This past weekend, millions of Americans sat mindlessly in front of their TVs as the world’s biggest corporations played a series of short videos intended to psychologically manipulate their viewers’ minds into giving them their money.

There was also a football game. Apparently, the red team won.

Anyways, it turns out that the University of Pennsylvania was very close to participating in America’s biggest showcase of capitalistic consumerism. Although Penn had several commercials lined up, none made it to the airwaves for various reasons.

The Punch Bowl Insiders were able to obtain the details on Penn’s incomplete Super Bowl commercials before they were scrapped. Here is what we found:

Amy for POTUS:

Yes, you read that right. At one point our very own Amy Gutmann was considering running for president, and was going to kick off her campaign with an ad during the Super Bowl. What better way to spend Penn’s endowment money than by using it for political gain? The creative team for this commercial was planning on highlighting how her current role as the President of Penn has taught her skills that would be applicable to being President of the United States, such as being a strong leader, making tough decisions, and sucking up to the rich.

This one actually began filming, and our sources who have seen glimpses of the footage claimed there were shots of Gutmann walking around campus while smiling for no apparent reason, shaking students’ hands (that were vigorously disinfected beforehand), and giving a fake speech (nothing new there).

Production was halted after Gutmann changed her mind about running when she found out that presidents are expected to donate their salary.

Penntrification:
Penn has taken a lot of heat in recent years for… how do we put this delicately? For screwing over the poor by continually expanding and increasing the cost of living in areas surrounding Penn’s campus. Or, as they would rather call it: Gentrification- a nicer and smarter sounding term to distract people from what is actually happening.

For their ad, Penn wanted to spotlight their efforts on making West Philly “safer” by “upgrading it.” Our sources tell us that at the pitch meeting, when someone suggested that Penn doesn’t focus on actually helping out the people in surrounding areas instead of forcing them out by increasing the cost of living, everyone in the room burst out laughing.

This commercial never made it to production when Penn realized it wasn’t worth putting money into because, as one board member put it, they “just don’t give a damn.”

Baby Quake:

This commercial was actually completed and had a social media campaign tied to it. The plan was to stage a golf cart crash that would tragically kill the Quaker mascot at a Penn football game, sparking weeks of mourning and a #RIPQuaker hashtag. Then the commercial would show an extensive mob attempting to find the bastard child of the Quaker, rumored to have come from a one-night stand while in Vegas. After finding the Quaker’s child, he would be officially adopted as Penn’s new mascot and affectionately dubbed “Baby Quake.”

The commercial was pulled last minute after finding out about Planter’s commercial with a slightly similar theme. Penn was afraid The Baby Quake would get overshadowed because it didn’t quite have the sexual innuendo possibilities that Baby Nut did.