There's something truly magical about a small niche community finally being introduced to a massive audience, and finding instant success. On the 10th of January 2022, the mad geniuses over at Adult Swim exposed hundreds of thousands of people to the particular sense of humor that was once the domain of a website called Newgrounds. Smiling Friends first aired as part of an April Fools' Day programming block on Adult Swim in 2020, but the demand for more episodes was immediate, sustained, and overwhelming. In a surprise reveal, rather than releasing weekly, the entire series dropped without warning on a single night.