2 February 2008: The Comfort Zone

Lost Season 4 premiered on Thursday night and as I am busy on Thursdays, I must watch the show online. A show's engagement level indicates one's reaction to the ads that sponsor Lost. Lost reminds me of living in Ireland with my ex, merging American association and my love of the things I was missing in the U.S., with the foreign country in which I was living. It creates an exotic combination of familiar and unfamiliar. This curiosity to know both better and enjoy the show translates to these sponsored ads. The first I saw was that for "The Comfort Zone" for Comfort Inn. It plays on this concept of unfamiliar saying "get in your comfort zone." It uses yellow bright vivid colors to create a sense of surreal happiness. Its slice of life attitude examines the suburban core that Brooks mentioned in Paradise Drive. The scene is as follows: Two women stand on either side of a fence with flowers growing on to it. The woman on the right picks the flowers and stands admiring the flower, only to see that the other woman is staring at her, clearly the true owner of the plucked flower. The plucker then says "beautiful flowers." The concept of flowers indicates growth and one always says that you should expand (or grow) your comfort zone. Secondly, it plays off of the suburban influence of golf. That the golfer wants to defeats his normal competitor of 'anxiety.' The humor is that the suburban knight wants to achieve mastery over anxiety, tension, hurry, and disorder. This is why the tagline "get in your comfort zone" works so well. It also associates the difficult that the characters have on the island over mastering these same suburban concepts.

The logo uses the 3 squiggly lines to create an image of waves. These waves can be mental waves, as in a dream, or those of ocean waves crashing upon the sand. Both are complete states of nature. The four descending colors of yellow, mustard, orange, and red, make people think of the setting sun. The blue background reminds people of the sky. The result creates great levels of comfort based upon personal experience.