The Olympic Pickup Advertisements. Walter and the Lightening.

There's been two really great television advertisements featuring pickups recently.

This is one of them.

Okay, first off, I'm not in the market for a new pickup.  Yes, my old Dodge 1 ton is. . . well it's old.  And  yes. . . it's rusting. But they don't make standard transmissions for sale in the US anymore, and I'm not in the market for an automatic transmission vehicle.

And for that matter, my D1500 has less than 200,000 miles on it, and it's a diesel.  So it has a lot of life left in it.  Probably as much life as I have left in me, so it'll do.

But this is a neat ad, it's really cool.

And Walter is great.

Frankly, the highly developed tailgate is great too.  I don't know why something like that wasn't thought of years ago, but I'll really give General Motors credit for some excellent recent developments like this.  Another is the steps on the side of the box, and in the bumper. That was, quite simply, a great idea.

Here's the other one:

This F150 advertisement is completely different.  The Chloe Zhoa directed commercial is also brilliant, and it hits the "electric vehicles will never be useful here" crowed right where they live.

Oh yes, they will be.

Indeed, the theme, Ford's continuity with its past, modern electric vehicles as a continuation of the best of Ford's historic vehicles, and a deeply American theme (aging rancher and his younger adult daughter) is brilliant.

Indeed, the Ford F150 Lightening stands to probably given the Chevrolet in which Walter has been riding more than a run for its money.

Prior electric vehicles have sometimes been presented as "the future is here, you dolt, buy one", which isn't a very effective marketing strategy except for people who have already placed an order for iphone72 and Windows 35.  

Ford's ad isn't threatening.