Barbie Has One Particularly Gratuitous Product Placement That's Hard To Miss

Contains spoilers for "Barbie"

There's no doubt that in between the plastic pooping dogs and pools that never have anyone swimming in them, the most important accessory with Greta Gerwig's "Barbie" is the messages it ensures to deliver before the colorful credits roll. The journey getting there is one littered with unfiltered jabs at capitalism, masculine superiority, and the Barbies that time forgot. For about 99.99% of the time, they land as perfectly as Stereotypical Barbie (Margot Robbie) does floating out of her Dream House. Still, there's one moment in her bout with reality that doesn't feel like a joke, but more of a corporate choice that feels familiar in all the wrong ways.

During Stereotypical Barbie's visit to the top dogs at Mattel led by Will Ferrell, Barbie is baffled that all the big jobs are taken by men (unimaginable, right) for the company's signature toy. But while Will Ferrell's CEO explains just how the Mattel machine is running, it's here where audiences might get a fleeting glance of another looming in the background. That's right. Just in case you'd forgotten that this was a Warner Bros. Discovery movie, the film takes a moment to have a tower with its title stamped on the side just outside of the boardroom window. It's a blink-or-you'll-miss-it moment but one that, for the more cynical viewer, could easily cause eye-rolling.

We get that the film often highlights how a good idea can be repackaged into something else once a corporation gets its hands on it. What might detract from that message, however, is having the one that's running the show hovering in the background while another gets welcomingly mocked. It just doesn't land as well as it should. Such a shoehorned bit of placement feels more suited to "Space Jam: A New Legacy," a film that's just as dependent on IP, but bares nowhere near the same smarts as Stereotypical Barbie (Margot Robbie) and her buds.

With that said, perhaps there's more to this slightly blurred-out building than meets the eye. While it might feel like some corporate decision-making, adding the Warner Bros. Discovery building into this world could be setting up something that is just one of many things that audiences might not have anticipated for this thought-provoking picture wrapped in product placement. "Barbie" could end up with a sequel — and Warner Bros. Discovery could be the next target on Gerwig's list if her hopes for the future actually come to fruition. After all, it's a very big world out there and an even bigger Barbie Land if our crayon-sketched-out map is anything to go by.

We don't want to get ahead of ourselves, but given just how much potential "Barbie" has to take over the box office this weekend and even give Christopher Nolan a run for his money, sequel chit-chat seems likely. It's not unexpected, either. Greta Gerwig has already admitted that she has hopes for a trip back to Barbie Land after finishing this one. In an interview with People, the brains behind "Barbie" highlighted that this film could serve as the launch for future "Barbie" movies. That's certainly an option, given just how many brilliant Barbies there are. "There's a tone and a humor and a joy, and obviously, the world is so beautiful. I want to go back to Barbie Land," Gerwig said.

We don't want to get too hasty, but we'd bet our Barbie beach party with a glowing fireplace that a sequel is going to happen. It might sound like a tired trope, but Gerwig has already shown she can turn an easy excuse for toy sales into something much more. Why not a sequel, too?