Gatorade & DC Comics Team Up to Bring NFL Gridiron Heroes to the Pages of Comic Books

 

Visit the Gatorade website between now and the kick-off of the NFL season and you can enjoy some FREE comic books featuring some of the brightest stars from the NFL. Working in partnership with DC Comics, Gatorade has produced a series of digital comics titled "League of Captains" that involve stories featuring JJ "MegaWatt" Watt, Cam "The Blender" Newton, Peyton "The Sheriff" Manning, Eli "Big Easy" Manning, and Robert "TrIIIple Impact" Griffin III. These digital comic books are part of Gatorade's larger "League of Captains" marketing campaign that also features specially labeled bottles hyping these players special flavors and a contest where you can win your own image on the cover of a comic book. Of course this is all meant to hype up consumers for the return of the football season while the NFL teams are in preseason training camp and get them to pick up some bottles of Gatorade - but hey its a fun campaign and its nice to see advertisers putting some creativity and imagination into their marketing efforts.

The digital comics feature stories about how in addition to physical talent it also takes experience, training, technology, practice and homework to be able to make the plays to win a big game   The comics include flash backs of moments in a players life that helped make them the "player" they are today and sports scenes of the players in the heat of NFL action.  While the stories might be somewhat cheesy the comics feature some great artwork and digital special effects.  These are some fun comic books that have some nice messages about teamwork and homework for kids, an interesting connection to the NFL, and aren't meant to be taken too seriously but rather just enjoyed for a moment by football fans.

When you go to the Gatorade website to view these "League of Captains" comic books there are also some other interactive things you can do while there.  You can create an image of  your own comic book likeness sports super hero...and not just for football but for a variety of sports.  Here I created A Geek Daddy football and futbol players.

There is also a contest you can enter online for a chance to have a comic book cover created in your own likeness. Submit a photo from a game, practice or workout showing how you "Win from Within".  Submissions will be judged and the BEST will be immortalized with a one-of-a-kind comic book cover depicting the winning photograph.  Photo entries are due by September 7, 2014.

Oh, and of course the campaign ties into Gatorade packaging that depicts the comic book images of each of the featured players:  Mega Watt, The Sheriff, TrIIIple Impact, Big Easy and The Blender.  You can pick up these "League of Captains" Gatorade bottles at your local grocery store between now and September 7th.

To check out the comics,  sports character illustrator and photo contest, visit: leagueofcaptains.gatorade.com