Go Compare advert
This allegedly funny advert for Go Compare falls into the same 'memorable through being infuriating' genre and marks the company's inevitable move away from their previous bland fare to the razor-blade-in-a-bath shock tactic of the latest.
Already garnering the kind of LOL!1! Amazin! comments on Youtube that the previous ad could only dream of, it's already a staple of ad breaks every five fucking minutes.
Watchers can always turn the television off. In many ways it's the front-of-camera talent that always attract my pity. I don't imagine the money's great, and there are surely thousands of badly-paid jobs that don't require workers to make themselves look like a gigantic arse in public.
I wonder just how far this meme can go. This Go Compare effort pushed the boundaries in an all-out assault on the senses. But what about a 60-second spot for Pampers simply consisting of a siren blaring and images of nappies flashed up in Technicolor.
Of course, that's hardly the image a nappy-manufacturer want to project, but since Cadbury's have gone all ridiculous in their advertising it raises the question of how far the envelope can be pushed.
If we're lucky, this is the nadir. The alternative doesn't bear thinking about.
Toolstation advert
If there's anything worse than a load of cockneys shouting about tools to the tune of the hokey-cokey I really don't know what it is.
Within ten seconds of learning of the existence of Toolstation I hated it. Go away forever.
Hitler is AIDS. Or something
This utterly fucking awful and stupid and ridiculous ad showing a man turning into a leering, shaking Adolf Hitler while shagging a woman is a German effort to warn of the dangers of contracting HIV from unprotected sex, apparently.
I voice an element of doubt, because looking at it it's impossible to discern any kind of cogent message in this piece, beyond instilling in me the idea that the next time I have sex I might turn into Hitler.
AIDS charities are understandably aghast at the association with sufferers as Nazi Jew-murderers, and also point out that the ad features no helpful messages regarding barrier devices such as condoms.
According to the Telegraph: 'The campaign also features poster adverts of Saddam Hussein and Joseph Stalin, and a radio spot that re-works a famous speech by Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propagandist.'
What with WWF Brazil's ad showing a fleet of aeroplanes flying into Manhattan, the question of whether there any brains at all floating around in these ad agencies now demands an answer.
ITV Brighter Place: The problem with modern branding
There was a time when UK TV channel branding consisted of a nice man smiling and telling you you were watching the telly. My favourites were Neville Wanless and Brian Steele on Tyne Tees, though I could name others.
They would announce the programmes coming up later in the day, relay information about which of the transmitters were down and for how long (Pontop Pike or Bedale), and wish a certain watching Grandma a happy birthday. They did this in front of a Tyne Tees logo. And that was branding.
The BBC had a revolving globe, with the letters BBC written underneath. That was their branding. As we moved into the 90s the BBC put in a bit more effort, and came up with the likes of the iconic BBC2 idents.
The various ITV networks all had their own ident that consisted of a clunky logo clumsily animated over a basic musical sting. Try these on for size:
Anyway, all of this predictably brings me to something more modern that I dislike. If you've been to the cinema recently you'll probably have discovered ITV's latest branding exercise.
Like seemingly any advert for a TV channel these days, this seems to consist of telling you that your life will be immeasurably better for watching a particular TV channel - as if watching TV is the single most exciting, mind-expanding, mood-enhancing horizon-broadening experience you could possibly hope for.
In this Brighter Side ad/ident, a bunch of kids enjoying a wet weekend on Shetland throw stones at the sky until sunlight appears. Which, I think you'll agree, is just like television.
It's fairly well executed, as it goes, and as a concept it's not too revolting. But it's hard to think of any one product that's worthy of such hyperbolic praise.
Something that metaphorically brings sunshine into your life, brightens up your day and can change your entire emotional state. There's only a few things I can think that could make me feel this way, and most of them are illegal.
I'm reminded of the Hugh Hudson-directed party political broadcast showing Neil Kinnock to be some sort of Welsh ubermensch in 1978. The film looked amazing, but when people saw it they shrugged and said "Yeah, but it's still that bloody Welsh windbag". Kinnock lost, heavily.
I feel like shaking the people at ITV, showing them the old idents and continuities and saying "Look, this is what inspires loyalty and fondness. This clunky old stuff. Real, identifiable people and companies that mean something to everyday people."
I'd be wasting my breath. Times change, the media has moved on - at least that's what they tell us. And even if they brought back continuity announcers they wouldn't be like old Neville (allegedly the template for Viz's Roger Melly).
As soon as you hit 25 in that game in this day and age it's curtains, like a voiceover version of Logan's Run.
Still, I can't believe that in 20 years' time there'll be someone tapping out an irritable missive on TV advertising, jonesing for the days when a faceless 19-year-old with a stupid haircut introduced the X-tra Factor.
TV companies could really learn a thing or two about their brands, simply by gawping at how much stuff there is on the web devoted to them back in the 70s and 80s.
In a time when terrestrial broadcasters are under threat from so many different directions, the public's affection for their TV stations could be the difference between life and death.
This Brighter Side piece is nice and shiny, and as this sort of high-concept fluff goes its quite good - barring the self-consciously wacky penguins – but I feel no emotional attachment to ITV in the way I used to.
In a world of glossy, feelgood branding, there's nothing to make this stick out beyond the Beeb, Sky, Virgin or even one of the smaller satellite channels.
In its efforts to compete on the bigger stage, ITV long ago lost any real connection it used to have with its audience, just as its long struggle to carve out an individual identity or purpose since losing those regional idents has been in vain.
Those silly, cheap, slightly weird idents that probably used cardboard and Chromakey and stock photography and cost £20 to make. A different time, and a different world.
• There's a quite brilliant video on all this stuff on this Youtube channel, which I urge you to watch. Look for the ITV In The Face vids.
BMW Joy advert
I think that this new advert from BMW is truly the worst I've ever seen in terms of its sheer ineptitude and muddled message.
The fact that it's so bad is accentuated by the fact that it's from BMW, who normally seem to know what they're doing with their ads. Power, style, grace, premium, driving dynamics, They're BMW watchwords. The company slogan is Ultimate Driving Machine, for crying out loud.
This one features some drivel about how cars are 'joy' (another 'sleep is gold' moment). BMW has gone all big lifestyle concept, perhaps heralding a subtle repositioning away from cars that are bloody fast and have as much traction as you can handle to a more family-friendly fun aspect.
BMW recently softened the edges of its Z4 Roadster and Coupe - turning it into a folding metal roof coupe-cabriolet - and eliciting complaints from its loyal buyers. It's hard not to ignore the fact that this ad is doing something similar, albeit much less successfully.
"We realised a long time ago that what you make people feel is just as important as what you make," claims Captain Picard. I'm unconvinced by this claim, and am doubtful that the team responsible for making the first atomic bomb to be used over Hiroshima felt the same way.
"At BMW we don't just make cars, we make.....joy" is the devastating pay-off. Although I anticipated it, it still made a little trickle of blood emerge from my nostril.
The Garage Band backing music, the softly-softly Patrick Stewart voiceover, the smiley happy mugshots that tick every demographic in the book and that inane bloody narration. What a strange way to vomit all over your brand.