Not long ago we learned that Idiocracy director Mike Judge and screenwriter Etan Cohen were planning on making a series of anti-Trump ads for the coming election, which would feature Terry Crews reprising his role as President Camacho. Not long after that, it was revealed that the ads wouldn’t be happening after all, and in a new interview, Judge himself explains why the idea ultimately fell apart.

It started back in February, when Cohen tweeted a humorous observation — it’s one that’s been made many times in recent years by fans of Judge’s cult comedy favorite, but this one, from the screenwriter himself, gained quite a bit of traction:

The popularity of the tweet inspired Cohen to approach Judge with an idea to recruit Terry Crews for a series of ads for the coming election, but despite their intention to satirize both political parties, it was reported that the two were making “anti-Donald Trump” ads. Regardless of their intent, they still needed 20th Century Fox (which owns the rights to Idiocracy) to approve the ads, and that’s where Mike Judge says they hit a “roadblock.”

In an interview with The Daily Beast, Judge says that although Fox (which is owned by Trump supporter Rupert Murdoch) has “probably forgotten they still own” Idiocracy, they killed the idea pretty quickly:

It kind of fell apart. It was announced that they were anti-Trump, and I would’ve preferred to make them and then have the people decide. Terry Crews had wanted to just make some funny Camacho ads, and Etan [Cohen] and I had written a few that I thought were pretty funny, and it just fell apart. I wanted to put them out a little more quietly and let them go viral, rather than people announcing we’re making anti-Trump ads. Just let them be funny first. Doing something satirical like that is better if you just don’t say, ‘Here we come with the anti-Trump ads!’ Also, when Terry heard that announcement he wasn’t happy about it.

Last month, Crews told Business Insider that the ads were no longer happening, and explained his position in the matter:

Etan Cohen went out and said we were making anti-Trump ads, but we weren’t. I'm not anti-Trump, I'm not anti-Hillary [Clinton]. I'm not pro anybody.

He went on to explain the concept of the ads, which would have featured a “a cage match between Camacho, Hillary, Trump, [Ted] Cruz, all those people [running for president].” But when Cohen described the ads as “anti-Trump” in an interview with BuzzFeed, it caused a bit of a stir. Says Crews:

It was going to be funny. But when you make it an anti-Trump ad what's funny about that? Now you killed the comedy. When you have totally picked a side, that’s not funny anymore.

The ads could have been the perfect humorous antidote to this bizarre election season, as many fans have noted the increasing similarities between Idiocracy and modern culture in recent years — and how Crews’ character, President Elizondo Mountain Dew Herbert Camacho, has a few things in common with Mr. Trump.

Unfortunately, those ads were “put on a shelf,” according to Judge, and they may never see the light of day.

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