0:01
When the Ad begins the audience is shown a young man getting a haircut by a woman in the middle of a kitchen in the day time. The small kitchen does not contain updated appliances as seen by the small white fridge and the beige oven and is nicely cleaned except for the table in the foreground with two mirrors, a comb, a spray bottle, and a rag or towel. The young man is wearing a clean t-shirt and jeans with a bored expression on his face. His boredom may be due to getting his haircut by the woman being a frequent occurrence. He is sitting on a chair with a towel partially covering his upper torso while the woman, who is possibly his mother or of close relation to him, is focusing on the back of his hair with the shaver in her right hand. She also is in clean casual clothes.
0:02-0:06
The woman uses the shaver, but immediately following the cut her eyes widen and an openmouthed frown appears on her face. Her body also backs up slightly from the surprise of her actions. This signifies a mishap in the haircut where she must have messed up and either cut to much or shaved the area completely.
0:07-0:08
The woman, who is confirmed to be his mother after the young man says (based on the one syllable word he says), leans closer to study the area she shaved. The son, noticing something went wrong, shifts his eyes upward and asks, “Mom?” and the text, “(A) Try to fix it,” appears on the screen.
0:09-0:10
The camera moves to the back of his head where the spot the mom cut is now shown to the audience. The young man is holding a mirror with his left hand to see his haircut. What is revealed is all but a single patch in the middle of the square spot is shaved. But how can he see the spot if we the audience only see his face in the mirror he is holding?
0:11-0:12
The mother is seen to be holding a mirror behind her son’s head to help him see the spot. She is holding her hand up in a placating manner probably saying something similar to “It’s not too bad” or “I can fix this” like at 8 seconds where the text said, “Try to fix it.”
0:13-0:14
The mom is the only one is this close up camera shot with the text on the screen saying, “(B) Work with what you’ve got.” The mother probably shaved more of the hair to hide the mistake she made. The camera angle is meant for the unveiling of the haircut to be more surprising.
0:15-0:17
The mother nods her head with a satisfied looked on her face as the camera shifts to the side of the son’s head. The haircut resembles a lizard lying on the middle of his head with the feet of the lizard on the side and the tail down the back of his head.
0:18-0:20
The scene moves to the family room of the house. The father and little brother of the young man sit with their backs to the camera on a teal couch. The young man has a smile on his face while looking at his family and another text is seen at the bottom of the screen, “(C) Show solidarity.” Did they all get the lizard haircut? It doesn’t look like it because the son’s hair in this scene is not in the odd lizard cut and the brother and father do not have the lizard cut which would be obvious since their back is to the camera. This scene also may be on a different day because of the son’s lack of lizard. So what haircut did they all get that makes them the same and did the mom make the same mistake?
0:21-0:22
As the mom entered the camera, the whole family turns their head and a bald patch is revealed on the side of their head similar to the son’s bald patch. The brother and father shaved their head similar to his in order to keep him from feeling like the odd one out, reminding me of when families shave their head if one of the family members has cancer and goes through chemotherapy.
0:23-0:25
The final scene contains the mother finishing up the haircut, probably on a different day again, as he holds the mirror to see the final cut. Practice makes perfect, right? This time the mom did not make mistakes and shaved his hair well based on the smiles on both of their faces. The final text on the screen says, “You don’t have to be perfect to be a perfect parent,” and the logo for AdoptUSKids.
0:26-0:31
The mother hugs her adopted son as the ad finishes.
At the end, we learn that the ad is promoting adoption of children and based on the final quote, “You don’t have to be perfect to be a parent,” is hoping to encourage parents who may be afraid they won’t be good parents and role models to their child. The fear of doing something wrong is normal, but because of the mother’s haircut disasters, something fun always came out of them. First the lizard hair, then the whole family supporting the son by having their own bald spots shaved on their heads. The ad wants the public to see that adoption can lead to fun times and days full of love and happiness.
Rowan Counterintuitive 