add the Coke Zero ad, it will equal to a sum zero ad, plus ADS Sindrome

What is with Coke and other worldly characters in their ads?

This Coke Zero ad is the second time this marketing year that they have other worldly characters in their ads. The first ones were the angel and the devil in their regular Coke thematic brandsell advertising.

In that ad, the angel in heaven got curious on the fizz that coke was making, flies down to earth to check it out, tries Coke, gets enamoured with it, then decides to become human to continue to enjoy Coke. Cute, interesting and straightforward story.

Except for one thing- they got carried away and added a devil character to the story where the angel turned human meets a handsome man who also enjoys Coke but turns out to be the devil as a last close up shot of the man reveals he has the horn impressions on his forehead, implying he is a devil turned human.

We did say a lot about this ad, things like the wings of the angel and the devil, etc. read all here in full : http://the-wawam-file.blogspot.com/search/label/coca%20cola

This new Coke Zero product introduces new characters to their line-up, most likely coming from Coke's large talent pool of other worldly characters- the mermaid and the centaur (ad featured here is the mermaid). We have to give 5 stars to Coke's talent casters for their stellar skills for finding such stellar pool of talents. They must travel far and wide to find such a wide range of talents. Up next will probably be Tinkerbell herself or the tikbalang.




This ad is about a male hunk in a swimming pool whose attention is caught by a hot lady drinking Coke Zero. It's unclear if the it's the hot lady in a swimsuit or the new Coke Zero product that she is drinking that caused him to move towards her. But the hunk uses Coke Zero banter as an opening line to strike a conversation with the hottie.

We all know that Coke is really just colored water with lots of sugar in it and that common knowledge the hunk uses to talk to the hottie, with a zinger line : "Impossible, right? Real Coke taste without sugar? Impossible!". The hottie says it is possible and he better believe it, saying that it is time the hunk believes in the impossible. The hottie dives into the water revealing her lower half, she revelas her tail, the hottie is a mermaid. And the mermaid that got away from the hunk as she swims back to sea.

The ad wants us to believe the impossible - the taste of regular Coke in Coke Zero even though it has zero sugar in it. We are the kind who are very skeptical and not prone to easily believe those that we know are not possible. Apparently for us, it takes a lot to make us believe in the impossible.

We are supposed to believe the impossible that Coke Zero was able to achieve because a mermaid says so. A mermaid who all of us know is not possible as mermaids don't exist in real life, except in fairy tales and cartoons which are all man-made.

That is like shooting themselves in the foot.

The ad wants us to change our mind about something that going in we think is not real and not possible. The ad wants us to think that a regular Coke taste is now made real and possible. And yet the character they used in the ad to convince us on that is a mermaid who we all know is not real and not possible. We are supposed to believe a fairy tale character, an unreal on something that is supposed to be true in real life.

The use of the mermaid can be cute but it defies the logic of what they want to achieve in the ad. The first question that popped in my mind was - what is it that Coke wants us to believe? Is this ad about the reality of Coke Zero tasting like regular Coke without the sugar or is it about the unreality of mermaids?

It's wierd that they are using an unreal character to make us believe reality.

This Coke Zero ad when you add the two key story elements of the ad do end up to a sum zero. In other words, it's a WAWAM! and has ADS Sindrome.