Is there a Dr. Pepper QB curse!? Caleb Williams might prove it exists…

Dr. Pepper made USC quarterback Caleb Williams the face of their Fansville campaign and some people are now calling what’s happened since then a phenomenon called The Dr. Pepper Curse. It’s like The Madden Curse but the college football version. Here’s the most recent ad… an ominous, possibly foretelling, commercial from Dr. Pepper and Caleb Williams called “Superstitious.”

There will be all kinds of opinions about this but facts are facts. Here’s a great recap from a Reddit user about the ongoing situation…

So what happened recently is that USC lost to Notre Dame partly due to multiple interceptions thrown by Caleb Williams. He did not look like a Heisman hopeful in that game. Was it just a bad performance? Or was it the curse? All I know is that because of this curse and not wanting my performance to suffer, if Dr. Pepper comes to me with a sponsorship deal, I’m definitely absolutely taking it. I might be a little superstitious but I’m not a fool.

-Out of the Wilderness

The Lincoln Serena Williams Commercial – The Music and More

When I think of Lincoln, I think of Matthew McConaughey (or Jim Carrey, if you know you know) but this latest commercial might wipe both of those guys completely from memory and replace them with Serena and this song. Check out the commercial then scroll down for more info…

I’m not sure why car brands are using these emotional songs lately (See: Jeep Drove All Night Commercial) but it’s working for me. The song in this Lincoln ad is called “Too Close” by Marvin Brooks, released in 2021. Check out Marvin’s backstory here.

-Out of the Wilderness

The Snickers CHEFS Commercial – Does This Remake Hit the Mark?

In a world where people get sick of remakes pretty quickly, Snickers is trying to break the mold. Sure, it’s TV and film that mostly get a bad wrap when shows and movies are repackaged as something new when the originals were just fine. But can that be said for commercials, too? Before the 2023 reboot, here’s the original Snickers CHEFS commercial from 1996.

SO Nice They’re Doing It Twice. A critical mistake, a funny catchphrase, and a grumpy old man add up to a great commercial. Now, decades later, Snickers gave the commercial a makeover. Check it out…

There’s No I In Team. But there’s definitely an ‘I’ in CHIEFS. It’s a great premise for a commercial, especially when ‘i before e, except after c’ is a rule of thumb people always get wrong. Just ask me to spell the word wierd and I’ll get it wrong 50% of the time. Somehow though, the creators of this ad managed to take something that was funny and make it… less funny. Weird.

Choo Choo All Aboard. Everyone’s riding the Kansas City Chiefs money train (especially since Taylor Swift single-handedly put Travis Kelce on the map!) so it makes sense Snickers would hop aboard, too. But what they’ve done is the equivalent to movie studios taking an animated classic and turning it into a live-action remake. “But why?” is a question you’ll hear a lot. The new Snickers commercial basically copied the original almost shot for shot but they forgot one thing, the humor. The sound design is poor, as well. Background audio is too low, which adds to the disjointedness of the conversation and the voiceover. The original commercial shines with great comedic timing and seamless flow, things the follow-up lacks entirely.

In fact, the only funny part in this failed attempt at a remake is the CHIEFS misspelling. None of the other jokes hit. The grumpy old man in the original is so frustrated when he says “great googly moogly” and then the player doubles down by mentioning the spelling AGAIN, just hilarious. The young man in the new ad says “great googly moogly” with no emotion at all. Not even dry humor, if that’s what the attempt was.

Snickers, you’re not yourself when you try remaking a classic.

-Out of the Wilderness

The Jeep Drove All Night Commercial – The Music, The Crush, and More

This might be– no, this IS my favorite version of “I Drove All Night” and who knew it would come as the soundtrack of a Jeep commercial? Check out the ad then scroll down for the name of the singer, and more info!

The Singer. Performing the iconic Roy Orbison song is a woman named Francesca Blanchard. If you look for a full-length track, you won’t find it unfortunately. But you can check out more of her music on Spotify (below) and follow her on Instagram.

This is originally a Roy Orbison song but you might know it from a few other stars who’ve performed it. Here are a few great performances of this song including my childhood crush, Cyndi Lauper.

Also, don’t forget about Jeep.

-Out of the Wilderness

Google Pixel 8 Commercial – The Music, The Sweater, and the Phone

Hello and thanks for finding my post today. I post every day at 1pm central about all kinds of things, but especially Popular TV Ads. Today features a commercial from Google advertising the Pixel 8. Check it out then scroll down for the music, the sweater, and more.

The Music. The song backing the ad is called “Zoom” by Friend of Friend featuring Daisha McBride. Here’s the full track…

Sweater Weather. I can’t really claim any glory for finding out more about this sweater. A YouTube comment from @Hello.Ashleigh deserves all the credit. Well, some of the credit. Alpacas deserve most of the credit since it’s their wool to begin with! Anywho, the sweater the dude is wearing in the very first shot is from Brain-Dead. It’ll set you back $280. Check it out on the Brain-Dead website.

The Actual Phone. When I was looking for phones last year, I held a Google Pixel in my hands and one aspect stuck out like a sore thumb. What’s with the raised surface on the back where the camera is? For that reason alone, I’ll never get a Pixel phone. Instead I went with the Flip 4 and I’ve loved it.

-Out of the Wilderness