Sometimes a product is so obviously desirable that the job of marketing is simply to introduce it to the world. Sky HD was powerful before it had even begun. Releasing it into the wild required inch-perfect handling, but it didn't require cleverness.
There's no need for grand analogy, or to explore a world without Sky HD, or even one in which televisions are clamouring for higher resolution. We don't need to meet Sky HD's imaginary friend. While no doubt true, we can't be bothered to consider the fact that having watched Sky HD, everything else will seem a little flat.
We're already impatient. We don't care about any of the make-believe that advertising could weave around this product. It has already made armchair dreams come true, just by existing.
We don't need to hear about competitors - they become irrelevant the moment a product like this becomes available. We don't need to hear that famous people like it - we'd much rather just watch famous people on it. We don't need to know how it works. Moreover, judging by the waiting lists, we don't particularly need to know what it costs.
We just need to see it, and this is where the real effort in the ad shows. Every slo-mo pixel has been given the same blood-pumping clarity in low-definition as it promises to offer in high-definition.
As we watch, we get just enough of a reminder of why we want it. We want it because it's better than what went before. We want it because it makes television even more exciting. We want it because it makes the unmissable even more unmissable.
This idea of must-watch viewing is all we need for the whole visual surge to come earth-wiring back to the brand that is Sky.
We remember Sean Bean marching across a football pitch claiming sport as the new religion, and we remember who pioneered this stuff in the first place.
Sometimes the cleverness of advertising lies not in what we do with it, but in what we don't do. Sometimes high concept is less powerful than flawless execution.
Opportunities for such straightforwardness don't come around very often, but if we fail to spot them when they do, we're just a load of clever-dicks.
Well spotted.