Adweek’s post on The Motor Company’s latest hail Mary makes me seriously wonder if Anyone’s Got A Clue Up On Juneau Ave. This is a brand in total freefall.

According to the release, H-D “…hopes to ride onto screens large and small in coming months. The motorcycle brand announced last week that it is has teamed up with entertainment consulting agency Davie Brown Entertainment for a major product placement push in film, TV, music and video games.” Folks, hope is not a strategy.

Corporate ad director Dino Bernacchi explained that, “We want to use it to socialize Harley-Davidson motorcycling . . . Entertainment can sensationalize the excitement and thrill of riding to the point of moving people to check it out.” Did you get that? Socialize Harley-Davidson motorcycling? Sensationalize the excitement? I’m not even going to ask what that bafflement of babble-speak gibberish is supposed to mean, because I really don’t want to know. But if Grand Theft Auto’s the model for consideration, it’s worse than it looks.

Listen to Sr. V-P for Davie Brown Entertainment Rob Souriall make the case: “They (Harley-Davidson)  do a great job (ummm, not so much) of speaking to the core male 35-plus, but we want to open up the sport of motorcycling riding to the younger guys, women, African Americans, Hispanics…really broaden the demo.” Pure genius. Wait for it. Meanwhile he’s drawing a paycheck.

Lets rewind. After all-too-recent placement laughingstocks like Wild Hogs and the Viva Viagra over-the-hill ads, it’s difficult to recall what it really took to connect testosterone to Harleys in a different time and space: the movie genre typified by Hells Angels On Wheels. The small screen quickly caught up in prime time with Then Came Bronson, allowing Michael Parks to catapult James Dean derivative mumbling into an art form. Like twin sons of different mothers, sorta’.

But seriously, how do you “…really broaden the demo,” without denying the modern era heritage once and for all? Sons of Anarchy notwithstanding.