David Fincher Proves That Video Game Commercials Are Art With New CG Short For Xbox

Xbox has picked up some star talent to make a new commercial for them, in partnership with Samsung.

Titled “Wake Up”, the commercial comes with this description:

“In Xbox’s Wake Up, directed by David Fincher and Romain Chassaing, a wonderfully off-beat fairy tale unfolds: Horatio, a rat, rekindles his humanity through the joy of gaming. We follow Horatio through a day in the rat race: a packed commute, the drudgery of the office, a rushed lunch at his desk.

The mundanity is interrupted by glimpses of mysterious gamers—the only humans we see amongst the rats. After a long day, Horatio powers on his Xbox on his Samsung OLED TV and connects with his friends. A much-needed dose of fun transforms him into the human he always was.”

David Fincher needs no introduction, but a few casual fans may be wondering why he ‘sold out,’ which would only indicate how little they know of the director. The man behind Mindhunter, The Social Network and Sev7n got his start in music videos and TV commercials before he started a Hollywood director film career.

In fact, only hardcore David Fincher or Alien fans would remember that he had an unusually rough entry into Hollywood from working on Alien 3, and settled back into making music videos before trying again and finally breaking out with Sev7n. Fincher certainly knows the craft of filmmaking and storytelling, but he isn’t as obtuse as David Lynch, famous for making his own mysterious atmospheric commercials for the PlayStation.

Microsoft definitely wanted to aura farm a bit from Fincher’s name now being enconsced in Hollywood, but it’s worth remembering that he’s been making commercials in some capacity since the 1980s. He made this blockbuster commercial revealing the Apple 3G, so we think there’s a decent chance that he still knows how to draw in the consumers.

We also want to credit co-director Romain Chassaing, who revealed in his Instagram post of the commercial that he and Fincher worked on it with advertising company Droga5. This ad isn’t too deep, but it’s a nice little narrative bit that was clearly planned to do TV and streaming play, aside from going viral on its own. So ‘Wake Up’ will likely be the first commercial to introduce a new generation of Americans to the new Xbox, including their console business, their Game Pass subscription business, and their wide range of games.

You can watch the commercial below.