Binaries

In this Samsung Commercial, we were exposed to many binaries, or polar opposites portrayed to showcase a point or idea. One of the most striking examples was the difference between the little boy and little girl in the commercial. The little girl was in a startling different place than the boy, yet even though they were separate they seemed to “connect,’ which none of the adults did. This could tell us a lot of things, the difference in economic conditions between the boy and girl. The girl, even though she could see the boy, was only looking at a picture of him through a TV. Even when she could see him, they would always be separate by thousands of miles and time. In a larger perspective could show the separate between the “first-world’ and the “third-world.” We may see pictures in the first world, we’re still insulated from anything “real.” I think Samsung might be playing off that a bit in the appeal to first world customers. They could be trying to put the idea in your head that because you’re a first world consumer, you need their TV to do all the cool things the people on the train are doing, including gawking at a “third-world” bazaar. Another binary portrayed in the commercial is the unusual versus the mundane. It’s a mundane thing to see trees, or a city outside a train window, Samsun wants to portray that they can transport you to something amazing, such as watching a stampede or flying through space. These differences all add up to plant the idea in your head that this product is important to own.