Audi Q5 just handles so much better than a giant cardboard box

This Audi Q5 ad is one of those commercials that looks like it's for the real thing but is actually for a fake company that's meant to provide a negative contrast to the actual brand. Are you still with me? Another recent example of this is PJ Blands, an ersatz restaurant that was invented to promote Chili's. You know right away that PJ Blands is fake because all the food is made of cardboard. Audi takes a startlingly similar approach with this ad for Chip's Motors, which features the proprietor crooning, "I'd love to sell you an SUV," as he and his wife dance in front of ... cardboard gas guzzlers. I don't know who came up with the idea first, but I prefer Chip's for its dreamy song, which has a very David Lynch vibe. I almost expect Chip to pick up a dismembered ear in the parking lot or see a naked, screaming Isabella Rosellini run out of the dealership.

—Posted by Todd Wasserman