Evolution of Family... And a Cool Car.

            The 2012 Volkswagen Passat commercial where a child is dressed as Darth Vader trying to use “the force” on random items around the house, may be adorable; however, this commercial poses some serious issues with gender/family representations of 21^st century life.  The basic make up of the people in the commercial is that they are a family made up of mom, dad and child.  Mom is at home with the child and dad comes home later in a suit/tie with a briefcase, clearly meant to display his arrival home from work.  In addition, mom can not help the child when she pushes the peanut butter sandwich in front of him but dad comes home from work and saves the day by starting the car from inside the house so that the child believes he has truly used “the force.”  Mom looks at dad and dad raises his eyebrows as he gives her a look with a bit of arrogance that the man is home and he has taken care of the problem. 

            While male chauvinism may still exist today, the old traditional family setting of mom at home with the kids and dad as the breadwinner who fixes all the problems is certainly in the minority.  Not only do most women work as equally as their husbands do, but there are many families made up of the mom as the breadwinner and dad stays home with the kids.  Not to mention all of the single parent homes, same sex parent homes, etc. that exist today which are more of an adequate representation of a family today. 

            Not only is the setting outdated in this commercial, but it is also featuring a child dressed as Darth Vader which is a character from the Star Wars series circa the latter part of the 1970’s.  The character remains current in popular culture today because of the enormity of popularity with the Star Wars series.  So much so, that George Lucas made 3 more Star Wars movies beginning in 1999 that are considered prequels to the original series.  Therefore, people who were too young or not born yet when the first series came out were introduced to Star Wars and the evolution of the Darth Vader character with the prequels.  The 2^nd series was also hugely successful and resulted in a resurgence of popularity in the original series because of the people watching them for the first time. 

            Perhaps Volkswagen is portraying this family with the old school make up and Star Wars theme to add emphasis to their marketing strategy and show viewers the incredible evolution of the new Volkswagen – the 2012 Passat.  Thus, comparing the evolution of the nature of family and what is possible for the 21^st century family make up since it has come such a long way from the male dominated version of stay at home mom and breadwinner dad.  Whether on purpose or not, this commercial reveals more than just an incredible car; it reveals the incredible evolution of a modern day family by showing the typical family structure of a time long ago.