Joel McHale Doesn’t Do an Online Video Ad for Nintendo 3DS

The latest addition to the online video canon of Advertising That Is Advertising Because It’s All About How It’s Not Advertising stars Joel McHale as a difficult-to-deal-with spokesman for the Nintendo 3DS.

The three-minute-and-33-second online video spot was released on Nintendo’s YouTube channel and is a blatant shill for the portable game console (which doesn’t require users to wear headgear like this) by way of having its principal actors spend the majority of those three-minutes-and-33-seconds explaining how the video spot is not a blatant shill for Nintendo’s portable gaming console.

McHale also references and/or shares the video frame with classic YouTube videos, perennially appealing base activities often documented in online video, Mario and Luigi, and a handful of bikini-clad models (whose attire happens to match some of the colors in which you purchase your very own a 3DS

The advert (dubbed Joel McHale goes viral for Nintendo) was directed and edited by ubiquitous online video and commercial behind-the-camera talent Jesse Selwyn, written by Brad Stevens and Boyd Vico, and co-produced with John Koch of ID-PR. It also represents a new attention-grabbing strategy for the consumer electronics developer.

Nintendo has produced at least one example of innovative online video advertising, but this is their first entree into something live-action, irreverent, and internet-y. If you’re a fan of this kind of online video advertising, here’s to hoping it will work.