there's plenty of black people appearing on the TV."

Here's the ad, if you can stand it.

Connections Are The Theme Of This Great Movie, And This Great Ad

See this movie! 

The other day I watched a fantastic science fiction movie called "Arrival."

In it, 12 spaceships land on various places on Earth.

A scientist and a linguist are dispatched to Montana, where one of the ships has landed, to determine what the aliens are saying and what they want.

This is no big War of The World kinda movie, but, without being more of a spoiler than I already am, is a meditation on perspectives, fear and bravery.

The movie encourages us to view things in different, novel ways, to see the other side, to see how connections work rogether, to see how people could potentially work together.

See that movie!

Along the same lines is a viral video that advetises a Dutch television network. They have groups of people come into a room: A rich group, a poor group, an immigrant group, a rural group, an urban group, etc.

Then the MC mixes and matches the group. Everybody who was the class clown stand together. Anyone who was ever bullied stand together.

There's a series of these mix and match groupings in the video, with this message: We can slice and dice any group we want, and no matter what, there are going to be commonalities and differences.

Us vs. Them goes out the window.

Here's the great video:

I Can't Help Falling In Love With A Damn Gum Ad For Christ's Sakes!

A scene from "Sarah and Juan," the new Extra Gum
ad that is actually quite moving.  

I saw a ad for chewing gum that pretty much turned me into an emotional puddle.   I was actually moved!

Most advertisements are so bad that I want to scream, of course. My husband is sick of me screaming at bad ads but he kindly tolerates it.

When I finally see a rare, well-crafted advertisement, I cheer for it like crazy.

So it is for the Extra Gum commercial you'll see below. You really want to watch it.

The nearly two minute ad from the agency BBDO features the story of "Sarah and Juan" high school sweethearts who meet and build a relationship into adulthood.

After every significant moment with Sarah, Juan draws a little picture on an Extra gum wrapper. You don't know why he does that until the end of the ad. And at the end, there's one drawing he made on a gum wrapper that actually hadn't happened........yet.

This ad is a follow up to another wonderful commercial for Extra Gum called "Origami" in which a dad keeps making little origami swans out of gum wrappers for his daughter.

While you're at it, check out the awesome Barbie ad currently on BBDO's home page. 

The Sarah and Juan ad is very sweet, of course. Maybe I'm biased because the soundtrack is Haley Reinhart's sweet version of the song "I Can't Help Falling In Love" the great Elvis Presley standard  that was sung during my wedding three years ago.

OK, I'm totally a sucker for romance. And, yes, the ad is manipulative, but aren't ads supposed to be manipulative?  I might actually go out and buy some Extra Gum today. See? Good ads work.

Here it is:

The Grinch's Heart Expands: I Actually LOVE This Too-Early Christmas Ad

Sam about to give his best friend, Monty the Penguin
his Christmas surprise in this perfect John Lewis holiday ad.  

People who know me know this rite of the Christmas Holiday Season, which started I think back on January 10:

I hate, HATE all the demands that we buy, buy, BUY our way to Christmas happiness.

If we don't brawl tooth and nail over some worthless electronic gadget at Walmart at 5 a.m. the day after Thanksgiving, then we're worthless human beings, goes the retail line.

That said, I stumbled upon an early Christmas ad for John Lewis, a British retailer.   Watch it at the bottom of this post.

In the ad we follow a boy named Sam and his best friend, Monty the Penguin.

I have to tell you right now I have a childlike fixation on penguins and actually wish I had one, so the fact the ad has a penguin got my interest.

The story in the advertisement, and how it's put together is so sweet. Sam and Monty, as I said, are best friends, but as the holidays approach, Monty is clearly longing for something. Sam notices and does something about it as a Christmas gift.

And like I said, the ad makes this Grinch's heart grow warm and sweet.  It's a nice antidote to the usual screaming and yelling about Christmas sales that we usually see.

It's really a wonderful ad. It'll go down as one of the all time classic Christmas commercials. But warning:  There is a MAJOR Kleenex alert before you watch this now totally viral video

Lots of people are getting weepy watching it.

Here it is:

ANOTHER Awesome Ad: There's Hope For The Ad Industry Yet

For the third time in a week, I found a really good television advertisement.

In an awesome ad, look what a dog does
 to help this guy.  

That's a rare trifecta in a sea of terrible TV commercials.

This one is well done, and promotes an awesome cause. (Especially if you, like me, are a dog lover)

It's from the Royal Dutch Guide Dog Foundation, which brings service dogs to veterans suffering from Post-Traumatic Stress Syndrome.

The tag line is guide dogs have traditionally helped people who cannot see,  but these dogs help people who have seen too much.

I also like how the ad really portrays the dog as the veteran's comrade in arms.

As much of the commentary on this ad says, it does make you want to hug the dog nearest and dearest to you.

Here's the great ad:

If Taste Were Visual, This Is How It Would Look: Incredible Video

There's a British spice company called Schwartz that wanted to promote its new line of "Flavour Shots" spices and did so brilliantly.

A still from a brilliant British spice advertisement 

They put explosions of spices in sinc with piano music to just wonderful, mesmerizing effect in their ad.

The awesome video is below:

All Parents Must Watch French Anti-Bullying Ad

Bullying has been hugely in the news lately, what with the bullying case in the Miami Dolphins locker room that led one player to quit and the alleged bully to be suspended.

A still from the powerful French
anti-bulling ad.  

And, worse, we keep hearing of youths committing suicide because of incessant bullying. Makes me want to cry every time I hear about one of those cases.

Now, there's a brilliant television ad out of France that all parents, all adults really ought to see.

Bullying is often dismissed as a rite of passage for kids, a day of being picked on a bit. It toughens you up, supposedly. Adults do it to. "Toughening up" was the excuse used in the Miami Dolphins locker room, apparently.

Anyway, the French ad puts adults in the shoes of the kids being bullied. In the ad, a proper looking businessman tries to do his work, but co-workers relentlessly bully and assault the businessman with extreme cruelty, in much the same way kids bully some of their peers.

I'll translate from French the tag line at the end of the ad: "A day at work does not look like this. And a day at school?"

According to Huffington Post, the ad is a promo for a  documentary on school harassment airing on France 5.  Apparently, bullying is a severe problem in France, too.

Let's help put a stop to it. We can begin with watching this awesome but painful video: