T-Mobile disconnects.

How could a brand that produced some of the funniest dialog-driven cell phone spots around come up short in this online series? Entourage Lite, aka connected, plays off their new Sidekick LX and the ‘sidekicks’ in this MTV Networks show. Yeah, I know the family plan crowd in the :30 spots is a different audience, but I’m not digging this series.

Homage is one thing, but Entourage works because Jeremy Piven’s fast talking Ari Gold drops F-bombs like nobody’s business and keeps things moving. None of his same charm, nor that of T-Mobile’s motivated realtor Ronnie Briskman is on display here. Still, I watched four episodes to see if maybe I was missing something. The scene with an agent and her ‘rock star turned actor’ client in Episode 4 was maybe the funniest thing I saw to that point.

Problem with the current branded content bandwagon–(BCB! Look at me coining phrases before the new year!)–is that it needs to work as a show first before anything else like a product mention. Drama, comedy, scifi. Whatever. Make it cool as hell. Otherwise, we should just go back to the days of network television and the infamous ‘Brought to you by...’ VO crap that sitcoms employed for years.

Maybe the current media-fragmented, disposable teen culture likes this watered-down stuff, I don’t know. Maybe brands are afraid of pushing the language past a PG rating? Maybe some brands just kick ass in :30 seconds and that’s it. Maybe I have too many high expectations.

Maybe I use maybe too much.

To be fair, the individual webisodes look like they generated some decent views, even though inconsistent from show to show. And no doubt T-Mobile will say they generated buzz. Hey, cool for them, really. Cool for the agency who made a shitload of money off this as well. But all I think I know is this: if as a brand, you keep putting your name on pale imitations of real content, all in the name of ‘engaging the consumer,’ there has to be a backlash at some point in terms of how those consumers perceive you.

Reason being is that those consumers already have the real shows to compare the knockoffs to. Unless it’s just a case of the ‘same old, same old’ being good enough. The underlying message sent though is that your product is just like everyone else’s. If that’s the case, what are you offering people that’s unique about you or your brand?

Tags: Entourage, Connected, Sidekicks LX