• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, April 12, 2017

Dodge Viper, the 25-year-old muscle car, is set to go out of production at the end of August. As part of the long goodbye, Pennzoil, via its ad agency JWT Atlanta is releasing a film to celebrate what some fans consider to be the last great American Sports Car.

The two-plus minute film, billed as “Pennzoil Films Presents: The Last Viper,” posits that said Viper, a sporty Pennzoil yellow model, has been stolen and that its owner has put up a reward for its return.

The scene cuts to a mysterious figure in a hoodie peering through what looks to be a PortMiami warehouse skylight at the stolen vehicle. Inside the darkly-lit warehouse a seedy character is counting cash. Sparks are flying nearby suggesting that the locale is a least partly a chop shop for stolen vehicles. Would the bad guys do that to the Last Viper? Not clear. Maybe the vehicle is being readied for clandestine export to a foreign buyer.

In any event, the scene cuts again and suddenly Mysterious Figure has somehow managed to gain access to the Viper and is burning rubber in reverse as he screeches out of the warehouse and makes his escape with his precious cargo, The Last Viper.

Then there’s a lot of zoom-zooming and nifty shifting with sparks flying as Mysterious Figure and the prized Viper tear across a causeway and buzz though downtown Miami.  At one point the speedster is tracked on a security camera that captures the vehicle’s license plate, “V8 EATR,” a reference to the Viper’s ‘V8 Eater’ nickname, given its standard V10 engine.

While the car is buzzing and screeching through downtown Miami there are clear Pennzoil integrations, including a Pennzoil billboard with the message “Look For The Yellow Bottle.” And when Mysterious Figure arrives at his destination, the swanky Miami home of the Last Viper’s rightful owner, Pennzoil parent Shell’s logo is displayed prominently in the home in one photograph of a race car.

The owner gets a text from Mysterious Figure, “The Viper is back in the nest,” and he texts back, “Perfect. How are you at exorcising demons?”

The film ends with a “To be continued” teaser and shots of a Viper burning rubber in place along with a call to action to subscribe to Pennzoil.

“After hearing auto enthusiasts’ overwhelming response to the end of its production, we decided The Viper was the perfect vehicle for us to feature in the latest Pennzoil film, The Last Viper,” said Jeremy Jones, Executive Creative Director, J. Walter Thompson Atlanta, adding,  “we wanted to give it the send-off it deserves.”