After a fortnight of watching the NCAA tournament on CBS, we all have been over exposed to two things; 1) copious amounts of college basketball and 2) that incessant bare-chested Southwest Airlines commercial. Those bare-chested runway jockeys got more air time than Coach K, Gus Johnson and John Wall combined! Read below for my takes on good, bad and terrible TV ads that were as much a part of our past two weekends as the hoops.
Capitol One Vikings: There are a couple of things that make a TV ad repeatedly watchable for men; humor and hot women
KC Danimal
Oh yeah, the hottie in the red dress and the boots is definately my favorite. and the commercial is ok too.
bschloz
SWA ad is annoying to the point nausea
HP…good stuff MURRAY..PRESENT
AXE…Curvy yes good
Shrimp Tacos…really? Hearne doesn’t give you AMEX card?..
IMG..is that ING? Anyway…yes …and don’t NYorkers know what to do better with your money?
Capital One…Why not just run a Sopranos ad..2% weekly or we kneecap you
Progressive Girl? I must say I think she is kind of hot?
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GH: ING…IMG… one of those. Thanks for the fix. That lipsticked Progressive gal is getting a lot of run. Here’s my hot but not gal for the ads — the bespecacled wife of the couple who goes to Lowes to bargain for a new fridge. They practice bargaining in their car before entering and she plays the role of the sales guy; “I don’t have that kind of authority!” Something about her is very interesting.
Hammy
Oh my God Greg….I’m almost speechless. Those Capital One Vikings ads are the worst ads ever made in the history of ads. If I had a Capital One card I would immediately cut it up.
Whats is your wallet? PHUCK OFF!!!!
kctacomonday
I enjoyed the DirecTV game show ad but only because I was surprised to see a former college roommate in it (the red-headed guy). I don’t really remember much about it though. Wasn’t horrible.
Blake
The actor that plays Murray on FOTC is not Jim Gaffigan. I don’t know the actor’s name, but Gaffigan is a tall, pasty white guy. Both are pretty funny though.
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GH: Good catch, Blake. Rhys Darby is Murray’s real alter ego.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhys_Darby
Ptolemy
My only thought was if that old lady on the plane can hear a bunch of baggage monkeys yelling on the tarmac, she should get her ass off that plane because there’s an air leak somewhere in the fuselage. She’s more likely to end up like Pane Stewart flying the friendly skies as a popsicle.
JOJO
KUDOS TO GREG HALL….FUNNY STUFF..VERY FUNNY.
What the hell are you doing on this site.
With your talent someone needs to put you on
some big time site/paper.
Call JoPo…call NewsCorp…call Steve Rose..
call someone asnd submit this column to
get a bigger and better paycheck.
I’m send your ad reviews across the country
virally because this is some really funny
stuff.
The ad by at&t rang home for me. One of my
clients lost his son who was texting on
the 405 in Los Angeles. The young kids have to
stop…what a waste of briliant/creative mind
who had just been accepted to the UCLA
cinematography institute.
Greg..when do we get you your own site.
We may disagree about sports…but this was
some major league stuff!
Gavin
Your wife isn’t…”special” is she?
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GH: No…and she doesn’t read my column. Thankfully.
bschloz
GH….LOWES Girl?….hilarious…must be a Huskerpower thing! That is a funny bit though..knock off on Sonic schtick
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GH: Keep this on the QT, my wife thinks I am interested in the fridge.
dp
E*Trade babies on the plane still kill me…
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GH: “Dad? Dad?”
SM
I’m with Hammy, Greg. I don’t know a single person who finds those Capital One commericals funny. At least until now.
Johnny Utah
what is this, the 1990s? get a DVR people. I didn’t see one ad. games are 1 hour 20 minutes instead of 2 hours 20 minutes.
I have better things to do than watch commercials. for instance… read dumb blog posts about commercials.
bugeater
I have not watched a single CSI incarnation, either, Greg. I don’t get why people need their gore seven days a week.
The attractive female SWA baggage handler has to be even rarer than the attractive female Taco Bell associate.
I agree that the blonde from AXE is pleasing to the eye. A bounty for anyone who can put a name to her?
Stevo
Haha I’m with Johnny Utah on this one. I think I saw some of the commercials in the second half once my dvr caught up. Greg, here’s another one who’s never watched an episode of CSI. Their commercials tell me everything I need to know…cheesy-ass acting and bad one-liners. Looking forward to Friday Night Lights coming back, watching The Pacific and looking forward to Treme by David Simon, the guy who created The Wire.
Hottest girl in a commercial right now is the one at the end of the KGB (God if I had kids and they used that shit I would lose it) commercial who goes “text KGB and you’re good to go.” Mmm she’s sexy.
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GH: FNL season #4 debuts Friday, April 30th on NBC. Coach Taylor (who I have a sneaky suspision enters my bride’s fantasies on occassion) is the new coach at downtrodden East Dillon High. A GREAT television series.
Cliffy
Add me to the anti-Viking Capital One ads. Just plain dumb.
Bags Fly Free? I too thought the word “bag” applied to the lady in the window seat.
For sex appeal, can’t beat the Axe ad, but the Palm gal is close.
Can’t recall if they ran during the tournament, but the Ally Bank spots are really good. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YypkoP92qNY&feature=fvw
Totally agree on the texting but I think it needs to go farther. I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen adults with phones clamped to their ears weaving across the lines at 70-80mph during rush hour.
dp
What’s the verdict on the Old Spice ads with the 4-shot of different armpits? I’m against it…creeps me out a bit.
Don
I agree GH, the SWA commercial was funny once or twice but I am so sick of it now I would gladly pay someone to haul my bags…
JayhawkTony
It’s Bo “Derek”–not “Derrick”
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GH: Thanks, JT.
zeke
I like the vikings.
never watched a single CSI
Robertoe
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_1OHlFOee2w&feature=player_embedded
Hot to trot! but check this out:
‘Palm’s Phone Sales Slump And Stock Dives’
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/03/18/ap/tech/main6312123.shtml
Great commercial, babe & music but your phone still sux!
Stevo
Glad you have a good taste in TV Greg. If anyone needs a guilty pleasure TV show, go back and watch the past seasons of Friday Night Lights. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry…and you’ll probably get a hard-on for Derek Jeter’s wifey!
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GH: FNL Season 1 is available on DVD for $20 on Amazon and at Best Buy. You cannot spend $20 and get more entertainment value out of a set of DVDs.
MrOlathe
CSI Vegas was solid back in the day. And you gotta watch the first part of CSI Miami just to hear what David Caruso says….it’s always the stupidest fucking thing you’ll hear that day, but funny as hell. And I know it’s gay, but that Buffalo Wild Wings commercial still makes me laugh when the guy gets shot in the nuts and takes a basketball off the noggin.
Dexter Morgan
As long as that geek with the long hair drawing the UPS logo on a marker board doesn’t show up on my screen, I can handle the rest.
GH: Here
Tom
The Taco Bell ad and Southwest both drive me nuts. Who the hell could earn a living as a shrimp blogger anyway?
And sports is still best watched live. The DVR is great for most TV, but the best part of sports is the live, unscripted drama. It looses a little something if you watch it later.
Stevo
Got to disagree Tom. DVR is the greatest thing to happen to TV since…I don’t know, something else that had to be pretty great. Football is the best DVR sport because they break about every 3 minutes. Love me some DVR but I kind of get your point. I always want to catch up for games like KSU Xavier.
I thought I heard that right when he said he “traveled the world as a shrimp boat blogger”! What the hell is a shrimp boat blogger? That guy needs an ass-kicking and if you’re eating shrimp from Taco Bell so do you!
A bit unrelated…does anyone know if there is a product that can delay a radio broadcast so you can synch it up with live TV?
MoCrash
What’s a CSI?
MoCrash
As the above post suggests, I don’t watch episodic TV. My schedule doesn’t allow for regular prime time viewing, I don’t have a DVR and there is little out there that interests me enough to either 1.) program my VHS or 2.) watch it later. Which is why I probably fail every pop culture quiz (but am hard to beat in Civil War trivia).
downtowndavy
Is that Glazer’s new girlfriend?
SKC Observer
I hate all the stinky men and stinky arm pit ads. No one I knows has grease fly off them when a fan is blowing on them, or has tools and dirt fall off their bodies. And the yellow birds in the pits just made me want to hide my eyes! Chill on the hygiene products advertisers! They don’t make my TV viewing day.
JoHawk
The Viking dude with beads in his hair, running on the beach is the guy who played Ogre in Animal House.
Ptolemy
Nerds!
Those armpit ads are just wrong. They could have done that shit with any body part, say the taint, for example. The ad doesn’t have the same selling power if it’s your wife/girlfriend’s taint spouting snow-covered mountains vs. fly-laden landfills.
C
I was loving the Buffalo Wild Wings commercials, especially in all the games that went to overtime! LOL
jojo
CURIOUS…DO MANY OF YOU WATCH THE LOCAL
NEWS AT 5PM/6PM OR 9/10PM….
Monkeyhawk
A lot of the spots you mention simply don’t register with me. I know there’s gonna be an extended commercial break every four minutes of play and that’s when I get a beverage or go to the toilet or check my e-mail or something else.
When I sit at my computer I watch TV via a mirror. Most sports work out okay but baseball is weird.
I can’t tell the difference between beer commercials. Based on commercials, I don’t know one car from another. Except they all create a swerving trafficless stretch of highway where I can drive like Jackie Stewart.
(sigh)
I’d rather go piss.
And usually do.
Stevo
98.9% of all programming on TV and commercials should be banned. I’m 26 and haven’t watched MTV in about ten years but it was on for about 10 minutes the other day and I couldn’t believe the garbage that was on. If I had kids NO WAY would they watch that stuff. I guess you start to sound like your parents at 26 but geez, there was never THIS trash on when I was growing up.
smartman
All the ads SUCK!. Did any of you actually buy a product or service as a result of any of these ads? While they may be entertaining, maybe even “aspirational” they are not creating a call to action which actually results in “measurable”sales against the specific ad. At best it’s throwing shit against the wall and hoping something sticks. As they say in the ad business, Half of your ad dollars are wasted. The challenge is figuring out which half.
Omaha
Stevo, take it from a parent who has kids older than 26, yes there was and no they weren’t allowed to watch it. Which doesn’t mean it wasn’t on the TV when we were out. Put me in the Viking Camp, while they have aged a bit I still find humor in the bearded 8 yr. old.
working woman of independecne ave
I can give you a better value for $20.00. Do u want my teeth in or out?
JoHawk
Sorry, not Animal House. Revenge of the Nerds.
can’t say
Does Bo have a camel toe?
Alan Coulthard
I have a long female tongue fetish myself and found femaletongues.com which seems to be the best place for pictures of female tongues, pierced tongues, and sexy girls with open mouths.