Hasta La Creative!

Players on headsets exchange strategy as two teams fire away at each other through the rubble of a virtual city. Thousands of video-game fans in an arena cheer as the clock ticks down to the five-minute finish.

“The nerves have got to be kicking in now,” an announcer says in a nearby booth.

The “Call of Duty” World Championship played out last weekend in Los Angeles and delivered an $800,000 prize to the first place team EnVyUs. The event’s promoter, Activision Blizzard, is the largest independent maker of video games in the U.S. Now, it’s trying to dominate the emerging business of professional video-game play by developing leagues, hosting tournaments and airing them live on its own online channel.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

After sixty years, P&G is ready to find a new face for its Mr. Clean brand. Leo Burnett and Citizen Relations launched a new spot for Mr. Clean starring actor Kellan Lutz of the Twilight series and The Legend of Hercules. Don’t worry, we had to Google him too.

The spot, which arrives on the heels of Leo Burnett reviving the Mr. Clean jingle for the brand, features Lutz in a mock audition for the Mr. Clean role. A casting director comments that it’s a big departure from “the whole teen hearthrob thing” and he explains that he’s been looking for something different. His qualifications for the role? He washes his car after every use, polishes his Teen Choice Awards every single day and has “never had a dirty thought” in his entire life. After initially struggling to adapt to the new character, he impresses the casting director…until she finds out something “too dirty for Mr. Clean.”

After the spot’s attempts at meta humor fall flat, it ends with Lutz inviting viewers to try out for the role themselves, directing them to TheNextMrClean.com. In addition to the full-length version online, which stretches the premise well past its breaking point, there’s also a 60-second broadcast version.

“This is the second in our series of efforts to go back to our roots,” Kevin Wenzel, associate brand director for Procter and Gamble North America, explained to Adweek. “The first was the new modern version of our jingle television spot, which we launched July 1. It was a well-known jingle that was used to launch the brand. We used it for decades, and it was brought into a more modern context.” 

“We will still have our iconic Mr. Clean, but this will be a chance to let a consumer have a little bit of fun and let us have a little bit of fun as well,” Wenzel clarified. “That next Mr. Clean will be helping us generate content, including appearing in a calendar which we’ll be showing online.”

The brand will be poring over audition tapes submitted online from today through October 7, as well as hosting a pair of casting sessions in New York and Los Angles, before announcing the contest’s $20,000 winner in mid-October. We know someone who would be perfect for the role.

Brands don’t newsjack Apple events quite as often as they used to. But Jim Beam is ambushing today’s announcements from the tech marketer by introducing an April Fools’-esque gadget called the Jim Beam Apple Watch, which puts a 1.5-ounce shot glass right on your wrist.

It gets away with the Apple reference because Jim Beam Apple is a real line extension from the whiskey brand. “The watch’s streamlined interface opens and closes manually on demand. And while it doesn’t tell time, it does save time, eliminating the need for a last-minute shot glass search,” the brand says of the gag product.

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Remember when everybody was all over trying to make Stringer Bell into the new James Bond? We were cool with that, because holy crap that franchise got boring so quickly.

The same thing is happening to Dos Equis, which has gone younger and sexier and more multicultural with its new Most Interesting Man in the World. The brand new effort that went live today is less a campaign launch than a teaser for upcoming work starring one Augustin Legrand, a French actor who introduces the world to his new character by speaking Spanish.

An ad agency hiring overseas talent to replace an American with far more experience? Well, we never.

The first spot “Cantina” shows us a tiny glimpse of why Mr. Legrand, or Mr. Man, is “edgier and more daring” than … someone who we assume to be his predecessor, Jonathan Goldsmith. It’s very much like an action movie trailer, and we feel sexier already for having watched it twice.

See, that was good. It got us interested in future ads and, more importantly, it included a pig wearing a fez for no reason at all. And of course the spot also left room at the end for Mr. Man’s female partner, because how can any dude be classified as a “resourceful, rough and tumble guy” without having a vaguely exotic woman nearby? It worked for James Bond and Donald Trump.

The client’s VP of marketing Andrew Katz explains in the press release: “The meaning of ‘interesting’ has evolved over the past decade, and this campaign features a new character and look and feel that opens the door to a world of interesting possibilities for today’s Dos Equis drinker. With the reboot of the campaign, we’re celebrating the good times The Most Interesting Man has with friends wherever he travels, while highlighting our refreshing cerveza. In the coming weeks, fans will have the opportunity to get to know the new character in a uniquely interactive way.”

Havas CCO of the Americas Toygar Bazarkaya also weighed in on how the creative work will change: “It’s the beginning of a new era of interesting. With The Most Interesting Man not just telling us about his adventures, but inviting us to be part of them.”

What does this mean? Snapchat activations! It doesn’t seem like the ads themselves will be TOO different from past efforts, though. The full campaign debuts on October 19 during Dos Equis’ College Football Playoff event, and the release promises more “classic vignette-style commercial[s]” to come along with all that social media noise.

We get the “why mess with what works” approach. If you Google “Dos Equis” you’ll find mostly items related to The Most Interesting Man, and it’s pretty rare to have a brand so thoroughly defined by its mascot. Not that this has anything to do with the quality of its product.

Anyway, we know you were wondering what old Mr. Goldsmith might be up to now that he is slightly less Interesting (read: older). He’s in the media! According to a release we got last week, he has joined the editorial board of True.Ink, which is not a tattoo rag but an “online magazine whose mission is to ‘live the story’ and engage readers through live, off-line experiences.”

Looks like the first day of the rest of his life is quite different than an average 24 hour span for Senor Legrand. But what is he drinking now that he doesn’t have to hawk mediocre lager?

CREDITS

Client: Dos Equis
Agency: Havas New York

Chief Creative Officer of the Americas: Toygar Bazarkaya
Chief Creative Officer of North America: Jason Peterson
Group ECD, Managing Director: Jason Musante
Executive Creative Director: Jim Hord
Group Creative Director: Keith Scott
Group Creative Director: Paul Johnson
Creative Director: Jonas Wittenmark
Creative Director: Tobias Carlson
Creative Director: Paul Fix
Associate Creative Director: Matthew Hock
Associate Creative Director: David Fredette

Global Chief Executive Officer: Andrew Benett
Global Chief Revenue Officer & Global Chief Marketing Officer: Matt Weiss
President of New York: Laura Maness
Group Account Director: Chris Budden
Account Director: Jamie Sundheim
Account Director: Michelle Garrard
Account Supervisor: Wendy Hu
Account Supervisor: Jenny Maughan

Chief Strategy Officer, North America: Tim Maleeny
Brand & Digital Strategy Director: Maggie Gross
Senior Strategist: Stacey Kawahata
Senior Strategist: Cassie Taylor

Director of Social Marketing: Larry Lac
Social Strategist: Rachel Korenstein
Social Coordinator: Katie Campo

Global Chief Content Officer: Vin Farrell
Head of Content, North America: Dave Evans
Head of Content, North America: Sylvain Tron
Executive Producer: Jill Meschino
Junior Producer: Lauren O’Driscoll
Junior Producer: Alex Zubak
Director of Broadcast Business Affairs: Cathy Pitegoff
Senior Broadcast Business Manager: Deborah Steeg
Senior Talent Specialist: Yvette Aponte

Production Company: Traktor
Director: Traktor
Director of Photography: Hoyte Van Hoytema
Executive Producer: Rani Melendez

Production Company: Rattling Stick
Executive Producer: Joe Biggins
Head of Production: Richard McIntosh
Controller: Christine Berentsen
Staff Coordinator: Hayley Wyett
Editorial Company: Final Cut
Editor: Rick Russell
Executive Producer: Stephanie Apt
VFX: The Mill
Chief Creative Officer NY: Angus Kneale
Executive Producer: Verity Graham
VFX Shoot Supervisor: Tara Demarco
Senior Flame Artist: Michael Smith
Sound Design: Yessian
Sound Designer: Weston Fonger
Executive Producer: Marlene Bartos
Telecine: Company 3
Colorist: Tom Poole
Producer: Clare Movshon
Audio: Sound Lounge
Sound Engineer: Tom Jucarone
Music: Beacon Street Music
Composers: Beacon Street Studios
Executive Producer: Adrea Lavezzoli

(TrendHunter.com) HuskMitNavn, an artist who’s based in Copenhagen, Denmark, has been creating 3D artwork for quite some time now, however he recently expanded his offerings to include more comical situations…