Update: Hulu Didn’t Remove One of Its Best Shows at the Worst Possible Time
Fall used to be more obvious—a change in the wind, a turning of the leaves, the inevitable pumpkin spice nonsense. Now those ecological markers are often crooked, and the crisp autumn air may not arrive until school is well underway. But one sure way to evoke fall, in all its rustic, rust-colored pleasures, is to look Over the garden wall.
Once upon a time you could stream Over the garden wall on Max and Hulu. Last year that changed: as of September 1st it was pulled from Max and only available on Hulu. And this year the winds of change became even more grim, with Over the garden wall Creator Patrick McHale shares (in a now-deleted tweet) that Hulu would now also remove the show — a huge blow, as it was the last place you could legally stream the show with just a subscription.
Fortunately, the rock facts came as quickly as the cause for alarm: McHale provided an update on Friday saying that after all that Over the garden wall was not Leaving Hulu.
Who knows why the streaming gods saw fit to move this one? another one platform at exactly the moment we need it most, even temporarily, but it’s a good reason to remind ourselves that we must find a way to welcome autumn in some way, with all its transience, regardless of the weather — or streaming services — or anything else.
You only need to spend a few minutes with Wirt (Elijah Wood) and Greg (Collin Dean) to understand why these two brothers are the perfect companions to kick off the season. Lost in a forest — aka “the unknown” — they encounter one mystery after another, each one more creepy or spooky than the last, as they struggle to find their way home.
Over the garden wall excels at flitting back and forth between a fantastical world and one that looks much more like our own. It doesn’t take long for Wirt and Greg to feel like your own traveling companions, with everyone in awe of the vividly drawn world in their own way (Greg, for one, fits right in). You stumble upon a town where all the people have pumpkin heads and sing a harvest song while dancing around an autumnal maypole. Maybe it’s “some kind of weird cult where they wear vegetable costumes and dance around a big thing,” but who cares! They seem nice enough. But maybe Beatrice (Melanie Lynskey), the talking bird you arrived with, is right, and it’s something much darker and more mystical.
Where other shows feel the need to define the world too quickly, Over the garden wall is, skipping rope with that line as it skips through its Unknown. It’s a charmingly liminal space, and if the audience is willing to surrender to it, they’ll find the unraveling of the mysteries Greg, Wirt, and Beatrice encounter rewarding.
With Wirt’s worries and Greg’s easy joy, Over the garden wall elegantly balances the dual emotions of the changing seasons. Like any claymation Christmas special, it’s a true seasonal programming; Max (and briefly Hulu) should know better than to let it disappear when the cool winds of fall are (hopefully) around the corner. While it lives on elsewhere, no one should have to subscribe to every streaming channel to stay up to date on the fruits of the season, and even then still miss the brightest autumnal tides available, making it no longer legally available to stream anywhere. But, as Over the garden wall teaches us, sometimes it is worth it to endure some hardships to find the sweet reward at the end. So mark your calendars: it is now autumn August. Happy harvest, everyone.
Over the garden wall was once streaming on Max and Hulu. It is now officially only streaming on Hulu, or you can buy it for about $10 on Prime Video.
Update (September 20, 2024, 12:39 p.m. EDT): This post has been updated to reflect that Over the garden wall is now streaming in even fewer places for some godforsaken reason.
Update (September 20, 2024, 3:00 p.m. EDT): This post has been updated to show that Enoch blessed us by returning Over the garden wall to Hulu.