ITV’s Ad of the Year 2011
ITV's Ad of the Year really is a quite remarkable conceit – a programme on a channel funded by advertising telling you how great advertising is. Interspersed with adverts.
It's fiendishly clever, in a way that the people responsible can only be baddies and must be machine-gunned to death by a 'double O' agent to make things right. That's probably unlikely to happen, so you'll have to settle for my efforts.
Ben Shepherd sells it like he's narrating a royal wedding; Lorraine Kelly does her level best to look like the stupidest person who ever existed; a parade of ad bods prove to be various shades of annoying.
The most interesting thing about all this is wondering how ITV comes up with these ads. Going through them I realised I've literally never seen about one in five of them.
I don't watch vast amounts of television, but you'd think if there were going to be adverts featured in a 'best adverts of the year' TV show, someone who blogs on adverts might have seen them.
Anyway, until we see ITV's working I think it's best if we all assume that there's some sort of financial bribery involved.
These are the top 20 best ads for 2011, according to a panel of ITV viewers. I'm with Sid Vicious when it comes to the man on the street.
The Sun - Football brought to life
Rotoscoping was invented by The Sun, apparently. Terry Venables dribbles a load of cliched footy waffle out.
"It was like an explosion but with the beauty of a dance," says Vegetables. What a load of shit.
It looks nice, but it's for vile hate-mongering filth-sheet The Sun, so it must be absolutely horrible. Go away.
Walls sausages dog thing
The dog who sounds like The Streets who apologises for useless men. Hated this from the outset.
'Behind the scenes' stuff in the ad included all sort of hideously banal details that would make you want to go out and nut a heron.
Dior - J'adore
Charlize Theron meets Grace Kelly, Marilyn Monroe etc. I have literally never seen this on television, so how did ITV viewers decide it was the 18th best ad of the year?
Bafflingly, the ad creators refuse to divulge how they shot the ad. Something involving time travel, presumably. I literally cannot think of any other way.
Lucozade
Like the concept; hate the execution. Horrible whiny-voiced band.
Kronenbourg 1664
Love these ads; don't care what anyone says. Music is great, ambiance wonderful; oddness intact, everyone love Suggs.
Weetabix
Kid dances with teddies. Another ad I've literally never seen before. What gives? Arlene Philips talks about the dancing teddies on the programme. Jesus.
Freeview
Corgis search for television. Literally never seen this. Lorraine Kelly think this ad 'very very good'. We get to listen to the owners of the dogs. For crying out loud.
Cadburys
Clothes dance. Literally never seen it. Arlene Philips lends vital – and I do mean vital – insight into what it's like to dance while dressed as a pair of trousers. The hair transplant man from a talent show was 'bowled over'.
Old Spice
This is a genuine classic. Razor-sharp lines that are totally on the button. Brilliant. Wonderfully pulled off. Mel Sykes basically reveals that she gets wet when this ad comes on.
Yell
The JR Hartley ad updated. Don't think this works. Not especially charming, though well done.
Heineken - the entrance
Despise this music, so can't like this advert. Yes, yes, well done.
People on the programme express amazement over the choreography. Pathetic.
Lynx - Sexy boy
Angels fall to Earth, remove halos in search of man who smells of gas. It's kinda the sort of thing that Lynx does. Whether you think that makes it brilliant probably depends on whether you read Nuts, or work in advertising. Smell is important, says Mel Sykes.
Hovis - Farmer's Race
Literally never seen this. Farmers run. Quite nice. 'Real farmers' were actually involved. Fuck me.
John Lewis - Through the ages
I genuinely don't get John Lewis adverts. They seem to work, but why? All they do is borrow good stuff from other people. Certainly there's a skill involved in picking music, but it's all such a shamelessly obvious tactic.
We're supposed to believe that everyone cries when they see these ads. Let's not overstate the case here – these are well-made ads but there's nothing novel about them.
"Brilliantly uses music," says Arlene Phillips. For the love of Christ.
Also, the ad ends with The Kooks, who are obviously fucking shit.
British Airways - The Aviators
Fuck right off. This is an absolute fucking disgrace. It's insulting. It's disingenuous. It's totally shameless. Despicable, awful, hideous. Dreadful. I'm not kidding. (Read my original post on this - the biggest wank ever wanked ).
Cancer Research UK
A powerful advert, no doubt. I like ads like this for charities that show you real lives – and show you the upside to charitable works.
Aldi Xmas adverts
Like these. Real people. In and out fast. Not too twee. Well done.
VW Darth Vader ads
Brilliant fun, really well done though I still struggle to connect the product with the ad. See if you can name the car. Bet you can't.
T-Mobile - Parking Ticket
Fake traffic wardens befriend motorists. The sort of thing that might raise a flicker of interest for four seconds during your lunch break. No doubt people in advertising will tell us how astonishingly clever this is.
I do like the actors in it though.
Cravendale - Cats with thumbs
Walking cats. Meh.
Last year I described this as drowning in warm bovril while Lorraine Kelly and Ben Shepherd coo in your ear. This year, more like a load of boardroom suits patting your fevered brow while relieving you of your wallet.
June keywords: The man who invented Cadburys Wispas has cried
Listen, you fuckers, you screwheads. Here is a man who would not take it anymore. A man who stood up against the scum, the cunts, the dogs, the filth, the shit. Here is a man who stood up.
I used to think this about advertisers - now I think it about my readers. Because if keyword queries are anything to go by I am indeed Travis Bickle, gazing out into the world at large and disgusted by what he sees. Sex. Shit. Sex and shit. Sex and shit adverts. Cheryl Baker's breasts.
Have I created a monster? Well, perhaps, but at least blogging gives them a lightning rod with which to work out their frustrations.
This month's keywords were saved, for me, by some amusing ones, mostly beginning with 'why?'. Why is Paul Merton so smug? Why is Gary Rhodes so weird? Why is Peter Kay rubbish? And - most importantly - why does the laughing cow drink her own milk? Valuable questions we need answers to.
My favourite one was the one in the title. Was it supposed to be 'died' instead of 'cried'? Has the man who invented the Wispa died? Or cried? Would either instance have been reported anywhere? It seems unlikely, but my interest's piqued.
Is there a man who works for Cadbury's whose job it is to devise new chocolate bars? Is the Wispa just a rip-off of the Aero? What would make such a chocolate inventor weep?
We're at the very limits of what even search engines can tell us here. As with the amount of queries that seem to start with a desperate 'why?'. We can never know, nor understand why. But, for the record, Shaun Williamson has had a hair transplant; Cheryl Baker hasn't been depressed;and Shane Richie denies that he's wearing a wig.
June AdTurds keywords
jacamo is for fat bastards - 26 instances
natwest helpful banking fuck off - 11 instances
giant rotating negroid head - 6 instances
confused microphone minge
women stalking the camera en masse — post-feminist zombies lusting after a scarf - this is one of mine
"barclays adverts"cunt
"cock comparison"
"i like old movies" advert shit
"you wouldn't steal a" "fuck you, i would if i could"
advert with bad neck
advert with balloons all over the place
adverts for cancer
adverts on itv about cars and cats
andrew castle shit
anyone else hate the confused adverts
are the two women on the halifax advert lesbians and fancy each other? - certainly, to my mind
arsehole from hair advert
asda advert long haired guy talking about quiche
asian girl halifax advert yeah
bad features of the cadbury eyebrow
barry eastenders hair sean williamson transplant
bouncing pendulous boobs
bouncing tits cunts
boycott gocompare and confused.com cos of their adverts
can you buy creme eggs in december in england?
can you say shit in ads
carey mulligan pussy
cheryl baker boobs
cheryl baker getting fucked
cheryl baker milf
cheryl baker tits
confused.com ymca what the fuck cunts
cream egg pussy filler
davina mccall squeezing ass
dildo on the woman and then facking a women driver car insurance
do you see breasts in barclaycard rollercoaster advert - I feel sure it was someone's responsibility to airbrush out any offending nipples in this ad
fucked under the table secretly wife is there
garnier ultralift advert behind the scenes
go compare adverts compare these two fingers fatty
god only knows ruined by volkswagen
god only knows ruined by vw vans advert
has cheryl baker been depressed?
has shane ritchie got a wig?
has the voice of the panda of fox biscuit adverts changed
here comes the girls adverts horrible patronising
how is gender constructed in the cadbury milk tray advertisement
hsbc advert what the fuck is he cooking
i've been fucked by bray leino
ian wright carpetright advert - why would anyone want to see such a thing?
is brian big brother and cadbury monkey ad racist
is it true that the guy in the barlays was seen on a railway station and picked for the advert?
is that paul whitehouse real face
jacamo is for obese people
jack davenport big penis
jenny craig causing weird poop
lesbian halifax advert
mumford oirish
ocean finance tv why does it exist
peter jones appears in advertisements suck dick
pillsbury dougboy jizzes all over
safe use smoked sausage dildo
sean pertwee i want you
semen everywhere
sex and the erosion of shit
sex keywords used on twitter
the biggest pile of a girl 1 kg turds
the man who invented cadburys wispas has cried
twat in a ford ka
up your bingo fat bitches
website compares tits people vote on them - an opening for Confused.com?
what do you think of the jammy doger? i think it's a very arrogant biscuit - I'd love to hear the reasoning on this
whose is that bouncing tits in all the adverts
why is gary rhodes so weird?
why is paul merton such a smug knob?
why is peter kay so shit these days?
why would the laughing cow eat her own milk?
wonga idiots
wow, pretty girl is shitting? surely pretty turd
yahoo caramel girls fucked roughly
halifax ad punch myself in the face
i hate that fucking creepy birdseye bear
Recurring keywords
Annoying - 121 - Spotify a runaway here; Barclays, Direct Line Line and 118 118 running up
Shit - 154 - All the usual suspects
Fuck - 71 - Natwest and Halifax
Hate - 40 - Louise Rednknapp, Betty Crocker, Confiused.com, GoCompare, Halifax, Barclays getting it here
Cunt - 25 - Jacamo ran away with this one
Cadbury’s in trouble again for ‘racist’ advert
Cadbury's has apologised and withdrawn an advert that compared a chocolate bar to Naomi Campbell, referencing her stroppy, prima-donna-ish behaviour.
La Campbell and some silly pressure groups have been shrilly announcing their displeasure at this advert, which is an insult to blacks everywhere and is basically the same as if everyone who works for Cadbury had dressed up as Klan members and set fire to a burning cross outside her house:
"I am shocked. It's upsetting to be described as chocolate, not just for me, but for all black women and black people. I do not find any humour in this. It is insulting and hurtful."
Now, this was a silly thing to do from Cadbury's, especially as they got into trouble not so long ago for another misjudged advert featuring a 'giant, rotating negroid head', but how exactly is this racist? Chocolate is brown; Naomi Campbell is black so is comparing one to the other in an entirely different context indicative or racism?
Hardly, but in an age where virtually every act committed by anyone in the world has to result in a public apology it's hardly surprising and someone should have foreseen this.
What's disappointing is that a number of people beyond the ghastly Campbell appear to be jumping on a rather ramshackle bandwagon. Three people in the country complained about this, as is their right. They may have felt that the ad was naive and misjudged, but it's all so depressing whenever people cry racism with the slightest prompting.
Does anyone genuinely believe that a massive multinational would okay an ad that compared chocolate to a black woman on the basis of her racial make-up?
Personally I don't, but by the same token I wouldn't have believed that Cadbury's would, twice in rapid succession, release adverts that could be attacked on the grounds of mocking black people.
Anyway, here's a strapline for that ad that might have been racist:
"Like Naomi Campbell, it's brown"