Tuesday, January 27, 2009

90210- Just What The Dr. Ordered


So judge me if you must, but I'm a big fan of the new 90210. I was too young when the original was on air, so I am loving every minute of this sitcom. However, what I am not loving is the in-your-face advertising style the show promotes.

Now being a JMC major with emphasis on advertising, at first I thought it was just me. In the episode where Naomi gets some new friends, they give her a cell phone to program. The first shot is a close-up of a T-Mobile Sidekick- not too distracting. Later, after she programs the phone, we see her hand it back to the girl with another close-up of the phone. I started to get really annoyed, because the programming of the phone had no relation to the actual scene whatsoever. It drove me nuts!!!!

Now don't get me wrong- I understand how advertising works and why we have it. But it became so distracting that it was all I could focus on, and Dr.Pepper is the worst of the culprits in this show. In pretty much every scene where someone is eating or drinking, there the Dr. Pepper is. At the lunch table, there's Diet Dr. Pepper. At the Peach Pit where Dickson works, there's a huge Dr. Pepper sign. EVERYWHERE you turn, there it is. It got so repetitive that I started to only pay attention to where the Dr. Pepper would show up in the new scene. I couldn't get enough..I even got to enjoy at least one commercial of Dr. Pepper during EVERY SINGLE COMMERCIAL BREAK!!! WOO-HOO!!!

From an advertising standpoint, these companies did a great job of getting me to notice their product. However, they also did a great job of annoying me with it too.I love the show, but Dr. Pepper and T-Mobile need to cool it. Just because the advertising annoyed me so much, I am boycotting Dr. Pepper for a month. Seriously. And my challenge to anyone who reads this is to watch the show (even if you can't stand it) just to see how long it takes to recognize some T-Mobile or Dr. Pepper advertising. My guess is- 5 minutes max.




1 comment:

Holly said...
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