Product Placement We Can Use

Subliminal advertising in the form of product placement in entertainment programming is nothing new. 

24 in particular – which seems to have performed the unthinkable, and re-jumped the shark and become watchable after its terrible sixth season – has indulged in some really bald-faced placement this past few seasons; Cisco has insinuated WebEx (or some special counter-terror version of WebEx that looks utterly unfamiliar to those of us who’ve been teleconferencing with it for years, now) into the dangedest places on the show this season.

But I noticed something else earlier this season, and it came to a head this past Monday.

In Season Three, Jack Bauer switched from his trademark handgun of the first two seasons, the SIG-Sauer P226 (the Audi of handguns) to a Hecker and Koch USP (the BMW of handguns).

Fair enough.

But for the past two seasons, and especially this season, every time someone picks up a long arm (who isn’t an obvious M16/M4-carrying US serviceperson), it’s a Hecker & Koch weapon; MP7s and G36s have been joining the RedshirtsCTU Tac Teams’ FBI’s MP5s in the big shootouts.  Bauer has chased through at least a couple of firefights this season with the esoteric MP7.

And then, this past episode, Agent Hotpants called in that Quinn had used “a Hecker and Koch UMP Submachine Gun” to kill Senator Red Foreman.  Now, you never hear the full make and model of firearms on TV, outside of reality or fictional cop shows (CSI or occasionally Law and Order), and even then only very rarely, and almost always very generically (“Beretta”, “AK”, “Smith and Wesson”).

So I gotta wonder – is H’nK paying for placement on 24?  Perhaps to help move their excellent products from their brand new American factory

And if so, could they perhaps try advertising on blogs as well?

Because either way it’s pretty dang cool.

17 thoughts on “Product Placement We Can Use

  1. So they want you gun nutz thinking its the firearm to use if you want to assassinate a United States senator?

  2. Nope, only the anti gun nuts would think that. It would never even occur to a gun nut.

  3. AssClown not only has BDS but also hoplophobia, that might deserve a bit of sympathy. tisk, what a waste of oxygen.

  4. Now when you say Audi and BMW, which one is better than which? Because all I know is that I have shot both a SIG 226 and a H&K USP and the SIG 226 is more accurate, balanced, confortable, and ergonamically designed. Its shows in price also since any Comparable H&K to a SIG will cost 100-150 dollars less.

    At least when it comes to handguns. I would suppose H&K has a better headstart in the sub-machine gun, carbine, and rifle products.

  5. I’d still take a Kimber over either H&K or SIG. Although I can’t think of an American car company analogy. Well, maybe Tesla.

  6. Hey, looks like one of you wacky gun nutz lost it and went berserk in Binghampton. Haven’t seen any posts from Shiftee today…

    Wonder if the maniac gun nut was at least smart enough to use a Hecker & Koch.

  7. Hey, looks like one of you wacky gun nutz lost it and went berserk in Binghampton.

    Yeah. Good thing New York has among the toughest state gun controls laws in the country, and that it’s difficult for a law-abiding New Yorker to get a carry permit, or Stu only knows how bad it’d have been!

  8. How much do you wanna bet the building in Binghamton was a legally “gun-free zone”?

  9. Whatevs. A guy with a bunch of guns killing immigrants. Yeah, that’s one of yours.

  10. Whatevs.

    Nah. There’s a reason this stuff happens on college campuses and New York subways and “gun free zones” and the like.

    one of yours.

    Nah. One of mine woulda had a carry permit and a pistol and woulda ended this thing nice and early.

  11. You can’t talk about product placement without going back to the old Quinn-Martin shows like “The F.B.I”. Ford was the major sponsor, and the good guys all drove new Fords, Mercurys and Lincolns. The bad guys drove old GMC and Crysler cars.

  12. I need a magazine fed AssClown launcher to feed targets into the air.

    Pull! Blamblamblamblamblamclick…Pull! Blamblamblamblamblam!

  13. New York subways? Maybe you remember the last mass shooting on the subway, Mitch, cause I don’t. Of course I’ve only been here 25 years.

  14. Er, Colin Ferguson killing five on the LIRR.

    “Hahahaha, silly rube, the LIRR’s not a subway!”

    Yeah, I suppose that invalidates my entire point.

  15. Weapon of choice during clown season is either a squirting flower or exploding cigar.

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