Regardless of whether the ad critics liked JC Penney's "Beware of the Doghouse" viral video last year, the masses did. According to Quantcast.com, the site bewareofthedoghouse.com saw almost 2 million visits last year during the Christmas season and an additional half million from a youtube re-post by a random fan. Right on target with their audience too—the ad attracted more visitors by males, demographically older, richer and more educated.

The idea behind the film was that men who gave their wives lame holiday gifts—vacuum cleaners, blenders, etc.—would be dropped down a rabbit hole known as "The Doghouse" to be judged by a jury of pissed-off wives. (The morale of the story being that jewelry is ultimately the ticket out of the doghouse.) The underlying genius was JC Penny's quite branding that left viewers curious about the company that sponsored such a hilarious take on a situation almost every man can relate.

This year, it's "Return of the Doghouse." JC Penney again tapped with Saatchi & Saatchi for the video creative, which is thankfully down from four minutes and 45 seconds to two minutes and 55 seconds. The website also features a brilliant participatory shaming wall where visitors can "build a case against their bad gift giver filled with written statements and imported photos, videos and witness testimony as evidence of the bad gift-giving. Each case file will be compiled into a trial movie and given its own web address, allowing users to share (can be e-mailed or posted to MySpace and Facebook) the link with friends."

The original commercial: