To combat the iPhone, Verizon Wireless recently licensed the name “Droid” from Lucasfilm. Now they’ve taken a trip to the Island of Misfit Toys, a setting in the 1964 Rankin/Bass stop-motion TV special Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer. The agency on the spot, titled Misfits, was McCann Erickson, New York, and the copywriting/art-direction team was comprised of Marco & Dan (Marco Cignini and Daniel Donovan). The animation was handled by Bent Image Lab in Portland.

Aardman Animations, the studio behind Wallace & Gromit, have partnered up with Nestlé to help promote Cheerios (it’s offered by General Mills in the US and Nestlé elsewhere). The ad, titled Characters, features a family who all discover a taste for the breakfast brand. McCann Erickson London led the creative endeavor.

Karen Cheung at jelly has joined McCann London in raising awareness of the gaining obesity epidemic. She designed and animated this promo and series of shorts ,titled Fatville, that play out like an online soap opera. More info at fatville.co.uk.

Quorn, a healthy, meat-free form of high quality protein, has been around since the 1980′s, but I still hadn’t heard about it. With a new animated TV spot, Premiere Foods is doing something about this anonymity. McCann Erickson oversaw directors Kim Burdon, Greg Mills and Alan Newnham at Hibbert Ralph Animation, where this colorful :30 spot, titled Eat Qlever, was produced.

Spotted at tellyads.com.

Global warming is serious business, and making us bleakly aware of this fact is this PSA from Quercus which doesn’t pull any punches. Creative on this spot, titled Total Warming, was overseen by McCann Erickson, and directed by FlavioMac.

Spotted by LineBoil contributor Shad Petosky. Originally seen at fubiz.net.