These ads depicting quarter-life crisis perfectly capture the millennial’s angst
Commercials for Samantha Jayne’s book ‘Quarter Life Poetry: Poems for the Young, Broke & Hangry’ touch a chord with millions.
There may still be no clarity on whom the term millennial represents but it is widely agreed that the generation comprises over-entitled, slightly infantile youths who can’t decide between hipster and norm core. A study by The Atlantic fixed it at people born between 1982 and 2004, but not everyone accepts that.
An entry for the word in Urban Dictionary describes a millennial as a “special little snowflake”. But despite the bad rap the generation gets, they are not without their angst and problems that are genuinely distressing.
The following ads, created as part of the publicity for a book titled Quarter Life Poetry: Poems for the Young, Broke & Hangry by Samantha Jayne, manage to capture the contradictions and problems of the average 25-year-old today.
There is the struggle of turning to your parents for all of life’s big questions, and still holding the fort for adulthood.
Social media of course plays a large part in their lives (where the cheeriest captions lie).
Money doesn't come easy, and the offer for a free meal can change everything.
And this could be true for most people, millennials or not, but Netflix and the rest of the internet do make getting out of the house even for the best-laid plans seem quite unappealing.
The book of poetry came from Jayne’s Instagram page, where she posted witty four line poems documenting her “quarter life struggle”, earning fame and eventually getting a book deal.
Jayne is also an art director wrote the scripts for these ads and even acted them out herself. Adweek reports that she “partnered with director Arturo Perez, a finalist in the 2015 New Directors' Showcase at Cannes, to create a handful of short films...”.
Speaking to Adweek, she said, “All of these spots, I’m pretty sad to admit, are 100% autobiographical, except for the humour, because none of this was funny when it was actually happening.”
She adds, “I really hope people take away that they’re not alone. I know these struggles are completely privileged struggles, and pretty much what you go through when you’re becoming an adult, and you make mistakes all the time.”
