This video has been picking up steam.

It’s an ad campaign by Mr. Pizza under the guise of Gumshoe Pictures. I have a feeling that the American offices came up with this one. With all the push to market Korean food overseas, I think this campaign gets it. It’s not over the top. It has humor. The humor is self-deprecating, which works well. It’s a little sneaky, in fact. From the YouTube comments, it looks like a good many people from the LiteralNet™ didn’t get the joke.

For observers of Korean culture, it’s a refreshing satire. It has all the cliches of the usual national panics that hit the peninsula, particularly the battles between Chinese and Korean historians. It has maps with “East Sea” prominently displayed. It has the lone protester picketing in front of a building. It has the college dropout “historian” who looks like he’s obviously been holed up in his room forever with “Dokdo is Korean Territory” posters, posting vitriolic messages on internet cafes. Even his lines and gestures about hating Marco Polo are almost exactly like when I have been around young Korean adults and the subject of something like Dokdo comes up.

“I hate the Japanese!”

And there’s the classic extra statement by an expert without trying to back anything up with evidence. Just stating it made it true.

“We also invented garlic bread.”

Note that the male experts are in suits and the female expert is in a traditional hanbok. I’ve wondered why female cultural historians tend to always be in hanbok but the men are not.

These are well produced bits, and I’ll admit that these have raised my respect for Mr. Pizza. In a way, I think it also makes Korean culture cooler. They have also created a new catchphrase.

“We make original pizza!”

Here are some other clips from the campaign.

“The Spinning Song” –love this one

[HT Matt at Popular Gusts]