Cuppacafe

When I got out of college, my first job was with a local radio station. It was then that I realized that there was a difference between sales and marketing. Selling is a tough thing to do, Marketing, however, is rather easier. I felt then that I would have a difficult time doing sales, but marketing, would be quite interesting.

These days, if you want to get your high-octane Summer, popcorn flick out in front of as many eyes as you possibly can, the thing you want to do is set up a tie-in to a fast food franchise, and include collectible tchotchkas (sometime referred to as Cheap Plastic Crap (CPC) by certain members of this household) with the kid meals. Well, while I was seriously disappointed that Wolverine didn’t include a tie-in with someone (as I fully expected it to do — yeah, yeah there were Slurpee cups & straws from 7-eleven, and a special pizza from Papa John’s, but I was really looking forward to Wolverine-related CPCs from Micky D’s).

Well, perhaps as a consolation to me, Burger King has cut a three-picture deal with Paramount Pictures to promote the Summer releases of Star Trek, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. This makes the first time BK has worked with a single studio on such a rapid-fire spate of films.

"Burger King has been an excellent partner for us because of the volume of customer traffic," says Ms. Stables, who adds that the chain's "global presence" made it a particularly appealing choice.

Movie tie-ins have boosted the fast-food chain's business in the past, says Russ Klein, president of global marketing, strategy and innovation at Burger King. Two summers ago, Burger King and Paramount were promotional partners on the first "Transformers" film, which grossed more than $700 million world-wide. Last summer, they had a similar arrangement for another blockbuster, "Iron Man."

"They have been a proven traffic driver for our business," Mr. Klein says.

The rest of that story can be read here. As for me, I’ve learned that there are some 16 Trek figurines packed with the kid meals, and four glasses. I might not pick up the Transformer or G.I Joe CPCs, but I’m definitely going after the Trek stuff.

Oh yeah, 7-eleven is going from Wolverine to Terminator in their Slurpee cups.

The Perfessor

Burger King is currently running a promotion with the Nickelodeon cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants. How do I know this? I saw the following commercial on TV:

I then saw the longer version online:

Can someone please explain to me why someone thought teaming Sir Mix-a-Lot’s Baby Got Back with a toy aimed at 10-year-old (boys) was a good idea?

The Perfessor

So, on Saturday, I went to see Iron Man (for the first time) and truly enjoyed the film. It was (essentially) true to the comicbook origins (updated — naturally enough from the ‘60s to the modern day) while incorporating some of the later additions to the Iron Man mythos. We got to see Tony Stark build the initial suit, as well as its two updates. There were all of the characters that we needed to see (Pepper Potts, his administrative assistant), Happy Hogan (his pal/driver/bodyguard), James Rhodes (re-imagined as a Col. io the U.S. military), as well as Obidiah Stane (cast as his overbearing “partner”).

So, instead of the crimson and gold Avenger being birthed in the rice paddies of Vietnam, he was born in the caves of Afghanistan, but that was to be expected. Now while I’m not a huge Iron Man fan, I will attest to the fact that much of what we saw on the screen rang true with what I’ve read in the comics for the past 45 years or so. Hence, I give this film a big (Iron-Clad) thumbs up. In fact, I’m probably going to see it again, just to see if there was anything I missed the first time around.

I’ll present a much more formal review later from my Film review site, but for now, it was the coolest. Oh yeah, when you go, you should sit through ALL of the credits to get to a way-cool bit after all the credits have run. Trust me, you'll love it.

Oh, and then just for fun, here is an image of some of the Speed Racer cars that are being packed into boxes of Cheerios.

UPDATE! UPDATE! UPDATE!

My full-blown review of Iron Man, can be found on my film review site (yes, yes, Walt, I’m eventually going to move everything over to My personal site. ‘Til then, cut me a break, will ya¹?)

The Perfessor