Thursday, May 13, 2010
TV - LOST joke on Kimmel
THIS is fantastic. Take three minutes out of your day and enjoy.
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Friday, May 7, 2010
TV - Embedded Commercials
The embedded commercials in television shows are getting to a point that is just pathetic and desperate. I'm trying to decide which is the worst offender - Gossip Girl or Bones.
Gossip Girl
So, Gossip Girl is shamelessly plugging bing.com, that search engine that is trying to compete with Google. Here are some of the things they have done:
1. Shown lingering over the shoulder shots of people looking up information on the internet on bing.com. Mildly annoying, but really not much worse than normal product placement.
2. Concocted a situation where te characters needed to find some information quickly. One says, "We'll just look it up on Bing," or something to that effect and sits down at the computer. Three seconds later after some furious typing, he says, "Done!" That one is pretty bad. I mean, if you cut out the 15 seconds of the show where that happened, I'm pretty sure it would be identical to an actual commercial for bing.
3. In the midst of preparing for a fashion show, with all kinds of people running around trying to get things done, the frazzled designer is asked a question. Her response? "Just bing it." Bing. It. As in, look it up on bing.com. As in, they are trying to replace the phrase "google it" with the phrase "bing it." Now THAT is just pathetic. Epic failure on the part of both Gossip Girl and bing.com. Gossip Girl, because it makes me lose respect for the show - not that I had a lot to begin with (though, don't get me wrong, I love the show). Bing.com, because it just reeks of kid brother syndrome. They are trying to force a square peg into a round hole. It would be like Puffs brand facial tissue trying to get people to call all facial tissue "puffs." Just accept that your competitor's name has become the generic term and move on with convincing people that you have the better product. Don't try to take over the generic term! It's just pathetic, and it's not going to work. That ship has sailed, bing.com. People are not going to start saying, "Bing it," when they mean "look it up on the internet." However, if your search engine is really that great and is superior to Google, maybe one day people will say, "Google it on bing."
Bones
So, Bones has been doing ads for Toyota. Mostly out of the mouth of Angela Montenegro. There have only been two glaring incidents.
1. Angela is driving a Toyota Sienna with another character in the car. The other character asks why Angela drives a mini-van (she's not a mom, so it makes no sense, right?). Angela replies that the Sienna has plenty of room for all her art supplies (do art supplies really take up that much room?) and that she is bad at parallel parking, so she likes the rearview camera. It was so jarring I had to pause it and ask my husband whether what I thought had just happened had in fact just happened. And while I generally like the actress who plays Angela, she is terrible at these little mini-commercials, so if they must keep them on the show, I think they should give them to someone else. Maybe no one else will agree to do them.
2. In last night's episode, Angela and Hodgins are driving in a Prius. Hodgins is driving but Angela is showing him something on a camera, I think. He starts to veer out of his land and the car automatically pulls him back into his lane. He says, "Whoa! What happened!?" Angela helpfully points to a littls screen showing to lane lines and tells Hodgins that the Prius helps you stay in your lane. "It's pretty cool," she says. He agrees that it's cool and does it again, prompting a police office to pull him over and ask if he's been drinking. This incident led to Hodgins and Angela being loked up in a jail cell together for an extended period of time in which they realize that they still love each other and before leaving the jail, they get MARRIED. That's right, an embedded Toyota Prius commercial led to a wedding.
So, which is worse? I really can't decide. Telling someone to "Bing it," is pretty ridiculous, but using an embedded commercial as a lame-ass plot device to lead to a wedding is also pretty much unforgivable. Read more!
Gossip Girl
So, Gossip Girl is shamelessly plugging bing.com, that search engine that is trying to compete with Google. Here are some of the things they have done:
1. Shown lingering over the shoulder shots of people looking up information on the internet on bing.com. Mildly annoying, but really not much worse than normal product placement.
2. Concocted a situation where te characters needed to find some information quickly. One says, "We'll just look it up on Bing," or something to that effect and sits down at the computer. Three seconds later after some furious typing, he says, "Done!" That one is pretty bad. I mean, if you cut out the 15 seconds of the show where that happened, I'm pretty sure it would be identical to an actual commercial for bing.
3. In the midst of preparing for a fashion show, with all kinds of people running around trying to get things done, the frazzled designer is asked a question. Her response? "Just bing it." Bing. It. As in, look it up on bing.com. As in, they are trying to replace the phrase "google it" with the phrase "bing it." Now THAT is just pathetic. Epic failure on the part of both Gossip Girl and bing.com. Gossip Girl, because it makes me lose respect for the show - not that I had a lot to begin with (though, don't get me wrong, I love the show). Bing.com, because it just reeks of kid brother syndrome. They are trying to force a square peg into a round hole. It would be like Puffs brand facial tissue trying to get people to call all facial tissue "puffs." Just accept that your competitor's name has become the generic term and move on with convincing people that you have the better product. Don't try to take over the generic term! It's just pathetic, and it's not going to work. That ship has sailed, bing.com. People are not going to start saying, "Bing it," when they mean "look it up on the internet." However, if your search engine is really that great and is superior to Google, maybe one day people will say, "Google it on bing."
Bones
So, Bones has been doing ads for Toyota. Mostly out of the mouth of Angela Montenegro. There have only been two glaring incidents.
1. Angela is driving a Toyota Sienna with another character in the car. The other character asks why Angela drives a mini-van (she's not a mom, so it makes no sense, right?). Angela replies that the Sienna has plenty of room for all her art supplies (do art supplies really take up that much room?) and that she is bad at parallel parking, so she likes the rearview camera. It was so jarring I had to pause it and ask my husband whether what I thought had just happened had in fact just happened. And while I generally like the actress who plays Angela, she is terrible at these little mini-commercials, so if they must keep them on the show, I think they should give them to someone else. Maybe no one else will agree to do them.
2. In last night's episode, Angela and Hodgins are driving in a Prius. Hodgins is driving but Angela is showing him something on a camera, I think. He starts to veer out of his land and the car automatically pulls him back into his lane. He says, "Whoa! What happened!?" Angela helpfully points to a littls screen showing to lane lines and tells Hodgins that the Prius helps you stay in your lane. "It's pretty cool," she says. He agrees that it's cool and does it again, prompting a police office to pull him over and ask if he's been drinking. This incident led to Hodgins and Angela being loked up in a jail cell together for an extended period of time in which they realize that they still love each other and before leaving the jail, they get MARRIED. That's right, an embedded Toyota Prius commercial led to a wedding.
So, which is worse? I really can't decide. Telling someone to "Bing it," is pretty ridiculous, but using an embedded commercial as a lame-ass plot device to lead to a wedding is also pretty much unforgivable. Read more!
Wednesday, May 5, 2010
TV - What is wrong with me?!
Dear "Glee" and "American Idol" - I wish I knew how to quit you! Why can't I stop watching these terrible shows?!? Read more for my whiny ramblings and my sad prediction for tonight's Idol.
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