When several people started sending in this image of a Johnny Walker outdoor ad that shows Johhny making his way across a broken bridge, the initially innocuous imagery and our agnostic sense of politics caused us to wonder, “What’s so special about this ad? It’s just a picture of a friggin bridge.” Well after the ad came to us a few times, we realize, “Oh, people are pissed off because Leo Burnett/BBH and Johnny Walker are making Middle eastern fun of bridges destroyed in Lebanon.” Oh, OK. Now we get it. Yea. Fuck that shit. We’re pissed off too. How dare they stoop to such insensitive tactics to sell a bit of liquor. Whatever.
Anyway, for its part, Leo Burnett says the ad was intended to lift morale which Mack Simpson thinks would have been better expressed as “raise spirits.”.