10 of The Craziest And Most Controversial Things Adult Swim Has Done

It’s hard to overstate how quickly Dan Harmon and Justin Roiland’s Back to the Future parody rose through the programming ranks to be a TV favorite. Though it premiered in 2013 and currently only has two seasons, the show has a highly active and devoted fan base despite its slow production schedule. Most networks that have a show this popular would spend a lot of time and money building up excitement for the new season. Adult Swim has never been most networks. After making fans wait for almost a year and a half — a too-close-to-home joke from the Season Two finale — Adult Swim dropped its cliffhanger-resolving Season Three premiere on the air without comment. The episode was released on April 1 of this year, continuing the network’s long tradition of bizarre April Fool’s Day pranks.

Where to stream Rick and Morty

This call-in talk show isn’t controversial or mean-spirited or even that popular. It’s just weird. As the sow’s four hosts answer questions, footage of fish swimming in a tank plays in the background. Each fish is assigned a team, and whichever team collects the most coins wins. The show makes next to no sense, but it’s oddly soothing to watch. However, what makes the show impressive is how many episodes have aired. Adult Swim has streamed online or aired over 600 episodes of this confusing series, and free episode replays are available on Adult Swim’s site. You’re always only a click away from watching fish accomplish … something.

Watch FishCenter Live on Adult Swim

Once a beloved show is cancelled, it’s not uncommon for fans to start petitions, begging networks to reconsider their decision. Most networks either ignore or strategically acknowledge the fate of these doomed shows. However, when it came to Metalocalypse’s cancellation, Adult Swim almost seemed to take pleasure from its viewers’ pain. The network promised it would add its own name to the Change.org petition to bring the show back as long as it received at least 25 signatures accompanied by a short essay on the show by fax. All of this was live streamed, by the way. True to its word, once the network received 25 of the petition’s now over 100,000 signatures, it filmed one of its employees signing the petition. This still doesn’t mean that Metalocalypse is coming back, but it’s impressive how much time the network was willing to invest in this petition without helping to bring the show back.

Where to stream Metalocalypse 

This one is far less of a tongue-in-cheek joke and more of a deliberate choice that infuriated fans, the internet, and some of Adult Swim’s creators. In August of 2016, Adult Swim aired a show from Sam Hyde called Million Dollar Extreme Presents: World Peace. After the show’s premiere, BuzzFeed revealed the ways the show was “winking” at Hyde’s alt-right fan base through coded racist messages, many of which, according to Jezebel, were later removed when the show made it to air. As the controversy increased, BuzzFeed published another piece discussing how many members of the network’s talent were threatening to leave if the show wasn’t pulled. Comedian Brett Gelman actually left Adult Swim in November, listing the existence of World Peace and the network’s treatment of women as his reasons for severing ties. Finally, in December Turner pulled the plug on the show, not renewing World Peace for a second season despite Adult Swim’s alleged interest. Videos and episodes from the series can no longer be found on Adult Swim’s site.

It’s rare for marketing efforts to go this wrong. In 2007, the Boston police and fire departments thought they identified two bombs. What they actually found were two LED placards part of a guerrilla marketing campaign for the Aqua Teen Hunger Force movie. The two men involved in setting up the campaign were arrested, and Adult Swim paid $1 million to the city of Boston and $1 million in goodwill funds. The incident was so bad, it led to the resignation of Jim Samples, general manager and Executive Vice President of Cartoon Network.

Where to stream Aqua Teen Hunger Force

Adult Swim has a lot of odd content, but few programs are as odd as the 11 minute short the network dropped unannounced in October of 2014. It didn’t take long for “Took Many Cooks” with its catchy music and confusing premise to take over the internet. However, “Too Many Cooks” is far from the only deeply disturbing short Adult Swim has dropped over the years. From “Unedited Footage of a Bear” to “This House Has People In It,” the network has been punishing sleep-deprived stoner fans for years now.

Gerald Bald Z’s quest to find the perfect head of hair was silly, even by Adult Swim’s standards. A spin-off from Space Ghost Coast to Coast, the anime-inspired comedy originally aired in 2005 with six episodes. Adult Swim announced that Season 2 would have 16 episodes, but that never came to pass. Instead, two years later on April Fool’s Day, the network aired what was thought to be the show’s official finale, “Return to Balding Victory.” The network then played a similar stunt a full seven years later, airing two more surprise episodes on April 1, 2014. Basically, we should always expect that there will always be another quest for perfect hair in Adult Swim’s pocket.

Prior to the theatrical release of Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters, Adult Swim had been advertising that it would air the movie on its network in its entirety. Technically, the network didn’t lie, but it also didn’t tell the whole truth. On April 1, 2007, Adult Swim showed the movie’s first two minutes, which were already available online. The rest of the movie was shown in a teeny-tiny window with the network’s normal programming running in the background, and the movie’s sound was played over SAP. Also, because Adult Swim can’t let anyone have the things they like, the network leaked several different endings to the Aqua Teen movie all across the internet. Adult Swim eventually admitted that none of the released endings were real before it proceeded to release seven more endings.

Where to stream Aqua Teen Hunger Force Colon Movie Film for Theaters

Adult Swim is well known for its April Fool’s Day pranks, but this holiday and network have an extra special relationship with perhaps the greatest bad movie that’s ever been made, Tommy Wiseau’s The Room. The Room was shown three times on three consecutive April Fool’s Days. In 2009, the full movie was shown with its sex scenes blurred by black boxes. That screening was then followed by an episode of Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! that guest starred Wiseau. In 2010, The Room was aired again, but this time the bumpers before and after commercial breaks featured clips of Wiseau being interviewed on Space Ghost Coast to Coast. Finally in 2011 Adult Swim rounded out the trifecta, airing The Room once more with a TV-MA rating. The network also premiered a CGI special of a George Lowe pilot, entitled Earth Ghost.

Where to stream The Room

By 2016, Adult Swim had firmly established itself as a network to watch on April Fool’s. So what was the late night block’s giant reveal last year? Absolutely nothing. After recapping its 12-year history of playing pranks and hyping fans to wait until midnight, Adult Swim continued its regular programming with no comment.