The bank and agency Arnold revive reliable characters and tropes for the latest chapter of its entertaining ‘Brilliantly Boring’ platform.
As an increasing number of new names appear in the financial services category offering more modern ways of banking, and other established institutions embrace the use of splashy celebrity names in their ads to bolster their position in the space, PNC has opted to be “Brilliantly Boring” both as a brand platform and as its North Star for its campaigns, which, to their credit, have been actually entertaining.Its latest for the platform, Boring Over Time, stands out not because it’s done anything creatively innovative — which is not to be mistaken as a detraction — but because it’s creatively taking cues from its own platform’s playbook by bringing back a steady spokesman and an easy-to-grasp concept wrapped in humor. Created by Arnold and directed by Craig Gillespie, the spot features actor Chris Diamantopoulos returning to the brand’s fold and attempting to dole out wise advice to stave off some famously catastrophic historical events as a metaphor for the bank’s own practice of delivering similarly steady and disciplined advice to clients. While references such as the destruction of Pompeii and the Battle at Waterloo might cause a chuckle, the NFT bubble will hit home for some in a way that may stick for consumers — especially in the current economic climate, in which some money-saving gimmicks can be extra costly.It’s storytelling at its simplest, and that’s what makes it brilliant.
