Life in the agency world is tough. Just ask North Carolina’s The Variable, which has been mentioned on this blog a few times in recent weeks in connection to something.
Just in time for an end of day Friday post, the folks down in Winston-Salem createed a little satirical web series called The Adland Adventures (though we hear that the word “adland” may be the intellectual property of someone who runs a blog somewhere on earth).
It’s all about making light of the fact that advertising is a weird place to work, sort of like the mini-sitcom that Toronto’s Elemental recently produced except maybe less overtly self-promotional. The theme is the natural world, and each short is kind of making fun of a different archetype.
First there’s the lawyer cheetahs, which “WENT THROUGH THREE ROUNDS OF REVISIONS AND A TWO-WEEK APPROVAL PROCESS.”
Then there’s “Eavesdropping Elk,” or an art director who wants to make sure he/she is in on the hot new project.
Here’s a bear riffing on the fact that some of what people call great work is really just coincidence.
And this is what we know cannot possibly be an accurate interpretation of a showdown between accounts and creative, because of course accounts always wins.
Joe Parrish, the Variable’s partner and chief creative officer, explains:
“We were adlibbing ridiculous jargon and all-too-familiar adlife scenarios over footage of animals in the wild one afternoon, and it quickly escalated into a joke we had to share. The series makes light of the universal truths that exist within advertising – the good, the bad, and the ugly – making it an inside joke for ad folks.”
There are more of these clips on the project’s homepage.
CREDITS
ECD: Joe Parrish
ACD: David Jones
Senior Designer: Matt Cook
Copywriters: Matteson Fields, Gary Bostwick
Video Editing: Emily Morgan
Sound Design: Hot Sake’
Sound Mix: Groundcrew Studios
Voice Talent: James K. Flynn, Matteson Fields