Adult Swim’s ‘Smiling Friends’ will end after season 3

Adult Swim’s animated comedy “Smiling Friends” will end after its third season. Creators and stars Michael Cusack and Zach Hadel revealed the news in a video posted to Adult Swim’s X account.

“I’m going to cut to the chase immediately,” Hadel said at the top of the post. “This is not a joke, this is not a joke. Michael and I are here to announce that ‘Smiling Friends’ will end after Season 3 ends.”

“To be completely honest, after we finished Season 3, Zach and I both felt the same way, feeling pretty burnt out after putting years and years into it, but also feeling pretty accomplished,” Cusack added. “We just came to a sense that after Season 3 we were like, ‘I think this could be it’.”

Hadel explained that he and Cusack wanted to put “110%” into “Smiling Friends” from the very beginning and then “come out on top.” He said it was better to leave the audience “wanting more” than to leave fans thinking, “That show is still on the air? Oh god.”

“We wouldn’t want to be half-hearted or burned out or not feeling it for more seasons,” he added. “That’s not fair to us, and it’s not fair to the public to give you fucking slop. That sucks.”

Cusack explained that ending “Smiling Friends” was “our decision,” and that Adult Swim was “very supportive.”

“When we told them exactly this, they said, ‘If you don’t feel like making a cartoon, we’re not going to stop you. Go take a break. Come back or not,’” Cusack continued. “That’s the other thing: We can come back in the future and make more episodes if we want, if we feel like it. And they were super cool and said they would let us do that. But maybe not. Who knows?”

The pair further announced that two unreleased episodes of season 3 will air on Adult Swim on April 12. Hadel clarified that they are “not finales,” but rather “little stragglers” that didn’t make it into the first season rollout.

“We know this is very disappointing,” Cusack concluded, “it was very difficult to even record this because it’s just very difficult for us to say. We hope you understand and that you enjoyed what we did. It was amazing. The fans were so good. It was the best. It was the ride of a lifetime. But I hope you see where we’re coming from.”