The scene: A heated demonstration. Bull Connor and Birmingham’s finest advance with German Shepherds straining their leashes. A group of African-American teenagers oppose the police, bravely standing their ground.
Enter: Kendall Jenner brandishing a Pepsi. She hands the Pepsi to a German Shepherd and smiles. Bull Connor smiles. The German Shepherd smiles. The African-American teens smile. Suddenly, everyone starts dancing.
♦
The scene: A quiet riverbank running alongside a large steel plant. Henry Clay Frick and a group of Pinkertons disembark from a series of river barges, Winchesters at the ready. The sound of guns being cocked fills the air as a group of striking steel workers aim and prepare to fire.
Enter: Kendall Jenner pushing a wheelbarrow containing a crate of Pepsi bottles. She tosses bottles to Frick and the Pinkertons, who shake them and spray the strikers. The Pepsi spray washes away coke dust, revealing smiling workers with healthy skin and dressed in snazzy red, white and blue jumpsuits. Suddenly, everyone starts dancing.
♦
The scene: An angry mob. The sans-culottes, in their frustration with the privations of life under the Ancien Régime, have gathered outside the Bastille. The garrisoned troops, recently augmented with crack Swiss soldiers, confront members of the mob who storm the courtyard.
Enter: Kendall Jenner in a hot air balloon piloted by the Montgolfier brothers. The balloon features a large Pepsi logo. She drops 2-liter bottles of Pepsi on the assembled crowd. She smiles. The Montgolfier brothers smile. Below, everyone starts dancing.
♦
The scene: A walled city rising from the desert. Several thousand crusaders, blessed by Pope Urban II and dressed in full battle armor, prepare to seize the holy city of Jerusalem for Christendom. Soldiers of the Fatimid Caliphate oppose the infidel, crying out to Allah.
Enter: Kendall Jenner bearing the Holy Grail. The Holy Grail is filled with Pepsi. Soldiers of Islam and Christendom alike fall to their knees in prayer. Kendall Jenner passes through their ranks stopping to anoint each with Pepsi, a process which continues over the course of several hundred subsequent commercial spots. In the last spot, timed for Super Bowl LII, everyone dances.
♦
The scene: The banks of the Red Sea. Moses leads the children of Israel, who are starving and exhausted. They are pursued by Pharaoh Thutmose III and a detachment of Egyptian cavalryman riding glittering bronze chariots. Moses, raising his staff, appeals to God for relief in divine vengeance.
Enter: Kendall Jenner in a burning bush. She raises her arms and smiles as the Red Sea parts. The Red Sea is actually a vast reservoir of Pepsi. Thutmose III smiles. Moses smiles. The burning bush smiles.
