Ciclope 2025: Loads to Telstra.

9 October 2025

The fourth and final case study of this year's Ciclope Festival was dedicated to Telstra's 'Better on a Better Mobile Network' campaign, comprised of twenty-six stop motion spots.

The fourth and final case study of this year's Ciclope Festival was dedicated to Telstra's 'Better on a Better Mobile Network' campaign. It takes 6' 55" to watch all twenty-six, count 'em, twenty-six commercials in agency Bear Meets Eagle on Fire and production company Revolver's opus—one spot in, everyone not too delicate after the night before knew they were in for a good time.

Directed by Jeff Low and stop-motion animated by Tobias Fouracre, it's a wonderful, quotable take on the 'Creature Comforts' formula from Down Under. Neither could make it to Berlin unfortunately (Low's father is unwell), so it was up to Revolver partner and executive producer Pip Smart and Bear Meets Eagle on Fire founder and CCO Micah Walker to shed light on this ripper of a campaign.

Voiced by non-actors from all over the country, the cast is made up of animals from all over Australia (bats, Tasmanian devils, cockatoos, krill, et cetera), but Walker and the team ruled out kangaroos and koalas from the off. We're hard-pressed to pick a favourite—if push came to shove, however, it would be the circus llamas, just for the crackpot delivery of the line: "I want to be shot out of the cannon!"

Shout-out as well to the wallabies who build snowmen on top of a mountain in eastern Victoria. Mum says "Mount Buller is better on a better mobile network", while her kid thinks a carrot nose looks better, ahem, south of the Equator. Such humour, Walker explains, was vital in helping "fix the Telstra brand"—no more "corporate, middle-of-the-road" shots of "guys working on mobile network towers".

DAVID hopes this is a nod to 'Untited Goose Game', one of Australia's best video game exports.

Instead, they plumped for stop-motion animation ("There's freedom in stop motion because there's not much they can fucking say once you've started!") Smart noted how the technique compels people to "make decisions and commit up front" and directors like Low to focus even harder on comedic timing. It helps that Telstra's not his first stop-motion rodeo, however—check out his previous spots for Sipsmith and Greenies.

From start to finish, Smart and Walker's appreciation for tactile, hands-on methods shone brighter than the sun that finally poked through the clouds over Berlin this morning. So, what about this newfangled tool everyone's talking about called AI? Would Walker consider using it anytime soon? "You can save money by doing things less well," was the answer.

This is clear and true... let's hope that clients hear the whole nine words, rather than just the first four.