Why’s the John Lewis’ Xmas Ad so bloody menacing!

[Purplefoo]

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2025/nov/04/john-lewis-christmas-advert-countdown-90s-club-classic-where-love-lives

I genuinely thought it was about an abusive dad or a murderous son at first! So intense……

You kind of lose any point and show true colours when you start banging on about "woke" when it comes to anyone who's black being represented and how lovely it is to see a white nuclear family again.
I mean, we're still here (white nuclear families that is) just because we're not always on the telly doesn't mean we've gone anywhere or been erased or some such nonsense.

How do we know re disabled people? A significant proportion of disabilities are hidden. Any number of those actors could have had a disability and we wouldn't know. In fact, I'd say there is some ND coding in the characters.

I don't like it, and I have a 15 year old boy. He's a happy, chatty kid and he and his dad dote on one another, share hobbies etc. I have never had distance with him (although that might change). But everyone's different and everyone has different experiences of parenting/childhood and different personalities. I don't think there's a "normal". The advert's depiction is not a million miles away from the dynamic my father and brother had. The reconciliation would have been temporary in the house I grew up in, with normal service resuming as soon as something triggered one of them. That was my normal growing up.

The reconciliation would have been temporary in the house I grew up in, with normal service resuming as soon as something triggered one of them.

Yes! What I find difficult to swallow, I think, is the idea that you can just spend money to get past a communication problem that has probably been years in the making.

That, and the fact that JL don't even sell records so it all seems rather contrived...

I'm on Perspectives which is the John Lewis review and survey panel so we are all John Lewis fans on there.

it's pretty much a 50/50 split on there if people love or hate it

Families have problems.
There are many kinds of problems, but we all have them to some extent.

This advert shows that there can be a little or even maybe a lot of joy at Christmas despite that.

I think that it reflects what many people feel.
I thought the advert was great.

it's pretty much a 50/50 split on there if people love or hate it

Perhaps this is the advertiser's dream ratio for maximising engagement?

I showed my 15-year-old daughter (who LOVES Christmas) some of the JL adverts of the past:

(1) the one with the penguin 🐧 getting a friend for Christmas;
(2) the one with the hare and the bear,
(3) the one with the dog on the trampoline.

All of the above made her cry.

The current one didn't and she didn't even want to see a repeat of it as she thought it was completely un-Christmassy. She also asked what it had to do with JL.

I don't think a 15 year old is the target audience for this advert though, they won't "get" it
It's more for us who were clubbing in the 90s and then had kids, who are now teenagers.
Reconnecting with them after losing your way a bit
Hits you "in the feels" for want of a better expression!

Surely nobody has a perfect life where teens don’t sometimes sulk or there are arguments? It doesn’t mean that there are fundamental flaws in the way the way families function. And music is often a way that teenage boys and their dads bond. You only have to look at the demographics of the revival of Oasis and Pulp etc to see that.

I agree with you, save that the person in the ad who bought (presumably from JL) the record and gave the present and brought about the reconnect was the 15 year old boy, not the adult. So I think the messaging is confused if teens aren't getting it.

This is a fascinating thread into how people view things differently!
My teen ds is fairly new to present buying so he thinks a lot about it and I get a lot of, ‘are you sure dad will like this?’ So to me the boy just looked nervous and hopeful that his dad would like the gift rather than his dad is abusive and he’s terrified of him!

I was thinking what teenage boy would be shopping at John Lewis?
I doubt it's a shop even on their radar.
This sounds incredibly sexist but I think of it as a "female" shop.
A place that sells make up, clothes and household stuff aka things that mums love 😂

Yes this is a fair point. If an advertiser can get everyone to agree an ad is great is it still better to get half saying they don’t like it for more content generation and free exposure?

I don't think successful brand advertising tends to be as direct as that.

I see it as the add is aimed at people who clubbed in the 90s, making them think Good Thoughts about JL because they associate it with the idea their kids might actually want to connect with them - something the ex-clubber desperately wants as they listen to the teen banging about morosely in their room.

Wow, that was amazing. I was welling up at the end.

It was specific but also had the ability to encompass all kinds of lost relationships.

Very clever.

This exactly

Why is there an assumption that the kid is the problem and the non communicative one? Considering it's the child reaching out to the father in the ad.

Just to say top floor of John Lewis in Oxford Street is tech heaven and has been for decades. So not sure about teenage boys but you do see loads of blokes in there buying TV’s.

Blokes probably....only because they've been dragged in by their wives.
Teenage boys - unlikely.
😂😂😂

I wouldn't have said anyone was "the problem" in this add. It's holding up a mirror to the estrangement and distance many parents feel with their teen children, but it isn't saying it's the child's fault.

Experience?
I was a teacher for 35 years. Teen boys are often non-communicative.

So are middle aged men.

This is true, we've spent at least £10k in tech at JL over the last year or so. However, I know my kids would rather go into the Apple Store for the excitement of looking at lots of new gadgets.

I don’t have enough experience to comment.
Why assume wither one is the (or even a) problem though? There’s been a failure of communication, could be 6 of one and half a dozen of the other.