Friday, December 14, 2007

Delicious fruit flavor + absurdist messaging

I've been honed-in on the trend of absurdist marketing campaigns for awhile now, but a post in AdFreak today has really perked my interest. Some of this stuff is just too good to be true, and watching a few spots starts to feel just like an episode of Tim and Eric Awesome Show (Great Job).
Specifically, Skittles and Starburst have gone head-to-head with the weirdness. Personally, I'll call Skittles the winner on this one, mostly because their switch at the end from bizzaro-world to 'BRIGHT SKITTLES SCREEN' is more effective than the similar Starburst transition.

The best absurdist campaigner in my opinion is Comcast, whose 'Spidey Rommie' spot gets me every damn time (I think its b/c I can relate to tiny dog torture in the form of odd costumes).
Perhaps that is what is at the heart of this type of messaging - it plays with your sense of reality effectively displacing your role as consumer. Instead you sort of 'wonder' at the message, and perhaps can even relate to it in some way in the disjointed pseudo-reality that you are presented with.
So weird, so cool.

I would totally trash the DVR if I had the option of only viewing commercials in this style. In the meantime, i'll have to keep fast-forwarding and look to the web for my healthy heaping dose of weird.

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