Commercials

An archive of blog entries about TV and film commercials.

Commercials

Virgin Trains ad gets 83 complaints

22 November 2006 Rob Buckley Post a comment

Virgin Trains ad

Have you seen that Virgin Trains ad? The one where the Native Americans attack the Virgin Train? No. Well, you can view it here.

Bit rubbish, isn’t it? First time I saw it, I

  1. Wondered who thought it was a good idea
  2. Wondered what the Hell it was about
  3. Wondered how long it would take to get withdrawn

Anyway, there are now 83 complaints lodged against it at the Advertising Standards Authority. Surprised? Not really…

Commercials

Virgin Trains ad gets 83 complaints

22 November 2006 Rob Buckley 1 Comment

Virgin Trains ad

Have you seen that Virgin Trains ad? The one where the Native Americans attack the Virgin Train? No. Well, you can view it here.

Bit rubbish, isn’t it? First time I saw it, I

  1. Wondered who thought it was a good idea
  2. Wondered what the Hell it was about
  3. Wondered how long it would take to get withdrawn

Anyway, there are now 83 complaints lodged against it at the Advertising Standards Authority. Surprised? Not really…

UK TV

Mysterious advert explained. Boy was it rubbish

26 September 2006 Rob Buckley 2 Comments

I was in Charing Cross train station today and I saw a somewhat offensive advert:

FIve US ad

“WTF?” I thought to myself. It was on a graphics screen, so I assumed it was going to change into something like AOL’s “Discuss” campaign.

But it didn’t. It was just that. I went away from it thinking, “What tossy Guardian-reading spanner thought that was a good idea?”, enumerating to myself all the wonderful things the US (I assumed they weren’t having a go at the Bolivians) has given the world. And I’m a Guardian reader.

Turns out it was an advert for Five’s new digital channel, Five US, which as we all know is the channel designed especially for me. There are going to be follow-up adverts that will turn the campaign into a positive one, apparently, but it’s already garnered complaints. And if I’m p’ed off with the ad, I’m pretty sure some of the rest of the target audience are going to be, too.

Whoops, Five.