Page 48 - AdNews magazine Jul-Aug 2021

Tokyo Take Two
With the Olympics finally set to take place in Tokyo across July and August, after being postponed in 2020, AdNews asked creatives to share their thoughts on some of the ads that have launched in line with the games.
WORDS BY
PAIGE MURPHY
Creative Review
HILARY BADGER
Clemenger BBDO Melbourne creative director
For sheer joy, visual originality and craft in Olympics ads, nothing comes close to Channel 4’s ‘We’re the Superhumans’ from 2016’s Paralympics. Well, definitely nothing in this selection. I enjoy the spectacle of sport, but the 2021 iteration of the Olympics seems obscenely self-indulgent and privileged, which these ads only reinforce.
BRIE STEWART
Wunderman Thompson Australia creative director — content
I believe the essence of good Olympics advertising is about understanding the role your brand plays strategically. Advertising that wins in this space understands if the brand can intrinsically connect with what the Olympics stand for and be a vehicle to portray the determination of Olympians, or whether it needs to play
a secondary role and connect via a shared purpose. And when this isn’t understood... well, it can feel gimmicky, stereotypical or just a bit “huh?”
VINCE OSMOND AND JADE MANNING
Special Group creative directors
No cheering, no autographs, no high-fives, no buzz.
The lead-up to the Olympics has been as suppressed
as the Games themselves. Maybe that’s because our perspective has shifted since the last Olympics. The world is dealing with a lot right now, and we’re running out of bandwidth to care. So it’s a pretty tough task to encourage people to see the Olympics as a moment of unity, to look abroad for hope, when their immediate concerns are
at home. Olympics 2021 is an incredibly daunting brief.