A Boy with a Vagina Shills for Tampax

If nothing else, the growing use of web video by top agencies working for major brands is leading to some truly weird content.

Take Zack16.com:

The marketer behind a stealth viral campaign featuring videos of a fictional 16-year-old boy who wakes up one morning to find his “guy parts” gone and replaced with “girl parts” is none other than Procter & Gamble’s Tampax.

The campaign from Leo Burnett, Chicago, is anchored by a blog featuring professionally produced videos at Zack16.com. Its main link to Tampax to date has been when title character, Zack Johnson, has his first period during French class and sneaks into the girls’ restroom to use a Tampax vending machine.  LINK

The videos themselves are professionally shot, using a lot of cinematic depth-of-field and indie music that lend it a sort of “serious” cred.  The actual story is just weird.  In the first episode, our lead goes to see his guidance counselor and informs her that he woke up with his “boy parts” but with the “female equivilant.” Is he panicked?  Nope.  Is he freaking out? Nope.  If anything, he seems a little sad, but other than that it’s as if it’s just one of those things that kinda happens.  Weird.

Nobody has really watched any episodes.  Fewer than 10,000 views for the first episode on YouTube.  Leo Burnett claims this is intentional, that it is a “stealth” release and they will wait and see if it catches on and “goes viral.”

The problem, I fear, for Burnett, P&G and Zack himself, is that while the episodes look great and the branding is not overt, the actual content is so much less compelling than the concept.  He is a teen boy, at the peek of his sexual desires, waking up one morning without a penis.  Even more distrurbing, he now has a vagina!  Yet, somehow none of this really phases our protagonist except for him to bemoan the fact that maybe the girl of his dreams will be less interested in him now.

Check out the first episode for yourself:

1 Comment

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  By Druu, June 16, 2009 @ 2:58 pm

  I’ve gotta agree. Top-notch production with a cool “out-of-the-box” concept, but the emotionally detached teen dude thing? 99% of 16 year-old guys would either freak out or stay in their room for a week or more playing around with their new “girl parts”. I guess that wouldn’t sell tampons, though…

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