March 06, 2008 - When Good Ads Happen to Bad TV Shows

What do you do when an ad for a TV show is clever enough to applaud, but the show it's promoting isn't worth watching? In the case of Comedy Central's Lil' Bush, the only thing to do is be a Lil' Creative: Dismiss the series, but support the ad.

The series Lil' Bush, which returns for its second Comedy Central season a week from tonight, is an Internet outgrowth that isn't worth the expanded effort. Crude animation is one thing, and, as South Park has proven for a decade, can even be an asset. But South Park is caustic, cutting-edge comedy brilliance. Lil' Bush is so dumb, it doesn't even put its apostrophe in the right place.

A cartoon series about a sawed-off George W. Bush, especially with cartoon caricartures of Dick Cheney, Condaleeza Rice and others in the mix, ought to be funny almost by default. But this series isn't. Not last season, and not with the preview samples for this season.

But the Comedy Central ad for the show - that's another matter.

Distributed to the press yesterday, it's a takeoff on the famous "Obama Girl" video, which on YouTube has generated nearly 7 million views, several of its own parodies, and an invitation for the real "Obama Girl" to play herself in a cameo on Saturday Night Live. The original "Obama Girl" video, just for the record, is available HERE.

And here, with appropriate warnings that the content is Comedy Central-level risque, is the "Lil' Bush Girl" ad.

If you like the ad, rest assured, it's better than the program. If you don't like it, rest even more assured, the program is worse.