LO1 - Evaluating an Existing Campain

Suicide Squad Advertising Campaign

TV adverts

This TV advert was created to advertise the film suicide squad. This advert comprises of 8 seconds of titles cut with 22 seconds of footage. Most cuts in the trailer are quick and shots (particularly after the music has kicked in) last about a second. This advert was created to promote the film Suicide Squad, the trailer is aimed towards a teenage audience and appeals to this market by using lots of bright neon colours and fonts, the trailer also advertises the films as different and rebellious; the tagline "Worst heroes ever" contrasting most modern superhero films and drawing in audiences who may be becoming tired with an overabundance of superhero films.  The longest shot in the trailer which lasts for around 3.5 seconds is of the Joker. This may be due to the fact that he was the character from the film that was causing the most controversy between fans, so by showing him that much in the trailer it is more likely to get people talking about him and draw more attention to the film. The trailer will have been checked and authorised by the ASA before it could distributed on TV, this means that any issues that there might have been with the trailer would have been dealt with, before the trailer was released.

Posters

The first thing people usually notice about the majority of the Suicide Squad posters, is how colourful they are and the use of a vibrant cartoon style art, which is inspired by the comics. This was mostly likely in response to the studio's previous film being critiqued for being too serious and not not being fun for audiences to watch. This influenced the advertising campaign, with the studio wanting to change the film's image into what the audience wanted from the previous films. Most of the text and information is placed at the top of the poster, this is so that they don't take away from the image in any way, and also gather all the information in one place so that people can get an idea of the cast and crew quicker. The poster features all the member's of the squad and 2 other important characters to the story of the film, also because these other characters are played by famous actors, more people will be drawn to the film because of its cast. 

The film features an ensemble cast, which all play varied characters as a part of a team or as villains in the film's narrative. They tried to use all of the characters largely in marketing so that if someone didn't like the look of one character there was likely to be another that they would do. One method used to sell this idea was by creating individual character posters. All of these use a similar art style/graphic, so that they are easily connected to one another both visually and semantically. By having a large variety of posters like this it allows the studio to distribute them without repeating images as much.

Fox also made sure to have coverage of the film in many pop culture and film magazines, with them even capturing original specific images for these articles, this is because they know that these magazines reach a large audience and so are an effective advertising platform.

Fox also strongly emphasised the soundtrack to the film during the advertisment. They even hired a large number of famous artists to create original songs for the film, so that the only way that audiences would be able to hear them is either via viewing the film or investing in the soundtrack which was released around the same time, which in itself is also advertising for the film.

There was also certain pieces of clothing released as advertising for the film, this included tshirts, jumpers and Sport jackets like in the image above, these were effective as each individual sale not only created revenue but when worn by the buyer works as a form of advertisements for the film within itself.

LO1 - Analysing an advertising campaign (second draft)

This advertising campaign was created  to advertise the film "Suicide Squad" and various pieces of merchandise associated with it.


 The film will be aiming of a target audience of teenagers aged around 15 - 18, these people might not have a large spending power and so would only be able to afford to attend the cinema rarely and most likely choose to see the big blockbusters, these are the people that fit the lifestyle of C1, C2 and B, this is because of how the film tries to appeal to the widest audience as possible, as opposed to a small niche crowd.


 The advertising for this product is often very colourful and tries to incorporate humour into it, this is partly due to the product being an adaptation of  comic book series and so this style makes sense for the product, however it could also be related to how the previous film in the franchise that was released by the studio was criticized for having an overly serious tone; therefore the studio wanted to make audiences believe that this film wouldn't have that problem. The film also tries to show off the cast it has as much as possible, giving as it is an ensemble film about a team, the film created many posters for individual characters which are all variations on the same art style. The film also released with alongside an album which featured original songs by famous artists, this would be to create a new line of revenue whilst also offer advertising in different ways, as each artist would be advertising the film to their fans, thereby attracting a wider audience.


 The advertising campaign uses mainly posters and billboards. But unlike other campaigns where there would only be a few different types of these, Suicide squad features an extremely large variety of poster designs, this can be credited to the large cast of the film, as well as the cartoony art style of the posters, which would allow graphic designers more freedom to create a larger amount of images that all fit the same style, without getting repetitive.


 One of the main issues with the campaign comes for the title of the film: the use of the word suicide in a film that is being marketed so widely and will have an effect on children could cause anger from parents and people who don't see it as an appropriate title. However, seeing as the film is being adapted from material of the same name, any issues would have been dealt with during the comics run, which started decades before pre production on the film had even started.


 The ASA (advertising standards agency) will have reviewed all of the advertisements before they ill be released so that they follow the rules that make them suitable for the public, however this will only be applicable to great Britain, whilst the film's wide international audience, will mean that some different types of adverts will be released in some countries that weren't allowed here (and vice-versa).