Today in Great Crossover Marketing: A Life-Sized Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Pizza Thrower

When I first heard the news about the August release of the new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie, my thought process went like this:

1. “Cowabunga!“

2. “Who’s playing April O’Neil?”

3. “Which lucky pizza company is going to jump on this marketing opportunity?”

The answer to that third question turned out to be Pizza Hut. This weekend at San Diego Comic-Con, which has quickly become the epicenter of entertainment marketing, Pizza Hut and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles will debut a life-sized version of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Pizza Thrower toy.

It will be a full-sized working vehicle and shoot pizzas at a speed of 75 MPH.

Are you as excited as I am?

Pizza Hut digital agency partner MRY came up with the concept, and as Jalopnik reports, Pizza Hut commissioned Special Effects Unlimited to make the childhood fantasy a reality. As you can imagine, it wasn’t too easy.

“Throwing pizzas is a unique challenge, ” Adam Sadowski of Special Effects Unlimited told Jalopnik. “The solution we settled on is actually a pneumatic ram. We take compressed air and inject it very quickly into a cylinder which will propel our pizzas right out the barrel… I1t’s gonna be a sight to see.”

A sight to see indeed! Apparently, it’ll look something like this:

And in case you need a nostalgia refresher, here’s a commercial for the original TMNT Pizza Thrower toy. It brought me hours of joy and almost blinded my nana once:

Note: This 24-year-old toy commercial has over 60,000 views, which speaks to the everlasting cultural relevancy of the Pizza Thrower.

Of course, let’s not forget the essential question Raphael brings up at the end of the ad: “Why are we so happy? We just launched our lunch.”

Because you’re about to make crossover-marketing history, Raphael. Because you’re about to make history.

Cowabunga.

(Note: If you’re craving more TMNT marketing content, see my Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Guide to Brand Newsrooms.)

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