Emerson, some nondescript international business entity (I guess), has a few ads where they talk about how they solve all the world’s problems. Here we have an orange peel becoming energy, or something. But because it’s showing us an orange peel being peeled off and revealing an empty center, it makes it look like it is a visual metaphor for an empty promise. Doesn’t it?
Maybe they’re trying to say that only garbage matters to them, and fruits and vitamin C are all an empty scam, and we should just throw that part away, since Emerson can’t use it in their ads. Or maybe orange pulp sued them to be removed from their advertising campaign because they don’t like being associated with nebulous ad campaigns by big faceless corporations. I don’t know.
But one thing I do know is this: The main thing this commercial made me think of was what a pain in the ass it would be to carefully peel an orange like this, and then have nothing inside, so I went to all that trouble for nothing! And this whole visual presentation seems like it’s saying someone is going to a lot of trouble for nothing. Or at least, that’s how I’m reading the visuals for the first two-thirds of the spot.
The end works nicely, but they should show an orange inside during the unpeeling part, and then show someone happily remove the fruit, and then they can drop the peel, and then the rest of the spot would play out just like it does: that would be much more effective, because it wouldn’t leave people like me thinking about all the wrong things, and so it would communicate its message, rather than leave us scratching our heads. (Oops: That little itch could be telling you that you have dandruff!)
But then again, I suppose this ad isn’t, and indeed none of their ads are, intended for me anyway! After all, I’m never going to hire or otherwise throw any business at Emerson anyway, so maybe it doesn’t matter if I think this spot has problems. Perhaps it will work perfectly for the people who this ad is intended to reach: nobody. For who hires an international business consulting firm based upon television advertising anyway? I’d think it would be much more from word-of-mouth, results, or trade publications, so this whole campaign seems like a waste of money to me. (But I like that they are creating advertising jobs! Please keep doing it, Emerson!) Unless they’re trying to brainwash us into thinking they’re a benevolent company helping mankind, so when it turns out they’ve irreparably damaged the environment with one of their projects (allegedly!), we’ll all come to their defense. If that’s it, then they really ought to leave the orange in, because everybody knows unpeeled orange peels do not have emptiness inside of them, and as such, this commercial makes them seem dishonest and unnatural at the same time!
Here’s the pulpless fiction:
