YouTube Trends says the Old Spice face-off between Isaiah Mustafa and Fabio, dubbed “Mano a Mano In El Baño,” collected 22 million views. “The Man Your Man Can Smell Like” video and the July 2010 campaign called “Questions” got millions more, but still.

And, in case you missed it (we did surprisingly), Mustafa won.

The campaign gets kudos from Mashable and Gary Vaynerchuk on Entrepreneur for giving Mustafa’s campaign additional legs and using Fabio’s ability to tap into people’s memories of advertising past. But Vaynerchuk also says that Old Spice missed an opportunity for further engagement. And Ad Age wonders if there was a point to this exercise at all.

We, and many others, were worried that Mustafa might be going away. But now that he’s sticking around, we’re curious about what more he can possibly do with his shirtless Man-Man persona. Maybe when you’re a buff shirtless Man-Man the possibilities are endless.

Last week, we thought Old Spice had gone crazy. Turns out they’ve gone crazy like a fox.

While we were lamenting the possible loss of Isaiah Mustafa, Old Spice and its ad firm Wieden & Kennedy have decided to kick its publicity up a notch by pitting its successful spokesperson against Fabio, who also has had a lot of success as a spokesperson.

Rather than letting its old marketing gimmick go stale, the brand has added a new element – a duel– to keep its marketing fresh and in the news. Kind of brilliant.

Read more

New Old Spice commercials have turned up on their own YouTube channel, but instead of featuring our fresh-smelling hunk Isaiah Mustafa talking manliness to us with all that bass, these things star hunk of the olden days Fabio just saying stuff that no one cares about. Nooooooo!

SheKnows.com notes that these videos aren’t feeling the love on YouTube. P&G says it’s not replacing Mustafa. Maybe Isaiah is busy with his new film career, and the company is testing the waters with other spokesmen.

Does the magic have to end? Who else will women look at after they look at their man? Nooooooooo!