The majority of characters appear as Rosie and Jim-style puppets, with some others being claymation figurines or entirely animated. Stylistically, Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared comes off in much the same way as any other children’s show. Three friends – named respectively Red Guy, Yellow Guy & Duck – live together in a little house and, in each episode, meet a new character who, just like real children’s shows, is there to help them to learn a valuable lesson about friendship, or jobs, or how the world outside works.
#DONT HUG ME IM SCARED SERIES#
Having started life eleven years ago as a series of darkly comedic shorts on YouTube, which quickly went viral and have since attracted a cult following, this twisted pastiche of children’s television is one that’s unlike almost anything else on TV right now.ĭon’t Hug Me I’m Scared presents a bright, colourful world reminiscent of any number of shows you might find on Cbeebies & other pre-schoolers TV, before quickly taking it in bizarre and grotesque directions. It’s as artistically abstract and disturbing as ever since the internet dark comedy transitioned into a full-fledged television show.With the release of new comedy-horror show Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared on Channel 4 (the show is already available to stream on All4), it would be interesting to know how many people will be going into it genuinely clueless as to what to expect.
Whether it’s about identity, workplace atmospheres, the importance of family, or even death, the show is shamelessly innovative and experimental in its art form combining segments of puppetry, live-action, claymation, traditional animation, and computer animation. Like the original series, Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared is now a sequence of self-reliant half-hour episodes, focusing on a ‘lesson’. With the longer runtimes come longer adventures in each episode. Establishing a feeling of existential dread and terror within the brightly colored space later in each episode, the team successfully preserved the look and feel of the original web series. The TV series carry similar plotlines compared to its YouTube counterpart a mysterious visitor, most commonly a felt inanimate object, coming to life and singing to the three characters (who are only named ‘Red Guy’, ‘Yellow Guy’, and ‘Duck’), seemingly teaching them a lesson on creativity, dreams, or technology before they begin to enact chaos. Comedians Phil Wang, Jamie Demetriou, and Lolly Adefope are now the voices behind new characters, too. Now, over six years since the last webisode, Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared has finally moved to television in the U.K (Thankfully, all of these episodes have already been uploaded onto YouTube for everybody to watch).Īs Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared moves to television, more notable names have joined the team: Edinburgh comedy award winner Sam Campbell joins as a new writer, and Megan Ganz (writer for Community & It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia) is now the story editor for the team. The careful attention to detail and hidden messages are what made the YouTube series so overwhelmingly successful.
with the artistic touch of offal-stuffed horrors. Each episode is carefully handmade with felt puppets and felt life-sized furniture. These videos would be slowly uploaded over the period of four years, 2011 to 2015, but this never seemed to discourage their dedicated fans. The juxtaposition of chipper singing puppets and gory folk horror is what made this series a great success on YouTube’s platform, quickly earning its massive fanbase in the company of thousands of theories and analyses, all on the show’s recurring cryptic themes.Ĭreated by artists Becky Sloan and Joseph Pelling, this crowdfunded web series has now accumulated over 216 million views on YouTube in only six episodes. Presenting itself as a colorful children’s television show, much like Sesame Street, coalesced with violence and dark comedy that hide thinly under the surface. Known for its surrealism and bizarre themes of horror, Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared made an iconic reputation for itself on YouTube in the early 2010s.
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