Adult Swim Show Hit By Surprise Delay (& Follows The Simpsons’ Worst Trend)

One Adult Swim animated series has announced a surprising delay, and with it has joined The Simpsons in an unfortunate Halloween special trend over the years. The Simpsons been running for 37 seasons, and has been releasing a special Halloween based episode ever year since its second season. Sometimes its broadcast schedule with FOX didn’t line up perfectly, however, and it meant there were many years that The Simpsons Treehouse of Horror episodes would be airing after Halloween. Hitting sometime in November instead, this had become a long running joke for the series itself. But that tradition continues in a rather funny way.

Although The Simpsons was able to air its latest Treehouse of Horror special ahead of Halloween this year, it’s now been announced that Smiling Friends‘ own Halloween episode will be airing in November instead. With the first preview for Smiling Friends‘ next episode (as spotted by @Swimpedia on X), Adult Swim confirmed there will be a surprise week long delay and we won’t get to see the next episode in action until November 2nd instead of on October 26th as fans originally hoped.

When Does Smiling Friends Season 3 Episode 3 Come Out?

Smiling Friends Season 3 Episode 3 is titled “Curse of the Green Halloween Witch,” and will be making its debut with Adult Swim on Sunday, November 2nd at 11:30PM ET. This delay means that the episode previously had perfect timing for the Halloween holiday, but for whatever reason it’s now going to premiere the weekend after instead. As for this change in schedule, Adult Swim did not reveal a reason as to why but it’ll be a bummer for Smiling Friends fans who have been loving the newest season so far. But thankfully, it’s also far from over as there are still many more to come.

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Smiling Friends has been renewed through to Season 5 with Adult Swim in the future, and the creators behind it all have started to think about how they ultimately want it to end. As for when that could happen, series co-creator Michael Cusack told ComicBook, “We want to end on a high. We want to end where we’re not making episodes that are disappointing people…we feel like we’ve outstayed our welcome. And when it comes to other shows, or like when a show has gone on too long, it’s hard to say, because there’s no real exact number, it’s more of a feeling, but it’s when universally, everyone’s like, ‘Alright.’”

What’s Next for Smiling Friends?

Speaking to ComicBook about that potential future, co-creator Zach Hadel echoed Cusack about when would be the right time to end it, “We talk about it, and we both go back and forth all the time. Like, since the pilot, we’ve had the conversation of, ‘If we got a blank check to do as many as we wanted, how many would we do? Would we do five, eight, ten, three? It really is a vibe. Also, if we get to the point where we feel like…’Man, we’re running out of ideas,’ or ‘Oh, we already did that.’ I think that’ll be the time.”

If you wanted to catch up with Smiling Friends‘ episodes thus far, you can now stream them with HBO Max while we wait for the next new episode. What do you think? Leave a comment below and join the conversation now in the ComicBook Forum!