The new O2 ad: are you a cat or a dog person? Jul 20th 2013, 05:00
O2 has entered the debate decisively, and they aren't on the side of feline-lovers
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Are you a cat or a dog person? OK, self-defining, as either suggests that on some level you've given up, but it's the national question. Which makes it heartening that O2, a publicly traded company, has entered the debate so decisively. Cats are cocks, their new ad declares in so many words. We meet one, sagged on the sofa, accompanied by gloomy piano plonks. "I used to be a cat," he laments, "aloof till lunch, coldly indifferent after. Meh." Felix is feline-blue, but has a novel, solution to his condition. "Why not be a bit more … dog?" The world is AMAZING, he decides, unleashing an unlikely canine vitality. He chases cars, digs up the lawn, jumps in a lake. Erik Satie gives way to Flash Gordon as the once-isolated mog bounds through the park with his pedigree chums, having dim-witted doggy larks. "Carpe diem! It means grab the frisbee."
The CGI chimera at the centre of all this looks, frankly, a bit off. It sticks its unblinking head out of the car window, looking less catdog than crackfox. Is that a Maine Coon, or have they photoshopped a ginger tom onto a corgi? You wouldn't want it in your lap. And what does #BeMoreDog have to do with #SellingYouThings? Dogs certainly aren't interested in mobile broadband. Delving into the promoted website though, O2's string-thin thesis is uncovered: while dogs are immersed in simple joys (chasing tails, ingesting faeces) we too live in a world of wonder. The wonder of lovely, expensive technology! Animal-spiritualism retooled as techno-capitalist – ahem – dogma. Who's better, cats or dogs? O2 don't give a shih tzu. Just sign this 36-month contract.
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