FUN VIRAL SITES

I have this feeling that Matt Groening wasn’t far off with his joke. In “Futurama” frye is having a wet dream, which then turns into an advertisement for briefs. He’s told later on that companies can input ads for their products into their dreams, and it’s considered the norm. I have a feeling someday I’ll be having a dream about zombies, and at the end it will say “Rage of the Dead: Coming Soon.” What with viral marketing all the craze, it’s not a far off concept, you have to admit.

I personally enjoy it (ex: Subliminal Viral Marketing Now?). Viral Marketing gives me some sense that studios don’t always view us as consumers. It’s attempting to appeal to us in some form, and I’m enjoying the new s**t that comes out to advertise a possibly shitty movie, because it’s just a lot of fun.

Here’s a few of my favorites. Or what I could remember.

Godsend institute website
Yet another great idea for a really bad movie, “Godsend” involved a couple who lose their son in an accident and genetically create a new copy of him, to which we learn that he’s all sorts of evil and psychotic, because carbon copies are always faulty. Damn Robert DeNiro. Either way, the Lions Gate launched a shockingly sleek website advertising their service all over the internet for bringing back the dead called “The Godsend Institute.” Inevitably, the masses revealed how a sucker is born every second, as Lions Gate almost immediately had to shut the site down due to the rapid number of actual requests they received to revive their loved ones, which ended up clogging their systems. Much to the disappointment of thousands, they revealed it was just a ploy to advertise their movie. Humanity scares me. The site has since been taken down.

The Harvey Dent Campaign page
This is one of my recent favorites. What looks like a simple campaign page for the one and only Harvey Dent, eventually dissolves into a dark image into the background. The page then prompts you for your name and code number, and once inserted, the picture of Dent is altered to look like a clown, and it’s disintegrated to reveal the Joker. One of the first peeks at the new Joker design, fans of the franchise were ecstatic for this glimpse, as was I, and it set the bar for even more viral websites. The site is still up.

Robert Kelly campaign page
Striving for a Mutant free tomorrow, “X-Men” saw the website for Robert Kelly come to the net as a propaganda page for folks who wanted a mutant free future. Through this website we had a very gorgeous information page, videos of Kelly with his family, a quiz on suspected mutants, information on the X-Men, and even surveillance photos taken of the X-Men individuals. We also had a television special which was a short film and glimpse at the making of the movie all in one. The site has long been taken down.

ATHF Terrorism fiasco
In possibly one of the funniest incidents since… ever, the folks behind “Aqua Teen Hunger Force” attempted to implement LED’s of the Mooninites as a form of Guerilla marketing to plant and hype the “ATHF” movie, and raised a terrorism alert in the process. Taking entirely new heights of hysteria, Boston authorities closed down the bridges in which the LED’s were installed, and began a citywide search for what was merely LED’s with batteries meant to advertise a fairly abysmal series. Bomb squads were called in, Turner broadcasting and Adult Swim went through a great deal of lawsuits, and the incident revealed that many times extreme advertisements can lead to rather surprising consequences. The upcoming viral ploy for Bomber man has since been halted.

Cloverfield
I really don’t think I have to inform you what this is all about. Currently, we’re investigating Cloverfield up until it’s release, and you can view our article of the Cloverfield hysteria here. As foywonder from Dread Central stated, if this turns out to be a sub-par film, it will have been a wonderful sociological experiment.

Rage of the Gods
I don’t know what the f**k this site is about, but it’s goddamn spooky. Many have suspected that it has SOMETHING to do with Cloverfield, while others think it may be connected to another movie entirely. Others think it’s a game. Regardless, this site is altogether confusing. While it may sport a few code numbers it’s featured the picture of what looks like a black rat drawn on a cave, which has then blurred gradually, and swirled, and now it looks like an Eye looking back at you with a nose. Suffice it to say, it’s pretty f*****g spooky. I’m still confused what it’s leaning toward, but I’d gather it’s a viral website.

Buy N Large
To prepare for the upcoming Pixar movie “Wall-E,” fans discovered a mock shopping website called “Buy N Large” which is a fully realized online store made to resemble “Wal-Mart,” and even offers you a chance to buy your own Wall-E, which is guaranteed to clean up all your messes, as is the plot of the upcoming film. This is yet another fantastic ploy from studios, but by all means, decide for yourself.

With all the s**t out there today, there’s always a good chance I’m missing one viral website in particular, so don’t stay shut. Have any favorites?