Rob Lowe Television Commercial

DirecTV and actor Rob Lowe have recently collaborated on a series of commercials. The purpose of these commercials was to persuade people to get rid of cable, and sign up for DirecTV. Every commercial that was released pretty much followed the same format. I will be specifically analyzing the commercial titled, "Far Less Attractive Rob Lowe." The commercial begins by presenting the audience with Rob Lowe as his normal self. He is depicted as the handsome, successful, and confident man that a lot of people know him to be. The commercial then proceeds to show us his "less attractive" alter ego. His alter ego is depicted as unattractive, a failure, and socially awkward. The real Rob Lowe has DirecTV, but his alter ego has cable. After introducing these two …show more content…
This fallacy utilizes a person to present an argument on a certain topic, but that person is not actually a credible authority on that subject. Rob Lowe is an actor, but occasionally being on TV does not make you an expert on TV service providers. Another fallacy in this commercial is the false dilemma fallacy. A false dilemma is when a limited number of options are given, but there is at least one other option. This commercial only presents you with the option to choose DirecTV or cable. These two choices are portrayed as two extremes. DirecTV is the best possible option, and cable is the worst possible option. This is a fallacy because there are other options available to consumers. Some consumers have started using online services, such as Netflix, in order to watch their favorite TV shows (Hunt). The final fallacy I was able to identify is slippery slope. Slippery slope is a fallacy in which it is illogically implied that one thing must lead to another. In this commercial it is implied that if you have DirecTV you will be as confident as Rob Lowe, but if you have cable you will be a failure like his alter