''I'm Poppy'' is a

surreal comedy Surreal humour (also called surreal comedy, absurdist humour, or absurdist comedy) is a form of humour predicated on deliberate violations of causal reasoning, thus producing events and behaviours that are obviously illogical. Portrayals of surre ...

pilot An aircraft pilot or aviator is a person who controls the flight of an aircraft by operating its directional flight controls. Some other aircrew members, such as navigators or flight engineers, are also considered aviators, because they a ...

starring American singer and

YouTube YouTube is a global online video sharing and social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by Google, and is the second most ...

personality

Poppy A poppy is a flowering plant in the subfamily Papaveroideae of the family Papaveraceae. Poppies are herbaceous plants, often grown for their colourful flowers. One species of poppy, ''Papaver somniferum'', is the source of the narcotic drug o ...

. It premiered at the

Sundance Film Festival The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,6 ...

on January 23, 2018, and is available exclusively on

YouTube Premium YouTube Premium (formerly Music Key and YouTube Red) is a subscription service offered by the video platform YouTube. The service provides ad-free access to content across the service, as well as access to premium YouTube Originals programming ...

. At the time, the producer expected further episodes.

Premise

The official

Sundance Institute Sundance Institute is a non-profit organization founded by Robert Redford committed to the growth of independent artists. The institute is driven by its programs that discover and support independent filmmakers, theatre artists and composers fr ...

synopsis for the first episode states, "Join internet sensation Poppy as she enters the real world for the very first time and quickly realizes that fame and fortune come at a price, with secret societies, dangerous fanatics, and a very envious mannequin named Charlotte."

Cast and characters

Main

as herself *

Samm Levine Samuel Franklin Levine (born March 12, 1982) is an American actor, comedian and podcaster. He is known for his portrayal of Neal Schweiber on NBC's ''Freaks and Geeks'' and PFC Hirschberg in the 2009 film ''Inglourious Basterds''. Levine was al ...

as Johnny * Dan Hildebrand as Ivan Kross *

Brad Carter David Bradley Carter (born December 5, 1973) is an American film and television actor, guitarist, painter, sculptor, and photographer, known for playing Charlie Lange in '' True Detective'' and Leland Gruen in ''Sons of Anarchy''. After suffer ...

as Able Abraham * Kofi Boakye as God and Satan * Madison Lawlor as Pop Star

Guests

* Brian Dare as Benton * Paige Annette as Crew Member #1 * Sierra Santana as Crew Member #2 * Dan Fleming as Crew Member #3 * Israel Wright as Cult Member * Irena Murphy as Reporter

Production

Development

On December 4, 2017, director and writer of the series, Titanic Sinclair, officially announced the show on his

Twitter Twitter is an online social media and social networking service owned and operated by American company Twitter, Inc., on which users post and interact with 280-character-long messages known as "tweets". Registered users can post, like, and ...

account for the first time, describing it as "easily the most ambitious and exciting thing I’ve ever been a part of". This was followed by an announcement of the dates it would be airing through during the festival: January 23, 24, and 26. On January 16, 2018, tickets to the show at the festival went on sale to the public. The series premiered on

YouTube Red YouTube Premium (formerly Music Key and YouTube Red) is a subscription service offered by the video platform YouTube. The service provides ad-free access to content across the service, as well as access to premium YouTube Originals programming ...

on January 25, 2018. Poppy has described the series as being "based on real experiences" and that the producers are "just telling what it’s like to be in Hollywood." The future of the series is currently unknown, as Poppy and Sinclair parted ways creatively in late 2019.

Marketing

On January 22, 2018, a trailer for the series was uploaded to

account.

Episodes

Reception

The Hollywood Reporter ''The Hollywood Reporter'' (''THR'') is an American digital and print magazine which focuses on the Hollywood film, television, and entertainment industries. It was founded in 1930 as a daily trade paper, and in 2010 switched to a weekly large ...

'' critic Daniel Fienberg said he found the pilot episode "inspired and distinctive", but couldn't imagine the series "holding up for another episode". ''

The Verge ''The Verge'' is an American technology news website operated by Vox Media, publishing news, feature stories, guidebooks, product reviews, consumer electronics news, and podcasts. The website launched on November 1, 2011, and uses Vox Media' ...

''s Adi Robertson said it didn't have the same hypnotic and ambiguous simplicity that many of the Poppy's videos do and that the episode was not "weird enough". Julia Alexander from ''

Polygon In geometry, a polygon () is a plane figure that is described by a finite number of straight line segments connected to form a closed '' polygonal chain'' (or ''polygonal circuit''). The bounded plane region, the bounding circuit, or the two t ...

'' said it was the proof that YouTube Red could be great, characterizing the series as "enjoyable" and "authentically YouTube".

References

External links

Pilot episode preview
* {{Poppy, state=expanded YouTube Premium original series Poppy (entertainer) Television pilots not picked up as a series