Twix – Singing Helium Cops

Alrighty, so this is right up there in the “WTF was that” category.  Wall to wall, this ad makes absolutely no sense whatsoever.  We start with a couple of latino cops sitting in their cars (with greased back hair, as is commonly acceptable in the police force) to show that not all cops are white.  We get it, you’re not racist Twix.  Naturally, the boys have had a rough night of policing (as you can tell by the still perfectly un-tussled shampoo commercial hair) so it’s time to kick back and have a Twix.  Rather than walk into a store and buy one, the james bond wannabes have a button with a ‘pause’ signal on it they push instead.  This causes flashing lights and pointless gadgetry to open up a secret compartment that reveals a couple of twix bars.  A robotic, computer voice informs us that a “twix pause is in progress.” The boys get a munching, and as they munch, one turns to the other and says ‘lets do it’.  All the while horrible music on the radio gets louder.  ”It” turns out to of course be the revealing of some helium balloons that the two professional officers inhale the gas from so they can sing along to the awful music with high pitched voices.  Oh, what a jolly old time. Then, their sirens go off for no reason, and we get your usual chocolate-caramel montage followed by possibly the worst slogan in decades  ”Twix – Pause Like You Mean It.”

I’m not sure what is more disgusting, that teams of creative writers wittled down months worth of meetings and ended up with this slogan, or that the same process decided on this plotline to sell some chocolate coated wafers.  Ether way, this is a prime example of lots of money being spent for a horrific result.

My rating: 1 star out of a possible 5

Cheaper Solution:  An equally effective ad would have shown a small fuzzy rabbit licking its anus for 25 seconds, followed by ‘Twix – It’s a fucking chocolate bar, eat it you fat shit”.

Diagnosis: I aint eating a Twix bar any time soon

 

To watch and rate your own commercials, join my varolo village and suck some free money out of corporate america

http://www.varolo.com/village/Mendlow

Welcome to my Varolo Village Blog

http://www.varolo.com/village/Mendlow

So I just signed up for this Varola thing, which basically looks like some sort of quasi-pyramid scheme, where desperate advertisers try and get you to watch their ads, because nobody is watching them any more.  Thanks to the digital revolution, DVR, .mp3, the internet, etc. people are simply not watching traditional advertising any more.  So the idea is, they’re trying to make it a ‘fun’ social networking contest sort of deal, where if you sign up your friends, and they watch ads, you get some money.  I’m a comedian, I get a new day job every few months, but I have some spare time on my hands, so I thought I’d give it a try.  At the least, maybe get some new material out of the ads.  But I thought a good way to make it fun, interactive, and most importantly, sign up a few suckers to make me some money… would be to blog about all the ads, and give a detailed break down of why they either suck or don’t.  Most ads these days seem to be trying way too hard, and thus making absolutely no sense at all.  Having worked in advertising for years, I know a thing or two about it, but I’m no expert.  So I’m just going to write about the ones that need a good thrashing, or perhaps even some praise.

But yeah, ‘join my village’ as they say.  And weigh in with your thoughts on the ads as you watch them too.

http://www.varolo.com/village/Mendlow

They don’t allow you to embed the video or have a direct link yet, so I’ll try and find the ads online and post them, or just a screen cap and description.  I don’t watch TV any more, so I don’t even know if these ads are out there or just in the testing phase.