No, Even Lexus Can’t Top the Big-Wheel Memory

lexus-big-wheel-memory.jpg

Every holiday season Lexus busts out with a campaign featuring some pearl-coloured vehicle with a bow on top. Far from perfect — whose pursuit Lexus claims to champion — it’s mediocre and irritating. Like weathered nativity scenes.

Last night we thought we saw something different. The comfortingly low-fi “Big Wheel” bears the consistency of old home videos or a classic holiday movie. In it, a kid with a new plastic trike faces us and cries, “Stop! What are you doing? You can’t top the big-wheel memory!”

We ruminate on our own ’80s-era big wheels as he reprises us on its merits: the freedom! The wind in your hair!

Then there’s an awkward cut. The kid is a man, and now he’s facing a Lexus — with a bow. And we’re like, “Fuck, this could have been so much better.”

Picture of Steve Hall

Steve Hall

RECENT ARTICLES

TRENDING AROUND THE WEB

Real confidence rarely needs to announce itself: it shows up as stillness under pressure, a level voice when everyone else in the room is raising theirs, a willingness to let silence sit for a few extra seconds, and no need to perform for an audience that was never really watching

Real confidence rarely needs to announce itself: it shows up as stillness under pressure, a level voice when everyone else in the room is raising theirs, a willingness to let silence sit for a few extra seconds, and no need to perform for an audience that was never really watching

Global English Editing

A survey of 2,000 women over 45 commissioned by the herbal remedy brand A. Vogel found that more than two-thirds felt completely ignored by men the moment they walked into a crowded room, and 46 percent said no one around them seemed to understand what that shift actually felt like

A survey of 2,000 women over 45 commissioned by the herbal remedy brand A. Vogel found that more than two-thirds felt completely ignored by men the moment they walked into a crowded room, and 46 percent said no one around them seemed to understand what that shift actually felt like

Global English Editing

Received Pronunciation, the accent linguists still nickname the Queen’s English, took shape inside a handful of England’s most expensive private schools, and it remains such a reliable marker of that background that a stranger can often place someone’s education within a single sentence.

Received Pronunciation, the accent linguists still nickname the Queen’s English, took shape inside a handful of England’s most expensive private schools, and it remains such a reliable marker of that background that a stranger can often place someone’s education within a single sentence.

Global English Editing

9 truths about people that regular volunteers learn fast

9 truths about people that regular volunteers learn fast

Hack Spirit

7 habits of people who remember everyone’s name and use it well

7 habits of people who remember everyone’s name and use it well

Hack Spirit

What a glass of wine at 8pm actually does for a writer — and what it doesn’t

What a glass of wine at 8pm actually does for a writer — and what it doesn’t

Global English Editing