Havas Taps Former College Football Stars for DISH Network

Havas Worldwide Chicago tapped former college football stars Matt Leinart, Heath Shuler and Brian Bosworth in their latest spot for DISH Network, promoting the DISH Anywhere app.

Also featuring the kangaroo mascots that just refuse to go away, the spot finds the three athletes deciding to head back to college after misunderstanding a conversation about watching live college football anywhere with DISH’s app. This is about as painful as the rest of DISH’s recent advertising, with the involvement of Leinart, Shuler and Bosworth the only thing really differentiating it. Hardcore college football fans might get a kick out of seeing the trio, but for the rest of us this is just another annoying DISH ad. Credits after the jump. (more…)

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If Bottles Could Talk: Keep America Beautiful Personifies Recycling

The press release for the new 60-second recycling spot from Keep America Beautiful, the Ad Council, and Periera & O’Dell states that the average American generates 4.4 pounds of trash per day, but only recycles 35% of that output. It’s unclear whether that means 35% of all recyclable trash is properly recycled rather than 35% of all trash, but the creators of the campaign don’t seem too concerned with stats. After all, people probably won’t respond to numbers.

Periera & O’Dell have decided to redirect the campaign with an emotional tilt, turning an empty plastic bottle into a protagonist that thinks and talks – through voice-over, thankfully. The result is a corny, yet necessary plea to viewers who should be recycling more. Credits after the jump.

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Good Lord, Sallie Mae (Or Something Like It) Can Be a Beast

Let’s face it, student loans are a bitch (and we’re honestly still paying them off 12 years after graduating). So how else to present the horrific than a horror short film courtesy of SS+K, which is promoting nonprofit program SALT via the clip called The Red above. If you want to watch the extended cut (no word if a Blu-Ray/Netflix stream is on the way), go here, but in the meantime, here’s half of it from Antonio Campos, Sean Durkin and Josh Mond, who were Sundance darlings thanks to their feature film, Martha Marcy May Marlene. We’re not sure if this will be received just as well, but yeah, creeping plumes of red mixed with a dash of The Eye, maybe a splash of Paranormal Activity and other modern flicks gives us decent visual representation of what being in financial purgatory feels like. Credits after the jump.

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Virgin Mobile Wants to Colorfully Brainwash Customers

What about the trucker who just had to sit there while a waitress poured fake coffee into an overflowing mug? Or the egg on top of a diner table? The guy swimming with sharks? The wind-up brain toy? The geeky guy playing with a giant ball of yarn? Aloe vera tissues? Yes, all of these things are in the same “Retrain Your Brain” Virgin Mobile commercial, created by Mother NY. The spot is certainly unique, but that doesn’t mean it will get customers to switch from other carriers to Virgin Mobile.

“Retrain Your Brain” was birthed out of focus group findings that suggested customers wouldn’t switch mobile companies even if they were specifically told how much money they could save. So, Mother and Virgin Mobile decided to go with Brazilian triplets, Colonel Meow, and The Flaming Lips frontman Wayne Coyne.

Could it be that most customers just aren’t suited for short-term pay-as-you-go phone plans? (Shh, don’t tell Virgin Mobile). Regardless, the spot looks like a surrealist drug sequence from a bad student film. If you’re going to include Brazilian triplets, you might as well use them. Credits after the jump.

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