Take That/Advertising: Difference between revisions

'''Bear 2''': You're [[All Animals Are Domesticated|not cute and cuddly]]. You're a ''grizzly bear''.<br />

'''Bear 1''': So?<br />

 

 

== Computers and related ==

* Apple Computer has a long history of [[Take That]] ads (but please, [[Computer Wars|no OS warring here]] [[Internet Backdraft|for the sake of sanity]]!):

** In the mid '90s, there was an ad with a shot zooming out to show two computers side by side: one with the Mac OS starting screen, the other with the Win95 startup screen. "Although watching them run side by side is not terribly special," cue the computer chassis beneath the Win95 screen being pulled away to reveal both monitors hooked to the Mac, "Watching them run from one computer ''is''." promoting the model of Quadra with a PC's core on a daughterboard allowing a single machine to run both platforms at once.

** The Switch campaign in the early 2000s, targeted at Windows PCs.

*** Not so much so any more, since Quizno's has five-dollar value-subs as well (although they're mostly just advertising their ''$4'' Toasty Torpedoes, which are also a foot long--though they're extremely skinny, which the commercials don't mention.) KFC snipes at the both of them by having someone ask how much the chips and the drink cost, as you can now get an entire ''box'' of food for 5 bucks at KFC.

*** Subway for a long time based a large bulk of its advertising on bashing McDonald's (and indeed, burger joints in general), so it's only right that someone hit them back. Heck, they ''still'' take shots at fast food. If you're to believe them, eating one meal at Burger King Stand-In will ''ruin your life''.

*** In New England (unless it was in one of the gas station franchises) Subway has always offered toasted sandwiches. They only started offering toasted in their gas station franchises since 1990...

* The Burger King commercials with Ronald McDonald, in a trench coat, ordering his food.

* The advertising for Billabong Ice-Creams Lime Spider flavour contained the slogan "A lime spider is better than a lame lion", a very mean "take that" aimed at Paddlepop ice-creams, whose mascot is a lion.

* In a [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_EFGMyfYoc Pizza Hut advertisement] promoting ''[[Back to The Future]]'', two Hill Valley teens from 1989 travel to the year 2015 in the DeLorean and soon start craving for pizza. One of them suggests, "What about that place that delivers?" They approach a building with a sign on the window saying "We Deliver". The camera tilts up, and what is the name of the building they've come to? '''Domino's Hardware'''. This revelation causes them to wonder, "What happened to them?"

* The link above also discusses the Miller/Bud dustup around the same time: Miller ran ads (in a U.S. presidential election year) mocking Bud's "King of Beers" slogan by saying, hey, in America, we have ''presidents'', not kings, and calling Miller the "President of Beers". Not mentioned in the link: One of the ads showed the spokesperson "debating" one of the Budweiser Clydesdales, and that apparently was seen as over the line by the Busch family, so Bud hit back with no-more-Mr.-Nice-guy radio and TV spots mocking Miller for saying this when it was foreign-owned ... and, just coincidentally for a beer very popular in the African-American community, the foreign owner was based in ... ''South Africa''! (So what if apartheid was long gone by this point?) That, in turn, became [[Hilarious in Hindsight]] when Busch was itself bought by a Belgian company, [[In Bev]], four years later.

* Ironically, a few years before that Busch had gone after Coors hard, pointing out that the Coors distributed in the Eastern US ''didn't'' use that fine Colorado Rocky Mountain spring water they bragged about since they were brewed in Virginia. Some were almost as quick and dirty as political campaign ads. Coors responded with ads where their president walked around with the Virginia mountains in the background and asserted that water was just as pure and didn't make a difference to the overall quality of their beer.

* Mike's Hard Lemonade has a series of spots taking shots at their competitors, with the innovations said competitors advertise being bought to the bosses by a well-meaning employee. Take Miller's Cold Activated (and for that matter Coor's Light's similar mechanic) can, which displays a logo when the beer is cold enough. The Mike's employees pointed out that you could do the same thing simply by picking up the can. Subverted in another ad, with the employee bringing in a sommelier, who described their product in beautiful, flowery terms. The bosses stand agape, then ask the employee if he wrote it down. He had just been doodling on his notepad.

** Or how about all their commercials remarking in general about how unmanly every other drink in the market is, saying "in a world that's gone soft, someone has to be hard"? Let me reiterate: a company that sells ''spiked fruit punch'' is attempting to make a [[Take That]] against other alcoholic beverages by accusing them of being unmanly.

* Ovaltine's chocolate milk commercials were infamous for featuring kids trash talking Nestle's chocolate milk. Not much anymore however: [[Hilarious in Hindsight|Nestle now owns the rights to Ovaltine in some regions.]]

* Commercials for Budweiser were quick to mock how long it took for NFL officials to review plays once video replays became commonplace: the Budweiser horses, who were shown playing football (don't ask how horses can play football) in other commercials, spends one standing around waiting as a [[Stealth Pun|zebra]] peers into an on-field replay system.

* British supermarkets got into a rather vicious commercial war, where each supermarket brought up just how many products it had cheaper than the others. Particularly bad with Asda and Tesco, where Asda started with 'Asda have this many products cheaper than Tesco', who then responded with 'Tesco have this many real baskets cheaper than Asda', and so on.

 

 

*** Kevin Butler is the anti-subtle. It's why people either think his ads are awesome or annoying.

* Print ads and commercials for ''[[Ty the Tasmanian Tiger]]'' shown the eponymous Ty dropping in on three hospitalized and highly bandaged characters who bear obvious resemblances to ''[[Sonic the Hedgehog]]'', ''[[Crash Bandicoot]]'', and ''[[Spyro the Dragon]]'', all of whom have Ty's signature boomerangs embedded in them somewhere. They all flatline thereafter. All three characters are still more popular than Ty ever was, though.

** A similar one said "At least this way you'll ''know'' the hot elf chick is a dude."

** Interestingly, a recent banner ad for ''D&D Online'' (seen on this very wiki) takes a much more pointed jab at other free [[MMORPG|MMORPGs]], specifically ''[[Maple Story]]''. "Broccoli or the Beholder" indeed.

* A commercial for a Nivea hair product ends with an Average Guy with good hair saying that it doesn't need to do anything fancy. What makes this a Take That is the earlier cuts in the ad, including a stereotypical geek whining about how the Nivea product won't increase their mating potential, like AXE and LYNX advertise in a decidedly tongue-in-cheek fashion.

* Kotex [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lpypeLL1dAs mocks] [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOM4AMV050A their competition].

*** And U By Kotex [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jd2wsczV8og are direct replies to Kotex], and vice versa.

*** And Tampax got into it with print ads showing a cheerleader in mid-air flip with the caption "At a time like this, you don't want to be thinking about the fact that your tampon came from a little black box." Clearly, they didn't consider the fact that [[Captain Obvious|some people who wear tampons aren't athletes.]]

== TV and related ==

* The television station UPN created an anti-olympics chant for their promos aired during the 1998 Nagano Olympics. It was simply "No, No, Nagano!"

* Let's not forget Time Warner Cable's stab at Verizon's FiOS ads. A guy at home is greeted by a Verizon employee and makes lots of flashy special effects similar to Verizon's ads while the potential buyer keeps putting down the guy, explaining how cable is so much better. When the Verizon character tries to explain about fiber optics, the potential buyer shoots back by saying "I think I'm taking care of that department" and shows off his fiber based cereal.

** Time Warner Cable has unleashed more ads bashing Verizon FiOS by proudly claiming they carry NY 1, which is a 24/7 news channel exclusive to New York residents, and that Verizon doesn't carry it. It is doubtful though that many people will quickly switch to cable just for that one channel. More recent ads show a group of people in a post office asking an employee to send all their Verizon equipment back to Verizon, and then talking amongst themselves on why Verizon sucks and how cable is so much better.

* An ad for [http://www.getpark.co.uk/AgencyOnlineWeb/ Park] mocks [[Dada Ad|adverts that have little to do with their subject matter]] - Cadbury's drumming gorilla, for instance. A bunch of CGI [[Executive Meddling|advertising executives]] suggest an advert in which "a giant reindeer plays the drums!" only for Park's mascot ([[Fairy Companion|a fairy]]) to zip the speaker's mouth shut while some woman explains that people join Park for a cheaper Christmas, not gimmicks. All very well, but when the zip-mouthed guy tries to respond, the [[The Fair Folk|fairy]] [[Nightmare Fuel|makes his mouth fall right off his face. The other executives smile and cheer nervously for the camera...]]

** They showed a similar advert, but with a few changes. The execs' proposals have changed (makes sense, it's no longer Christmas), but also Mr. Zip-mouth no longer gets his mouth zipped, and in fact is the most vocal in supporting Mrs. Some Woman's explanation.

* The British climate change group "10:10" has a very violent [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=azaMU9SaeXc Take That] directed against global warming skeptics. Viewer discretion advised.

* Though not pointed at any specific competitor, handgun manufacturer STI had a [[Take That]] in one print ad: "We've upped our standards, now up ''yours''."