‘Don’t Hug Me, I’m Scared’ Shorts Being Turned Into A Series With Super Deluxe And Conaco

The cult U.K.-produced webseries Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared, a surrealist and often disturbing takeoff on children’s series, is being developed as a television show by Blink Industries, the company that produced the original shorts, and Conan O’Brien’s production company Conaco. Turner’s Super Deluxe will produce the series.

The mixed-media series is being developed by Don’t Hug Me I’m Scared’s creators, Becky Sloan and Joseph Pelling, and Baker Terry, who helped write the shorts.

Though only a half-dozen short films have been produced, the project has built up a considerable online following. Produced between 2011 and 2016, the six original shorts have amassed nearly 160 million views on Youtube. A new teaser announcing the series, posted below, has earned nearly 4.5 million views since being posted on September 13:

According to a report on CNET, a spec pilot for the new series has already been made and is being shopped around to both streaming and cable networks.

This wouldn’t be the first time that Conaco has turned a webseries IP into a mainstream production. O’Brien’s production company also developed Olan Rogers’ Gary Space webseries into the series Final Space, which launched earlier this year on TBS in the United States and Netflix internationally.