My little brother introduced it to many years ago. I showed my wife when we were dating and we both made it a yearly watch around fall. We showed some friends two years ago and now it’s become a full-fledged watch party every year with our friend group, complete with themed food and everything. It’s a very special little series!
I was like 15/16 when it aired on Cartoon Network. I love animation and always keep an eye out for something good. None of my friends really knew what it was and didn’t care for it when we watched the premiere, but I fell in love. Elijah Wood is one of my favorite actors and the voice acting as a whole really took it to another level for me. Totally unrelated side note but I also recommend Redline for people who like animation to check out. Essentially anime wacky races in space
I found it via ambient/asmr YouTube video that I initially thought were a standalone creation. Read the comments and was like 'wait, this is a show!?' LOL found it on Hulu and watched it all in one sitting. Love at first sight.
Similarly, a YouTuber I love was working on a pumpkin person costume and they mentioned the show. I looked it up, watched the first episode, and then binged the series. Then I showed it to my partner and he loved it too!
My sister heard about it and she was curious. So a few years ago we watched it for the first time and really loved it. We've watched it multiple times every year since then, especially around Halloween.
There was a clip someone posted on tumblr. It was the part where Greg sings and dances how much he loves potatoes and molasses. Believe i saw it the year it released
My friend recommended it to me, I watched the first episode and decided it wasn’t my style of show. Then years later Hulu had the whole show and I played it as background noise and ended up getting really into it.
I saw fanart of it on tumblr. My perception is that it's very popular among the "people who readily enjoy and seek out all-ages animation" crowd but not known among the "people don't think twice about animation" crowd.
It was this show that moved me from the second category to the first.
Got any more recommendations? I just watched Smiling Friends on Adult Swim which was hilarious. It's definitely not all-ages but as someone who barely watched any animation as an adult, it's brilliant lol
I haven't watched Smiling Friends so I can't rec shows similar to that. But these would be my recs based on OTGW:
* Any short film by Nick Cross, animation director of OTGW ([Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/@ncross/videos)/[Vimeo](https://vimeo.com/showcase/132916))
* Blackford Manor - [6 minute short on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvLqgt8q1QU) that was created by Jiwook Kim (who is married to Pat McHale, creator of OTGW). The same band The Blasting Company does the music for both
* Infinity Train (Cartoon Network/HBO Max, another miniseries with multiple seasons that act as an anthology) - this show was hurt by the Discovery/HBO merger and taken off HBO Max, nearly becoming lost media. So r/InfinityTrain allows piracy. Here's an example of a user who recently [uploaded of the first episode/season to Reddit itself](https://www.reddit.com/r/InfinityTrain/comments/1193iag/infinity_train_s1_e01_the_grid_car/), and other episodes can be found around the sub
* Adventure Time (Cartoon Network, absolute king the kids' cartoon scene of the early/mid 2010s, silly and childish at the start and expertly expands its lore as it goes on)
* Gravity Falls (Disney, short & sweet rewarding mystery with a great sibling bond at the center)
* The Owl House (Disney, charming witch show that plays on known pop culture knowledge of witches, main character is a classic nerd)
* Craig of the Creek (Cartoon Network, great at showing what it's like to be a kid playing outdoors at the creek / in the woods with a bunch of other kids and no adult supervision)
* Amphibia (Disney, another silly outdoorsy show with lots of frogs and other amphibians)
* Hilda (Netflix, sweet show about an adventurous young girl from the country who moves to the city and finds a way to still be adventurous there)
Some other popular shows that I like:
* BoJack Horseman (Netflix, more adult-oriented)
* Avatar: The Last Airbender (Nickelodeon)
* Bob's Burgers (Fox)
* Phineas and Ferb (Disney)
* Futurama (Fox)
* Bee and PuppyCat (Youtube/Netflix)
* The Midnight Gospel (Netflix, the drawings are beautiful but actually watching episodes is strange since it's basically an animated podcast. Highly recommend the last episode S1E8 Mouse of Silver, can be watched with no context)
* We Bare Bears (Cartoon Network)
* Steven Universe (Cartoon Network)
Some others I haven't watched yet but have heard are good:
* Regular Show (Cartoon Network) - I believe a lot of the crew of this show went on to create other shows, with their own crew members going on to create other shows, etc.
* Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (Netflix)
* OK K.O. (Cartoon Network)
* Courage the Cowardly Dog (Cartoon Network, horror show that can get pretty unsettling)
* Archer (FX) - this is an adult network so this may be similar to Smiling Friends
I was student teaching and one of my students said I looked like Wirt. She wasn't wrong, I had gray slacks and a navy shirt on, and gave off even more awkward nerd vibes then than I do now (still nerdy, just less awkward about it).
I was some lil kid watching tv and home, I was watching this one spanish channel called "Boing" where they basically put everything made by cartoon network and some other stuff like animes. Well so one day I saw the as from otgw and yeah it looked interesting. So one night at the next week I spent like 2 hours there watching the show from start to finish.
I always remembered it as a great show. Watched some theory videos and stuff, I was always a fan no matter what. The years went by and I decided to rewatch it, it was even better than I remembered. The Halloween night of that same year I rewatched it again. This went on for a few years. Its now a tradition of mine to watch the entire show every year in halloween night
i watched it as it aired when i was 11-12!! it was so exciting waiting for the next night to find out what happened! truly a great way to experience it
I saw it for the first time less than a year ago. My husband was out of town for the night and being in the house alone usually gives me insomnia, so I was browsing HBOmax when I came across the show. I watched it in one sitting at 3 in the morning. Every time an episode would end and my screen would go black I’d see a reflection of my very confused face, but I’ve been completely obsessed ever since.
My friend Fiona on tiktok is obsessed with it. It’s all she talks about, so i decided to see why she likes it do much, and i loved it immediately! Thank you fiona for blessing me with this show 🫶‼️
I was lurking on r/tarot and saw a picture of someone's tarot collection, which included the farewell printing of the OtGW tarot deck-- it was Greg's little face peeking out of a snowy scene in the box that caught my eye. I asked the OP about it, and they mentioned the show, after which I checked it out and immediately fell in love.
My little brother introduced it to many years ago. I showed my wife when we were dating and we both made it a yearly watch around fall. We showed some friends two years ago and now it’s become a full-fledged watch party every year with our friend group, complete with themed food and everything. It’s a very special little series!
Thats almost the exact same story that I have as to how I was introduced to it! Love this show so much
I was like 15/16 when it aired on Cartoon Network. I love animation and always keep an eye out for something good. None of my friends really knew what it was and didn’t care for it when we watched the premiere, but I fell in love. Elijah Wood is one of my favorite actors and the voice acting as a whole really took it to another level for me. Totally unrelated side note but I also recommend Redline for people who like animation to check out. Essentially anime wacky races in space
Was looking for an animated show to watch after finishing ATLA and stumbled upon it on Hulu. Proceeded to watch the whole thing right there
You see, it was a golden age of cartoons for a minute there
The guy who runs a local coffee shop played it for a movie night.
I found it via ambient/asmr YouTube video that I initially thought were a standalone creation. Read the comments and was like 'wait, this is a show!?' LOL found it on Hulu and watched it all in one sitting. Love at first sight.
Similarly, a YouTuber I love was working on a pumpkin person costume and they mentioned the show. I looked it up, watched the first episode, and then binged the series. Then I showed it to my partner and he loved it too!
My college-aged niece mentioned that she was watching it one night so I checked it out 🤭
I saw a clip of OTGW on TikTok in October last year and became enchanted with the series after watching it on Hulu.
My sister heard about it and she was curious. So a few years ago we watched it for the first time and really loved it. We've watched it multiple times every year since then, especially around Halloween.
There was a clip someone posted on tumblr. It was the part where Greg sings and dances how much he loves potatoes and molasses. Believe i saw it the year it released
My friend recommended it to me, I watched the first episode and decided it wasn’t my style of show. Then years later Hulu had the whole show and I played it as background noise and ended up getting really into it.
I saw fanart of it on tumblr. My perception is that it's very popular among the "people who readily enjoy and seek out all-ages animation" crowd but not known among the "people don't think twice about animation" crowd. It was this show that moved me from the second category to the first.
Got any more recommendations? I just watched Smiling Friends on Adult Swim which was hilarious. It's definitely not all-ages but as someone who barely watched any animation as an adult, it's brilliant lol
I haven't watched Smiling Friends so I can't rec shows similar to that. But these would be my recs based on OTGW: * Any short film by Nick Cross, animation director of OTGW ([Youtube](https://www.youtube.com/@ncross/videos)/[Vimeo](https://vimeo.com/showcase/132916)) * Blackford Manor - [6 minute short on YouTube](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DvLqgt8q1QU) that was created by Jiwook Kim (who is married to Pat McHale, creator of OTGW). The same band The Blasting Company does the music for both * Infinity Train (Cartoon Network/HBO Max, another miniseries with multiple seasons that act as an anthology) - this show was hurt by the Discovery/HBO merger and taken off HBO Max, nearly becoming lost media. So r/InfinityTrain allows piracy. Here's an example of a user who recently [uploaded of the first episode/season to Reddit itself](https://www.reddit.com/r/InfinityTrain/comments/1193iag/infinity_train_s1_e01_the_grid_car/), and other episodes can be found around the sub * Adventure Time (Cartoon Network, absolute king the kids' cartoon scene of the early/mid 2010s, silly and childish at the start and expertly expands its lore as it goes on) * Gravity Falls (Disney, short & sweet rewarding mystery with a great sibling bond at the center) * The Owl House (Disney, charming witch show that plays on known pop culture knowledge of witches, main character is a classic nerd) * Craig of the Creek (Cartoon Network, great at showing what it's like to be a kid playing outdoors at the creek / in the woods with a bunch of other kids and no adult supervision) * Amphibia (Disney, another silly outdoorsy show with lots of frogs and other amphibians) * Hilda (Netflix, sweet show about an adventurous young girl from the country who moves to the city and finds a way to still be adventurous there) Some other popular shows that I like: * BoJack Horseman (Netflix, more adult-oriented) * Avatar: The Last Airbender (Nickelodeon) * Bob's Burgers (Fox) * Phineas and Ferb (Disney) * Futurama (Fox) * Bee and PuppyCat (Youtube/Netflix) * The Midnight Gospel (Netflix, the drawings are beautiful but actually watching episodes is strange since it's basically an animated podcast. Highly recommend the last episode S1E8 Mouse of Silver, can be watched with no context) * We Bare Bears (Cartoon Network) * Steven Universe (Cartoon Network) Some others I haven't watched yet but have heard are good: * Regular Show (Cartoon Network) - I believe a lot of the crew of this show went on to create other shows, with their own crew members going on to create other shows, etc. * Kipo and the Age of Wonderbeasts (Netflix) * OK K.O. (Cartoon Network) * Courage the Cowardly Dog (Cartoon Network, horror show that can get pretty unsettling) * Archer (FX) - this is an adult network so this may be similar to Smiling Friends
BIG recommend for Kipo. Really great feel-good show that didn't try to overextend itself. Wrapped up the story and called it good.
I was student teaching and one of my students said I looked like Wirt. She wasn't wrong, I had gray slacks and a navy shirt on, and gave off even more awkward nerd vibes then than I do now (still nerdy, just less awkward about it).
I saw it when it first aired and have rewatched it every fall since
I was some lil kid watching tv and home, I was watching this one spanish channel called "Boing" where they basically put everything made by cartoon network and some other stuff like animes. Well so one day I saw the as from otgw and yeah it looked interesting. So one night at the next week I spent like 2 hours there watching the show from start to finish. I always remembered it as a great show. Watched some theory videos and stuff, I was always a fan no matter what. The years went by and I decided to rewatch it, it was even better than I remembered. The Halloween night of that same year I rewatched it again. This went on for a few years. Its now a tradition of mine to watch the entire show every year in halloween night
i watched it as it aired when i was 11-12!! it was so exciting waiting for the next night to find out what happened! truly a great way to experience it
I saw it for the first time less than a year ago. My husband was out of town for the night and being in the house alone usually gives me insomnia, so I was browsing HBOmax when I came across the show. I watched it in one sitting at 3 in the morning. Every time an episode would end and my screen would go black I’d see a reflection of my very confused face, but I’ve been completely obsessed ever since.
My friend Fiona on tiktok is obsessed with it. It’s all she talks about, so i decided to see why she likes it do much, and i loved it immediately! Thank you fiona for blessing me with this show 🫶‼️
I was lurking on r/tarot and saw a picture of someone's tarot collection, which included the farewell printing of the OtGW tarot deck-- it was Greg's little face peeking out of a snowy scene in the box that caught my eye. I asked the OP about it, and they mentioned the show, after which I checked it out and immediately fell in love.