Adult Swim has churned out no shortage of popular animated shows over the years, from Robot Chicken to Rick and Morty. One of the network’s more recent efforts, Smiling Friends, immediately broke out as a cult hit back in 2022 before enjoying popular second and third seasons in 2024 and 2025. In a surprise move, however, the adult animated series is coming to a close far sooner than initially expected.
If you want to know what happened to Smiling Friends, here is everything you need to know before Season 3 puts an abrupt bookend on the show:
When do Smiling Friends Season 3 Episodes 9 and 10 come out?
Season 3 Episode 9 will premiere on Adult Swim at 11 p.m. ET on Sunday, April 12. Season 3 Episode 10 will air immediately after. Both episodes will be available to stream on HBO Max on Monday, April 13, presumably around 3 a.m. ET. The two final episodes are titled Friend-Bot (Version 12589218731809213528796879521) and Charlie’s Uncle Dies and Doesn’t Come Back. They are expected to have runtimes of about 12 minutes each.
That will mark the end of Smiling Friends‘ run at 27 episodes. In total, the show’s runtime will come in at about 5 hours and 20 minutes.
(Warning: Spoilers for Smiling Friends Season 3 ahead.)
Why is Smiling Friends ending?
Adult Swim announced in June 2025 that Smiling Friends was returning for Season 4 and Season 5, before Season 3 had even premiered. Season 3, which originally ran from October 5 to November 30, drew more viewers over its eight episodes than Season 2. However, the show’s creators and lead voice actors, Zach Hadel and Michael Cusack, changed course in February 2026.
Hadel and Cusack posted a six-minute video announcing that the show would air two more episodes to cap off Season 3 before coming to a close. The decision came from their side, rather than Adult Swim’s or from their parent company, Warner Bros. Discovery. Hadel and Cusack admitted to feeling both burnt out and accomplished, electing to end the show before it overstayed its welcome. They decided Season 3 would be a “good place to end it” instead of giving audiences “slop” somewhere down the line. The pair decided not to hand the reins to other showrunners, either, and Adult Swim was supportive of their decision.
While Hadel and Cusack said that they could theoretically return to the show in the future, they did not want to leave fans hanging by classifying it as a long hiatus.
What to expect in Smiling Friends Season 3 Episodes 9 and 10
Based on the brief looks we’ve gotten at the last two episodes, one storyline will center around the in-universe ending of the Smiling Friends company.
The title of Episode 10 references the original Season 1 finale, Charlie Dies and Doesn’t Come Back, before the The Smiling Friends Go to Brazil! special was retroactively tacked on to that season. Charlie died and helped cheer up Satan in that episode, only for God to bring him back to life. We haven’t met Charlie’s uncle during the course of the show, but he could very well come back to life as well – this is a chaotic, animated nonsense world, after all.
Considering these episodes were produced almost entirely before Hadel and Cusack announced that the series was ending, it remains to be seen if we will get definitive endings or heartfelt goodbyes for Charlie, Pim, Allan, Glep and Mr. Boss.
Here is the trailer for the final episodes of Smiling Friends Season 3, which features mostly highlights from previous episodes of the show:
Smiling Friends FAQs
When does Smiling Friends Season 3 come out?
Smiling Friends Season 3 Episode 9 will premiere on at 11 p.m. ET on Sunday, April 12. Season 3 Episode 10 will air immediately after, around 11:15 p.m. ET.
Where can I watch Smiling Friends?
The final two episodes of Smiling Friends Season 3 will air on Adult Swim. They will be available to stream the next day on HBO Max.
Will there be another season of Smiling Friends?
No, Smiling Friends will not come back after Episodes 9 and 10 of Season 3. Adult Swim initially renewed the show for Seasons 4 and 5 in 2025, but creators Zach Hadel and Michael Cusack elected to end the show prematurely.
