You are now entering Ad Space, a realm of commercials, brought before us so we might examine how they work, and discuss why we both love and hate them so. So it is written …

The Product:
Coca-Cola

The Promotion:

The Pitch:
We had to choose between stopping Galactus or getting this fan a Coke – I think we made the right call.

I’m curious how the funding for this commercial worked.

Obviously, it’s an ad for Coke, so the immediate assumption is the Coca-Cola company paid Marvel for the rights to use some of their characters to shill soda – a pretty standard arrangement. Except the commercial spends so much time showcasing a wide array of Marvel characters, and making them all look so cool, it kinda feels like it’s a commercial for Marvel, too.

So, how’s the money situation work there? Was it just a standard Coke-pays-Marvel setup, and it making Marvel look good was just a bonus? Or was it something where Marvel waived any direct money from Coke, in exchange for ensuring the ad spotlighted their characters well? Or was this a full-on collaboration, with Coke and Marvel splitting production costs for the commercial, knowing they’d both come out ahead if they did it right?

Either way, they definitely went all out making an epic and visually arresting ad. Of course, Marvel is no stranger to going all out when it comes to shilling sugary treats. Just type “marvel hostess fruit pie” into Yahoo! and you’ll see what I mean.

(P.S. I’m hardly up-to-date on Marvel Comics, but I always thought Juggernaut was supposed to be world’s-largest-bodybuilder big, not King-Kong big like in this ad. What up with that?)