Samurai Jack, Hero Narratives, and Marketing.

I find watching Samurai Jack deeply inspirational, because of how often the show tells entire stories with nothing but subtext and action. This is possible because (most of the time) everyone falls into the same archetypes: Hero (Jack), Villain (Aku / Henchmen), and Unformed (Everyone else).

While hero and villain are hopefully pretty clear, the unformed characters are the most interesting - while the theme of the series is Jack trying to triumph over Aku, the only character arc we ever see is the unformed characters, those who will either shift towards heroism and self sufficiency, or evil and dependence, after being touched by the Jack / Aku conflict.

Because of who I am, this got me thinking about marketing.

Traditionally, casting someone or something into the hero role. The product is the hero, the product makes the audience the hero, or the supplier of the product is the hero.

In the first instance, you’re selling association. As in the recent superbowl commercial, buying a certain model of car will associate you with masculinity. In the second, you’re selling empowerment. Buying this shoe, for instance, will help you become a better athlete. The last example gets me thinking about the Orkin man, coming to save the day.

Samurai Jack suggests a different narrative to me - where the audience is already the hero, and your product is just part of their story, not the point of transformation or empowerment.

The best example of this in recent memory was Google’s superbowl ad. A love story where the risk, the romance, the passion and the reward all had nothing to do with the product. The product was a tool, and in the hands of the right person, it was powerful and a little magical.

The biggest problem we face is that everyone wants to be the hero, from the client to marketer to consumer. And since people on our end of the equation get most of the control of the story, we can see why so many narratives focus on the pre-consumer elements as heroic, as the protagonist.

The amusing part is, crafting a narrative where the consumer was the hero to begin with, and where you’re marketing a sidekick for them, is probably a half-decent way for you to actually save the day.

[Apologies for the lack of links, this was written on my iPhone, from bed.]