Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mac have turned running Wrexham AFC into content for years, and now a sponsor has handed them a recruitment interview. This Nex Playground Newest Signing commercial, posted on Reynolds’ verified YouTube channel on October 6, 2026, is the pair’s first appearance for Nex since the active-play console maker became a Wrexham partner earlier this year. It runs 74 seconds, and for most of them the real star is an eight-year-old who would like a juice box.
WHAT HAPPENS ON SCREEN
We open in a club office that could only belong to Wrexham: a framed red crest with “1864” on the wall, red-and-white scarves hanging nearby, crest mugs on a long wooden desk. Reynolds and Mac sit behind it with clipboards, studying a sheet of paper like a scouting report. Across from them, in denim overalls and hair bows, sits their candidate. “How long have you been playing? Since you were five? But you can’t be more than eight. That’s not a ton of experience, is it, uh, Stacy?” She answers with a request for a juice box.
The co-chairmen press on in full mock-serious mode. “We’ve got a lot of eyes on us,” one explains. “Every decision that we make is being scrutinized.” Then: “We don’t want to be mid-table. We need you to be ruthless. What’s the meanest thing you’ve ever said?” She writes her answer down and slides it across the desk, and the film simply lets the two men read it. There are close to ten seconds without dialogue while she writes and they read, before “Oh, that’s intense. And it came with a drawing, too.” Reynolds ends up with his head in his hand while Mac stares at the page, and the verdict arrives in two lines: “Can we get a priest?” and “Welcome to the squad.”
Only then does the product appear: a close-up of the small two-tone Nex Playground unit, followed by a living room where the girl plays Bluey Bust-A-Move on a big TV alongside two Wrexham players in red home shirts, Josh Windass and Ben Sheaf. “Quit stalling, Windass. And take your beating,” someone says. A red end card pairs the Wrexham crest with the Nex Playground logo over the line “Official Game Console of Wrexham AFC,” before a final beat of Sonic Forces: Rival Rush and the girl’s closer to the pros: “You guys are even worse at this game.”
CREDITS
Brand: Nex Playground (NEX). Film: “Rob Mac and Ryan Reynolds Meet Wrexham AFC’s Newest Signing,” 1:14, posted on Ryan Reynolds’ verified YouTube channel; no separate campaign title has been published, so “Newest Signing” is taken from that upload. Creative: created in collaboration with Maximum Effort. Cast: Ryan Reynolds and Rob Mac as Wrexham AFC co-chairmen, with Wrexham players Josh Windass and Ben Sheaf. Games shown: Bluey Bust-A-Move and Sonic Forces: Rival Rush, which joined Nex Play Pass on October 7. Sources: The Drum (Ad of the Day, October 7, 2026), the Nex announcement as carried by the North Wales Chronicle and The Leader, Collider, AS USA and the official YouTube upload. Not found in any of these sources: the director, production company, the name of the young actress, cinematographer, editor, music and media agency.
THE EXECUTION
This is the Maximum Effort playbook, played straight down the middle. Two famous men treat something trivial with corporate gravity, someone refuses to play along, and the punchline is withheld. Keeping the note off screen is the smartest decision in the film. Whatever she wrote is funnier in your head than anything a copywriter could put on paper, and the silent read lets Reynolds do what he does best: react.
The casting of the kid carries the spot. She barely moves, never mugs for the camera, and her flat delivery makes the co-chairmen look like the children in the room. The set is dense with Wrexham detail; the club is being sold as much as the console.
WHAT WORKS AND WHAT DOESN’T
What works: the interview is tight and genuinely funny, and “Can we get a priest?” is a great button. The final line, the eight-year-old telling professional footballers they are bad at the game, is a neat way to land the brand promise that anyone can play.
What doesn’t: the product arrives at roughly the 53-second mark of a 74-second film, and when it does, the ad barely explains it. You see a small box and people dancing at a TV, but nothing tells a parent that Nex uses a camera to track movement with no controllers, which is the one thing the brand needs a new audience to understand. Windass and Sheaf are used as props rather than characters, and the back half has three endings in a row – the end card, the Sonic beat and the closing line – which makes it feel like a social sketch that grew a pack shot rather than a commercial built from a single idea.
VERDICT
“Newest Signing” is a likeable, well-cast piece of celebrity-sponsor comedy, and the first 50 seconds are sharp, classic Maximum Effort. But it is a better Wrexham ad than a Nex ad: the product is late, under-explained and upstaged by its own pitchmen. Fans will share it; whether they learn what Nex actually does is another question. Rating: 3.5 out of 5.
