Lately Hollywood's been running out of ideas and has been milking old money-making franchises by "rebooting" them, updating them or changing the mood of the original (ex: Batman, Robocop, Friday the 13th, etc.)
While Hollywood has been running out of ideas, the people in charge of the advertising for these reboots haven't and have created expansive and elaborate viral campaigns that get the audience jazzed about the forthcoming movie. These campaigns can start months or even years before a movie is done. The best example of this has been The Dark Knight's viral campaign that included scavenger hunts, fake political campaigns, clues called into phones baked in cakes, and so on.
Even though I can't find any reference to it anywhere, I get the feeling that studios are trying to reboot the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle franchise and this time the ad wizards have gone a step too far by playing god. Recently an unidentified creature washed up in the Hamptons about the same time a deformed pig was born in China. Why are these two seemingly unrelated events significant? They both bear striking similarity to TMNT II mutant mutant henchmen, Tokka and Rahzar.
NYTimes: Many also shared with Mr. Bush’s national security team a belief that pessimistic war coverage broke the nation’s will to win in Vietnam, and there was a mutual resolve not to let that happen with this war.
This was a major theme, for example, with Paul E. Vallely, a Fox News analyst from 2001 to 2007. A retired Army general who had specialized in psychological warfare, Mr. Vallely co-authored a paper in 1980 that accused American news organizations of failing to defend the nation from “enemy” propaganda during Vietnam.
“We lost the war — not because we were outfought, but because we were out Psyoped,” he wrote. He urged a radically new approach to psychological operations in future wars — taking aim at not just foreign adversaries but domestic audiences, too. He called his approach “MindWar” — using network TV and radio to “strengthen our national will to victory.”
Submitted by DanteBronte on Thu, 08/16/2007 - 22:10
So the State Department has essentially created a new position called "Director of Digital Media" to hire a former producer of Bill O'Reilly to upload "viral" propaganda videos to YouTube. This one could be called "High Tea with Condi Rice, Karen Hughes, and Hall of Fame baseball player Cal Ripken, Jr.," whom the Bush Administration has tapped to salvage America's image abroad. A few words of caution: this video is a train wreck.
Some classic lines:
"Well, Mr. Ripken -- let's call a spade a spade." -- State Dept. Director of Digital Media Heath Kern (Who Is Heath Kern?)
"Sports is a universal language, kind of like the arts." -- Sec. of State Condi Rice
"Hmmmm... that's a TOUGH QUESTION!" -- Cal Ripken, Jr.
Submitted by booyahbaisse on Thu, 08/16/2007 - 13:39
After returning from Istanbul, which feels like the only place left in the world where cigarette smoking has yet to eclipse toothpaste in popularity, and returning to New York's nearly smokeless society, and now seeing these wonderful Soviet cigarette packets, I am finally realizing what almost everyone else around me has: we are well past the golden age of tobacco.
Submitted by DanteBronte on Mon, 07/09/2007 - 23:26
This is really taking viral marketing to the next level. Click the above logo to go to the website of all the corporations that have partnered with The Simpsons to hype the upcoming release of The Simpsons Movie.
To their credit, each of these companies has done an amazing job of making the hype feel like highly personalized excitement for Homer and the gang. I confess, I did a fist pump when I saw that there would be an entire channel dedicated to The Simpsons on my JetBlue flight to Chicago last weekend; and I admit, I did shed a tear when I saw photos of the Kwik-E-Mart of Los Angeles. I never thought I'd see the day. But is this going too far? A website devoted strictly to the commercials?
Submitted by DanteBronte on Mon, 07/09/2007 - 19:49
The newest addition to NYC's never-ending quest to eek out public space from the margins of society (or wealthy developers trying to slap a happy face on a significant loss of NYC affordable housing), StuyTown has introduced a new series of free shows called Concerts on the Oval, every Wednesday until August 8th at 6:30pm. To get to the oval, you walk into the housing project on the First Avenue Loop, off 1st Ave. and 17th/19th Street. I will see you at Escort on July 25.
Submitted by DanteBronte on Tue, 06/26/2007 - 13:22
The DVD industry, with its insatiable appetite for repackaging old crap, has produced a glut of meaningless, trite, and horrible special features.
This is a new section to Cosmodrome, where we laugh at movie moguls gazing at their navels, talking about how brilliant they themselves are in special features that reveal just how un-special they really are.
Behold Ron Howard on the scoring of A Beautiful Mind. Get a load of the scripted ad-libbing. It's insane!
NYTimes: Many also shared with Mr. Bush’s national security team a belief that pessimistic war coverage broke the nation’s will to win in Vietnam, and there was a mutual resolve not to let that happen with this war.
