Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Professor Blackburn
RC-1000
9 February 2019
This McDonald’s commercial takes the viewer through its “recommitment” to its
customers, showing the ways in which the company has “reformed” their menu to become more
healthy, sustainable, and adaptive to the needs of modern America. First, the advertisement
makes an emotional appeal to parents, being assured by the narrator that McDonald’s is changing
its meals to be more healthy for their children, attempting to seem trustworthy, that McDonald’s
is there for the ‘working parent’ of our modern days. Next, the advertisement transitions to
acknowledge and put to rest the possible reservations that some may have upon hearing that
McDonald’s is actively working to make its menu healthier. The audience is assured that
McDonald’s will still continue to have its specialties, such as their hamburgers and “world
famous” (McDonalds, “Commitment”) fries. While this transition occurs, the reforms of a new,
“healthier” McDonald’s are still pushed, to ensure that both new and old audiences are enticed
by their programming. The narrator then casts their gaze once again the promotion of healthy
children, and while they’re at it, a healthy earth, stating that McDonald’s is working to support
the children, “our future,”(McDonalds, “Commitment”) as the ad sentimentally puts it, showing
images of two high-achieving children, one with awards, the other with a robot. The ad then
shifts to its final message, stating that “simpler is better,”(McDonalds, “Commitment”) that
we’re all building a better McDonald’s. This advertisement works tirelessly to snare the family,
who much of the video is spent targeting, in order to ease any worries that parents have, due to
Throughout the video, a gentle, compassionate guitar plays, whilst a man with a calm,
encouraging voice, doing everything in its power to gain your trust, tells the audience about how
it’s safe to eat McDonald’s food, as it’s only improving, and becoming more simple for parents
and their families to enjoy. This advertisement makes many appeals regarding family, with most
of the healthy reforms being said with a happy child or family residing in the background.
McDonald’s is aware that their food is quite popular among children, and the prospect of an
easy, quick meal is quite appealing to parents, so combatting any potential unease that parents
may have about feeding their children McDonald’s food by describing how they’ve changed as a
company to become healthier in order support the “modern family” would make their advertising
all the more effective. The advertisement shows the audience exactly who they’ve changed for,
trying to show that they’ve changed for every type of parent, including the “modern mom,” clad
in her pantsuit, implying that she’s a modern, working woman, the “discerning dad,” and “all
important to note that to accomplish this goal of trying to draw in all parents, the race of each
parent is changed as each of the types of parents mentioned above is addressed, and only one
innocent and wholesome, making this seem to be a genuine effort by McDonald’s to show how
they’ve reformed and become healthier for all to enjoy. As a part of the imagery, a small farm
where a farmer cuts her kale to directly be used in McDonald’s salads is shown. In reality, it is
known that McDonald’s likely gets their vegetables from large, commercial farms that lack the
intimate touch portrayed in the video, as well as workers with stylized hair, makeup, that slowly
The entire purpose of the commercial is to make the audience feel comfortable and at
ease, so it is reasonable that few fallacies are identifiable throughout, as most have to do with
scaring or angering the audience. It is difficult to make an audience willingly give their trust if
they are being harassed with information or attacked through argument. The natural choice for an
advertisement based around comfort and trust would be the “overly sentimental appeal”, which is
utilised in the entirety of the commercial. Heartwarming moments between the major types of
people (or at least the major types of people desirable to the general audience that is being
catered to) McDonald’s wants to draw are shot and continuously revolved back to over the span
of the advertisement, parents spending time with their children, young friends “hanging out”
together, and an elderly couple just coming from the movie theatre are all shown in order to
create a false warm, intimate feeling to entice as many in these broad groups as possible.
This advertisement works hard to try and persuade others to eat their food mainly through
warmth and sentimentality, attempting to cater to values that are believed to be in all families,
while still managing to persuade even those who manage to resist these overly sentimental
aspects of the commercial by including health claims with the aim to boost their credibility. The
aim of this advertisement is to convince just about any people with doubts about the health risks
tailoring a majority of the ad to show that McDonald’s has changed to be “simpler” (McDonalds,
“Commitment”) to fit their individual needs as parents, no matter who they are.
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