Apple is adapting Nathan Pyle’s webcomic Strange Planet into an animated series. Apple TV+ has handed the project a straight-to-series order.
Illustrator and author Pyle launched the Strange Planet webcomic in 2019, which followed a planet of genderless aliens who want to learn more about the human race. After gaining traction on social media, Pyle published the first Strange Planet book in November 2019. He released the follow-up, Stranger Planet, in 2020.
Started in 2019, Strange Planet follows a group of blue aliens who describe the activities they’re doing in unusual ways. For example, in one strip they say of a cat, “If we gently admire the softness, we don’t experience the sharpness.” The webcomic is immensely popular on Instagram, where more than 6.1 million accounts follow it.
The Strange Planet series is said to tell profound and heartfelt stories about beings on a distant planet not like our own. Steve Levy and Taylor Alexy Pyle serve as executive producers. Apple Studios will produce along with animation studio ShadowMachine, the animation studio behind Netflix’s BoJack Horseman. ShawdowMachine was established in 1999 by Alex Bulkley and Corey Campodonico and has grown into an award-winning production house for film, television, commercials and music videos.
Dan Harmon, Nathan Pyle, and Levari are all executive producers on the project. Pyle has previously contributed designs to Harmon’s NBC comedy Community and has published multiple New York Times bestsellers.
Harmon is best known for creating and executive producing the long-running comedy series Community which ran from 2009 to 2015 and he recently set up Krapopolis as a series with Fox. His adult swim series Rick and Morty, which premiered its fifth season, has proven to be a breakout hit, winning the Emmy for best animated program in 2018 and 2020.
Following Central Park from Bob’s Burgers creator Loren Bouchard, Strange Planet is the second adult animated show Apple has announced. The second season of the musical comedy series Central Park is scheduled to premiere on 25 June.
The comic strip about aliens living human-like lives is ready to become an animated series soon and we cannot wait to watch! Although the series doesn’t have a release date yet, its first season will include 10 episodes.
Be it hosting or producing films, limited series, specials, and multi-season series, Apple TV+ is steadily growing and taking its game one-notch higher with each project.
