Is viral German TV commercial too shocking? — VIDEO

It’s either a masterpiece of Yuletide warmth or the most morbid TV commercial ever.

But, either way, the ad for Germany’s Edeka supermarket chain has prompted fascination internationally for its take on holiday season family togetherness and a surprising, perhaps infuriating, plot twist.

The ad features an elderly man who arrives home to find that his adult kids are too busy to visit him for Christmas.

(Spoilers from here on)

The ad then takes a disconcerting turn as the adult children are notified that their father has died. When the grieving kids return home for what they expect to be his funeral, they go to his home and find the table set for holiday dinner and Dad himself stepping out from around a corner. Dad then explains to the shocked, now chastened, kids, “How else could I have brought you all together?”

The ad was posted on YouTube on Nov. 28 and as of Wednesday had been viewed almost 21.7 million times. And while the video garnered more than 114,000 likes, some viewers apparently found the plot twist jarring.

Among them: Savannah Guthrie, co-host of NBC’s “Today” show, who, after viewing the ad, dropped her head to the desk in disbelief and called it “the worst thing I have ever seen.” 

So, in an expanding sea of Christmas-themed TV ads, is this one a success? Veteran Las Vegas advertising executive Tom Letizia thinks so.

While he hadn’t seen the ad, Letizia notes that, “first off, let me just say the fact that we’re having a conversation about it right now immediately tells me that it was a good commercial for a lot of reasons.”

Then he watches the ad for himself and a few minutes later utters a surprised “Oh my god.”

And, when the video ends: “OK, that’s good.”

It’s possible that a few decades ago, the ad might have trod too close to being uncomfortably edgy. But, Letizia says, “today, the No. 1 rule is, there are no rules.

“It used to be that you’d take a lot of things into consideration before putting any kind of ad on the air or in print. Today, you’re fighting for exposure, you’re fighting to stand out amongst the crowd, and the fact that this has gotten that many hits tells me, right there, it’s a success because they went viral with this and they lit up computers all over the country.”

It’s also possible that the ad might not work as well if it were made for an American audience.

“Of course, this is a German company,” Letizia says. “If you look at commercials in France and some other countries, they are much more risque than the kind of stuff you see here in America, and I think that’s because America is so politically correct.”

Olesya Venger, an assistant professor in the Hank Greenspun School of Journalism and Media Studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, says the ad probably can be considered controversial “because there are multiple people who would be offended by it. At the same time, there are other people who would be very thrilled to see that ad and be thinking, ‘Oh my god, that is so awesome.’ “

In making any ad, Venger says, “it’s not a question of how to make a great ad, it’s a question of how do you make a great ad for that particular product for that particular goal you have for that product and that particular target audience you have in mind.”

Then, she says, “how do you define effectiveness, and that’s kind of a rhetorical question, because effectiveness for many people means different things. If the goal of this was to make it going viral, yes, it went viral. If the goal was … to create an ad that would be controversial and go viral, yes, it became controversial and went viral.”

Letizia admires the ad’s creators for doing something different and edgy amid a universe invariably populated by more traditional Christmas ads.

“I admire the people who put that together and their creativity and their ability to jump out on a limb and be aggressive,” Letizia says.

“Now I’m sure there are people who are offended by it,” he adds. “But, overall, as an ad guy, I love it.”

Contact reporter John Przybys at jprzybys@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0280 or follow @JJPrzybys on Twitter.