Lorenzo J.

Ricci 4/14/20

The ad that I decided to critique was the puppy-monkey-baby Mountain Dew Kickstart Super

Bowl 50 Commercial. This commercial is one of the most memorable Super Bowl commercials

in recent memory, mostly because it is so haunting that it has been burned into the memory of

everyone who has seen it. The commercial was born out of the idea that taking 3 things that

people really like, such as puppies, monkeys, and babies, and combining them all together makes

something that is also awesome. The Kickstart drink is a mix of Caffeine, juice, and Mountain

Dew, which is supposed to be another awesome thing people like. However, having the puppy-

monkey-baby to compare it to, I feel, ruins the drink.

Mountain Dew has historically been associated with gamers, as sort of a soda of their choice.

They have run multiple campaigns aligned with different video games. Recently, they chose to

create an ad that appealed to not only were fans of Mountain Dew but were also Sports Fans

since it aired during the Super Bowl. They also make it a point to mention that the drink includes

caffeine, so they are appealing to those who drink coffee or energy drinks, as the drink contains

more caffeine than a can of Redbull.

To continue to push the idea that this drink was geared towards sports and energy drink fans,

the ad appeared in Super Bowl 50, a very important game in Football history. Super Bowl 50 had

a viewership of 111.9 million people, at a point reaching 115.5 million people. That is nearly a

third of the country who watched the puppy-monkey-baby dance around on their TVs. The

commercial also ran again at the NBA Finals, where it once again garnered very split opinions.

Some people were excited to see the Ad again (Appendix A). However, most people once again

felt very off put by the ad, with most of the negative tweets calling the ad disturbing. (Appendix
B). While the idea of the ad seemed to be aimed towards their ideal audience, the actual

execution seems misplaced.

For the content of the ad, there is not much in the way of claims that the ad is making. The

entire ad is just about promoting the new drink Mountain Dew Kickstart, made of Mountain

Dew, juice, and caffeine. There is no effort into personalizing the ad, as it does very little to

establish much relatable content with the viewer in terms of lifestyle, values, or even interest.

There is the boring night with friends that can be relatable to some younger people, but besides

that there are no real links to anything. Moving on to the audio and visual content of the ad. The

audio and visual portion of the ad is where the worst parts of this as come in, besides the fact it

doesn’t really tell you anything.

For the visual content, the ad starts with three guys sitting on a couch. The door opens and

then the puppy-monkey-baby enters through a makeshift hole in the wall. The thing is dancing

the whole time, then it jumps on the table. It kicks a bucket of ice on a guy on the couch, then

jumps on him and licks his face. There is one shot of one of the guys drinking Mountain Dew

Kickstart. The puppy monkey baby dances out into the hallway, with the three guys following it

into the hallway. The puppy-monkey-baby is, in my opinion, very visually upsetting and, if

people don’t stick around to the end, where it mentions 3 great things combined, then it has no

context to why it would have to exist in the first place.

The audio content of the commercial is not necessarily great either. The commercial starts

with a guy saying, “man I might just stay in tonight.” Then the puppy-monkey-baby comes in

repeating it name and shaking a rattle. There is a licking sound effect as it licks one of the guys

on the couch. Towards the end, music starts to play as the thing leads the guys out of the

apartment. The last bit of audio is a voice over saying “Mountain Dew Kickstart. Dew, Juice,
Caffeine.” This is said while the puppy-monkey-baby returns to lick the can, causing more

licking sound effects.

This commercial is very similar to many other commercials that have been released. It was

clearly made with the intention to disturb and shock the viewers because the look of the puppy-

monkey-baby is not pleasing at all. The goal is usually to sell the drink, but this commercial

doesn’t really try to entice new consumers to the product, and it kind of repels loyal customers.

However, the over 111 million people who watched the Super Bowl are not all completely loyal

Mountain Dew fans. Most of them may not even really be sports fans. The Super Bowl is the

biggest sporting event of the year, so many more people than just watch football watch it. As

soon as one of these people sees the puppy-monkey-baby, then they will remember it forever, as

I have.

The ad itself does not offend people, at least by definition that is usually used for the word

offended. However, the ad does disturb people. Mountain Dew continued to use the puppy-

monkey-baby for their advertising. If I was to make recommendations to fix this advertising

campaign, I would suggest just never making this creature in the first place, just making a

completely different ad campaign all together. If Mountain Dew wanted to keep the three things

combined ad campaign, then I would suggest using a puppy, a monkey, and a baby all separately,

which people would very much enjoy.

The puppy-monkey-baby Super Bowl commercial is one of the worst commercials I have

ever seen. The commercial is very uninformative, and very off putting. Mountain Dew has been

known for quite a few different ad campaigns and yet this is probably the most memorable as the

most disturbing campaign. They thrived on the mixed reviews and it gave them the attention any
bad commercial is intended to do. At the end of the day, shock ads are no new concept, and this

is a classic example, due to just how horrible the commercial really is.

Appendix A

Appendix B
Works Cited

Puppy Monkey Baby- Mountain Dew Kickstart Commercial

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nQcfK9EKfL4

https://www.caffeineinformer.com/caffeine-content/mountain-dew-kick-start

https://bleacherreport.com/articles/2615035-panthers-vs-broncos-super-bowl-50-ratings-revealed

https://ftw.usatoday.com/2017/06/puppymonkeybaby-mountain-dew-commercial-reactions-nba-

finals-game-4-cavaliers-warriors