I watched some extraordinary television yesterday. It was the kind of TV that makes your eyes widen and your jaw drop to the floor.
Not Sherlock, obviously. Much as I love the uptight detective, I know what I’m getting when I press the play button. I mean Morph, the animated clay character who made his debut back in 1977 and has now been recreated for the Sky Kids channel.
You read that right, Morph. In a homage to the mockumentary This Is Spinal Tap and The Sugarhill Gang, the legendary American hip-hop group, the diminutive children’s favourite and his cream-coloured pal Chas change (or, er, morph) into a couple of seasoned rap artists in a short entitled Rapper’s Delight.
My sister and I watched slack-jawed as Chas turned the volume up to 11 before joining Morph in what can only be described as a couple of minutes of sheer animated genius. Meanwhile, my four-year-old niece jigged around on the sofa, oblivious to the adult connotations of the show but enjoying it nonetheless.
It got me thinking about reinventions of childhood favourites. While I’m all in favour of a relaunch of Tony Hart’s plasticine pal, I’m less sure about another 21st century use of much-loved kids’ characters. I’m talking about financial adverts.
Earlier today Halifax unveiled Scooby-Doo as the latest character to feature in its TV advertising campaign. It follows the bank’s series of ads starring Top Cat, the gangster feline protagonist from the animated 60s series. I love a bit of Top Cat but I felt uneasy seeing a key part of my childhood being employed to sell mortgages. And just how sensible was it to use a character living in a bin to promote Halifax’s homeloans? As a Twitter commentator joked at the time, ‘Surely it was reckless lending like this that got the banks in to all that trouble in the first place?!’
I’ve seen the Scooby-Doo advert. The juxtaposition of Scooby and a bank made me squirm in my seat, particularly when the gang escape the clutches of a mummy by running into a Halifax branch. That’s when Scooby and Shaggy discover the benefits of the lender’s debit cards. Sigh.
Halifax’s Catherine Kehoe, managing director of group brands and marketing, said: ‘Just like the previous stars of our ads, Scooby and the gang help us demonstrate our commitment to helping customers to be better off, showing that whoever comes through our doors will be welcomed by our friendly, down-to-earth colleagues.’
The bank knows what it’s doing: last year’s Top Cat campaign generated more than four million views on Facebook and Twitter. I expect Scooby-Doo will enjoy a similar level of success.
Nevertheless, I’m in agreement with Spectator Money‘s Rebecca O’Connor who, when writing about sentimentality in financial adverts last November, said: ‘Their genius is the manipulation of emotion – and deep emotions too, that induce feelings of familiarity, security, even dependency.’
I don’t want to feel happy when I see a financial ad. I want to feel sceptical, possibly even a bit cross. So I have this to say: like wow Halifax, please stop plundering my favourite childhood shows to flog mortgages and credit cards.
Helen Nugent is Online Money Editor of The Spectator
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