How Skeletor and He-Man came to life for MoneySuperMarket’s EPIC campaigns
In 2017 MoneySuperMarket were looking for new ways to bring that EPIC feeling of saving money to life. Alongside creative agency Mother London they decided on recruiting two iconic 80’s characters: Skeletor and He-Man from Masters of the Universe for their famous ‘You’re So MoneySuperMarket’ theme. The resulting campaigns were amongst the biggest advertising campaigns of 2017.
The first campaign featured Skeletor feeling EPIC dancing along to Irena Cara’s Fame. We secured the rights for MoneySuperMarket to license the characters from Masters of the Universe and managed liaison with Rights Holder Mattel. Find out more about our work on the #EPICSKELETOR campaign here.
He-Man and Skeletor returned for the second campaign, with Mother and MoneySuperMarket taking things one step further. This time, they recreated one of the most iconic and beloved dance scenes in movie history, using choreography from Dirty Dancing to the instantly recognisable hit song (I’ve had) The Time of My Life. Check out the work we did for this particular campaign here.
Iconic 80s Characters in EPIC Advertising
Phillipa Heywood, brand director at MoneySuperMarket, said that “positive engagement and enjoyment scores were off the charts”. It was great to see MoneySuperMarket reaching a much broader audience as well as introducing these iconic characters to a generation that may not be so familiar with them.
The campaigns were a huge success, with the Dirty Dancing spot generating over 27 million views in a matter of days and trending on Twitter across the UK three times. It really garnered the level of word of mouth that everyone was hoping for and resulted in a 6% uplift of total revenues for MoneySuperMarket.
“This is a brilliant example of how iconic characters can be used in a truly creative way. It perfectly plays on the character traits of Skeletor and He-Man that we all know and love.” - David Born, Born Licensing Director
Born Licensing’s Director, David Born, with He-Man on set.
Interestingly, the questions everyone has been asking us are, ‘is that He-Man’s real body?’ and ‘is Skeletor really that ripped?’
So, we’ll let you in on how the EPIC Skeletor and He-Man characters were brought to life for the MoneySuperMarket campaigns...
The costumes were created by the same special effects company that worked on major Hollywood films such as Jurassic Park, X-Men and RoboCop. They are also the same company that developed the RoboCop suit for our Direct Line campaign which launched in March 2020.
Check out the behind the scenes videos below to find out how Skeletor and He-Man came to life for MoneySuperMarket’s EPIC campaign.
It was our responsibility to make sure that the Rights Holders of the characters were happy with costume development at each stage of the process. We managed liaison with Masters of the Universe Rights Holders Mattel and Dirty Dancing Rights Holders Lionsgate, working through the license negotiations, creative and brand assurance processes.
Campaign Magazine rated the second campaign at #7 for Film Ad of 2017 and MoneySuperMarket went from 100 tweets a day to 35,000 an hour on the night of the launch.
These two campaigns are a great example of how much-loved, iconic characters can touch the hearts of many and drive positive brand conversation.
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