the commercial is telling us that the faster way to get your child or owner’s attention is to trick them, or to play dead.
I used to think that the commercials featuring helpless, suffering animals were the most depressing ones on television.
I long ago decided I’d start being emotionally bothered by fictional dogs dying as soon as I start being emotionally bothered by fictional people dying.
Maybe you guys are right that the dog was just missing the boy. I’m going to watch it that way from now on. If that’s what they were going for though, they really should have shown the dog playing at the end!
So he shouldn’t have gone away to college?
We get sad because the fictional characters trigger our sadness over our own real losses. It HELPS to remind yourself “it’s only a story,” unless you’re already sobbing your guts out by then. Anyway, those starving, homeless dogs and kids are real.
RIP Buster
and damn you whoever made the commercial
In front of whatever device the kid was using. I assumed the dog got better in the end.
I never assumed the dog was dying, just that he missed the kid. And after the kid ignored his mom’s texts and calls, she finally got his attention by, in effect, saying, “Okay, so it doesn’t matter to you that I miss you, Rover misses you-- does THAT matter at all??” And apparently it did. Icky situation all around.
Boomer is fine, goddamit.
THAT would make a much better commercial. It’s just too bad that’s not what the final product looks like. That dog is a goner.
In the last shot, the tablet is sitting in front of the dog - the first time I saw the ad, this made me think that they wanted you to think that it was the dog that sent the messages the whole time, and it was just a clever dog being manipulative. But if that’s what they were intending, it was pretty poorly executed - too subtle.