Old Spice’s Spicy Ad Campaign

For the past two years, Old Spice has been on a campaign to get your attention. Moving away from its image as a rustic deodorant worn by fishermen and your dad, the new viral ads created by the Wieden+Kennedy agency — starring arguably has-been celebrities like Neil Patrick Harris (before his comeback) and Evil Dead‘s Bruce Campbell — are playful, tongue-in-cheek self-parodies of what the advertising industry tries to tell men that they want: a strong, masculine image that women find irresistible. The latest Old Spice ad shown during the Superbowl may not star a household name (the actor is Isaiah Mustafa), but it follows in the same winking-at-the-audience formula.

Doogie Howser makes a comeback:



Bruce Campbell’s “Hungry Like The Wolf”:

What we love about these ads? Unlike say, Axe Body Spray’s campaign, which is equally silly but less self-aware, these ads let the viewers in on the joke: “Yes, it’s ridiculous to think that a deodorant brand will give you everything you ever dreamed of. But hey, our job is to sell you on that idea, so the least we can do is recognize that how silly it is.”

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