I’ve seen a couple of tv ads tonight which are desperately awful. The first is the latest for Walkers crisps starring old big ears himself, Gary Lineker. He’s done well over 25 different ads over the years since 1995 and this must be one of the munters. It features the old Flanders and Swan ditty Mud, Glorious Mud. Maybe it’s to reflect the lousy bloody summer we’ve had – but who needs reminding?
So we see this bunch of blokes sploshing around in a potato field full of mud. At one point this pair of blokes are sat on the sodden ground splashing away in the mud with their hands like a couple of very young kids. Yes it’s a very adult moment. The final scene sees them strapping jug ears to a pair of wooden fence planks acting as skis as he’s pulled along by a tractor before falling headfirst into…you’ve guessed it, some mud. The tag line message is that Walkers crisps are made from 100% British potatoes, presumably full of wet rot. Muddy marvellous goes the voice over. What is? It’s crap. Sorry AMV 2 out of 10.
The second ad is more crisply produced but just suffers from the most cringeworthy dialogue and acting. It’s the ad for the new Toyota Auris. Picture the scene, young attractive couple are seen leaving the entrance to an hotel. She’s tut tutting away as he just mumbles something pathetically like ‘but when I approached him from behind he looked just like David’ (or some bloody name). She then exclaims ‘but that nickname!’ What nickname’s that then love? I mean what’s the worst that you could call somebody in that situation? Pervy boy, bum bandito, Fred West? Ooh scary. And if somebody called you that, you’d have every reason to give them a slap. But he clearly hadn’t done that. He’d been name-called and she’d got embarrassed for him. It’s hardly ‘Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolf’ is it?
They get into the car and then the voice-over declares that life seems better inside an Auris which is dangerously close to something Kenneth Williams could have said. We then see her smiling and saying it was actually quite a gentle name whilst he confers like Julian out of the Famous Five saying ‘Yes well at least the receptionist thought it was funny’. You kn*bhead. They press the ignition button and all’s well again in the land of the Sloane Rangers. Thanks to Toyota and the Auris, the car for pricks who let hotel receptionists take the piss out of them. Oh that’s going to make me want to buy one. Pitiful ad; 2 out of 10 but only because the girl’s attractive.
Am I being too harsh?
pp
Pasta Paulie 