'Modern Family' Season 11: Fans slam show for artless plug-in of Facebook Portal device promo
The premiere episode of ‘Modern Family’ Season 11 has fans slamming the show for plugging in an ad for the Facebook Portal device. The hit sitcom’s final season’s premiere was a much-awaited episode, and fans were very disappointed to see the subliminal advertising for Facebook’s video calling device ‘Facebook Portal’, within the first few minutes of the opening sequence.
We see the younger Dunphy daughter - Alex, who is on an expedition to the south pole, use the device to call her parents. She addresses her portal to call her parents, and her parents answer the video call by asking the portal to answer it for them. This not-so-subtle product placement didn’t sit well with the fans, who felt that the premiere episode appeared more like an ad for the device.
Fans didn’t mince their words when it came to expressing their displeasure with the show’s premiere episode. A fan expressed his displeasure with, “Been watching the show since Season One. Didn’t like the whole Facebook portal ad they did. #ModernFamily." Another fan who felt that the show has lost its charm wrote, “Okay, so the @ModernFam premiere is just a blatant @PortalFacebook commercial. I miss the golden days of this show. #ModernFamily."
Subliminal advertising conveys hidden messages of which viewers are not consciously aware by subtly plugging it into other media such as songs or commercials. This strategy is often seen as unethical practice because it manipulates consumer behavior without them being aware of it. Although there are no laws that specifically ban this form of advertising, several states have attempted to outlaw this unethical form of advertising.
Few fans wondered how much the show made by promoting the video-calling device. A fan tweeted, “#ModernFamily opens its final season by whoring itself out with a Facebook Portal ad poorly disguised as a plotline. I was going to be sad this show is ending but now it just feels way past it’s “sell by” date.” “How much money did #modernfamily get paid by Facebook to use their Portal for video calling? You know the device that no one uses”, shared an unhappy fan. “Is this just a 30 minute commercial for a video chat app? #modernfamily”, wrote a fan after noticing the number of times the device kept showing up on the episode.
‘Modern Family’ season 11 airs every Wednesday, at 9/8c only on ABC.