Ads are the cave art of the twentieth century.

Host: The city hummed below like an endless machine, its veins of light pulsing through streets slick with rain. From the rooftop, the world looked both alive and artificial — a living circuit of neon, smoke, and sighs. Billboards flashed in colorless rhythm: faces that smiled too wide, products that promised salvation in plastic form.

Host: Jack leaned against the metal railing, a cigarette glowing between his fingers, his eyes half hidden beneath the city’s electric haze. Jeeny stood beside him, her hair caught in the wind, her face illuminated by the strobing glow of an ad screen. Behind them, a giant digital poster cycled between an image of a woman drinking soda and a child laughing at nothing.

Host: Somewhere far below, a car horn cried out like a lost animal. The night was full of sound and loneliness.

Jeeny: “Marshall McLuhan once said, ‘Ads are the cave art of the twentieth century.’”

Jack: (lets out a low chuckle) “Yeah. Except the cavemen painted their gods. We just paint our desires.”

Jeeny: “Isn’t that the same thing?”

Host: Her question hung in the air, caught between raindrops and light.

Jack: “Not even close. The cavemen drew to survive — to honor the hunt, to tell stories. Ads just sell us illusions. McLuhan was being clever, not reverent.”

Jeeny: “Or maybe he was being prophetic. Those ancient paintings — they were the first attempts to make meaning visible. Ads do the same thing, Jack. They tell us what we worship now.”

Jack: (flicks his cigarette away) “Worship? You mean consumption. We kneel before brands, not gods.”

Jeeny: “And isn’t that the irony? That the human instinct to worship never disappeared — it just changed its face. Look at this city.” (gestures toward the skyline) “Every glowing billboard is a modern cathedral window. Instead of saints, we’ve got celebrities. Instead of prayers, slogans.”

Host: The light from a passing screen splashed across her face, painting her in quick, false color. Jack turned, his expression unreadable.

Jack: “You make it sound poetic. But it’s all manipulation — psychology, not spirituality. Ads aren’t sacred. They’re cynical.”

Jeeny: “And cave art wasn’t manipulation? Those hunters used it to claim luck, to call the spirits to their favor. It was the first persuasion. Maybe persuasion is our oldest art.”

Jack: “You’re saying ads are… spiritual evolution?”

Jeeny: “I’m saying they’re mirrors — crude, but honest. We carve our souls into pixels now, not stone.”

Host: The wind shifted, carrying the faint hum of a thousand unseen voices — the chatter of the digital night, the ghostly conversation between consumer and product.

Jack: “So you think McLuhan was admiring this madness?”

Jeeny: “No. I think he was warning us. The way the cave walls once defined human imagination, the screens now define it. We’re still inside the cave, Jack — only now the shadows talk back.”

Jack: (laughs, bitterly) “So we traded fire for fiber optics. Progress.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But think about it. Those paintings were born from awe — the need to say, ‘I was here.’ Don’t ads do the same thing? Every brand screaming its name across the sky — ‘I exist.’ Maybe the instinct is ancient. Maybe we just lost the reverence.”

Host: The rain began again, light but constant, tracing silver threads down the billboards. The ads still gleamed — unstoppable, untouchable — even as the storm blurred their perfection.

Jack: “I can’t buy that. Ads don’t express awe. They exploit it. They don’t say, ‘I exist’; they say, ‘You’re not enough unless you buy this.’ That’s not art. That’s control.”

Jeeny: “But control can be artistic too, can’t it? Even propaganda has beauty — in its power, in its design. Look at the old World War II posters, or the Coca-Cola ads that shaped decades of memory. They didn’t just sell; they defined eras.”

Jack: “Defined them, or trapped them?”

Jeeny: “Both. Art always traps something — a time, a feeling, a truth. Ads do that too, whether we like it or not.”

Host: A pause stretched between them. The city below flickered like a restless heartbeat. Somewhere, a sign glitched — the perfect model’s face dissolving into pixel static before reforming, flawless again.

Jack: “When I was a kid, my father took me to the Lascaux caves. He said, ‘This is where art began.’ I remember staring at the drawings — the animals running across the rock, still moving after thousands of years. They felt alive. Now, when I walk through Times Square, it’s the same — walls full of movement. But there’s no soul in it, Jeeny. Just electricity.”

Jeeny: “Maybe that’s our new soul. Our collective pulse — artificial but real. You can’t tell me those screens don’t move people. They make us laugh, desire, envy, remember. Isn’t that the same energy that once moved the hand of the caveman?”

Jack: “If that’s true, then we’ve turned spirituality into spectacle.”

Jeeny: “Maybe spectacle is the new spirituality.”

Host: The rain intensified, drumming on the metal roof. Neon lights blurred into a liquid painting — pink, blue, white — all merging into a surreal watercolor of commerce and light.

Jack: “You sound like McLuhan himself — always romantic about the medium. ‘The medium is the message,’ right?”

Jeeny: “Exactly. And the message of advertising isn’t just ‘buy.’ It’s belong. It’s matter. Every ad whispers: You’re part of this story.”

Jack: “And the tragedy is — it’s not true.”

Jeeny: “But it feels true. That’s the dangerous beauty of it.”

Host: Lightning flashed far away — a brief, white tear in the sky. In that instant, the billboards all froze, every screen pausing mid-glow — a tableau of light suspended over darkness.

Jack: “You really think there’s beauty in all this?”

Jeeny: “I think there’s truth in it — ugly, brilliant truth. Ads reveal what we want, what we fear, what we worship. They’re our collective diary written in pixels.”

Jack: “So we’re all cavemen again — except the walls are electric.”

Jeeny: “Yes. And instead of painting the hunt, we paint the hunger.”

Host: The rain slowed. The city sighed. Jack turned his face upward, eyes half-closed, feeling the last drops fall against his skin. Jeeny watched him, her expression softening — like she’d caught a glimpse of something fragile beneath his cynicism.

Jack: “Maybe McLuhan was right. Maybe ads are cave art. But I think he meant it as an insult — not a compliment.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But even an insult can carry truth. Maybe the real joke is that we’re still drawing on walls — only now, we charge admission.”

Host: They both laughed — low, weary, but real. The kind of laugh that knows it’s standing on the edge of something tragic and beautiful all at once.

Host: As the lights of the city continued to shimmer and hum, their faces glowed — two shadows illuminated by the art of their own time. Behind them, the giant screen flickered once more, then went dark for a breathless moment.

Host: And in that fleeting blackness, before the next image bloomed, it felt like the world had stopped — the cave empty, the fire gone, humanity pausing between desire and reflection.

Host: Then the light returned — bright, blinding, and utterly human.