I am so confused by these, I just had to write and see if ANYBODY out there understands these two baffling commercials. I know it would help if I remembered the product names, but my brain was still busy trying to make sense of what had happened previously when they flashed it on the screen.
Commercial one: a tiny piggy-bank pops up out of a portal in the floor and looks around, blinking. It notices a car noticing it and is apprehensive. A giant tentacle that looks like one of Doctor Octupus’s appendages comes out from beneath the hood and attacks the bank with a laser beam, a power saw and a hammer, literally breaking the bank. It extracts one coin that looks like a penny and sucks it beneath its hood, after which it splits into TWO cars! Then there is the name of the car and something about it being cheap. Theories?
Commercial two: I didn’t catch the very begining, but when I did look up there was a half-dressed man trapped in a bondage harness while two firemen laugh at him, after which they show the same guy using their product, which I believe is some kind of soap or body wash… I don’t get it.
The first one is advertising the new Toyota Yaris, which (in the US) is replacing the Echo as their entry-level vehicle. The are two or three-similarly-themed adverts, which apparently are attempting to simultaneously promote the high technology and miserly frugality of the car. The mitosis bit at the end has to do with there being two bodystyles, a hatchback and sedan. I agree that the ads are creepy in the extreme; they’ve already been discussed in another thread here.
I saw that one this morning. It’s one of Tag’s new commercials. The gist of it seems to be if you use Tag, you’ll have lots of adventurous freaky sex. Of course, if it’s anything like the usual bodysprays/whatever the hell it is they’re pimping, it’ll smell like bug spray and make women flee from you in real life, instead of improving your kinky sex factor.
I haven’t seen the one with the bondage harness, but if it’s like a similar commercial, it is for some sort of Tag/Axe/Huh? shower product, that is so powerful in its cleaning power, it’ll will also wash away shame, humiliation and/or embarassment.
Maybe it will wash away the shame of being seen buying the crap.
Heh. Until this minute, I hadn’t quite realized that there were two different products being advertised in these commercials. Of course, as middle-aged married guy, I’m not in the target market.
I haven’t seen the Yaris ad, but I’m wondering - maybe it is meant to appeal to the segment of the market that views Japan as Wacky TV Land. (Interestingly, the first link there as of this post is to a Japanese show about Americans visting Japan called ‘Otaku from USA’.)
In commercial one it kind of creeps me out that the piggy bank is basically being chopped up alive (as indicated by the squinting eyes right before it gets hit with the little mallet). Obviously it’s a cartoon, so it’s not suffering. But it’s weird.
When I was a kid, we used to play tag with roman candles (in winter, with leather jackets for protection) and shoot BB guns at each other (leather jackets, one pump only). We never thought of Axe Tag.
Mom, if you’re reading this, calm down. I’m just making things up. Besides, noone got their eye put out.
There’s another Yaris ad showing a spider-like creature made out of gas pump nozzles. The car is equally merciless. The ads are cool, but they make the car look like a big sadistic meanie.
As for Tag ads, they do employ a lot of really hot women. It doesn’t make me want to buy the product, though I might invest in a Tivo.
Seen it – it is indeed as you say, and the “running gag” is a pitchman character, wearing a bathrobe colored Buddhist-monk saffron, who tells you that the way to release yourself from shame is to join the users of this product.
Me, I think I’d rather stick to the classic theme that using our product will land you a posse of hot babes…
Just to make reference to panamajack’s post above yours, don’t ever watch the animé titled Cat Soup. You’d be quite disturbed…
They seem to run those body spray ads a lot in Adult Swim. One of the other commercials involves a wimpy guy who hooked up with a female body builder type. And now he’s feeling queezy about it.