Lexus - Missing h

Taken from Everything's Better With Brentter: Lexus - Missing h

So Lexus just released this spot promoting their new hybrid line of automobiles. In it they try to show us what a typical day would be like if all of a sudden a letter in the alphabet (you guessed it: the "H") were to all of a sudden go missing. This was a product of Team One (LA) and I have to admit that I liked this spot, but that's just because I think I might have some sort of psychological disorder that makes me like 90% of all Lexus ads.....no matter how "off" they might be in concept (I'm still waiting to get the test results from the doc. though, so we'll just have to wait and see on whether this is treatable).
...........

In typical Lexus fashion they have that great sounding announcer explain that the letter "h" didn't leave because it felt unappreciated, but rather it had just found a better place to live.... that place of course being on the back 'hybrid' tag on the new Lexus. If they just wanted a spot that utilized an interesting concept, and left it at that, then they succeeded. That is at least what I've been telling myself (and my shrink). If they were attempting to convey the message by showing just how off center the world would be if a letter were to be removed, thus inferring the power of that particular letter, which would then lead the consumer to associate the power of the letter with the power of the car, then I think they were a little "off" in their presentation. Then again, this is probably me just making up an entirely new series of storyboards that never were pitched (and for good reason).

view more on the piece here.

You can also watch the entire campaign here in the commercial archive.
Lexus - H left - (2008) :30 (USA)

Lexus - H left part 2 - (2008) :30 (USA)

Lexus Hybrid - Hypothesis - (2008) :30 (USA)

Lexus Hybrid - The Power of H - (2008) :60 (USA)

Lexus Hybrid - Missing H - (2008) :60 (USA)

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tod.brody's picture

You need to stop saying "no, no, no," and spend a month in Lexus rehab. Or at least book a few more sessions with your shrink. That ad is so freaking boring, it gave me an eadache in less than the 60 seconds it took to watch it. :-)

But at least an eadache is better than an eart attack!

alex's picture

Hmm. So the creative brief arrives and the USP is: "Er... it's got an 'h' in the name." Is that how it happened? Fair enough then.

brentter's picture

You know what it most likely is..... their announcers soothing voice... something about it just lulls me to sleep... that's gotta be the case..

anyhow, i thought i tagged it under the right category for the content provided... ha.

Plywood's picture

_OLY COW: classroom + street corner + home office + desert + office + diner + 6 o'clock news set + Hollywood + Wheel of Fortune set + street!

That shoot:
a) cost a bazillion dollars
b) took 4 or 5 shooting days
c) was a lot of fun for the creative team

I don't mind the spot - it's slick, clever, drives home H for hybrid pretty well.

Dabitch's picture

Well, they're not using the footage for one ad only though, I guess that's good, and they save some cash using those text-only teaser ads (which I just added to this post). I like the footage, it's very nicely framed/shot.

bma4843's picture

well i hate to spoil the fun for all.... but..... they missed an "h". On the yahoo web page there is an h in the word the in the article about global warming

Dabitch's picture

Really? Oh this would be fun, do a list of inconsistencies in ads like film-geek do with movies. *giggle* But I'm not seeing it. Hard to read mind you. Do you mean this shot?

Allan1's picture

I see it (them) under the title " Weat er Report: Climate " on this screen.

"Recent activity on the sun's ...
starting to speed up the neg.. [???]" I can't quite make out the last word - could be "negative"?