May the Shill Be With You: 9 Classic Star Wars-Themed Commercials
Recently, the UK-based Currys electronic stores hired a couple of familiar spokespeople for their new round of advertisements: Celebrity droids C-3PO (voiced by Anthony Daniels) and R2-D2. My first reaction was, Really? Lucasfilm is allowing its beloved characters to advertise for a department store? But then, thinking back over the years, there have been plenty of Lucasfilm-approved ads -- and at least a handful worth watching again. For instance:
1. Anti-Drunk Driving PSA
Apparently drinking and driving is a problem not only in this galaxy but in the Star Wars galaxy as well. Especially on Tatooine, it would seem, which does seem to have a lot of land speeders as well as cantinas -- no doubt a deadly combination. So here's a PSA showing that when an unruly Mos Eisley creature gets a little out of hand, he's helped home. (Or shot, if he happens to be sitting next to Han Solo.)
2. Anti-Smoking PSA
Drinking and driving wasn't the only social scourge in the Star Wars galaxy, either: Smoking was also an issue. Seeing Artoo dragging on a cigarette still shocks me to this day. I mean, if any of the characters from The Original Trilogy were going to be smokers, I would assume that it would be Han. I mean, why would a droid be smoking anyway? I can't imagine there's any personal pleasure derived from the nicotine. This has to be 100-percent peer pressure, so it was good for Threepio to step in and put a stop to this nonsense.
3. C-3PO's
I love how Threepio gets to name his own cereal after himself. From the commercial, it appears the cereal isn't christened yet when Threepio pulls it out of the cabinet. "We'll call them C-3PO's!" he pretty much tells Artoo. I guess this wasn't up for debate. How arrogant can he be? Was this part of Artoo's punishment for smoking?
Comments
R2 smoking? Raff raff...