Taco Bell Talking LionsSuper Bowl XLI Commercial

This year there must have been some traveling CGI salesman who convinced all the advertisers that talking animals was going to be the “in” thing during the Super Bowl.

I already took a look at Bud Light’s talking gorillas. They are rejoined by several other enchanted animals, first up are the Taco Bell lions.

For a Taco Bell commercial, this is a little above average. For commercials in general, it’s below average. (But it’s Taco Bell, who cares.

The effects on the lions, similar to the CGI Bud Light gorillas, are a little more sophisticated than the little wiggling mouths that used to adorn all the special effects talking beasties. You have some better mouth / eye movements, and cohesive facial reactions. Despite all this the lions, like the gorillas, come off soulless and fake. I agree with Gore Verbinski, director of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies, who preaches that “CGI” is not a verb. Computer graphics isn’t a magic wand that will make a production look awesome, or replace the need for brick-and-mortar special effects.

Blockbuster Mouse ClickingSuper Bowl XLI Commercial

That said, I’d much rather see the entire animal stylized in CGI, as we see in this commercial for Blockbusters. Some hamsters or something are clicking on a mouse and torturing it to death. It might actually die off screen, I don’t know, I had the sound turned down.

This spot was much funnier and engaging to me than the gorillas or lions, and the animals aren’t presented as completely photo-realistic. The ability to completely control the characters and breathe life into them makes up for the “hey that’s a real lion talking” wow factor.

Comcast Talking TurtlesSuper Bowl XLI Commercial

Normally I’d advocate using puppetry over CGI wherever possible. Until I saw this stinker from the current Comcast campaign.

The talking turtles kind of look like petrified stool samples, and I found myself generally annoyed by this spot. Maybe by the time I saw it I was so fed up with talking animals this one just didn’t stand a chance.

I think they spent four dollars making these puppets. And part of their budget went into buying a three-dollar cup of Starbucks coffee. They must have made one puppet and split-screened it to save money. Anyway, whatever, I am so over the talking turtles. They are dead to me.

I am not a student of body language but I think it’s pretty obvious from the way these two are sitting that they are brother and sister

This one is a quickie. Um no pun intended. Ok I lied, that is a hilarious pun.

Most of this commercial is “eaten up” by an actual ad for the product they are selling. Similar to the previous two ads from the same fast food chain, though, the presence of both Taco Bell food and raunchy sexual innuendo make for an “odd couple”. Get it? An odd couple.

So great. I have to imagine these two doing it while they still chew and swallow Taco Bell. What would happen if I were eating a Monterey Spicy Chicken Whatever in the Taco Bell store and I met eyes with a large hairy trucker? What then?

What then would probably be the fourth and final installment of this advertising campaign if the people running this campaign had their way. I don’t think they’ve had sex in their lives. If they had they would know that amorous feelings feel nothing like Taco Bell sludging its way into your belly and nether-regions.

Since there isn’t much else to write about I guess I’ll fill some space with a fan fiction about these two people. Then maybe I’ll photoshop them doing it in my free time.

Montery Matchup, Chapter One: Love at First Bite

Max had lived next door to Terry for months, but she never could seem to get his attention. Was he blind? What did she need to do to get her to notice that her breasts heaved for him and only him?

One day by happenstance Max knocked on the door to see if Terry’s cable had gone out. “No,” she said, “it’s still on.”

“Oh,” Bill answered. Oops I mean Max. Max answered. “My cable modem went out and I thought maybe it was the cable. I don’t have cable tv so I thought I’d just check but maybe it’s my router or just temporary packet loss or something and blah blah blah!” Stop talking and notice that my bossoms heave for you, Bill! I mean Max!

I am multifaceted and made this image in under nine hours

Max was turning tail back to his rot gut of an apartment when Terry made one last desperate attempt. “Say I got too much Taco Bell and if you hadn’t eaten anything, I mean it’s just Taco Bell I could just throw it out or fertilize my flowerbox with it..but you know if you were hungry or something I might as well..” And his eyes lit up! He was on the hook. But could Terry reel him in?

Stay tuned for Chapter 2! If you kept reading this long, watch the video again already, you obviously have a lot of time on your hands.