Blockbuster Gets Nostalgic for Holidays in Heartbreaking Last Stand

In Christmas Dinner, a bustling family talks to each other with nothing but quotes from movie classics, presumably rented at Blockbuster.

Nothing warms our hearts like hearing a little girl go, "Say hello to my little friend!"

Cute ad (courtesy of DDB, Toronto), but will it save Blockbuster from deathwatch status?

Led by MTV, Virtual Beauties Get the Lewd Eye

MTV, Ford Models and Elizabeth Arden are conducting a cattle call for the best-looking avatar. You can enter from the virtual world for The Hills, a TV show.

It was probably stupid to think even the virtual world would be exempt from aesthetic groping by the "culture makers." But hey, at least it's a lot easier -- and maybe less morally constricting? -- to get work done to meet the standard. Whatever it is.

Lowe's Labels Chistmas Trees Family Trees, Blames Creative Process

In the first of what is sure to be many holiday advertising fuck ups, Lowes is taking heat for calling Christmas trees family trees in one of their recent catalogs. "Come on kids, let's go take a nice family trip down to Lowe's and pick up a family tree for the living room. After all, it's nice to stick a tree in the house isn't it?"

Lowe's has apologized for what it is calling a "breakdown in our own creative process." Um, right. Like no one noticed the non-sensicle heading, "family trees," above a shot of those cone shaped trees people like to put decorations on and presents underneath? Were human resources' PC police running the creative department the day the catalog was created?

Emerald Nuts Skips Super Bowl This Year

It is a sad day indeed when quirky Emerald Nuts announces it won't advertise in the Super Bowl this year. While the company say the October 30 death of pitchman Robert Goulet had nothing to do with the decision, one can't help acknowledge his last ceiling crawler/office pest commercial was a nice cap to the brand's three year run in the game.

In lieu of a commercial, Emerald Nuts will focus on events and sponsorships surrounding the game, one of which will be to team with Anheuser-Busch.

For McCain, British Potatoes Go on Parade

To reinvigorate love of starchy spud fare, McCain, makers of "the best damn chips in England" according to our in-house British consultant, tapped the expertise of Glue London, which developed the campaign; Aardman Animations; and Rubber Republic, which did the seeding.

The result was Potato Parade. For a friend, you could get a dancing line of spuds to spout praise and glory with little wooden signs.

Last year Benetton taught us that potatoes come from seeds, so madd props to Rubber Republic for "seeding" an all-singing, all-dancing parade.

Okay, that joke was just lame.

Starbucks to Kick Dunkin's Ass With 1,600 Stores and National TV Campaign

As if there weren't already enough Starbucks on every corner of every city and town in the nation, the chain plans to open 1,600 more in the next year. Partially in support of that and partially to stave off a minor (one percent) decline in transactions per store, Strabucks, in a conference call yesterday announced it would launch a new (it's first) national TV campaign (three spots now, two later in November) as well as an online initiative where visitors can share holiday cheer. Wieden + Kennedy is behind the campaign.

Hmm. Does America really run on Dunkin' or is Starbucks out to change that once and for all?

Tree-Hugging Pedal Pushers: Innovate or Die!

Pedaling to save the world -- or at least fuel advertising -- has endless appeal because we'll probably never run out of human energy or youthful tenacity.

The idea of driving people to oblivion for not doing the right thing (Vote or die!, Funny or die!, Assimilate with Android or die!) is also insanely appealing.

So Google and Specialized give us Innovate or Die(!), a rewards-driven invitation for young engineers to invent eco-friendly, zero-emission machines that operate on human pedal power.

If you're crazy enough to do it, or need to kill time until FlugTag, make a film about it and post it on YouTube by December 15.

Prize for the most innovative submission includes $5K and a Specialized Globe bike. Five runners-up will also get Specialized Globe bikes. We don't actually know what those are.

Orangina, Did You Really Just Go There?

Wow. We knew Orangina had pulp, but we didn't know they meant pulp like Pulp Fiction means pulp. (Or maybe we should be thinking Flashdance.)

Actually, there are a few other movie references worth noting in this commercial, which will change the way you look at forest animals. Seriously. Inter-bestial relationships were beyond our realm of Orangina-oriented thinking, plus we've never seen a flamingo pole dance before.

Says CD Todd Mueller of Psyop, "I guess it goes without saying that when you get the opportunity to spray Orangina all over the chest of a sexy bunny girl, you go for it." In terms of sheer logic, that's not really helpful, but it puts the spot in context.

(Dude, our dad gives us this stuff when we go home for the holidays!)

Catch more info on the creators, and Steve's take on the spot, here.

Google Debuts Contextual Email Security. Hrm.

Postini just released a few updates that include contextual email security. If your email, or an attachment to it, has a social security or credit card number in it, the message will be automatically gobbledy-gooked as it wizzes through the tubes.

If this all doesn't go to shit, Google will probably debut Postini-esque security offerings for wikis, blogs and instant messages, says Google rep Adam Swidler to Internet News.

We know Google's really married to this "contextual" thing but we just wanted to point out "contextual" can give rise to both appropriate and inappropriate algorithmic activities. Observe the dumb-fuckery resulting from bad (or maybe just inopportune?) contextual advertising: 1, 2, 3, 4 (and we could go on).

Disgruntled Stuffed Animals Butt Heads, then Hug, for Zune

New ad for Zune Arts: Masks, which follows the "don't fight; sharing is caring!" trail that this one started. Imagine the Care Bears and Disney jumping Tim Burton on William Wallace Avenue. Add a dash of Bravia bunny. Now we're in business.

The work was directed by Jonathan Garin and Naomi Nishimura of PandaPanther, NYC; produced by 72andSunny. The track is “Young Men Dead” by The Black Angels.

This was the last time we liked a Zune ad.

The new Zune Arts website also launched today with help from 72andSunny. According to the PR people, it's "bigger, faster, stronger." Yeah, we've heard that one before.

This one does look faster, though. But what does it mean to be "bigger" and "stronger"?