They may have already taken over Twitter, but anyone reading this week's Marvel comics will have seen that the Skrull brand of alien passive-aggressiveness has started infecting the offline world as well. Should we embrace change, if change is defined by allowing ourselves to be overrun by alien invaders who wish to save us from ourselves? We talk to the person in charge of the campaign - as well as the awesome "hands across the universe" print ad - below.Revealed in the most recent issue of Marvel's Secret Invasion, the agenda of our latest alien invaders isn't exactly the conquering and destroying one that you may have expected. Instead, they want to save us from ourselves: This new kinder, gentler alien invasion is reflected in the new ad campaign for the series, created by Marvel's VP of Marketing Mike Pasciullo. We asked Mike what was behind the shift from the more traditional "images of heroes looking serious" advertising to this creepier, funnier, promotion:
This ad campaign was designed to entertain comic fans but more importantly to intrigue and entice the mainstream audience so that they want to learn more about what Embrace Change means and then hopefully pick up an issue of Secret Invasion. [The print ad, below] is just the first ad in a series that the Skrulls have planned to get humankind to Embrace Change. In fact, they have an entire marketing campaign that has begun with the use of MySpace and Twitter acting as precursors to a stronger push in the next few weeks.
So, expect to see your world invaded by yet another party promising change over the next few weeks. And, hey - about that. With both Obama and McCain's Presidential campaigns being based around the idea of "change," how much of this campaign is a party political parody? Pasciullo denies it:
The Embrace Change mantra had actually been part of [Secret Invasion writer] Brian [Michael Bendis]'s Secret Invasion storyline for a long time. It truly was just a coincidence that when it was time to introduce it, that the candidates had begun to use similar slogans.
Total coincidence... or perhaps both Obama and McCain have secret parts of their history that haven't been discussed at the conventions. Secret alien parts. [Embrace Change]