Hasta La Creative!

With Avengers: Age of Ultron almost upon us, the Marvel cross-marketing blitz–which already includes partners like Target, Dr. Pepper and Kellogg’s–is only getting started.

Longtime partner Audi, though, is taking a different route. Tony Stark’s automaker of choice, which will see the inclusion of the 2016 Audi R8, 2015 TTS and 2015 A3 Cabriolet vehicles in Ultron, has teamed with PMK*BNC (the PR-first agency perhaps best known to us for last year’s Breaking Bad Emmy promo) to unveil a two-minute short directed by well-known comic book geek Kevin Smith.

Most importantly, the campaign allowed the guy who made Chasing Amy to work with his hero Stan Lee, (along with a few other familiar faces).

Smith, who owns real-world comic book store Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash and hosts AMC’s Comic Book Men, has found the perfect outlet to mark his first time directing an ad with “Stan Lee Cameo School.” Playing on Lee’s penchant for making cameo appearances in Marvel films (not to mention Smith’s own Mallrats), the clip also features the likes of Smith’s constant foil Jason Mewes, Sharknado 2‘s own Tara Reid, Mallrats co-star Michael Rooker and the original Hulk, Lou Ferrigno, who pays homage to his early ’80s show at the end.

In the midst of the marketing onslaught of Ultron, this one offers some B-List geek fun along with its relatively subtle branding.

Title: “Stan Lee Cameo School feat. Kevin Smith, Tara Reid, Michael Rooker, Jason Mewes and Lou Ferrigno”
Hashtags: #Avengers #AgeOfUltron
Audi Twitter Handle: @Audi
Starring: Stan Lee, Kevin Smith, Michael Rooker, Tara Reid with cameos by: Lou Ferrigno, Jason Mewes and the Audi S8
Executive Producer: Kim Dellara
Director: Kevin Smith
Producer: Adrianne McCurrach

(TrendHunter.com) The Senzati Jet is a completely custom-constructed and built-to-order converted van. This vehicle consists of a Mercedes Sprinter van converted into a vehicle including everything from reclining…

Most NewFronts presenters are trying to get advertisers to buy ads against their content alone. Not Maker Studios.

While Maker Studios’ NewFronts pitch did include ads against the Disney-owned online video network’s original content, Maker Studios is also looking to extend those buys across all of YouTube, including non-Maker channels, through a program called Select that will use Maker’s audience data to target ads on YouTube.

“We’re offering it as a full media opportunity. It’s a complement to what Google is offering,” said Maker Studios’ head of sales Jason Krebs in an interview. The company is seeking upfront commitments for advertisers to access Select but pricing can vary. “There are no [pricing] ceilings or floors,” he said.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

The Swedes have done it again. On Sunday, a Gothenburg-based shop called Dogwash launched “the brand new emoji-keyboard that creatives” didn’t even realize they’d been waiting for.

It’s a real– if somewhat limited–app that might amuse you for a day or two, though the agency took it seriously enough to produce a video teaser:

Our only real complaint (from a UX perspective, of course) concerns the fact that the emojis are more like brain farts than real messages because they just don’t do horizontal.

Here, for example, is “our CD’s dog likes the new intern”:

Here’s “UGH, Don is still talking about ‘Epic Split’”:

…and here’s “Peggy isn’t impressed by your AmEx campaign even though it won a Silver Lion”:

Dogwash’s other interests include jazz, champagne, Eames chairs, and oddly-patterned menswear.

Is this any way to celebrate Mother’s Day?

A trio of unholy terrors—pre-pubescent boys, presumably brothers—wreak havoc in a gas-station convenience store in “Mom,” an amusing Volkswagen spot from Deutsch L.A.

These little rowdies like their carbonated beverages shaken, not stirred, and heavy on the cheese-whiz, please! (Teach that chili dog a lesson!) Their acts of impish mayhem are captured in glorious Sam Peckinpah-style slow-motion as the Willie Nelson/Waylon Jennings version of “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys” plays in the background. The clerk looks horrified. Guess he doesn’t like that song.

While all this is going on, Mom is outside, filling up at the pump. Too bad she doesn’t drive a 2015 VW Passat Clean Diesel. It gets “up to 814 highway miles per tank,” so you can “stop less, go more.”

If you ask me, the store got off easy. The Golden Sisters and Stinky would’ve burned that mother down.