O/T New Ford Escape commercial

[WestCoastSVX]

Well if anyone has seen this you know exactly what I'm talking about.

I just saw this commercial last night, it might be pretty new. For a couple seconds I thought it was going to be a Subaru Outback commercial. First they show a Ford Escape, then a Subaru Outback, saying something about test driving them both. Then they announce that if, after test driving both cars, you end up buying the Outback, Ford will pay you $100. One dollar for each year Ford has been in business (I took that to mean they are trying to say that since they have been in the biz longer than Subie they are better?). I'm not sure if they have this deal going with other models or not, in the commercial it was only Escape vs. Outback.

I'm not sure if there is fine print or not, but the commercial went on to make so many unfair comparisons IMHO. The fine print may have contingencies for how you get the $100, like which models of the two cars you test, how much credit you qualify for, etc. Who knows.

But in the commercial they make the Ford look good by talking about how it has a V6, costs $7,000 less, and some other things I can't remember. It's typical marketing I know, but it just made me mad in this case because they were trying to make such a direct comparison and targeting one car. As far as I know, not all Ford Escapes come with a V6, and some Outbacks do have an H6. So no big deal there. And the $7,000 less? Well that is probably a base 4 cylinder Escape 2 wheel drive vs. a H6 AWD Outback. Maybe not, I didn't take the time to go to sites and compare, but even still, does anyone even put those two vehicles in the same class? I mean beyond most of Subaru loyalty here, does anyone in the auto world even consider them the same class?

[RSVX]

I guess that would depend on the version of the Outback referenced....

Impreza? NO not same class.

In fact the only thing I would even REMOTELY consider in the same class as an escape would be the forrester.

[WestCoastSVX]

Yeah I agree on the Forrester. The Outback shown in the commercial was the full sized Legacy version. I believe that in technical Subaru terms the Legacy one is called simply "Outback" and the Imprezza version is "Outback Sport".

[LarryIII]

I haven't seen the Ford vs. Suby commercial, but I saw a commercial last night and it made me very, very angry. It is for Pontiac. I think it's for the Grand Prix, but don't hold me to that. It shows a young guy and girl dressed in black leather outfits (ala Matrix) and dark sun glasses. The girl is driving. She is tossing the car around then puts it into a 360 degree drift. When it comes to a stop, she gets out and deploys a white cane with a red tip. This implies that she is legally blind.
I think that this is quite irresponsible of GM. I hope that they get letters from the blind organization protesting this commercial.

[RSVX]

Originally posted by LarryIII
I hope that they get letters from the blind organization protesting this commercial.

I guess they figured that the blind would never see the commercial

[benebob]

Maybe all they could find was a blind girl willing to drive the thing. After they put on those stupid widebody commericals when the truth is its is narrower than the other two cars it shares a platform with. Both the Chevy and Olds are wider.

[WestCoastSVX]

Originally posted by LarryIII
I haven't seen the Ford vs. Suby commercial, but I saw a commercial last night and it made me very, very angry. It is for Pontiac. I think it's for the Grand Prix, but don't hold me to that. It shows a young guy and girl dressed in black leather outfits (ala Matrix) and dark sun glasses. The girl is driving. She is tossing the car around then puts it into a 360 degree drift. When it comes to a stop, she gets out and deploys a white cane with a red tip. This implies that she is legally blind.
I think that this is quite irresponsible of GM. I hope that they get letters from the blind organization protesting this commercial.

Larry, I'm not sure if you are trying a new humor angle lately, or if you are serious, but the last few months I've noticed you've been offended by quite a few things both in posts here and stuff like this. Just an observation, everyone is entitled to their opinions and free to speak them, so that is cool. It was just that I've known you for a few years and hadn't really noticed this until recently.

Anyway, as for the blind organizations protesting, I'm not saying they won't, but I don't see why they would. First of all, the commercial is obviously not meant to be serious, it is trying for shock value and a little humor and probably most importantly they know people will talk about it as we are now. Back to blind people being offended, I can't see why they would be. As you mentioned, until the end of the commercial all we see is a very hip young couple skillfully pushing the car to the limit in several performance maneuvers. At the end when we see that she (and maybe both of them) is/are blind, the only thing we would take from it if we believed it to be real would be, whoah, blind people are cool. Yes, I'm sure no one really believes it is real, but even then I doubt anyone thinks real sight impaired people are being exploited by the commercial. I guess time will tell and maybe we will hear about some protests, but I would think most of the blind community will just chuckle when they hear about this commercial from their friends.

One could say that this commercial is irresponsible in that maybe a blind person could actually try to drive a new Grand Prix with disasterous results, but that would be beyond stupid of them to try. I'm sure there is a disclaimer in the fine print on the ad, similar to how paint thinner now has to have a disclaimer on it saying do not drink. And every other car commercial out there for anything remotely performance oriented has the same disclaimers for all the stunts they show the car doing. We had the conversation on here months ago about the WRX commercial showing the guys pushing the car through mountain roads at illegal speeds.

[LarryIII]

Mac,

Maybe I'm just getting old and intolerant. I am serious and not trying a new type of humor. I did not find the commercial funny.

I know that teenage kids try to do the things that they see on TV that they think are cool no mater how stupid the stunt is.

Maybe the blind orgs. won't be offended by it and think that it projects the message that blind people can be cool. I don't know. I only know that I was surprised by it and didn't like its implications.

[WestCoastSVX]

Originally posted by LarryIII
Mac,

Maybe I'm just getting old and intolerant. I am serious and not trying a new type of humor. I did not find the commercial funny.

I know that teenage kids try to do the things that they see on TV that they think are cool no mater how stupid the stunt is.

Maybe the blind orgs. won't be offended by it and think that it projects the message that blind people can be cool. I don't know. I only know that I was surprised by it and didn't like its implications.

Yep, I think you are getting old and intolerant. Just kidding.

Guess the jury is out on what blind orgs would think of this issue.

As for teenagers trying any crazy stunt, it does seem like every generation the stunts get more and more dangerous and pointless. Or maybe I am just old and intolerant too. I just heard another news story over the weekend about another death involving kids trying to do something they saw on that Jackass show. And a couple weeks ago here locally a young man in the military stationed at a base near here was killed driving down windy mountain roads in his Civic. He was doing a test run and then was supposed to pick up the rest of his military (sorry I forgot which branch it was) buddies and they were going to film out the window as he raced back up and down the hill again. He ran into a truck and died instead.

So yeah, I'm right there with ya, almost, I just didn't feel that this particular commercial was any worse than anything else that has been put out over the last couple years. I think a kid is more likely to try to parasail behind a Saab or shoot a WRX off a mountain road before they blindfold themselves and get behind the wheel of a Grand Prix. But I have been wrong before.

[SHISVX]

speaking of stupid things kids do after seeing Jack Ass...

a few of my friends (male) thought that it would funny to attach a muscle stimulator to their body parts and send the shock to each other...it was pretty funny, especially when they did it to someone that was sleeping...

i think it all falls back to monkey see monkey do

some people aren't creative enough to think of stupid things to do on their own

Kelli

[Aredubjay]

Believe it or not, Peugeot was the first to use a blind driver in their commercials. There are three differences, however: It was an actual blind person doing the driving; The blind person was a popular singer (Ray Charles), and; They filmed his segments on the Bonneville Salt Flats to make sure he had plenty of room.

[ensteele]

Gosh Randy, I didn't SEE that!

[Landshark]

Originally posted by LarryIII
I know that teenage kids try to do the things that they see on TV that they think are cool no mater how stupid the stunt is.

Larry is still smarting from the pain he experienced when he and his friends imitated the Three Stooges in his younger years.

[Aredubjay]

Originally posted by ensteele
Gosh Randy, I didn't SEE that!

There is none so blind as he who will not see.

[Subafreak]

I don't see how the comercial would be offensive to anyone (Other than the fact that they are trying to imply the Grand Prix as some kind of performace car, pulease. The comercial is filmed in the desert so their is no danger of hitting anything and if somthing was out their the other guy would warn her. I think the idea was to give a blind person who could not usually drive a car, a chance to do it a safe enviroment. Was that so hard to figure out? As for the Escape they are crap and the V6 sucks gas worse than a 70's musle car.