Toyota has given Alice in Wonderland a glossy, fashion-forward reboot for the new Yaris Cross Hybrid, turning Lewis Carroll’s familiar characters into a surreal city adventure built around the idea of being ready for whatever comes next.
Created by T&P and directed by Rodrigo Saavedra, the film follows a modern-day Alice through a world where the White Rabbit is reimagined as a mysterious young woman in an embroidered silk jacket, the Mad Hatter becomes a DJ in a silver top hat and the Queen of Hearts appears as an intimidating caller on Alice’s phone.
The story begins in the city, where Alice spots the woman wearing the white-rabbit jacket and follows her through boulevards, back streets and eventually into a tunnel that transforms into a rabbit hole. From there, the campaign slips fully into Wonderland.
A giant teacup ride spins with models dressed like couture characters. A dashboard dial dissolves into a Victorian stopwatch. The White Rabbit figure falls from the sky before opening a parachute marked with the Cheshire Cat’s grin. Even the streets take on a checkerboard pattern as the visual references pile up.
Each encounter also gives Toyota a way to introduce the Yaris Cross without turning the film into a conventional product demonstration. The car’s agility, hybrid performance, digital interface and design are woven into the story as Alice moves confidently from one strange situation to another.
That structure was intentional. T&P creative director Mehmet Guven said the characters of Alice in Wonderland provided natural ways to represent different vehicle features, while giving the campaign a cultural reference almost everyone already understands.
The result feels closer to a fashion film than a typical automotive commercial. Costume designer Celia Arias, hair and makeup artist Javier Ceferino and production designer Anna Colomer helped build the world physically, creating the surreal environments in camera.
That choice is particularly striking now. Dreamlike landscapes, impossible transitions and stylized characters are exactly the kind of imagery brands can increasingly generate with AI. Toyota and T&P chose craft instead, relying on sets, styling, performance and cinematography to give the fantasy texture.
It gives the campaign a visual richness that supports the car’s “Ready for What’s Next” line without overexplaining it.
Alice has always been a character defined by curiosity. Toyota simply gives her a hybrid and sends her somewhere stranger.
