Christmas Adverts 2012: From Love Sick Snowmen to Slavery

Christmas time! The cold time of year where Santa Claus sets up his sleigh, carried by his 9 prancing reindeer – led by Rudolph, the show off. It’s a time where ol’ St Nick squeezes down your chimney, (if you have one – if not he probably just breaks in through your backdoor), to delivers gifts to all the children of the world. It’s at this festive time of year where Santa ensures every child’s dreams come true, by giving them gifts made by his enslaved elves, back at his sweatworkshop.

The television is dominated by the ‘joyous’ Christmas adverts, supplied by the Lords of the British high-street trying to convince you part with your hard earned student loan.

First up the department store everyone wishes they could afford to shop at: John Lewis. Last year’s award winning Christmas ad was a touching tale of a young boy, excited about giving his parents their gift instead of caring what he received, pulling on the public’s heart strings.

This year, John Lewis tell a love story so bold it rivals Romeo and Juliet, with the tag line ‘give a little more love this Christmas‘.  It’s a snowman’s journey across the English countryside, (even though it was filmed in New Zealand), to find the perfect gift for his beloved.

On his journey he gets stuck at the bank of a river where all faith is lost in his mission, until a robin lands on his branch arm giving him the strength to continue. The robin is made using CGI, so it’s a shame they didn’t liven up this ad by shoving Dobby on his arm.

The Snowman’s button eyes fill up with delight once he sets sights on John Lewis, or at least, that is what we assume considering they you don’t actually see the store in the advert. He finally returns home, where he is reunited with his love, Mrs Snowman, giving her a beautiful pair of gloves with a matching scarf and hat, although truth be told, she would have probably been much happier with some fetching undies from Ann Summers!

The advert is acompanied by ‘Frankie Goes to Hollywood’ remake sung by Gabrielle Aplin, adding a rather morbid tone to the happy love story.

http://youtu.be/0N8axp9nHNU

To continue with 80’s musical onslaught B&Q’s advert does the same with a cover or ‘Our House’ sung by another whiny wench.

Also from the John Lewis Partnership: Waitrose. The super market decided to ditch the usual idea of spending millions on a glorious Christmas ad, filled with shots of turkey and Christmas pud and instead, just have Heston and Delia looking quite at home in an empty studio. They use their air time to explain how the money saved will be used to help the local community. It just goes to show that true Christmas spirit does still exist!

Sticking with the supermarket theme, every student’s homeland: ASDA.  This year they seem to have travelled back in time to 1940’s England, with Mum in her rightful place, slaving away in the kitchen, wrapping the presents, writing the cards, decorating and cleaning the house and of course, peeling the potatoes. The poor dear doesn’t even get a seat at the table instead she is seen sitting on a bean bag looking like a scene from Dickens’ Oliver Twist “Please sir, can I have some more?”.

And finally: Iceland. Going with the original theme from Willy Wonka, this advert is a world of imagination with strange cross-breed varieties of food which would only look appetising to a cave troll. Iceland seem to be continuning to produce food even Heston Blumenthal would be scared to concoct!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKAXLJ27S68

Whether you’re looking for that perfect present for a loved one to a inbred turkey the British high-street has it all this Christmas.