here's one I don't get

[calimac]

British department store chain spends £7 million to kick off its Christmas ad campaign with a 2-minute ad by an Oscar-winning director.

OK, it's a touching story of a little boy and the monster under his bed, but what is its point as an ad? The boy gets a toy with lights on it for Christmas, and it makes the monster go away. Or it doesn't make the monster go away. Or both. It seems to me that the toy the ad is actually trying to push is the monster, but they don't sell that at John Lewis. Or do they?

Comments

[andrewducker]

They do:
https://www.johnlewis.com/john-lewis-moz-the-monster-plush-toy/p3265967

And yes, the advert seems rather a mess to me.

[calimac]

That's a toy of the monster. Not the monster. They don't even look that much alike. And it looks like it's a lot smaller, too.

See, that's the difference between having a character on a TV show and then also selling a toy of it, even if the TV show was created for the purpose of generating toys; and making an ad that has no pre-existing referent. Ads should have some sort of direct commercial purpose, whatever else they also do.