Cell Phone Companies Will Not Stop Sending Celebrities To The Middle Of Nowhere

We have a battle on our hands.

A cell phone battle.

Specifically, we have a battle between T-Mobile and AT&T over their coverage areas.

Which, honestly, I would not care about…

IF…

… it hadn’t resulted in dueling commercials where they send celebrities to the middle of nowhere in an attempt to prove it.

We actually discussed this a few weeks ago, at least the first part of it all, in a very silly piece I titled “Do You Think Billy Bob Thornton Owns A Smart Phone?” which I mostly stand by. It was in reference to this T-Mobile commercial that’s been playing a lot during the World Series and football Sundays, the one where they sent Billy Bob out into the endless flat fields of America’s heartland to explain that you can even get reception out where there ain’t no towers or whatever.

Which, you know, great. I guess. There are many worse commercials out there and I’m glad Billy Bob got a nice check and I’m glad I got to rip off a goofy blog about it. And if that’s all this had ever been, fine. I was ready to move on, as was just about everyone.

The key words in that sentence were “just about,” though, because AT&T was very much not ready to move on. So not ready that they recently released this commercial as a kind of rebuttal.

To be very clear about what has transpired here:

• T-Mobile sent Billy Bob Thornton to a farm to say there is cell phone coverage there
• AT&T sent Luke Wilson to a mountain ranch to say there is cell coverage there, which they appear to be indicating — subconsciously, at least – is a higher degree of difficulty to the various peaks
• We officially have an ad war between cell phone carriers that involves sending celebrities to desolate locations to prove the power of their coverage

This is one of those things that straddles the line between stupid and terrifically exciting. AT&T escalating this feud — which, again, I do not care about at all on its actual merits — means we could be heading toward a situation where things spiral out of control. Verizon must answer with its own commercial where a celebrity ends up in an empty abyss. Other carriers will feel pressure to jump in. It could all get out of hand pretty quickly. I can see it now…

Verizon ups the ante and sends Walton Goggins to the Gobi Desert

T-Mobile responds by putting Billy Bob Thornton inside a grain silo

AT&T puts Luke Wilson on a glacier

Consumer Cellular puts Ted Danson on a submarine UNDER the glacier

Billy Bob goes into orbit

Luke Wilson goes to a Colorado Rockies game

Mint Mobile comes out of nowhere and runs an ad with Stephen Root fielding phone calls from inside the Earth’s core

”You’re probably wondering what would happen to your cellular coverage in the event of a nuclear apocalypse. Well, now we know. Billy Bob Thornton has died. I’m Harrison Ford for T-Mobile…”

“Hey, Luke Wilson here. I died in that nuclear thing, too, and I still get reception in the afterlife”

“You know, a lot of people told me, Ted, Consumer Cellular won’t work in your lead-lined post-apocalyptic nuclear bunker, but here we are…”

[Stephen Root in a huge underground drill that is tunneling through the walls of Ted Danson’s nuclear bunker with him on speaker] “I’LL SEE YOU IN HELL, DANSON”

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STUFF I CLICKED ON

— Keith Phipps wrote about the ongoing trials of the biopic in a post-Walk Hard environment 

— Cameron Crowe wrote a blog

— this is a zillion words long and behind a paywall but if you have an hour and a subscription to The New Yorker (or a Barnes and Noble nearly that won’t hassle you if you sit down with a physical copy for a while after you pay for a coffee or two), I absolutely gobbled up the investigation into the Irish drug lord who lives in Dubai and has a criminal father who kind of gave away his location by posting restaurant reviews online (lol)

— terrific thing at Vulture about Tubi hosting the Looney Tunes for free now

— excellent point, The Chair Company

— another great Jim Downey interview

— Glen Powell interview

— the Yellowstone man is leaving Paramount

— Alexander Skargard remains a delightful goof

— One Battle After Another is being submitted to the Oscars as a comedy, which I don’t love (it was a better “movie” than the new Naked Gun but probably not a better “comedy,” if we’re being honest), but I will go with it if it gets Benicio del Toro a trophy or two

— shoe heist

— Shaquille O’Neal custom Range Rover heist

— surfboard heist (BY OTTERS)

— congrats to the fat squirrel

— “The AWS Outage Bricked People’s $2,700 Smartbeds”

— “I was part of a diamond heist. Here’s how the Louvre was looted”

— I somehow missed Colbert interviewing Gary Oldman about Slow Horses a few months ago, but please do watch if you want to see a legendary thespian reduced to tears over fart humor

Okay, that’s it for this week. Please share and subscribe and send your favorite actor to a desolate hellscape in the name of technology.