Salman Bhai, Prem, and Tuffy rekindle 90’s nostalgia in new Pepsi ad

The beverage brand has used “hi-tech DeepFake technology” to conjure Khan’s character from ‘Hum Aapke Hain Kaun’ for this ad.

The more, the merrier might have run through the minds of the folks behind Pepsi’s new summer campaign because we’ve been treated to two Salman Khans in a 40-second ad.

Called ‘The Biggest Crossover in History’, Prem and Tuffy from ‘Hum Aapke Hai Kaun’ fame make their way to meet today’s Salman Bhai. As per Pepsi, it is the first-ever brand in India to use ultra-hi-tech Deepfake technology in an ad. In this case, to recreate an iconic Bollywood character.

Deepfake media is the modern-day version of photoshop where a person’s face can be cropped and applied to any body. Unfortunately, there have been countless instances of women finding their faces morphed onto someone else’s body without their consent and it is used to bully them online.

Saumya Rathor, category lead, Cola, PepsiCo India, said “With Bollywood being a key consumer passion point in India, this new campaign takes the SWAG narrative several notches higher by featuring not one but two Salman Khans. For the first time in Indian advertising, we have leveraged hi-tech deep fake technology to recreate one of the most iconic characters of Indian cinema. We are confident that this campaign will resonate strongly with our consumers, given the entertainment quotient in this film.”

"We felt an instant rush when the brief landed on the table - to create a big summer campaign for one of the most legendary brands on the planet, featuring the biggest superstar in the country. Cliched as it may sound, we wanted to break category codes and push all the P's of marketing to its absolute limit. It was a delight working with those who backed us to the hilt with this idea." Devaiah Bopanna, writer of the film.

It is intriguing to see Wunderman Thompson, Pepsi's creative agency, not being mentioned in the credits.

Ayappa KM, director of the film said, “For the first time in Indian advertising, Pepsi has used hi-tech DeepFake technology to resurrect Salman from the ’90s. While it's a throwback to the past, the tech is a peek into the possibilities of the future. We have no doubts it'll create quite a stir.”

Also Read: Janhvi Kapoor and Coca-Cola become Ishaan Khatter’s saviour in a ‘ladies’ special bus

The summer campaign from Pepsi may have missed the bus because rival Coca-Cola and other beverage players such as Up, 7UP, and Maaza have already released their campaigns.