Tuesday, June 14, 2011

I'm a WHAT, Honda??



Oh, this is really appropriate. I'm sure the good people in marketing at Honda were just a little too busy making this stupid, pointless nub of a commercial to notice that the song they decided to use is about a teen stalker who is in a mad rush to get to the house of the object of his obsession so he can watch her undress. No kidding. Check out the lyrics (no, I'm not providing a link- go find it yourself if you are really that interested. Pretty sick.)

I guess they were also too busy to look around and notice that it's not 1985 anymore, and nobody is driving to the Arcade to play cheap-graphic video games. Not even Hoodie Ninjas (seriously, what does that even mean?)

Is it too much to expect that as soon as someone taps an executive at Honda on the shoulder and explains to them how inappropriate the background music is, or how "Do Not Attempt" should not refer to this "ninja's" use of the featured car as a freaking TIME MACHINE, this ad will cease to exist? Bleh- of course it is. My guess is that nobody at Honda ever actually bothered to listen to the song beyond the "I'm a Hoodie Ninja" line, which a focus group of People Who Really Ought To Just Die Now decided was really cool and catchy. (Focus Groups do more damage to this country than Republican governors, I swear....)

So thank you, Honda, for making me ashamed of my chosen mode of travel. My Civic EX has given me eight years and 103,000 miles of excellent service- but now I feel associated with this ugly, clueless ad campaign. Believe it or not, I don't want to be a Hoodie Ninja, whatever the hell that is. I had planned to buy a new car next year, and just assumed it would be another Honda, but now I have to rethink the situation. Toyota hasn't irritated me for a while, and the last time I checked, it wasn't using disturbing, violent lyrics to sell it's product.

Worth a second look this time, in any case.

10 comments:

  1. It gets worse; the other people associated with the campaign are a zombie office worker, a masked wrestler, a lumberjack and a character from a Sid and Marty Krofft show.

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  2. That furry character is really creepy. I keep waiting for her to open wide her gaping maw and bite the heads off those girls she hangs with.

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  3. Wow, well every time I saw this commercial I kept hearing "I'm a horny ninja" and neither me nor my boyfriend could figure out what it was really saying. So I guess "I'm a hoodie ninja" is somewhat better.

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  4. Yeah, that's what I heard the first time too. I had to watch it a few more times to figure out what it was saying. And it nearly killed me, because this commercial SUCKS!

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  5. Haha, thank you for this post. It made my day.

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  6. Mr Jamele as a 49yr old consumer all I can say is, if you don't like the commercial change the channel or mute your TV, better yet get off your couch and live life outdoors. There have been so many annoying or in appropriate selling tools in all forms of media, anyone interested in chronicling marketing would probably come up with enough material for a book twice the size of War & Peace.

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  7. Here's what you don't know about me, Teri-

    1. I watch no more than an hour of tv a day. Don't need more than that for material.

    2. I walk at least forty miles a week (just came back from a 14-mile walk through Rock Creek Park, DC- zoo was nice and crowded and it was a gorgeous day.) I am never inside unless I'm working or it's night- and not always then.

    3. Thanks for your "change the channel or mute the tv" suggestion, but I didn't ask for it. This is a hobby of mine. Apparently making blanket judgements about people you don't know is yours.

    Mine's more fun.

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  8. I too thought it was "horny ninja". I like it better that way. As for the significance of what's going on in the commercial, I really don't care. I just really like Asian girls. I'll watch an Asian girl doing anything. Literally. Anything.

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