Terry Tate: Office Linebacker

"Terry Tate" redirects here. For the Australian footballer, see Terry Tate (Australian footballer). For the singer, see Babies Having Babies.
Terry Tate: Office Linebacker
Directed byRawson Marshall Thurber
Written byPeter Chiarelli
StarringLester Speight
Release dates
  • 2000 (2000)
  • 2003 (2003)
CountryUnited States
LanguageEnglish

Terry Tate: Office Linebacker was a series of short comedy television commercials created by Peter Arnell and the Arnell Group, for Reebok, based on a short film pilot created in 2000 by Rawson Marshall Thurber.[1][2] Tate was first shown at Super Bowl XXXVII in 2003. The short films feature Lester Speight as "Terrible" Terry Tate, an American football linebacker who "gives out the pain" to those in the office who are not obeying office policies.[3]

Originally, Reebok produced six episodes between August and December 2002 with another episode Terry Tate, Office Linebacker: Sensitivity Training being made on February 1, 2004. Even Reebok in the United Kingdom made an episode called Late Lunch on January 22, 2005. There are a total of 9 episodes. The advertising campaign was one of the most successful of those in the history of the Super Bowl halftime shows.[4]

The catchphrases include "The pain train's comin'", "You kill the joe, you make some mo'", "You can't cut the cheese wherever you please!", "'Cause when it's game time, it's pain time!", "Don't bring that weak-ass stuff up in this humpy-bumpy" and "Woo-woo!" After tackling a worker, Terry usually leaves him with a "WOOH! Bitch!!!"

While the first episode of the series implies that hiring an office linebacker is a highly unorthodox practice (one described as "thinking outside the box"), future episodes depict office linebackers as a common occurrence.

Though successful in attracting viewers and attention, the ads' ability to increase recognition of the Reebok brand has been questioned, with only 55% of respondents on an on-line poll indicating they realized the ad was affiliated with the company.[5][6] Despite being aired only once on national television, the short was downloaded more than seven million times from Reebok's website.[6]

  1. ^ Wiese, Mike (5 February 2016). "Terry Tate: The Forrest Gump of branded content". www.campaignlive.com.
  2. ^ "REEBOK - TERRY TATE, OFFICE LINEBACKER". AdAge. 26 January 2003.
  3. ^ Jussim, Matthew (January 30, 2020). "Here Are the Best Super Bowl Commercials We Saw This Year". Men's Journal. Archived from the original on 2021-12-12 – via MSN.com.
  4. ^ Sankey, D (2008-10-20). "Terry Tate's a big hit — on Palin". Brisbane Times. Retrieved 2008-10-22.
  5. ^ Rovell, D (2003-01-30). "A Twist of Tate". ESPN.go.com. ESPN. Retrieved 2008-10-22.
  6. ^ a b McCarthy, M (2003-03-23). "Office enforcer wins raves". USA Today. Retrieved 2008-10-22.